Not What Normal People Do

We continued working on the Laundry room. I took off all the old siding, and added plywood. I ran out of coil strap (steel straps for shear walls can be bought individually, or in rolls, colloquially referred to as “coil strap.”) So there’s only strap below the window. Need to add some above it.

Once I got it all on, nailed, and cleaned up, we had a kitten inspection. They love this room.

Then I started on the second part: Raising the roof. Because of how this room has been built over the last hundred years (in bits and pieces tacked onto the previous pieces), the roof framing was haphazard. So I added new roof joists. I had to hold the roof up with 2×4’s while I cut the old framing and added in new.

It’s rather tricky figuring out how long to cut them, and what angle all the cuts need to be. When I put them in, because the roof slope was still steeper, they all looked short (above left). Then I put a beam across all of them, and started jacking. Above right you can see a gap forming between the wall and the roof!

Here’s me jacking up the ceiling. Maybe I should have been wearing my hard hat. Above right: When mole saw this gap, she said “this is not what normal people do to their house.” Poor house.

So Mole started working on taking out the old tile and plaster board where the old ‘shower’/toilet was. At first it was really tough going, but then she managed to get most of the wall off in one piece.

We then framed in a new wall to support the lifted up roof. Above right, you can see the gap where the roof has been raised up, and the new wall next to it. This wall is going to be mostly windows. Above left, Mole is looking out of one of the future window openings. I’ve used all the old scraps of plywood I can find to fill them in until the new windows are delivered in about four weeks! In the mean time, it’s looking like there was a fire. 🙁

Here’s Arwen playing in the comforter.

Foundation, Flowers, Travels, Walls!

Quite a bit has happened, both before I went to England and Brooklyn, and after. As usual, I over estimated how much we could do. I wanted to get a new foundation poured, and walls built to support the laundry room before I left. We almost got there…

The old walls around this space had been built in stages. Initially, it was probably open, and just posts supported the floor. Then siding was added. Then concrete. So the siding was buried in concrete, and very rotten. We tore out everything, leaving the laundry room sitting up in the air.

The problem (well, one of them) with being an amateur: Even if I know how to do something, sometimes I forget, because I do it so rarely. When laying out the foundation, I forgot that you are supposed to stretch string out to lay out the sides. That helps get them straight, and is easier than snapping chalk lines. I snapped chalk lines.

As you can see, I’m not doing real foundations, just putting a concrete wall on top of the old concrete slab. It will lift the wood framing up, so that it’s not sitting in water. Hopefully will stop the rot.

We drilled and epoxied threaded rod into the old slab, and made sure they were sticking up high enough so that we can use them to attach the new wall to the concrete.

The formwork took a whole weekend to make.

The next week, in four car trips, I got the concrete, and rented a mixer. Janeen and I poured the new concrete walls in a day. I spent quite a while cleaning up, and trying to smooth and flatten the top.

 

And that’s as far as we got before I took off. I screwed some plywood onto the outside, and hoped for no earthquakes.

When I got to Brooklyn, I pulled out the gifts that Janeen had made: Pocket Bears! She said that Misha and Aja could pick whichever ones they wanted. Misha had a lot of trouble (he wanted them all I think.)

Arwen and Bella glamor shot!

Spring is really here. The flowers are all out in our garden. Janeen took these photos while she was outside with the cats.

Here is Bella inspecting the foundations that have been setting for a week by now.

I forgot to take photos when I was in England (because my phone wasn’t working, I didn’t even think of trying to use the camera. Oh well. I spent a week in Stroud, enjoying beautiful weather, and Mum’s great cooking. 🙂

I stopped back in Brooklyn as I returned, and one day there was a track meet! Managed to snap a photo of Misha running the 800 meters, and Aja running a relay.

Nails! [Mole note: these nails are almost 100 years old! they are hand made. see how they are not round? they have corners! so cool.]

Yes, we’re back at it. And there was a 4.0 earthquake while I was gone. Fortunately, it was quite small, so nothing fell down.

Besides peach blossoms! The Freesia are blooming.

Drilling holes, and then putting the sill plate onto the new concrete. Above right, I’ve painted wood preservative into the drilled holes, and hammered the plate over the threaded rod anchors. It fits!

Janeen is dismantling the ‘Jenga’ that was supporting the laundry room. Above right is one of the pieces of wood that the jack was pushing on. I guess it was pushing quite hard!

Above left, building a new wall. Above right, with pile of wood supports removed!

Above left: I made a mistake measuring for one of the anchor bolts, so the washer and nut will extend into one of the posts in the wall. Janeen used a chisel and notched out the bottom of the post to fit over the square plate washer. Nice!

