Had a leak: Worried about mold

Timmy27

Hey everybody,
I'm a total newb when it comes to house repair. I hope the folks here can advise me.

About 4 months ago, a hose going to my icemaker broke and water leaked from the kitchen to the room downstairs. It was a slow leak and we think we found it about 8 hours after it started. The paint had bubbled and made a 'T' Shaped stain at two drywall joints in the ceiling.

At the time of the leak, I immediately
-stopped the leak
-placed a small house fan in the crawlspace above the damaged drywall
-placed a small house fan in the room blowing on the wet carpet

I also pealed away some of the bubbled paint and put a small hole in the joint tape to allow the pooling water to drain out.

After about 2-3 days everything was dry to the touch and I removed the fans and put the rest of the repair off until now. The paint was stained from white to off white.

Today when I was pealing back the joint tape under the stain, I found that the nails holding the drywall to the joist were rusted and there was some sort of black or grey stain on the tape between the tape and the drywall. Whatever it was, it didn't make it through the joint compound to the paint and when I look from above, i can't see any black stains, only the discoloration from the water.

So what do you guys think? Does it sound like mold?

ponch37300

If it were my house, since you have to do a drywall repair allready i would cut a square section of the drywall out to completely remove the affected area and see what the wood looks like above it. Then patch the hole with a new peice of drywall. That way you can be sure there is no mold and drywall is cheap anyway.

Timmy27

Thanks,
I picked up one of the mold test kits at home depot. I figure I'll give that a quick try to see if what I'm seeing is actually mold. Has anybody every had any success with these?