Mold

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In our old flat we had a leak that we didn`t know about which had soaked into the walls and carpet, we were both getting sick and didn`t know why, I accidentally noticed the damp carpet one day and found a small forest of mould under the bed. The culprit was the overflow of the bathroom which was the other side of the wall but there was no evidence in the bathroom. I had to remove the plasterboard to over 1m high and it took ages to sort out. As soon as we got rid of the mould we got better in about a week.
we have some quite serious condensation in our current house too.
The most successful thing we have done was to put in a PIV (positive input ventilation).
The principal is that it continually pushes a bit of fresh air from outside into the home. This fresh air dilutes the saturated air preventing the condensation. Effectively the air has more carrying capacity for moisture so it is less likely to condense on surfaces.
Maybe this principal can be applied to your workspace as well.

Ollie
This is something I've been considering, I have the schools gas meter and manifold in my space so have 2 large vents in the wall, one near floor and one near roof, figure I could install a solar powered fan in the lower vent to push air in from outside, just need to get the school permission as it would be picked up on our annual gas safety checks
 
we have some quite serious condensation in our current house too.
The most successful thing we have done was to put in a PIV (positive input ventilation).
Ditto. The Boss and I had asthma all our lives. The loft-based positive pumping wotsit we put in - to our new house - solved catastrophic condensation (and suqsequent mould) inside 24 hours. Even just regular airing can make a big difference. Modern houses, aiming for hermetic closures of doors and windows, encourages condensation, and thus, mould. Older habitations with draughty windows etc, don't have as pronounced a problem. It should also be said, temperature highly influences dew-point too.
 
This is something I've been considering, I have the schools gas meter and manifold in my space so have 2 large vents in the wall, one near floor and one near roof, figure I could install a solar powered fan in the lower vent to push air in from outside, just need to get the school permission as it would be picked up on our annual gas safety checks
Excellentissimus idea.
 
Don't take further risk with bkeaching, drying and carrying on, remove it all and burn it.
Fumigate your maker space and stay out of it for a month, and give it plenty of ventilation and air movement for the month.
Should be time enough for you to get clear of symptoms and detox your lungs and body and for space to clear up and dry out!
 
In our old flat we had a leak that we didn`t know about which had soaked into the walls and carpet, we were both getting sick and didn`t know why, I accidentally noticed the damp carpet one day and found a small forest of mould under the bed. The culprit was the overflow of the bathroom which was the other side of the wall but there was no evidence in the bathroom. I had to remove the plasterboard to over 1m high and it took ages to sort out. As soon as we got rid of the mould we got better in about a week.
We had some quite serious condensation in our current house too.
The most successful thing we have done was to put in a PIV (positive input ventilation).
The principal is that it continually pushes a bit of fresh air from outside into the home. This fresh air dilutes the saturated air preventing the condensation. Effectively the air has more carrying capacity for moisture so it is less likely to condense on surfaces.
Maybe this principal can be applied to your workspace as well.

Ollie
We had black mould keep occurring in our bathroom around the shower. My fault really as I'd put a PIR extractor in and turned it off as the noise drove me crazy. Replaced it with a "silent" (hmmm) humidistat extractor that ramps up speed according to moisture levels, which has been brilliant.
 
from my forensic cript of moisture info.....

client calls me in to recaulk a shower in a vacant appt as thw baseboard around it was flaking off paint, and looked water damaged.
All caulking looked good, tub was levelled properly. - stuck my moisture meter into the baseboard and highest readings were about 3' away from tub. An inquiry to building manager as to what was behind the wall revealed it was the boiler room. Asked him to check it for a leak and gave him approx location. Would you be surprised to learn he found a leak!

Another client whom Iknew quite well asked me to reno his bathroom. The only stipulation was he wanted to keep his retro chrome plated exhaust fan, but it had to come out to be replated, so up to the attic I went...No exterior vent, and here in the CDN prairies, where -20-30C occurs in winter, the moisture condenses on the roofing nails, and produces "attic rain" which comes spring drips down into the insulation and as the summer heat ocurs, the moisture evaporates and gets absorbed by plaster/drywall and affects humidity throught the home. New roof vent installed.

Two instances -one in a row housing complex, ? 15 town houses---the other in a neighbours home...During heavy rains, water dripping down windows, WHY???

Row house, situation had had new exterior application of insulative siding covered by new vinyl siding, new roof housing manager contacted siding company...."not us"---contacted roofing company....again "not us". The called in the inspectors for a BIG meeting to which I was invited. finger pointing big time....

