Rutland 12.5 lbs Tub Castable Cement - Mix with Water (Fire Clay) 2200 Degree (5)

This stuff is amazing! The slate firebrick in the back of my fireplace was cracking and crumbling, and after speaking with nearly every employee at Home Depot I left under the impression there was no such thing as "fire mortar", or any kind of cement like material to patch a fireplace with. After calling a guy out for an estimate, he was going to charge me $250 to replace the panel. After making 3 separate appointments with this guy and him never showing up to any of them, I decided to take another stab at finding a patch like material. I stumbled across this at Amazon, and at a fraction of the repair cost from the guy who never shows up, it was worth a try. This worked perfectly! I was able to patch every crack and even the corners of the firebox (where the panels didn't quite meet) and I only used half the bucket! 2 winter seasons and it is still holding strong.

We had to patch a fireplace at a rental property. The fireplace is a steel pre-fab, but has a firebrick insulation in the box, which had cracks in the back. I bought this product because the first line in the description says, "Easily fix large masonry holes or cracks in your indoor or outdoor fireplace, stove, or other heating appliance".My husband was a mason/Certified Masonry Inspector when younger, he knows how to patch masonry. He said that this contains a fluidizer... a very expensive additive, that would self-level on the ground. Well, that's what it does. No matter how thick you mix this, you pack it into a hole, the fluidizer makes it flow into the floor instead of filling cracks or holes in walls.Re-reading the product title, it says 'cement', not 'mortar'. Technically, cement does go on the ground, not walls. But most people don't know that, and the description is that this is a CRACK and HOLE repair. Most masonry cracks are in the wall, not the floor.The product may work well for it's intended purpose, which after mis-use is clearly as a cement to fill in a hole on the floor. But the description is deceptive, and the product will not work for those who bought it to fill cracks and holes, based on the misleading description.I want to return it, but since we used some already to find out the hard way that the description is inaccurate. On the other hand, if you are using it ONLY on horizontal cracks (in the flooring of a fireplace), this may work fine for you.

Let me start off by saying that my rating is coming from someone who has never worked with mortar of any kind. For my application, I'm giving it a 4 out of 5. I bought this after exhaustive research into finding a product that would seal up the gaps between my fireplace facade and the firebox; There was a danger where embers could be sucked up into the framing of the fireplace and catch the chimney on fire. The drywall is visible as well. I had a bottom strip opening, (roughly .125"-.25" x 30") and 2 vertical side gaps running the height of the firebox, about 1.25" x 2" x 24". When mortaring onto a ground surface it's much easier to work with, but if you're trying to patch/fill a gap on a vertical surface, it's more challenging. Take care to add water a little bit at a time, and do the ball test like the instructions on the outside of the box suggest. It's easy to get the mortar too wet. ***If you're going for a vertical application where you're using a thicker layers: make sure it had a good and tough consistency.. if the mortar starts sliding out, it's too wet. There is definitely a sweet spot, where using this mortar on vertical surfaces can be more easily achieved. I suggest using braces, wood, or strong tape to hold vertical gaps you're trying to fill. The color dries to a very light gray. I also suggest gloves, a face mask, goggles, gloves, and a drop cloth, especially if you're working indoors.Photos: 1. Still wet after filling in the bottom gap. 2 & 3. Dried vertical sides and showing a bit of the bottom as well. You can see how much cleaner the work was on the bottom versus the vertical sides. If I was to do this again, I would have waited when realizing some of my mortar mixture was too thin to apply, and I would of had some type of bracing setup to hold in place. But if you find the "sweet spot," you wouldn't need any braces.

Great product. I used it to recement the bricks in my fire place. I had several fires this past winter and only had a couple of cracks where I left the cement too thin. The first photo is what it looked like before I started. The second photo I ground down the old cement. The final photo is the finished product.

Mix the 12.5 tub in at least 2 batches if you are mixing in a bucket. It's hard to mix otherwise. I ended up needing part of a 2nd bucket which I had to order, so my fireplace floor has a rough seam about 3/4 of the way to the front. No big deal as it will be covered in ashes soon. Good to know coverage is a little under represented if I use it on a project which is more visible after completion. So far so good!

Had Chimney Sweep come out and do Chimney Inspection and one of many items they recommend was to seal some small cracks and missing mortar in the brick fireplace. They quoted $150 to do this. Very easy to do, and dry very quickly and then painted with MEECO'S RED DEVIL 405 Spray Paint, Satin Black. Looks great and you can't even tell anything was done!

Got this to repair some bricks that had came loose on the front of the fireplace just below the firebox. it mixed easy and was very easy to work with. Another thing I like is it only requires some basic prep work before applying. It did not require heat to harden and was hard and set the next day. The color closely matched the mortar of the surrounding brick which was one factor I was looking for. I will but more as needed for other repair jobs as they come up around my home.

Used it to line my blacksmithing propane forge. Was great as a product. Easy to mix and spread. Directions were spot on.The only issue I had was the packaging. It arrived leaking from the bucket. Not sure if it was because of transit. Box was filled with powder, but the contents of the bucket were still almost full. Maybe add tape around the lip of the bucket to prevent leakage of contents.