What do railroad ties smell like? Is it worth building a house from sleepers? How to build a house from sleepers yourself

All travelers are well aware that railway stations and railways have their own, incomparable aroma. Feeling this smell, you can mentally transport yourself to distant countries and foreign cities. But how is this aroma formed? You will find out the answer from the article.

The smell of sleepers

The smell of sleepers, beloved by many people since childhood, is inherent in every station. This aroma attracts many people, evoking pleasant associations and memories in their minds. The smell comes from the cresote that is used to impregnate the sleepers. It is thanks to cresot that sleepers can be protected from corrosion and destruction.

Cresote is extremely toxic. However, you should not be afraid: inhaling it does not lead to addiction and does not affect your health. The substance has a carcinogenic effect only if taken orally. Cresot can only be sold under a special license.

The smell of ozone and pine forest

There is a version that the smell inherent in train stations and the subway is formed due to a combination of ozone, which is released by the contact rail when high voltage, and brake fluid.

There is another version, filled with romance. Many argue that the aroma of sleepers is due to the pine resin they contain. Well, being in a coniferous forest evokes pleasant associations for any person, which also extend to railways.

Ventilation features

Engineers working in the subway believe that the aroma inherent in the subway is due to the peculiarities ventilation system. A significant contribution to the formation of aroma is made by the finishing materials used in the arrangement of stations. In subway conditions, this smell can persist for a very long time.

Whatever the explanation for the specific aroma of the railroad, for many people it causes Nice memories. This smell is associated with adventure, discovery and unforgettable encounters. If you feel like you can literally smell the train station right now, it may be that you haven't traveled in too long and it's time to hit the road!

"We've got our eye on garden plot. And the place is good, and they are asking for an inexpensive price, but it’s confusing that the house is built from sleepers. True, it is plastered outside and inside. Nearby there is an unfinished bathhouse, also made from impregnated sleepers. How dangerous is this impregnation for health and does it erode over time?

Gennady Makhovikov

1. ... at my grandmother's house with sleepers and my great-grandmother had a house with sleepers, my grandfather, on his wife’s side, had a house with sleepers, and there were no problems, no smell, no headaches. In such a house it is cool in summer and warm in winter. And this despite the fact that at my grandmother’s it was simply plastered on the inside, and not decorated with anything on the outside. I built myself a garage with sleepers, and I’m finishing building a bathhouse, and soon I’ll build a house (from the same ones). By the way, sleepers may be different. When I sawed, I discovered that they were saturated by about 5 mm, and the rest was all clean wood, maybe that’s why there was no smell. There were a few soaked through, these will probably give off a smell. Still, the decision is yours.

2. ... no problem, we even had a bathhouse made of sleepers, although the main condition is that the sleeper must be used. Having “laid down” in the ground, it has already released the bulk of the creosote into the ground. A fresh sleeper must be isolated from the outside and internal surfaces. Cover the outside with siding or clapboard; it is better to plaster the inside. There was a case - creosote seeped through the nails onto the face of the plywood with which a beam made of fresh sleeper was sheathed. We got tired of painting it over - after a year it turns black again. I had to cover the beam with impermeable material. And for the first crown, the sleeper is generally an irreplaceable thing, they also impregnated it additionally so that it would stand, there would be no smell under the floor, but it would attract less living creatures...

3. ... oh, I would like such sleepers, I would quickly put them in the fence... But no... I would not build a house, no matter what anyone says.

4. ... I lived in a provincial town in the south of Russia, where there was never any wood. There, 90% of the houses are made from used decommissioned sleepers, lined with brick. The combination of sleepers + brick is considered a very good structure there, there are no odors, it’s warm in winter, cool in summer. The plaster does not crack. I believe that the harm from creosote that has weathered over decades is no more than from dried drying oil...

5. ... in the south of Kazakhstan, many people built houses from sleepers. The main thing is that the sleepers are old, lying in the ground. Of course, no one built new ones. My grandfather built such a house. My father, my aunts and uncles grew up there, and then we, our grandchildren. And no one died because the house was a sleeper. Between the sleepers, in the cracks, they stuffed old rags (they stuffed whatever was available) and covered it with clay. The inside was stuffed with shingles and plastered with clay and straw. Afterwards, for finishing - clay, sand, cement. And there were never any smells! Don't listen to those who say you can't live in such a house - it's a health risk. IN major cities There are many “allergy sufferers” and people who have died from cancer. Neither our family nor our neighbors had anything like this.

6. ... I have the first 3-4 crowns of sleepers. But since the log house was built a very long time ago, and the outside is covered with a “fur coat”, insulation, wind-hydroprotection and siding, the inside is plastered and “plasterboarded” - there is no smell... at all... I don’t really support the sleepers myself, the timber is drier and warmer and It's easier to saw and doesn't cost that much...

7. In my opinion, one should not equate the creosote itself with the room in which the sleepers are neatly and securely hidden. Besides, home is different from home. There are houses made of sleepers, in which the sleepers are insulated somehow (naturally, they are harmful to health), and there are houses with sleepers reliably isolated from the premises. And this is far from the same thing.

1. ... we built a house from used sleepers, laid mesh inside and plastered it, now in some places stains from the composition with which the sleepers were treated appear through the plaster. What to do and how to treat the walls to stop stains from penetrating?...

2. ... my father built it during the perestroika period summer kitchen from a sleeper, 12-14 years have passed already, I don’t remember exactly, but in the summer, when the sun warms up, there is a smell, stains appeared on the inside of the plaster, the outside is covered with tin... Regarding the vapor barrier with film... this is the same mistake as the house itself is made of sleepers, Firstly, the film after filling the mesh becomes a sieve, secondly, it is not a vapor barrier, since it still allows air and moisture to pass through at least a little on its own, and is not durable...

3. ... many houses were built from railway sleepers. I visited one such house and was unpleasantly surprised. As soon as I entered the house, I immediately felt how hard it was to breathe in it. I don’t know about the owners, but I immediately caught the smell of diesel fuel and fuel oil. Despite the fact that the façade of the house was painted in bright colors, he was not pleasing to the eye. But it seems to me that health is more important, and therefore I advise everyone to choose environmentally friendly materials when building a house...

4. ... that’s right, there are entire villages of houses built from sleepers. But they were mostly built from unimpregnated sleepers. There were, of course, unique people who didn’t care about their health, but there were very few of them. In the summer heat, try just standing next to sleepers soaked in creosote and what pours out of trains during the current. for long years. The poor railway workers serving their local area have swollen faces in the evening. Nothing can save you from this “stench”, not bricks, not plaster...

5. ...it is impossible to completely isolate the smell from sleepers. You can only reduce its destructive impact. I saw a comrade who burned his hand with creosote; it looked as if burning tar had been doused on his hand. All I did was carry fresh sleepers in the heat...