But they had a 32' ladder set up, so up I went. A hunch led me to put a level on the aluminium soffit, which was sloping back towards the walls of the complex. and was attached to existing wall. As well, the roofing co had not installed drip edge under the new roof, so I pointed out that a heavy rain would /could overflow the gutter and run down the wooden facia,flow down, , hit the bottom "j"edge of the aluminium fascia, hence to the soffit, then flow back to the wall behind the new insulative cladding and run down the wall till it hit the protrusion of the windows, and then some of it would flow inside. Why would this occur? Siding company would have had to install another strip of insulative siding and vinyl siding, to raise that soffit another 1/2" over maybe 1200', roofing co would have to have installed 1200' of drip edge Never did hear how that worked out!

Niehbours house, again water running down windows in heavy rainl--- but again no drip edge on their roof. . She had called in a window company, and of course they told her she needed new windows. 30K$. Drew her diagrams explaining why it was occurring, as again her soffits were sloped back towards the house, and held up by a strip that ran behind her stucco.

She also had two other complaints, her front door , which was covered by a substantial roof, also leaked water, and her back door always had a little drift of snow on the floor inside when iwe had blowing snow. I dunno if folks are familiar with ne home construction, but with adjustable latches, the latches are sometimes set so that when painters are painting, thy can still lock the door without the paint sticking to the weather stripping, and then reset to seal when paint is dry, This was never done. Simple fix, no charge

Front door was a bit on an enigma, so I asked her to tell me when it happens.....her reply..."everytime my husband pressure washes the front door"...no amount of weather stripping is designed to resist the 10 or 20klbs of a pressure washer

What happened? she opted for the 30k$ new windows, then they sold the house!

Last boring story.

replaced a whole main floor with new doors, all adjusted properly. Client said he would paint them. Job done .

Two month later I get a phone call ...two of them are binding. I go back and fix them, wondering why, and this time I notice house feels "clamy" but dismiss it ---untilI get another call back about other doors binding. WTF?

The first two doors were a bathroom door in the master bathroom, the second was just across from a 2nd bathroom. A puzzle to be sure,and my suspicion is "humidity", so this time I go there, put a humidly meter in the front hall, and start getting tools. Within 10 minutes, humidty meter is reading 80% and I point that out. check the exhaust in the 2nd bathroom, and clean it. -blades caked with dust, and oft times the dust and humidty act as glue to prevent the flapper valve from opening to exhaust position (oft seen- as a frequent source of "noise complaints", which leads folks not to use them), but it's not really bad and the flapper isn't "glued" shut yet, so I ask him to go down and check to make sure his dryer vent pipes haven't come loose. and he inexplicable to me refuses. after two call backs I push him and he reveals that "it has never been connected". So as he had lived in this house for years, that dryer was pumping out literally liters of water and dust into his house everytime they used it- for years


As he was to do the painting, I had told him, and showed him how to paint the top and bottom of the doors and also explained why, so I checked, and they hadn't,been- on asking why not "nobody ever sees them" was the reply

The door across from the 2nd bath, well on the second recall, it had two clothes drying racks in it this time

In chatting with him, turns out he was recently retired from a job that took his around the world, and he said everytime he came home he felt sick so he retired!

Did his frugality cause this, I cannot be sure, but I bet it contributed!

Thanks for letting me bore you

Morale of the story- simple test instruments like level, moisture meter/ hygrometer can be immense assistance in getting to the root of a problem.
 
So I spent an hour getting the moldy stuff out of the garage and noticed something odd, apart from the dragon eggs that I baked dry in the oven, the mold is only growing on the pva that I painted the ends of logs with, the birch that isn't painted has no visible sign of mold. Plus the dragon eggs have green spots of dusty mold, the pva has white fluffy/hairy mold, looks like 2 different molds. Unfortunately the chlorine tabs I have seem to have gotten damp and do not dissolve as they should so I've tried something that may or may not work, I mixed equal part hand sanitizer gel and methylated spirits in a spray bottle and gave everything a spray before touching/moving anything then doused everything as I tidied up the pile of birch blocks, going to wait a couple of days and see if anything grows back, I also set up one of the C02 monitors that the government sent out to schools during lockdown, once it settled the temp was reading 11degrees, C02 was at 500 which in classrooms would mean an increase in circulation is needed (open a window) so I think I do need to look at installing a fan in one of the gas vents at the back, the humidity was reading 58% so another reason to increase circulation out there.
 

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