Blew $60 on a premix mortar that was total garbage last Saturday

Honestly, I grabbed a few bags of a brand I never tried before because it was on sale. Mixed it up on site and it turned crumbly and wouldn't hold a brick for nothing. I lost half a day trying to make it work and ended up pitching the rest. Has anyone else had bad luck with random cheap mortar mixes?

2 comments

2 Comments

wright.taylor23d ago

My cousin used that same sale brand last week and it went bad on him too. I've been sticking with the same brand for 6 years now and never had a crumble issue, even in weird weather. Maybe the store let the pallets sit outside in the rain or something, because that sounds like moisture got into the bags before you ever opened them. I'd say it's probably more about how they stored it than the brand itself being junk... cheap mortar can work fine if it's kept dry.

keithharris23d ago

Yeah that bit about pallets sitting outside rings true. I worked at a lumber yard back in high school and we'd have cement and mortar pallets just sitting on the gravel lot for weeks sometimes. The bottom bags would soak up moisture from the ground even if they looked dry on top. So it could be that store got a bad batch from the supplier that way, not the brand itself being junk.