6. ... when unloading fresh sleepers impregnated with creosote, you are given the usual overalls, but disposable. Because after 2-3 hours of unloading it all falls apart. I don’t know about leather, but the railway workers say that creosote burns well...

7. ... about 15 years ago, neighbors at their dacha built walls from sleepers on their half of the house. The smell lasted for a very long time, probably ten years. As far as I remember, the sleepers were not new. In the vicinity there is a plant that uses phenol in production. And the house made of sleepers is something very similar to gas chamber.

8. ... I built the house myself, from impregnated used sleepers... Inside, plaster on shingles clay mortar, grouted with alabaster on top. The outside of the house is faced with brick. One might say that the smell of creosote is not felt – I’m used to it, but whoever “strangers” comes in can feel it. I built the house in 1995, at that time I didn’t know about the harmfulness of phenol, and many did it, because there was no money for anything else, but I wanted to live somewhere. Please, someone who is competent, help me, how to be as safe as possible without bringing a bulldozer into the process. I can’t build another house, and living in this house has become completely uncomfortable. There are many doubts, as they say: “the work of a lifetime is down the drain.” He didn’t build a house, but a gas chamber, and how much effort and money was invested. Maybe it's not quite so scary? Please advise, our lives depend on this...

9. ... I know a lot of people who lived in such houses. And they didn’t seem to complain much about their health or the smells in the house. But when you come to visit them, it’s impossible to breathe. They have already sniffed it and don’t feel this “stench”. But they live less than those who live in more environmentally friendly houses. Years of lying on the tracks don't do anything to the creosote. Sleepers remain just as hazardous to health as freshly impregnated ones. Building from sleepers is only for enemies, and even then I would judge such builders for excessive cruelty. Don’t be tempted by the cheapness of sleepers, later your children and grandchildren will curse you for it.

10. ... noticed that the sleepers were soaked through with creosote. Such sleepers begin to rot after 40-50 years, respectively, within approximately this period the creosote evaporates from them. I think that the sleepers were not always and not everywhere impregnated so well, and it is possible that if the impregnated layer is small, the creosote has already evaporated, and the houses from them do not smell. But I still wouldn’t live in such a house; after all, it’s chemicals, and it’s not for nothing that no microorganisms live in sleepers. After all, some diseases from chemistry manifest themselves after decades, or even in subsequent generations. In general, phenol is highly poisonous substance and building a house out of wood with its maintenance is a dubious economy, very dubious. The health of loved ones and children is not worth it in any way.

11. ... has anyone remembered how much spilled from toilets from passing trains onto these sleepers that were used in the construction of the house? After all, all the diseases of the world have been “waiting” for their time on these sleepers for years. In one word: “build from public toilet"cozy apartment" Just “how to get rid of the smell of urine? Can you give me some advice?"...

12. ... I have friends. They built themselves a house from sleepers about 20 years ago. Fortunately, the whole town there is connected to the railway. Husband, wife and son seem to be... My wife died of cancer a year ago, my husband is also on the way..., I don’t know about my son. ...it’s easier, in my opinion, when living in a dorm, put a kilogram of mercury under your bed... and you won’t strain yourself during construction and will “go away” faster...

13. ...I highly recommend that those who are planning to build a house from sleepers go to oncology sites and look at the properties and durability of creosote, its consequences, especially for pulmonary oncology, especially in childhood. Even if you don’t smell it, I again recommend asking around...

“Used” sleepers are a fairly cheap material, so during the decades of general shortage, it was most popular among gardeners. But doctors categorically do not recommend using sleepers impregnated with creosote for housing construction.

The smell is far from the worst thing about this material. Over time, it, of course, weakens, but does not completely disappear. When the doors in an old house are wide open in the summer, you can barely feel it. But as soon as you close the house for at least a week or heat the stove, the “sleeper” spirit appears again. The smell is even stronger in the heat, and no amount of plaster can prevent it. And the construction of a bathhouse from sleepers is not subject to discussion at all: when heated, sleepers will intensively release extremely harmful substances into the air. For this reason, sleepers should not even be used for firewood, since when burned they release many toxic substances.

To assess the degree of danger of housing made from sleepers, we present the answer of ecologists from the website Ecohome.ru to the question: how harmful is the effect of creosote on the human body? This is an excerpt from the reference book “Harmful Substances in Industry” (a reference book for chemists, engineers and doctors. 7th edition, trans. and additional. In three volumes. Volume I. Organic matter. Ed. honorable activities science prof. N.V. Lazareva and Dr. honey. Sciences E. N. Levina. L., “Chemistry”, 1976.):

There is a known case of poisoning of a worker who doused his clothes with creosote oil and did not change them for a long time. Symptoms: headache, weakness, cough, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea. In case of repeated contact with creosote oil (wear the same outerwear) cyanosis, persistent headaches, general weakness, and yellow hair coloring appeared. After 11 months, the symptoms intensified, additionally appearing jaundice, liver tenderness, uneven pupils, trembling fingers, dizziness, sweating; in the blood - Heitz bodies.

Cases of toxic polyencephalitis that developed after treating several poles in a poorly ventilated garage with creosote have been associated with the effects of creosote. Within a few hours, the victim developed diplopia, nystagmus, paralysis of the oculomotor muscles, speech disorder, ataxia and left-sided hemiparesis. Fundus and blood without abnormalities; all symptoms disappeared after 2 weeks and were not observed subsequently (Arieff, Altas).

Skin contact with creosote leads to the appearance pink spots, papules, warty growths, strong pigmentation, increased keratinization of the skin. The disease is especially acute in sunny days. Those working on the impregnation of sleepers with creosote very quickly developed such a severe burn on the face (especially the cheeks and nose), forearms and neck that they were forced to stop work after 0.5-1 hour. In mild cases, pigmentation appeared after 1-3 days, in more severe ones - peeling and prolonged pigmentation. At the same time, 50% of workers experienced photophobia and lacrimation; in a small number of cases - damage to the cornea (with prolonged action - staining).

Hyperkeratoses and warty growths caused by creosote can develop into skin cancer, metastasizing to the lymph glands and distant organs. Apparently it takes a long time for cancer to appear from creosote. However, a painter with 4 years of experience, 4 years after stopping work with creosote, was found to have 5 cancerous tumors on the face, keratinizing papillomas, and pigmentation of the skin of the face and hands (Lenson).

Personal protection. Preventive measures.

To protect the skin and eyes, protective ointments from vegetable oils with titanium oxide, dark safety glasses, face masks (for example, made of papier-mâché). Always wash your face and hands with soap and water or commercial skin cleaners."

Recycling wooden railway sleepers

The problem of recycling railway sleepers is the most acute problem for the transport industry. Currently, the divisions of JSC Russian Railways have accumulated more than 500 thousand tons of wooden sleepers impregnated with antiseptics. Regional industrial waste landfills are mostly overcrowded, and road departments are forced to accumulate used sleepers in places not intended for their storage. Such unauthorized disposal of waste is costly for sleeper owners.