Above right: The plywood on the far left is a new shear wall. The rest of the panels are temporary. I’ve got some old aluminum windows that I am planning to resize and fit here.

 

 

 

 

Jack!

We did jack this weekend.

It took most of Saturday to get the supports and bracing in place. I added diagonal bracing below, to try to stabilize everything as much as possible. When the back room is cut off the house, the only thing stopping it from toppling over will be these braces. I wore my hard hat so that I didn’t keep hitting my head. Looks more professional, too!

Using a reciprocating saw, I cut all the way round, through the nails that held the laundry room onto the house, completely separating it from the house. We also disconnected piping (well, most of it – see later) and other things that held the floor to the house.

Above left you can see the step (red) between the kitchen and the laundry room.

Once we started jacking, Janeen ran outside and took a photo (above right). You can see a gap under the framing that is going up with the floor, and the wall below.

Above left, there’s about six inches between the floor and the wall below. Above right, this is half way there.

While we were pumping the jack, there were all sorts of creaking noises. Sometimes there was the sound of splitting wood, or sudden cracks. After one noise, I went outside, and found that I’d forgotten to disconnect the sewer pipe from the wall, so it was being lifted up with the room and had separated at a joint. I had to disconnect it, and carefully slide it back down into place (while up on a ladder, leaning on the room sitting on temporary supports – above left).

Above right, you can see light shining through a gap between the house and the laundry room. The whole thing would tilt sideways as we jacked up one side. Then it would tilt back when we jacked the other side. I didn’t realize it would tilt around this much, and am really glad I put in the bracing. It’s quite scary being underneath all this with the jack.

Janeen kept calling it ‘reverse Jenga’. I have one 20-ton jack but have six support points to lift the room at. We put the jack onto one of the supports, and pumped it until it lifted that side about 1 1/2″. Then I slipped a couple of 2×4’s into the gap, and let the pressure off the jack. Then we moved it to the next location. It took all day.

Above right, here’s the gap after getting the floor to the right level.

Above left: Flush! There’s no more step down. Above right, the whole room was moving around while we jacked it up. At one point, I noticed that as I was jacking, the room was moving sideways. A piece of wood had got stuck, and was levering the whole room sideways about 1/4 inch before I stopped. To get it back into place, I screwed a block of wood to the floor joists of the laundry room, and a block to the side of the house. Then I tightened a clamp between the two pieces of wood to pull it over. It worked!

Above left, here’s a nice (scary) pile of wood supporting the laundry room. Above right, at this side of the room, it raised up about a foot, because the floor of the laundry room (in addition to the step), sloped away from the building.

It’s been a funny winter. Actually, I think there was none. It only rained two or three times. And now it’s spring. The daffodil, crocus and iris bulbs that we planted around the tree are popping up. And the peach tree is coming into blossom already. Janeen took a photo of a couple of sprigs we brought in and put into water.

Head Banger

Besides working my tail off on paid work, I’ve been plodding forward on the house, preparing to raise up the floor of the laundry room.

The floor framing in this space was done without much help from engineering. It also did not leave much head room in the space below (I can’t remember how many times I’ve hit my head — probably once a day — working on this.) In place of the two undersized beams that span across, I’m replacing with a slightly deeper beam, but I’m setting the top of it flush with the top of the joists. I have to cut all the joists to get it in. Janeen caught a photo of me after I’d cut a couple of the joists. No going back now.

Janeen spent most of last weekend pulling nails out of old pieces of wood. I’ve got such a pile now, I need to figure out a project to use it all on.

Using some old wood, we made some support contraptions to fit the jack, and support the floor while we jack it up. It was a bit tricky getting them in place: I managed to break two windows simultaneously when the post fell over and smashed them (left). Right now, I’ve got the beam in the middle, and have put load onto the first two support posts. How do I know that they are carrying the weight (see below)?

This is a photo looking at one of the old beams (above left).

Two things: One, there’s now a gap under it, because all the weight is on the new beam. But the second is the troubling thing in earthquake country: When the previous person did this, they just sat the beam on top of loose blocks of wood. That’s fine until the building starts shaking around: Then, the blocks would just slide out, and the whole room would have come down! Speaking of earthquakes, I also added more plywood on the wall upstairs. The wiring for the light switch is just temporary!

Next, I have to get the outside walls supported, and disconnect this room from the building. Then I can start jacking…

happy birthday misha!

bella and arwen wish you a warm and fuzzy happy birthday and ask, “when is uncle misha coming to see us?”

bella would like to sit on your lap some more.

we hope your day is full of loved ones…

…and smiles.

