Serious Leaks in Biological Building Necessitate Costly Repairs on Walls

Further investigations into University buildings revealed that difficulties with the bricks similar to those found in the Business School are also causing expensive repairs to the new Biological Institute, completed in the spring of 1932. In the case of the Biological Institute serious leaks were found to have developed in the summer of 1932 causing almost a foot of water to collect on the ground floor of the building. Investigation revealed the cause of the leaks to be improper waterproofing in the brick laying and the mortar between the bricks themselves. Last summer work was pushed to remove all the mortur from between the bricks with air drills and then to replace defective material with a substance of an improved type. The new material is believed to be a mortar mixed with paraffin which is placed in the cracks and then heat applied by coal burners in an effort to melt the wax which, they hope, will then spread around the bricks and form a protective film against the driving of the rains.

The virtual resetting of the bricks which was begun early last summer was completed only last week, most of the work being done by the Maintenance Department at the expense of the University. During the summer the Department is understood to have had 15 masons working at six dollars a day for three months on this and other repair jobs of a similar nature. At this price the sum would come to something over $8000 for the summer's repairs on defective brick laying.

Further faults in the Biological building were revealed when it was found that one of the floors in a room on the ground level had to be relaid three times before it was satisfactory. Each time more water seeped in causing the parquetry to swell and buckle necessitating new flooring. It is believed that the University had to sustain the expense of this unexpected repairing.

The Institute was not built upon "made" land, as was the Business School nor was it completed in a hurried fashion as was necessary in the case of the Business School, in which modern engineering gave way to modern architecture in an effort to construct the plant as quickly and as cheaply as possible. Careful investigation is understood to reveal that the trouble may be laid to possible improper inspection and supervision of the contractors by the University or architectural authorities.