The difficulty of disposing of sleepers is associated with the high toxicity of the antiseptics used (creosote, coal oil, cresol, etc.). Creosote, which is most often used to impregnate sleepers to prevent them from rotting, is a product of coal distillation and contains more than 70% aromatic hydrocarbons (phenols, their esters, cresols, naphthalene, anthracene, etc.).

Direct combustion of sleepers impregnated with coal-tar antiseptics is impossible, since smoke emissions contain up to 3-4% of unburned aromatic hydrocarbons. Cement kilns are most suitable for solving this problem, where the thermochemical process takes place at a higher temperature of up to 1700-1800 °C with increased residence times of destruction products.

For effective use railway sleepers in cement kilns, they are pre-crushed in a HAMMEL 750D/DK crusher. During the grinding process, simultaneous separation occurs metal parts from wood using a magnetic separator. The crushed products are mixed with other types of waste, which help reduce the concentration of aromatic compounds, as well as improve the technological and operational characteristics of the resulting products - additives for cement production, corresponding to TU 5743-001-84050842-09.

Recycling of wooden railway sleepers is environmentally friendly, resource-saving and completely waste-free

Prepared

Magazine " Vacation home Khabarovsk"

Those working on the impregnation of sleepers with creosote can very quickly develop severe burns on the face (especially the cheeks and nose), forearms and neck, so that they are forced to stop work after 0.5-1 hour. In mild cases, pigmentation may appear after 1-3 days, in more severe ones - peeling and prolonged pigmentation. At the same time, 50% of workers may experience: photophobia, lacrimation in a small number of cases - damage to the cornea (with prolonged exposure - staining it). Hyperkeratoses and warty growths caused by creosote can develop into skin cancer, metastasizing to the lymph glands and distant organs. Apparently, for cancer to appear from creosote, prolonged exposure to the body is required. According to recent studies, creosote is considered a potential carcinogen. In this regard, since 2003, the unlicensed use of creosote has been prohibited in EU countries.

How dangerous is a house made of sleepers?

But these measures are not sufficient to eliminate harmful effects creosote per person. Some people object and say that their sleeper houses, when well insulated, do not emit a smell, and that their great-grandmothers, grandmothers and relatives lived happily ever after in such houses.

Part of the answer to this objection lies in the quality and method of impregnation of wooden sleepers. In the production of sleepers, there is surface impregnation (to a depth of up to 5 cm) or through impregnation (under pressure).
So, when building a house from wooden sleepers with surface impregnation and good insulation, the harmful effects of antiseptics are minimized. I would also like to note the fact that many more people who own such “miracle houses” respond extremely negatively.

To be or not to be a house made of wooden railway sleepers?

I wouldn’t build a house, no matter what anyone said. 4. ... I lived in a provincial town in the south of Russia, where there was never any wood. There, 90% of the houses are made from used decommissioned sleepers, lined with brick.

The combination of sleepers + brick is considered a very good structure there, there are no odors, it’s warm in winter, cool in summer. The plaster does not crack. I believe that the harm from creosote that has weathered over decades is no more than from dried drying oil... 5.
... in the south of Kazakhstan, many people built houses from sleepers. The main thing is that the sleepers are old, lying in the ground. Of course, no one built new ones. My grandfather built such a house.

My father, my aunts and uncles grew up there, and then we, our grandchildren. And no one died because the house was a sleeper. Between the sleepers, in the cracks, they stuffed old rags (they stuffed whatever was available) and covered it with clay.

How does creosote affect humans?

Half of the house is plastered and there is no smell. There is some in the second half, but as they say it doesn’t hurt the eyes. Taking apart a house is cool because... If you have the funds, it’s easier to build a new one.

Philosopher Forum Member Philosopher Forum Member Registration: 09/29/08 Messages: 366 Likes: 0 So, at the moment, the entire extension is upholstered on the inside with plasterboard, with foamed polyethylene film previously laid between it and the sleepers. During the process, changes were made to the design, namely, the seams were not sealed polyurethane foam, and putty-vetonite.

I thought it was more reliable, and besides, such seams give the wall a more finished and attractive look. Result: the sleepers were reliably insulated, the smell disappeared.

We bought a house made of sleepers, how to get rid of the creosote smell

Attention

After all, some diseases from chemistry manifest themselves after decades, or even in subsequent generations. In general, phenol is a highly toxic substance and building a house from wood containing it is a questionable economy, very questionable.

House made of sleepers!!!

Should I buy railway sleepers or not? Ultimately, it’s up to you to decide whether it’s worth saving on your health or not. Based on the above, I personally strongly advise against building a house from used wooden sleepers, much less from new ones.
Boo wooden sleepers acceptable to use as building elements for construction utility rooms, where a person spends very little time (households, sheds, etc.). Although the owners of such utility rooms write that even after 30 years of operation, especially in warm weather, the premises have an unpleasant odor both inside and outside. And finally, for those who have a strong desire to build a house from wooden sleepers - choose only new sleepers that are not yet impregnated with toxic antiseptics, especially creosote - such a house will be warm, dry and comfortable to live in.
The difficulty of disposing of sleepers is associated with the high toxicity of the antiseptics used (creosote, coal oil, cresol, etc.). Creosote, which is most often used to impregnate sleepers to prevent them from rotting, is a product of coal distillation and contains more than 70% aromatic hydrocarbons (phenols, their esters, cresols, naphthalene, anthracene, etc.). Direct combustion of sleepers impregnated with coal-tar antiseptics is impossible, since smoke emissions contain up to 3-4% of unburned aromatic hydrocarbons.

Cement kilns are most suitable for solving this problem, where the thermochemical process takes place at a higher temperature of up to 1700-1800 °C with increased residence times of destruction products. To ensure efficient use of railway sleepers in cement kilns, they are pre-crushed in a HAMMEL 750D/DK crusher.

Construction from sleepers. advantages and disadvantages

After 11 months, the symptoms intensified, additionally appearing jaundice, liver tenderness, uneven pupils, trembling fingers, dizziness, sweating; in the blood - Heitz bodies. Cases of toxic polyencephalitis that developed after treating several poles in a poorly ventilated garage with creosote have been associated with the effects of creosote.

Info

Within a few hours, the victim developed diplopia, nystagmus, paralysis of the oculomotor muscles, speech disorder, ataxia and left-sided hemiparesis. Fundus and blood without abnormalities; all symptoms disappeared after 2 weeks and were not observed subsequently (Arieff, Altas).

Skin contact with creosote leads to the appearance of pink spots, papules, warty growths, strong pigmentation, and increased keratinization of the skin. The disease is especially acute on sunny days.

We built a house from used sleepers - the smell of creosote comes from the underground: what should we do?