…and not too much work.

we miss you and hope turning 40 is FUN!

lots of love from mathew, janeen, arwen and bella xoxo

brackets

Been so busy lately, that almost nothing has happened on the back stairs. But I am starting to make some fancy brackets out of old redwood…

I took a photo of the brackets on the front of the house, traced them and adjusted the image to fit the dimensions I need on the back deck in CAD. Then I printed out the CAD image.

I pasted the printout onto a piece of wood, and cut it out. Above left, I’m showing off the template to Janeen and Bella.

The wood from the tear off room is now stacked up in the garage. I ran one of the planks from the old sub-floor through the planer to see how it looks. Above right – it’s actually quite nice old oak. Bella likes it. It has some stains from rusting nails that would need to be plugged, but I think I can use it.

Using old pieces of Redwood from the rotten stairs and tear-off room, I’m piecing together new brackets. Above left, clamping and gluing. Above right, after I’ve run it through the band saw. I still need to rout out the sun-ray part, rout in beading, and sand the whole bracket smooth. And I’m making five of these.

The weather has been weird this winter. We’ve had almost no rain. Last week, we went out and bought a bird feeder, and hung it in the lemon tree! We also had an arborist come over and prune the lemon tree.

While the Arborist was here, he planted a new Espalier apple tree where we used to have the Avocado. It’s a funny looking tree right now, because it’s been carefully pruned so that it grows horizontally and flat.

Sad that we tore out the Avo, but hopefully we’ll have nice Fuji apples, and the tree won’t take up the whole garden. We’re also waiting for a pear tree.

 

Mrs Simmons’ Sewing Room

Last weekend my neighbor came over to help again, and we finally got the “tear-off room” (as we called it) torn off.

Above left, with all the roofing and siding removed. I got really covered in dirt, as I had to cut through the roofing from below.

A last look into the tear-off room from the laundry room (left), and the view from up above. It’s strange taking something apart like this. Most contractors pull out a sledge hammer, and smash everything down. It’s done in half a day. Then they have a huge pile of landfill.

I’ve been trying to carefully deconstruct the space so that I can reuse much of the materials. Still, there’s quite a pile: Roofing breaks up, and has come to the end of its useful life anyway; some wood is too rotten or broken or small to salvage; the old aluminum single pane window didn’t slide any more and the catch was broken….

But the result of working like this is that it’s exactly the reverse of building it.

Here’s Nick, my neighbor-assistant, monkeying from the last of the roof joists before he tore them down. Above right, when my neighbor on the other side came out and saw this, he told me a story.

He reminiced how Mr Simmons, who was born in about 1870, built this room. Even though the ceiling in this room was about 5′-10″ high, apparently Mr Simmons was about my height. He built the room as a sewing room for his wife. “Mrs Simmons’ Sewing Room” makes it sound so nice; I can almost forget what a dingy, damp, moldy, cramped, low-ceiling little cell it was.

Above is the view of the back of the laundry room. The two doorways are boarded up right now. I plan to put windows all across this wall, looking out onto the garden. Even though Mrs Simmons’ sewing room was tiny, it really took up a lot of the garden.

Now I have a big pile of wood. Nick started pulling nails. But I still have a huge pile to pull nails out of.

Root Freedom

Over the past month, I’ve had a lot of work, so not much progress on the house. But last weekend the sun was out, and it was just beautiful winter weather to get a bit more done on the stairs. I pulled another “while I’ve got this open, I’ll just…”

The back porch upstairs smells moldy, is drafty, and has no insulation. So I started tearing off the siding, and added plywood. In the photo above left, the last of the old stairs is peeking out. Gone in the above right. And more nice plywood glamor shots.

Now I’ve got the stair framing replaced all the way up. Still need to finish the hand rails, painting, and.. and…

Meanwhile, we built up a rather large pile of rotten wood, and other debris. For months I’ve been trying to put a bit at a time into the garbage can. I finally went out and rented a truck. We piled it full – over a ton of landfill! Now we need to finish tearing off the ‘tear off room’. Above right, partway through pulling off the old siding.

My mum will like this: A couple of weeks ago I had an Arborist over to look at our lemon tree, and the other trees in the back yard. His first suggestion was to tear out the concrete around the tree. He said that putting concrete over roots creates a similar problem to over-watering house plants: The roots can’t get any air and are susceptible to rot.

It took about three hours with a rented jack hammer to take out most of the concrete. The tree looks so much less strangled by the concrete. Now the Arborist is going to come back and do some pruning and put in a couple of Espalier fruit trees. My mum hated all the concrete in the back yard. I agree; now that much of the concrete is gone, I feel like the garden is starting to come back to life.

