Removing old plaster and window has come loose!

[angliojoe]

Hi,
Really hope someone can help. I was asked to remove the plaster from a second floor wall that had some damp stains so the plasterer could board and replaster (we thought we had fixed the cause of the damp). As i was doing so, some bricks started coming loose beneath the window where the damp was, and the frame and window started moving out of place!
Ive never seen this before as in my old house, the window was screwed into the masonry whereas here, it seems to be screwed into a hollow wooden frame that seems to have been plastered into the wall somehow with what looks like a thin piece of clear plastic wrapped round the ends
Its all super confusing, can anyone help? I am happy to mortar the brick work back in and then attach the window to the brickwork through the wooden frame (and maybe foam the whole thing?
Can anybody tell me whats happening and how to fix?
Thank you,
Joe.

 

[mrrusty]

screwed into a hollow wooden frame that seems to have been plastered into the wall somehow

Sounds like bodger window fitters in the past fitted new windows into the remains of the original box sash windows, leaving the boxes in the reveals. It isn't that bad a job to fix. Take the window out. Brick up below where it is all loose. Get some thermalite concrete blocks (easy to cut with a hand saw) and brick up the old reveals where the old wooden sash boxes were to create a decent and solid opening. Fix the window back into the new blocks. If the wall is a cavity, put some dpc between new blocks and outer brick leaf.

 

[angliojoe]

Thanks mrrusty, Is there any way of keeping the original timber frames and just getting longer screws to go through, into the brick work?

 

[mrrusty]

Is there any way of keeping the original timber frames and just getting longer screws to go through

Difficult to say how it can be re-bodged without being there. If it is the old sash boxes (and that is still a guess) I do think you are going to struggle to make it all secure without taking it out and making good first.