And this is far from the same thing. CONS 1. ... we built a house from used sleepers, laid mesh inside and plastered it, now in some places stains appear through the plaster from the composition with which the sleepers were treated. What to do and how to treat the walls to stop the penetration of stains?... 2. ... during the period of perestroika, my father built a summer kitchen from sleepers, 12-14 years have passed, I don’t remember exactly, but in the summer, when the sun warms up, there is a smell from the inside stains have appeared on the plaster, the outside is covered with tin... Regarding the vapor barrier with film... this is the same mistake as the house itself made of sleepers, firstly, after filling the mesh, the film becomes a sieve, Secondly, it is not a vapor barrier, since at least a little, but it allows air and moisture to pass through on its own, and it is not durable... 3. ... many houses were built from railway sleepers.

Houses made from sleepers are harmful to health

We looked at the garden plot. And the place is good, and they are asking for an inexpensive price, but it’s confusing that the house is built from sleepers. True, it is plastered outside and inside. Nearby there is an unfinished bathhouse, also made from impregnated sleepers. How dangerous is this impregnation for health and does it erode over time? Gennady Makhovikov FOR 1. ... my grandmother had a house with sleepers and my great-grandmother had a house with sleepers, my grandfather, on his wife’s side, had a house with sleepers, and there were no problems, no smell, no headaches. In such a house it is cool in summer and warm in winter. And this despite the fact that at my grandmother’s it was simply plastered on the inside, and not decorated with anything on the outside. I built myself a garage with sleepers, and I’m finishing building a bathhouse, and soon I’ll build a house (from the same ones). By the way, sleepers may be different. When I sawed, I discovered that they were saturated by about 5 mm, and the rest was all clean wood, maybe that’s why there was no smell.

Is a house made from sleepers harmful to health?

Often for construction country houses or bathhouses, in order to save money, they prefer to choose available materials. For example, proximity to a railroad may encourage gardeners to build structures from new or used railroad ties.

This option is attractive due to its financial affordability and speed of construction. Is this really profitable option? Let's try to figure it out.

To build or not to build? Pros and cons of building from wooden sleepers The advantages of such construction have been revealed by many years of operation of such houses. Indeed, houses made of wooden sleepers are light, do not rot, are durable, and protect well from low temperatures and rodent infestations, these houses also perform well in earthquake conditions.

In addition, the specific shape of the sleepers makes it easy to assemble houses of simple structures.

Today you can often find a house made of sleepers. Not everyone knows how to remove the smell, which is quite noticeable in such a building. In this article we will discuss this issue and some others regarding sleeper housing.

House made of sleepers

Nowadays, when apartments in multi-storey buildings are expensive, and plots of land are even more expensive, people try in every possible way to save on building materials. Construction own home not an exception. For example, families that live near railroads often build houses from railroad sleepers.

Both new and used sleepers are used for these purposes. Unfortunately, not everyone thinks about the question: is this housing construction option harmful or not, because the material is quite cheap, and the shape of the beams greatly simplifies the process of building a house.

Important! One of the most important questions that should be asked even before building such housing is how to get rid of the smell of sleepers in the house? With this approach, you will greatly simplify your life and quickly be able to arrange your family nest cozy and comfortable.

Advantages and disadvantages of a house made of sleepers

In any case, you need to know all the advantages and disadvantages of such housing, so that later you do not regret the work done, the money and time spent.

High level of heat capacity

IN winter frosts Such a building warms up very quickly and retains heat for a long time. In the summer heat, the inside of the house is always cool and comfortable.

Durability

Sleepers are made primarily from pine or other softwood. Thanks to the even trunk of trees, their processing is greatly simplified.

• Pine is a soft species.
• It is moisture resistant.
• Has a homogeneous structure.
• Doesn't crack.
• Has great strength.
• Not subject to rotting.
• Retains all its properties for a very long time.

All of the listed characteristics of wood are considered an advantage of railway sleepers as a material for building a house.

Antiseptic impregnation

A special composition of creosote, which is used to impregnate sleepers, has a strong antiseptic effect. Thanks to this treatment, the service life of the sleepers is maximized. It is believed that a house built from sleepers and covered with plaster on both sides can survive more than one generation. He is not afraid of fungus, rodents or insects.

What is creosote?

It is a mixture that consists of various phenols and aromatized carbons. It is extracted from wood and coal tar using caustic solutions of alkali and sulfuric acid. Therefore, creosote has a rather specific smell.

The last advantage is also the most significant disadvantage of a house made of sleepers. Since creosote is a strong toxic, carcinogenic substance that can significantly worsen human health. And naturally, it is for this reason that the question will bother you: “a house made of sleepers - how to remove the smell?”

The effect of impregnation on human health or what are the disadvantages of a house made from sleepers?

When staying in a creosote-impregnated room for a long time, a person may experience the following symptoms of deteriorating health:

• Constant headache.
• Development of liver disease.
• Formation and rapid growth of cancer cells.
• Nervous system disorder.
• Breathing problems, asthma.
• Chronic skin diseases, allergies.

Important! Creosote, if it comes into contact with the skin, causes burns. Its vapors, which are formed in warehouses of wooden sleepers during high temperatures, can also cause burns.

In addition to being harmful to human health, impregnated sleepers are highly flammable. Such houses burn down in a fire in 15-20 minutes.

Important! In 2003, after a study of the harm of creosote on human health, in the countries of the European Union this substance was prohibited for use in civil engineering.

You can hear a lot of objections from people that their grandparents used to live in such houses, and everything was in order. Part of the answer to such statements lies in the method of wood processing. When making sleepers, they can be impregnated superficially (to a depth of 5-10 mm) and through the through method (under pressure to the entire depth of the beam).

By using surface-impregnated sleepers to build a house, and ensuring the room has good ventilation, the harmful effects of creosote are minimized. But the minimum is not complete absence. In the heat, you will constantly smell the unpleasant smell of harmful impregnation. Therefore, whether or not to buy sleepers to build your own home is up to you to decide.

How to get rid of the smell of sleepers in the house?

If you have built a house from railroad logs or are planning to do so, then minimize the release of harmful substances and get rid of the smell of railroad ties in the following ways:

• Treat the sleepers with clean cement diluted in water. Its consistency should correspond to thick sour cream. Apply the mixture with a brush, carefully rubbing it into the grooves and crevices.
• Finish the inside of the house using metal or wooden frame drywall.
• Between the frame and sleepers or between the frame and finishing material lay a layer of high-quality vapor barrier, airtight material.
• Cover the internal and external sleeper partitions, ceilings and floors with film. All structures through which leakage of harmful substances is possible must be hermetically sealed.

Important! Polyethylene film fiberglass reinforced or foil-foamed polyethylene are fairly reliable and cheap options construction vapor barrier. Conventional greenhouse film is also suitable for this purpose, but it quickly becomes unusable.

• Eliminate other ways for harmful fumes to enter your home. All joints between door and window blocks must be filled out at least construction foam. Traditional tow will not help much in this case.

Important! The integrity of the vapor barrier should not be violated by sockets, switches and other electrical wiring elements.

