The Historic District

The house we're interested in has steam boiler and radiators. If they're working well, I'd like to leave them. But I'm not the kind of person who can live without air conditioning. What have other's done? Mitsubishi mini-split systems, in our 1927 Sears type house, replaced noisy and expensive to o...

An update after 5 years of use - Our two Mitsubishi split system air conditioning systems continue to function at high efficiency, but the need to clean the rotary blower fans remains an annual event, to insure efficient operation, as I showed earlier on our web page. To date, no one in our area off...

Sashguy makes a good point. On our 1927 house triple-track exterior storm windows were added in the 1960's and the screws used to secure the triple-track frame to the exterior were way too long, going straight through the exterior stop and into the top interior sash and preventing the top windows fr...

1927 standing seam tin roof, now needing another repaint after 4 years and looking for a better coating material, other than a premium white roof paint, that will last quite a bit longer. Has anyone had experience with any of the following? I would appreciate your experience with any of these. 1.)PP...

You may have already seen my web pages on my old windows restoration, but if not they are now located here. I had to move my web pages off of Verizon to another server, as Verizon stopped offering web page hosting for private parties.
-Rod

Thank you for your inputs. The term 'tin' is an old one, of course, and the roof is actually 24 gauge steel standing seam, installed in 1927, over 1x6 oak boards. Fortunately, it is otherwise in very good condition and is one of the last two on our block. There were seven (7) originally, but five (5...

Are there ways to make repairs to the gutter end of a tin roof, without requiring that the whole tin sections be replaced? We have some deterioration of the last 3-4 inches of the roof edge, as it comes out over the rain gutter. Is there a known way to deal with this effectively, that doesn't requir...

I've installed interior thermal windows back in 2002 and they've proven to be an excellent product. I documented the work here, for those who may be interested.
-Rod

Both Rod and Rosemary are Old House Treasures for their wealth of knowledge and their ability to disseminate it. Hail, hail. Each, in your own way, have made a difference in the literature. Bless your blogs. Thank you! I had no idea that my web sites on the subject would become so popular, but I su...

You know, Rod, I have never ever asked that question and it is is a GREAT question!! Gosh, I wish I'd thought of that! Your house is incredible. Just incredible. The work you've done looks FIRST class!! I would love to come out to Purcelville sometime and maybe give a talk and do a survey of the ho...