Penetrating Damp Treatment
Penetrating damp is the damp that moves with the weather. It darkens while it is raining, it fades in a dry week, and it lives on the walls facing the wind. That pattern tells you where the fix has to go, and it is not inside.
Request a Quote
Tell us what the water is doing. We come out free, find where it is getting in, and quote in writing.
A deposit secures your booking and materials, with the balance due on completion.
Our Process
This gets fixed from the outside. We establish which elevation is taking the driven rain, and what is letting it through, before anything is applied.
- 1Free site inspection.
Which elevation, what the exterior surface is doing, and what is above the damp.
- 2An honest finding.
Penetrating damp, condensation, a gutter fault, or something else, said plainly.
- 3Treatment on the outside.
Cracks and entry points sealed, defective details corrected, then a weatherproofing treatment appropriate to that wall.
- 4Internal reinstatement, follow-up and guarantee.
Plaster and paint made good once the wall has dried. Fred phones to confirm it held. Written, minimum 2-year guarantee.
Why Choose TurboMax
We fix penetrating damp from the outside, which is more work than selling you a tin of damp-block paint and is the only version that lasts.
Fred does the inspection himself and will tell you when what you have is condensation, or a gutter, rather than something needing a treatment. That costs us jobs regularly and it is why people come back. He follows up once the wall has dried, before you have to phone him, and if it has not held we return at our cost.
Written, minimum 2-year guarantee, with extended guarantees available on request, and a 10-year service guarantee where the work is maintained by us on an agreed cycle.
What Our Customers Say
Verbatim reviews from Google, alongside photographs of penetrating damp treatment we have actually done. No stock imagery.
Fred is a man of his word. The work they did on our roof was on time and good quality.
Repaired some leaks, redid the waterproofing and sprayed my entire roof with liquid rubber in 2 days at a reasonable price. They also guarantee their work for 2 years.
Run by a hands-on owner who impressed with his honesty and integrity. After the first rains, he contacted me to enquire about the work.
I received an extremely professional and friendly service. I was provided with expert advice throughout the project, which was completed well within time and under budget.
Excellent, professional, well-priced work. And a completely hassle-free process! 6/5. Thanks Fred!
Thank you TurboMax Waterproofing for your service and after service. I can definitely recommend your professional service.
Areas We Serve
Based in Kuils River, covering Greater Cape Town, the northern suburbs, the Helderberg, the Winelands and the Overberg. Each area has its own page for what fails there and why.
Frequently Asked Questions
Straight answers, including the ones that talk us out of a bigger job.
What does penetrating damp treatment cost?
Extent and height drive it, since this is external work and a double-storey elevation needs access equipment. Crack repair, pointing, sill and window perimeter corrections, the weatherproofing treatment itself and internal replastering are quoted as separate lines, because on many of these jobs the repairs are the actual fix.
Can I just paint the inside wall with a damp sealer?
It will hide the stain for a season and make the underlying problem worse. The water is arriving on the outside face, and sealing the inside traps it in the masonry with nowhere to go. Every treatment applied to the dry side of a wet wall eventually pushes off.
The damp is directly under a window. Why there?
Nine times out of ten it is the sill. A sill should have a groove on its underside so water drips clear of the wall. Where that groove is missing, worn or filled with paint, water tracks back underneath the sill and into the wall below it. It is a small and inexpensive correction, and it is very commonly missed.
My damp is on a sheltered wall, not a weather-facing one. Is it still penetrating damp?
Possibly not, and that is worth knowing. Winter rain here comes in on north-westerly fronts, so the north and west elevations take almost all of the driven rain. Damp on a sheltered southern or eastern wall more often turns out to be an overflowing gutter, a broken downpipe or condensation. We check that before proposing a treatment.
There is white powder on the wall and the plaster is crumbling in dry weather. What is that?
Salts. Water moving through the wall carried dissolved minerals and left them at the surface, and they now draw moisture from the air on their own. It is why replastering over a contaminated wall fails. The water source is stopped first, then the affected plaster is removed rather than covered, and the wall reinstated with a system suited to salts.
Related Services
Free inspection, a written quote, and no obligation
Fred will tell you what is actually wrong before there is anything to decide.
Get a Free Quote
Free site inspection, honest diagnosis, written quote.
A deposit secures your booking and materials, with the balance due on completion.