• Complete vapor barrier turns the house into an airtight structure. Having completed all the procedures, you will minimize the degree of penetration of unpleasant odors and harmful substances into living rooms, but you will lose important property wooden walls– their “breathing”. To ensure air exchange and remove excess moisture, it is necessary to consider and ensure ventilation of the premises. Rooms should have adjustable openings through which Fresh air: micro ventilation devices, vents, windows. There should be exhaust ducts in bathrooms and kitchens. This way, you will establish a favorable microclimate in the house and be able to get rid of the smell in the house from sleepers.

How to build a house from sleepers yourself?

If, after reading all the information above, you still have not abandoned the construction of housing from sleepers, then the following recommendations will be useful to you during construction work:

1. The construction of each room begins with the foundation. As a rule, sleeper houses are built columnar foundation. But if you are planning to make a basement under the building, then the best option The strip foundation will be poured.
2. Should be covered with waterproofing top part foundation before laying the frame. To do this, you need to coat the concrete with melted bitumen mastic, and lay several pieces of roofing felt on it.
3. Next comes the laying of the first row of sleepers. They lie flat with the wide side. For the bottom row, it is best to choose the heaviest sleepers, for example, wood completely impregnated with creosote. The dressing is carried out with a tenon connection.
4. You need to lay insulation on the first crown. Moss, jute or tow can act as insulation.
5. After this, the second row of sleepers is laid edgewise with the narrow side.
6. Fastening occurs using a dowel method. To do this, holes are drilled for wooden pins that will hold the sleepers at a distance of 60 centimeters from the ends on opposite sides of the log.

Important! Installation of the structure can be carried out without laying insulation. The seams are subsequently sealed with polyurethane foam. Fastening the rows can be done using 200 mm staples and nails.

1. It is worth selecting the same parts for each row. They will depend on geometric parameters and sizes of sleepers.
2. Using a level or plumb line during laying, the vertical direction inside is checked. Irregularities in the external walls are hidden using façade finishing.
3. Corner fastening of wooden sleepers is carried out in the same way brickwork- using a special dressing and staples.
4. Window and door openings in the partitions are vertically filled with 50 mm boards or installed sleepers. The cracks are eliminated using tow or polyurethane foam.

Important! Internal partitions It's better to make it from regular wood. In this case, you will have a warm and dry house made of sleepers.

Sportsman 29-07-2008 17:24

I’m finishing up the garage and started laying the floors. Kind people suggested sleepers for translations. Ok, I found used sleepers for cheap and brought them. In the morning I go into the garage and it stinks. I worked for half an hour - I smelled a strong stink, threw out the most smelly sleeper in my opinion - it became easier. but it still smells like the railway... it is of course romantic, a memory of travel, etc... BUT HARMFUL!!! The question is - what to do? Or will the garage floor smell less? I’m not going to live there, the workshop is also separate - just to build a horse. and the sleepers are ancient, generally dry in appearance... I know that many even made basements out of sleepers - that’s probably where the gas van is...

qwwerty 29-07-2008 17:49

Creosote, it seems. This is impregnation so as not to rot. If you paint them later, they will stink much less.

Oregonian 29-07-2008 17:50

The sleepers are treated with some kind of chemical like creosote... which causes Cancer. Therefore, all the switchmen who were on the railway were transferred. and those who lived in basements with sleepers also disappeared. So decide for yourself

Ann 29-07-2008 17:55

Creosote is truly a carcinogen, and it will stink for a very, very long time.
Either put some kind of insulation on the floor, or redo everything and replace the sleepers with something more normal.

P.S. There were people who even built houses from stolen or used sleepers. Especially in forest-poor areas. And they even lived in them. True, usually not for long.

Serjant 29-07-2008 18:04

throw out all the sleepers.
this is the only way out. Creazote is never erased by anything.

Billy Kid 07/29/2008 19:04quote: Kind people suggested sleepers for translations
Punch these “good people” in the face for such advice.
Genzel 29-07-2008 19:11

Sorry… (((
Throw them away! Your health is yours!
And advise “good people” to sprinkle grain on the roof of their car every morning and that stains on the car from sticky buds from trees are good to remove with brilliant green.

ASDER_K 29-07-2008 19:18

At my father’s dacha, the base of the barn is made of sleepers... the sleepers are old. They were decommissioned 35 - 40 years ago... so they don’t stink even now... not like my father ever stank... they are made from larch boiled in bitumen...

right now - yes, the smelly ones are gone...

Ann 29-07-2008 19:35

There are several sleepers different types... The usual ones are wood in creosote. For southern regions They did impregnation with vitriol, for Central Asia, we don’t have those.
It seems that boiling in bitumen was not used commercially for sleepers. Only telegraph poles did this.

The shed is a fix... But in the garage, if you have plans to stay there for any length of time, it’s better that this doesn’t happen.

crap 29-07-2008 23:04

We also had sleepers at our dacha. 19 years - normal flight, they stank until the floor was laid tightly, about a year. then it didn’t smell like anything. By the way, the sleepers were laid new.

Sportsman 30-07-2008 09:18

What if they are sealed with plastic wrap? and the floors on top?

Oregonian 07/30/2008 09:21quote:
I propose moving the topic to the Memorial. fkbr 07/30/2008 09:26quote:Originally posted by Sportsist:
What if they are sealed with plastic wrap? Can I coat it with bitumen mastic under the film?
Sportsman 07/30/2008 10:33quote:Originally posted by fkbr:
Can I coat it with bitumen mastic under the film?

I mean why?

San Sanych 30-07-2008 12:21

This is to prevent the creosote from evaporating.

A house made of sleepers - three years and the whole family in the cemetery. Statistics, sir...
At the dacha opposite they built a house from sleepers.
What can I say... The first owners are all already THERE, the second ones are half THERE, but they stubbornly say that “The pancake doesn’t rot”

Sportsman 30-07-2008 12:33

they scared me, damn it... I'll have to look for timber

San Sanych 30-07-2008 12:36

No, you can leave the sleepers, but fill them with bitumen to prevent evaporation from the sleepers and plus, if you don’t live in the garage, then it will be fine IMHO

Sportsman 30-07-2008 15:01

threw away. because it's scary. Who thinks about the poles, which are popularly called “telegraph”? (in fact, until recently they carried wired long-distance telephony)

Abar 30-07-2008 16:23

Right! Very poisonous rubbish, in our village the house was made of sleepers, so the whole family there died of cancer... So screw it!

crap 30-07-2008 16:32

Sportsman, are you going to live in a garage? Sleepers are normal for a garage. (although my channels are spliced)
and none of us died at the dacha... although other people live there now...

Sportsman 30-07-2008 16:37

I thought: am I a fool for building in a 100% forested region using stinking sleepers??? I didn’t take the poles either, what the heck. I took 5 round logs 3.5 m, diameter 23-26, paid 500 rubles, although I loaded it myself.

