Prefabricated house 1978 Asbestos? Wood preservatives?

Good morning,

I have purchased a prefab house from 1978. Unfortunately, I have no experience with construction in general. Therefore, I wanted to ask if the walls contain asbestos or the known wood preservative. Attached is a photo of the exterior wall of the ground floor.

I have bought a prefabricated house from 1978. Unfortunately, I have no experience with construction in general. That’s why I wanted to ask whether the walls contain asbestos or the well-known wood preservative. Attached is a photo of the exterior wall of the ground floor.

You can safely rule out wood preservatives in both the reinforced concrete slab and the facade panel, but asbestos in the facade panel is possible. In exposed wood (ceiling paneling or the like), wood preservatives were certainly used back then that are now considered problematic. Generally, hazardous substances will have degassed to a residual potential below that of materials used for the same purposes today over 46 years. What still “radiates” today can be clarified by indoor air measurement. Asbestos in the facade only becomes “dangerous” when you drill into it. Maybe someone knows more if you name the manufacturer of the house.

Take a sample, bag it, send it to the TÜV, a few days later you have the result. It cost us about €200 per sample. At least on the phone they are very competent and helpful, and there are also plenty of information sheets that they will gladly send you.

Take a sample, bag it, send it to the TÜV, a few days later you have the result. It cost us about €200 per sample. At least on the phone they were very competent and helpful, and they also have lots of information sheets that they will gladly send you

There are plenty of companies online that cooperate with labs, among others in the Netherlands, that analyze/offer this for €70-80. We have had quite a few samples taken ourselves and were always satisfied with the reports – even the tax office recognized these analyses. Based on the sketch, not even an expert would be able to say anything about the matter. Do you have a building description? For asbestos boards that thickness is quite noticeable. We had 8mm gable boards that were made of asbestos. The facade boards too, but they were plastered over again and then about 3 cm thick. According to your sketch, the outermost layer is supposed to be 8 cm; that would be a lot of asbestos (weight-wise for disposal). Manufacturer of the house? Model?