Masonry cured, and lintels bear the specified length
Why — act while you have leverage
A lintel with too little bearing transfers load onto the brickwork below it and cracks the wall over the opening — always at the corner of a door or window, where it is most visible and most expensive to make good.
What to look at
- Bearing measured at both ends, not assumed symmetric
- Curing of the wall face, not only of the concrete elements
How to check it yourself
Check the bearing each end of every lintel against the structural drawing before the wall closes over it. Masonry is kept damp for the curing period as concrete is — a wall left to dry in a Kerala February loses mortar strength quietly.
Where this comes from: IS 2212:1991; IS 456:2000 cl. 13.5 for RCC lintels (indian standard or building code)
More masonry and wall checks
- Photograph before this is covered
- Bricks or blocks soaked before laying, and joints filled
- Laterite blocks: soaked properly, and laid with the right mortar
- Burnt clay bricks: water absorption within the standard
- Concrete blocks: cured and aged before they go into a wall
- AAC blocks: thin-bed mortar, and never soaked
- Fly ash bricks: to the standard, and the right mortar for them
- Mortar measured by gauge box, not by shovel
- Sand bulking allowed for before the mix is batched
- Mortar used within its working time, and never re-tempered