ASDER_K 07/30/2008 16:41quote:Originally posted by Sportsist:

gave 500 rubles,

For all????????!?!?!? and you were still fooling around with the sleepers?????? ASDER_K 07/30/2008 16:47quote:Originally posted by Sportsist:

why, is it expensive?

kopecks Abar 30-07-2008 16:57

Health is more expensive, and your prices are really low...

Sportsman 30-07-2008 17:03

but there’s nothing - I sifted through the lens cap - so everyone unanimously said: go to Moscow! Because of the cap, maybe someone will send a penny? in PM? plz...

crap 07/30/2008 17:15quote:Originally posted by Sportsist:

can someone send it?

I'm changing the lids to logs! Sportsman 30-07-2008 17:35quote:Originally posted by damn:

I'm changing the lids to logs!

On the vine pick up

crap 30-07-2008 17:56

no, off to Mongolia.

PILOT_SVM 07/30/2008 23:17quote:Originally posted by Serjant:
throw out all the sleepers.
this is the only way out. Creazote is never erased by anything.

Everything has already been said about creosote - POISON. Sportsman 07/31/2008 09:18quote:Originally posted by damn:
no, off to Mongolia.

I'm lying around, why doesn't anyone know my city??? By the way, it is closer than Kazan to Moscow - only 750 km. Have you heard of Cheboksary? so it’s 80 km from them to me.

Sportsman 07/31/2008 09:19quote:Originally posted by PILOT_SVM:

If you’ve already thrown them away, then good, but you should also put them away.
Everything has already been said about creosote - POISON.

I sold them to a neighbor at a low price, he really asked... well, in principle, he doesn’t have long to live anyway

crap 07/31/2008 09:38quote:Originally posted by Sportsist:

rolled around...
why doesn't anyone know my city???

I probably got confused, but still far away.
fkbr 07/31/2008 10:01quote:Originally posted by Sportsist:
why doesn't anyone know my city??? no need to generalize.
Genzel 31-07-2008 10:45

Originally posted by Sportsist:

gave 500 rubles,
This is just me, to compare prices and I also sold it for cheap)))

Sportsman 07/31/2008 16:27quote:Originally posted by ASv:

Off-topic, but I actually thought it was in Kazakhstan and was stunned: “Well, people are not lazy interior doors bring from Kazakhstan?"

Where does the forest come from in Kazakhstan??? and we have a lot of doors, yes. including iron ones - I know for sure in Moscow they sell doors and locks.

SergeyVS 31-07-2008 20:56

DIZZI 07/31/2008 21:37quote:Originally posted by SergeyVS:

And if they are used as a base for a bath with vents. A sleeper, then a log, then a bathhouse?

Sergey, many people do this.

What is the best way to finish a bathhouse made of sleepers so that creosote does not seep through?

I personally didn’t, although the sleepers were free. Let it be better log lies on a stone. Its better modern antiseptic pass the. Rexby 01-08-2008 09:34

Today, waste wooden sleepers are one of the main environmental problems of Russian Railways.
The sleepers are impregnated with an antiseptic containing phenol, hence the harmfulness.
Refers to hazard class 3 for environment- moderately hazardous waste(5 hazard classes in total).
Therefore, they cannot even be placed in landfills (only waste of hazard class 4-5 is allowed to be placed there).
And even more so, sleepers should not be given to the population, but we used to do this, and houses were built from them, although our region is not poor in forests.

Sportsman 01-08-2008 09:51

Abar 01-08-2008 10:54

SergeyVS 07-08-2008 11:12quote:Originally posted by DIZZI:

Sergey, many people do this. I personally didn’t, although the sleepers were free. It’s better to let the log lie on the stone. It is better to go through it with a modern antiseptic.
What
DIZZI 08-08-2008 12:02quote:Originally posted by SergeyVS:

What

I couldn't ask yesterday

The stores are full of all kinds of antiseptics.

Oregonian 08-08-2008 07:17quote: I recommend everyone to stay away from sleepers - within a day, lying in the garage in cool weather stank so much that your head hurt
Well, I finally understood what it is. From communicating with smart people, you yourself become like them. Pavel_A 12-08-2008 11:48

I'm sorry, but I live in a house like this, maybe the sleepers are different???

Oregonian 12-08-2008 17:38quote: I'm sorry, but I live in a house like this, maybe the sleepers are different???
Or maybe I’m living, but not living? sahara 12-08-2008 19:04quote:Originally posted by Sportsist:
I thought: am I a fool for building in a 100% forested region using stinking sleepers???

and people also... stare at them

Pavel_A 13-08-2008 20:50quote:Originally posted by The Oregonian:

Or maybe I’m living, but not living?

We saw what your houses are built from, who the hell knows how they live in this chemistry, if the timber has been buried in the ground for 50 years, they dug it up, and it’s like new, and the electric poles on the streets are saturated with some kind of crap, they stand for 50 years without little boy. so the creazote before the bourgeois impregnation is just son.

Nikifor 20-08-2008 23:08

An acquaintance from Zheldorbatov told how they sold sleepers, new, smelly, for the construction of bathhouses.
and the old ones, weathered, said nothing, go to the baths...

Pavel_A 08/21/2008 09:15quote:Originally posted by Nikifor:

and the old weathered ones, said nothing, go to the baths

they say that after 20 years the creazote evaporates and the sleepers become less harmful. Oregonian 08/21/2008 10:35quote: The electric poles on the streets are saturated with some kind of crap, they stand for 50 years without a guard.
Pasha, we don’t build houses with them. come, I’ll show you what houses are built from Oregonian 08/21/2008 10:36quote: they say that after 20 years the creazote evaporates and the sleepers become less harmful.
They say that you can drink vinegar if you drink a glass of soda first.
—————————————————
try it. Nikifor 21-08-2008 15:42

They drink vinegar in sips, and their health only improves.

next door there is an unfinished dacha. all made from old sleepers. It has been standing for 30 years without windows, ceiling or roof.
Apparently this is one of the reasons

Surgeon2005 21-08-2008 18:42

Sleepers are evil
I speak as a person who worked directly with them, on the tracks.
About the weathering of creasote - well, in 20 years, under the rain or in running water, the creasote will probably wash away. Almost whole .
And what is sold is usually out of the way, worn out. They are also covered with waste, diesel fuel, and other rubbish.

You say it stinks, out of habit, you wear it for a day, and the next day your face and hands look like they’ve been burned.

Petrus 29-08-2008 06:32

And one of my friends built a house from sleepers

Surgeon2005 29-08-2008 13:16

In fact, there are untreated sleepers.
Rare, but also expensive. Or you need to have very successful acquaintances.

Personally, I have never seen this, but I know what happens

Serjant 29-08-2008 13:39

so at any sawmill..

Surgeon2005 29-08-2008 13:47quote:Originally posted by Serjant:
and is it called sawn timber??:
so at any sawmill..

