Stacked stone foundation

marine73

Hello everyone. I need to do some repairs to the stacked stone foundation on my house, circa 1838. I believe the correct mortar mix will be a Type N lime based mortar and sand with an additive such as Metastar to speed up the curing process. I will cover the repairs and keep them wet for at least a week, or more but I understand that the curing process for this type of mix is rather long. I'm going to jack the house up slightly to replace a dry rotted bottom "plate", really an 8x6 beam, and I would like to know how long I should wait before I allow the weight of the house to sit on the repaired stone foundation. The repaired areas are corners so the main sections of wall will still be untouched. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

jomama45

Interior or exterior?

marine73

Exterior.

jomama45

I would personally use something with more portland cement, like Type S, rather than an N in this case. It depends on the type of stone as well.

As for setting the house back down & loading the foundation with weight, I wouldn't think more than a few ways seeing as most any masonry foundations can bear far more weight than the lightweight wood structure above.

I have no idea what Metastar is either. I tried to Google it to no avail.