Addition

[shazapple]

We've been working on the east and north side of the house recently, which involves tearing off all the old siding.

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The front part of the house was really poorly built. A lot of the plywood is rotten or moldy. There's a lot of gaps too, so now we know where the ants are coming from and why it's so cold in that front part!


Of course, the old house had some rot too, but it's forgivable considering it's 3 times older. We dealt with it the same way as we did on the other side by drilling and chipping back a layer in order to install new pressure treated 2x8.

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We buried pipes for our electrical so we are waiting on the power company to run the new wires (you can see the pipes in the picture) Our windows for the front are on order, so the next step is to reframe the walls. Fun!

[Gothichome]

Shazapple. Starting your thread from the beginning and watching the progress. It looked so and is so grand, the addition and the two sides that are finished. Then we go the two unfinished sides, I thought to my self gezzz, there's a lot of work left to do, and I'm ready to be amazed (and inspired once again).

[matchbookhouse]

Shaz, this is going to sound like (and probably is) a stoopid question, but is the wood that is exposed in your picture the sheathing on the original part of your house? I'm asking because my house has none and I always wonder what it looks like on other old houses. Thanks for the info.

[shazapple]

Thanks Gothichome. We are definitely talk of the neighbourhood as each day people drive by and try to spot the progress!

Shaz, this is going to sound like (and probably is) a stoopid question, but is the wood that is exposed in your picture the sheathing on the original part of your house? I'm asking because my house has none and I always wonder what it looks like on other old houses. Thanks for the info.

There used to be a patio door where you see the large piece of plywood. We took it out and are putting in a window to match the rest of the windows on that side of the house.

The old siding you see is nailed directly to the studs, no tar paper or anything else in between. I think this contributed to some of the rot on the rim beam as water would get in around windows/doors and run down the back of the siding and onto the beam. The old siding will essentially act as sheathing for the new insulation and siding.

[shazapple]

We got a little more siding done on the addition porch. There is a bit of frigging to be done around the windows and at the gable end.

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It's hard to see in the photo, but the siding flares out at the bottom of the porch. A lot of older houses have this detail. I'm not sure the exact reason (other than aesthetics) but I like it!

The sill work on the old house is finished, although I still need to repoint the foundation. Progress on that side of the house is stalled until our electrician moves the meter. The next step is to work on the front of the house which will consist of tearing off the old roof and rafters and installing new trusses as well as tearing out the walls and installing wider windows. Lots of work ahead of us

[Don M]

I think the flair you mention was supposed to help shed water away from the foundation. Why do you have to replace the roof & rafters with trusses---rot? You work on the rest of your home looks great!

[shazapple]

I think the flair you mention was supposed to help shed water away from the foundation. Why do you have to replace the roof & rafters with trusses---rot? You work on the rest of your home looks great!

Too low of a pitch (2/12) and extremely undersized (2x4, should be at least 2x6). We have to shovel it off every winter, which is a pain and dangerous. If we didn't do it this winter I'm fairly confident it would have collapsed as the center of the ceiling was bowed and cracked.

The back porch has a sloped ceiling, so the new trusses for the front will have the same. Part is for aesthetics, and part is to make it easier to install (I can remove the old rafter and install the new truss without removing the ceiling joist).

[Don M]

That makes sense, I thought you were planning on working on the main house roof rather than the porch roof!

[mattswabb]

The house is looking real nice. The flair I assume is to deflect the water away a bit.

[shazapple]

We've been working on the front of the house recently. The picture windows had lost their seal and did not fit the style of the house, so we remove them... along with the entire wall.

Here is a before picture. The windows are 5x8. The annoying thing was that the best view always seemed to be in the corner of the room where there was no window!

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During. We essentially had to remove the entire wall and rebuild with a new header and framing. We also replaced the roof trusses.

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After. Sorry for the garbage, it took us an entire day to rejig the wall and install the windows to keep the critters out.

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