No no no
By the way, sawn timber of this size is also rare, and is usually 6 meters long.

And sleepers are, in general, also timber, but of certain sizes. It’s just that they come out normal from under the saw, they are impregnated later, sometimes even during link assembly. This is where you can have an unsaturated marriage for free.
According to rumors.

Sportsman 29-08-2008 15:32

screw the sleepers!

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Littleone 2009-2012 > Family matters > Country theme > sleeper log house..SOS!!!

View full version: log house made of sleepers..SOS!!!

24.10.2011, 18:51

please advise what to do!
The frame of the house was built by my father in the 90s (when there was no money or materials) from sleepers, now (when a lot of money has been spent on completion and finishing) I don’t know what to do with it because of the smell from the sleepers:008:
It looks like they covered the inside with film, then lined it with clapboard... it still stinks, there is no money to demolish it and build a new one
Maybe there is some solution????????

In addition to the smell, the evaporation of creosote is EXTREMELY HARMFUL for health.

If you don’t demolish it, then at least reduce the emission of VOCs inside the house - shingles, thick plaster, gypsum board.
But even with these measures, most likely the concentration of phenol will be significantly higher than the maximum permissible concentration, especially in summer.

24.10.2011, 19:41

Of course, that’s what worries me... if it were just the smell...

24.10.2011, 20:34

24.10.2011, 21:47

This creosote is 100% demolition.

24.10.2011, 21:48

I don’t want to upset you, but in a good way - demolished. Creosote is not a very useful thing. Sleepers are impregnated with it under pressure, to a decent depth - that is, there is a lot of it there.
Even if you somehow manage to insulate from the inside, the outside on a hot day will still not be very good..

You can only get rid of the smell by completely sealing the walls - both outside and inside. What will this stand for? financial investments and forces, and without a guarantee - one can only guess.

It might be cheaper to demolish it. You still can’t buy health later.

plus! don't risk your health!

This creosote is 100% demolition.

1
everything has already been said above
it's poison! and the first category:ded:
I wouldn’t live in the house for any price... cancer is guaranteed and damage to the cornea, do you need it?
THIS is definitely more expensive:ded:

from Wikipedia:

Creosote (French créosote) is a colorless (sometimes yellowish or yellow-green), flammable, sparingly soluble in water, oily liquid with a strong odor and pungent taste, obtained from wood and coal tar. It is a mixture of phenols, mainly guaiacol and cresols. Soluble in water, alcohol, ether. Poisonous.

Toxic effect
Acts similar to phenols, but has a weaker effect on nervous system; increases skin sensitivity to light. Skin contact with creosote leads to the appearance of pink spots, papules, warty growths, strong pigmentation, and increased keratinization of the skin. The disease is especially acute on sunny days. Those working on the impregnation of sleepers with creosote very quickly developed such a severe burn on the face (especially the cheeks and nose), forearms and neck that they were forced to stop work after 0.5-1 hour. In mild cases, pigmentation appeared after 1-3 days, in more severe ones - peeling and prolonged pigmentation. At the same time, 60% of workers experienced photophobia and lacrimation; in a small number of cases - damage to the cornea (with prolonged action - staining). Hyperkeratoses and warty growths caused by creosote can develop into skin cancer, metastasizing to the lymph glands and distant organs. Apparently it takes a long time for cancer to appear from creosote. According to recent studies, creosote is considered a potential carcinogen. In this regard, since 2003, the unlicensed use of creosote has been prohibited in EU countries.

Marina_it

25.10.2011, 15:57

I agree with the forum members, don’t risk your health (and most importantly, the health of your children!!!) and save money for new house, or sell (although, in my opinion, this will not be very fair to the buyer). In this situation, saving and living in such a house is not only unwise, it is dangerous!

My mother grew up in such a house, my grandmother lived until her death, although she died of cancer. BUT, many families lived in the house (barracks), no particular morbidity or mortality was noticed, some grannies are now 90 and they all live in these barracks. The only thing is that this house didn’t “stink”, I don’t know, maybe everything has weathered over time.:009: The inside of the house was plastered and painted with water-based emulsion.

1
My grandfather also built such a house, before the war. lived there until he was 92, and his grandmother until she was 89. They died of heart problems.

Hallucination

25.10.2011, 16:49

Our neighbors' house in the country house was built from sleepers more than 40 years ago. The owner died a long time ago and I know that it was not from cancer, and he drank a lot. The owner died this year from a heart attack, she was old and recent years 20 she almost always lived in the country.
She tried to sell the house for several years, but without success. Of course, it’s unpleasant to realize, but maybe the devil is not so terrible.

25.10.2011, 16:59

No, of course it’s not all that scary...
There are people who get drunk to the point of bestiality and smoke like locomotives - and yet they die at an advanced age not at all from cirrhosis or lung cancer. But are you sure that you or your children will be just as lucky?
And whatever one may say, the general environmental situation is worse from year to year, general health is not at all like that of grandparents.

But fact is fact. Creosote - very harmful substance and there is such an amount of it in sleepers that there is no need to talk about any “permissible concentrations”. Sleepers are intended to lie on railway tracks, and not to build houses from them...
Getting rid of the smell is very difficult. Young children are in the first risk category.

I’m not a fan of “environmental friendliness”; I don’t go around with banners about the dangers of polystyrene foam, mineral wool and smallpox :)
But a house made of sleepers is only due to complete hopelessness and lack of alternatives.

Hallucination

25.10.2011, 17:11

Marina_it

25.10.2011, 17:26

There is no need to turn the tables on my children and me, remember to yourself. I don’t have such a problem, the author has it and it’s up to her to decide what to do with the house. I would sell it in the cold season, when the smell is minimal.

This is, of course, like last option, but, I repeat, this will not be entirely fair to buyers: fifa:

25.10.2011, 19:15

Yes, well, what are you talking about, sell it in cold weather... the smell is the same in both cold and hot weather...
We’ll be working on options for demolition, but there’s still a huge veranda + 2nd floor... it’s just some kind of disaster, the place is good, that’s why I don’t want to sell,
Maybe someone has come across this - is it possible to disassemble the log house itself and leave the veranda (the same area as a house?)

Arishka_LAV

25.10.2011, 22:44

Don't make up nonsense.

Why not simply plaster both the façade and the inside - after all, the plaster will practically not let in the smell of creosote..... After all, there are such barracks made of sleepers all over Siberia and people live like that.
Or, as an option, there are now technologies for laying foam on external walls it also insulates and seals - but it’s not a fact that all these activities will bring 100% results, and it’s not a cheap task to stretch the mesh and plaster all the walls, and I think there’s another layer. not less than 30 mm.
But it’s not impossible - I don’t remember the ratio of lime, cement and sand - and then 2 good plasterers and a concrete mixer for a couple of days.....
Or, as an option for mastic, moisture insulators - they will not let in 200% odor - but that’s the price...
here you need to sit down and calculate what is more profitable to insulate the sleepers or demolish and build a new house.