I think Arwen wants to be a plumber: Here she’s looking out the kitchen window watching the contractors installing a new flue. The old furnace was starting to smell of fumes, so we had to replace it. The new one is about half the size. We didn’t get a super high efficiency furnace, but it’s supposed to be about 50% more efficient than the old one.

I also started to put in the final leg of the stairs. Because it’s cold out now (by our standards), I paint everything in the garage first.

On my way home a couple of days ago, I walked by a garage sale. They had this nice mirror hung off a tree. The cats seem to think it was a good buy.

“I feel pretty
Oh so pretty…”

Newel Post

This was the first time I’ve installed a newel post for a stair. I’d often wondered how a post can be attached at a right angle to a beam, and be sturdy enough to support a hand rail. Well, there’s a trick. It’s not just nailed down.

There’s a threaded steel rod embedded into the end of the post that bolts down to the beam below. It’s all hidden. First I need to drill a hole down the post. I had to get a long drill bit for this, because the rod needs to go about 8 inches into the post.

To get at the end of the rod, and put a nut and washer on it, I need to drill a large hole into the side of the post. It’s so nice having a drill press.

Above left, you can see the rod inside the post, with a washer and nut on it. I painted wood preservative all over the bare wood. After the post was solidly in place, and i was sure it was right,  I made a plug out of the same wood, and glued it in with a waterproof glue.

Above left is a view from underneath the deck at the beam that is under this post. I drilled a hole through the beam for the threaded rod, and pushed the rod through from the top, with the post attached. Then I put a nut and washer on it, and tightened it.

Tada! A post, sticking straight out of the deck, and it’s quite solid. There’s a bit more to it than I showed: To get the post vertical, I had to fiddle a bit with the angle of the cut on the end of the post. Because the deck slopes, if the post was cut perfectly square, it would slope, also. So now I’ve got the framing in for the first two flights of the stair. Just one to go.

Mole’s brother Jason gave me some clamps as a Christmas gift, years ago. They are unusual, because you can tighten them with one hand. I don’t think he realizes how useful they are; I’m using them almost every time I work on the stairs project to hold things in place while I adjust lengths, or fasten the other end. Above left, I’m starting to put in the hand rails.

Above right: Another project – I need to repair the window sash in the garage. This window is so rotten that it just fell apart in place and the glass fell out of it. The previous owners had plumbing pipes running up the outside of the house, and entering above this window. Rain would run down the outside of the pipe, and run into the window. I’ve moved the plumbing, but now the window needs help.

Stairs Phase II

After pounding away at nails on the new plywood for a couple of days, I ran out and bought a new nail gun. My hammering of nails managed to crack the plaster over the kitchen window. Need to fix it again. I don’t understand the mechanics of it, but somehow a nail gun can shoot a whole nail in with less noise, and much less rattling of the wall. One less thing to fix if I’d only known.

Do you think this could be part of a superhero Halloween costume? Of course, the cats need to inspect a new tool: Knitted ball or nailgun – decisions, decisions…

For my birthday (41!) I got a dual fluffy-cat-hug. Then I went and put the water resistant paper (“Super Jumbotex”) on the wall with the new plywood. I layer it staggered by half a sheet, so there’s always at least two sheets thick on the wall. Instead of nailing the siding directly to this, I read it’s better to leave a gap behind the siding. The gap allows any moisture that makes it through the siding to run down the wall and not be trapped between the paper and the siding. I’ve used 1/4″ thick strips of redwood stapled over the Jumbotex paper with stainless steel staples. I’ll use stainless steel screws to screw the siding to the wall through these strips.

After hours of sanding the old siding boards, Mole put a couple of coats of primer on both sides.

I’m not sure if it’s a building code requirement, or just one plumber’s interpretation of it, but there used to be three drain pipes running up here: One for the roof drain, one for the vent for the kitchen sink downstairs, and one of the drain of the kitchen sink upstairs. Seems to me it’s less cluttered to just have one pipe with sufficient diameter for both kitchen sinks, and one for the downspout. So I changed that.

Right now it’s quite far from the wall. There’s going to be a stair landing on the right of the top of the window. When that’s in, it will be easier to work on the siding over the window. I’ll also put a proper wall jack for the plumbing penetration. Caulk really does not seal these penetrations properly.

We’ve started on the second phase of the stairs. Last weekend, with Nick’s help, we tore out half of the upper part of the old stair. Ahh, so open! Now we need to build the new stairs. Above right, you can see that I’ve put most of the old siding back on. On the right of the photo is my neighbor’s fence, which I’m planning to cover (once the stairs are in).

Here’s the view out the kitchen window downstairs. You can see the stringer for the new stair lying on the deck. Above right is Arwen using Bella as a pillow. Since we came back from LA they have been more cuddly together.