Sale - well, my opinion You can’t drown an awl in a bag.

25.10.2011, 23:04

Our house is made of sleepers, nothing smells in it, neither in the heat nor in the cold.
Don't make up nonsense.
How did you isolate it and what did you treat it with?

Arishka_LAV

25.10.2011, 23:50

things smell and smell after the dacha...
and how did you isolate it and what did you treat it with? Well, of course I sympathize...:005:
I know what sleepers smell like (we once sawed up the ones that were lying in the yard)
Maybe your dacha less years and therefore…
Our house is already thirty years old.
We've had it for 8 years and I never remember the smell!
Inside there is plasterboard and wallpaper, double-glazed windows with slopes and trim. There is clapboard on the outside; this year they also put siding on it.

Barbarossa

25.10.2011, 23:53

26.10.2011, 00:24

It's a shame it's harmful...

How to get rid of creosote smell!!!

I love the smell of sleepers. I would buy it :)
oooh, I just melt from this smell. On the subway I sniff the tunnel like a dog: love:
I lived in such a house for 7 years, then it was sold. But the house was built in the late 50s, and is still in excellent condition. There was never a smell while we lived there. No matter what complex finishing the house was not subjected to damage and was sold for decent money at the time.

27.10.2011, 18:10

27.10.2011, 19:46

oh, maybe I should really try plastering, at least it will be enough for a couple of years while we save money
You would know here www.forumhouse.ru (http://www.forumhouse.ru)

28.10.2011, 18:04

thank you very much, I registered

I wrote to you either plaster or fill it with foam for pouring and insulating the facade and it’s cheap (relatively) and cheerful.
Look at new materials - insulating mastics, for example - almost all of them do not allow odors to pass through.
And I wrote - don’t read it, or something - calculate the price first - maybe it will be more profitable to make a new one.

Polyurethane is an infusible thermosetting plastic with a pronounced cellular structure. Only 3% of its volume is occupied hard material, forming a frame of ribs and walls. This crystalline structure gives the material mechanical strength. The remaining 97% of the volume is occupied by cavities and pores filled with fluorochloromethane gas with extremely low thermal conductivity, and the proportion of closed pores reaches 90-95%
Since the deposition itself occurs in liquid state, and foaming the material takes 6-10 seconds, creating strong and durable adhesion to any material - be it metal, concrete, brick or glass. The result is a seamless thermal insulation that does not require any fasteners, capable of bearing the load even from subsequent finishing.
The 21st century is in the yard - this material will definitely kill the smell and solve the heat problem in the house at the same time.
But once again, ECONOMY decides.

29.10.2011, 20:24

Thank you very much, I think it’s still many times cheaper than disassembling 2 -storey building 5 by 4 and build a new one

You're welcome - in fact, I think someone has already done something like this, try looking at the city of masters
There are a lot of professionals there and practically no amateurs.

It’s a pity that it’s harmful.. I love the smell of sleepers. I would buy it :)

I asked around among dacha experts, they all give roughly the same advice as here! You can live, you don’t have to break things! And I also remembered the song from the movie “The roadside grass sleeps, sleeps where the trains rush to the ocean along the rails...” “Your railway house, In my opinion, it gives a lot of ideas on the topic of railways!

and the chimney is insulated with asbestos for sure...
However, many prove that domestic asbestos is safe.

01.11.2011, 23:28

As an option, a mixture of cement and sand is cheap and cheerful - throw it on a metal mesh. and will last a long time and will hold any smell. Just modern materials far from cheap.
What do you think - we have clapboard upholstered inside - should we remove the clapboard or should we plaster over it? (I’m probably asking a stupid question) or rip it off? The smell has probably ingrained itself forever...

My eyes became like those of the cat on your ava))))) HOW can I tell you 100%, I can’t see.
HYPOTHETICALLY: 100% I would remove the paneling further underneath it what????????????? sleepers right away?????
if immediately sleepers then sleepers or - on top with film-forming mastic or at least film - on a stapler...... and then mesh and plaster...... But again, you need to embroider everything, the walls and the ceiling - and the floor, too. you need to insulate the walls 100% i.e.
insulate the joints of the wall and roof. and gender. So that the smell doesn't go anywhere. As an option, you can leave the embroidered sleepers for the winter………. Perhaps they will blow out at least a little bit.
At least the sleepers that have been lying on the street for me personally for about 10 years do not smell at all.
I would start with
1. opened the walls outside and inside in 1 - 2 places
2. determined what condition the sleepers were in
3. calculate the amount of work.
4. I would ventilate the sleepers in winter.
5. Already in the spring I decided to do something or not.

And once again I will repeat the CITY of craftsmen - try asking there - perhaps someone has encountered such a problem.
My garage is on sleepers and there is no smell either. Everything has disappeared a long time ago. It’s strange that the sleepers, which are covered with clapboard and something else, cannot be ventilated - i.e. USE passive methods struggle.

How can you get rid of the unpleasant smell from sleepers?

We bought used wooden sleepers to build a garage. How can you get rid of a specific smell?

I wouldn’t like to upset you too much, but apparently I have to.

The smell of creosote (this is the composition that is used to impregnate sleepers) cannot be removed by anything.

The fact is that the impregnating composition does not lose its properties for more than fifty years.

Sleepers that are laid under the railway bed continue to emit a fetid odor even after 20 years of lying under open air(I just haven’t seen any sleepers that are even older).

You don’t have many options; if you tightly cover the sleepers with some kind of polyethylene-based material, you won’t feel the smell of creosote, but the smell of mold will come (the sleepers will stop “breathing”, or rather the wall made of them).

The second option (by the way, it almost works, although the smell is a little noticeable), fill the shingles inside your garage and add plaster on top of the shingles (namely shingles, not mesh for plaster, and add to the solution a large number of clay mixed with sawdust).

A house made of sleepers - how to remove the smell?

On top you can have sheets of drywall on the frame, naturally.

A friend of mine used this method, they plastered together, there was practically no smell, the room was for work, not residential.

Well, at the end I’ll add even more terrible information, creosote contains phenol, this smell slowly kills a person, phenol causes cancer, creosote is fatal.

A friend in the village, in a shed made of sleepers, all the chickens died, and the raspberry bushes that grew near the shed made of sleepers withered.

There is only one conclusion: it is better to park your car than to build a garage from used sleepers soaked in creosote.

In order to eliminate the smell of creosote, which is what the sleepers are actually treated with, you need to make sure that the surface of the sleeper is covered with something that prevents all this nasty stuff from evaporating.

I once tried to whitewash the sleepers with lime, which was still slaking, but in the first layer I only painted over the sleepers a little, and the second one (to everyone’s surprise) removed the smell a little. So I think that if you try to completely whitewash the sleeper, you might be able to remove most the smell it exudes, although this is hardly possible to do completely.