What to do when you have the flu.....

[angler]

Tear out a couple of interior walls.

Load bearing wall between living room and dining room.  Should get flitch plate from the steel place today.  Tearing out most of the upstairs duct work means there will be a mini-split in my future.


Wall between dining and kitchen.  Going to leave left side as a half wall with a two seat cast concrete bar top.  Was going to do a bar height half wall on the right side, but currently thinking I will leave it.


I've always wanted a more open floor plan.....

(obviously Thanksgiving isn't at my house)

[Fresh Pants]

 

  Looks super clean. Plaster+lath? Or was it gyp board?
Good work so far. (of course demo is fun...)

[triangleforge]

Looks like a good project -- be sure to post photos in progress! 

What neighborhood is that? Looks like nice, old construction, not something I remember seeing a lot of in the DC area once you get outside the core city.

Of course, if that is lath & plaster I see peeking out at the corner, you have my condolences. I was working on our 100+ year old house here in AZ, removing a decrepit crown molding from the central room, cursing as sheets of plaster came down in random chunks. I got all excited when I finally hit the spot where the room had been expanded to incorporate the former front porch, calling AM at work to tell her "Honey, I struck drywall!"

[angler]

  Looks super clean. Plaster+lath? Or was it gyp board?
Good work so far. (of course demo is fun...)

My house was built in '47 - right on the cusp of drywall.  So they used this odd 2' wide drywall that is like 3/8" thick and backed with foil.  I've had many of the walls open in this house and it looks like the plaster guy had no idea how to deal with the product (perhaps the industry didn't as a whole) because there is a 1/2"+ of rock plaster on top of the gypsum and then the normal 1/8"-1/4" of finish plaster.  The plaster guys actually drilled 1" holes in the gypsum to get the rock plaster to stick in some places.  It is heavy ass shit.  I took 1700 pounds of plaster to the dump yesterday.  

Oh, and for the record, I hate demo.  I used to like it (when I was younger and full of angst), but I am still blowing white boogers out my nose today and my hands are all cut up.  I think we spent 5 hours pulling all the plaster down and 4 hours cleaning up.  I believe in completely cleaning up every day when you are remodeling where you live.

[angler]

Looks like a good project -- be sure to post photos in progress! 

What neighborhood is that? Looks like nice, old construction, not something I remember seeing a lot of in the DC area once you get outside the core city.

Of course, if that is lath & plaster I see peeking out at the corner, you have my condolences. I was working on our 100+ year old house here in AZ, removing a decrepit crown molding from the central room, cursing as sheets of plaster came down in random chunks. I got all excited when I finally hit the spot where the room had been expanded to incorporate the former front porch, calling AM at work to tell her "Honey, I struck drywall!"

I will always argue about nice and old.  Don't be fooled when people say "they don't build them like they use to."  They certainly did.  That load bearing wall was probably lucky to bear the weight of the half ton of plaster hanging off of it, let alone the master bedroom and my office upstairs.  Two of the joists have so much bark on them I can't believe it ever passed inspection (perhaps no inspection in '47).  Those are also 2x8 joists, which, IMHO, is WAY under what would be used today.

I'm inside the beltway in Silver Spring.  My entire 'hood is post-war housing for the most part.  I'm real glad it is not plaster and lath.  They did use like 4" of metal lath in the inside and outside corners which makes it really interesting to leave nice edges post demo.  I've pretty much gutted this entire house since I bought it and demo-ing drywall is soooo much easier. 

[Bun-bun]

I will always argue about nice and old.  Don't be fooled when people say "they don't build them like they use to."  They certainly did. / I'm inside the beltway in Silver Spring.  My entire 'hood is post-war housing for the most part. / drywall is soooo much easier. 

I'll happily argue nice and old all day long with you. As a rule, I've found that older dwellings ARE better built than what's being thrown up today. As with any rule, your house may be the exception, but that doesn't negate the rule. I have noted that post WWII housing boom houses are less well built than prewar houses, although they seem to have gotten the hang of it by 1950 or so(area dependent, of course). Once you hit the late '70s, it's all over.
It's not just construction methods, either. Materials were of higher quality back then as well. People were still using old growth, straight grain lumber, a 2x6 was actually 2" by 6", etc.

Oh, and cut the metal corner bead with a grinder and cut off wheel. Makes it easy.

[superjohn]

A lot of the reason the older houses seem better built is that the less well built examples have already fallen down so the only ones left are the well built ones.

I'll be interested to see what happens to al these "boom time" built houses that have gone up in the last few years in 25-50 years time. Especially in the homogenous subdivisions.

Sorry, back on track. Nice job on the remodel. Looks like it'll really open up that room. 

[angler]

I'll happily argue nice and old all day long with you. As a rule, I've found that older dwellings ARE better built than what's being thrown up today. As with any rule, your house may be the exception, but that doesn't negate the rule. I have noted that post WWII housing boom houses are less well built than prewar houses, although they seem to have gotten the hang of it by 1950 or so(area dependent, of course). Once you hit the late '70s, it's all over.
It's not just construction methods, either. Materials were of higher quality back then as well. People were still using old growth, straight grain lumber, a 2x6 was actually 2" by 6", etc.

Oh, and cut the metal corner bead with a grinder and cut off wheel. Makes it easy.

Agreed.  I should have qualified it a bit. I think overall quality was a bit higher, but a cheap house is still a cheap house.  Mine was a cheap house.  A boom time house. However codes were less stringent then - you should see some of the stuff they did in this house.  My favorite is the thickness of the concrete floor in the basement - it is as thin as 1" in places and as thick as 4" in others, very soft in spots, and in one place there was a 200 pound quartz boulder poking to within less than 1" from the surface that I found when I put in my sump pump and new bathroom.  I will also agree on the lumber.  This stuff is rock hard southern yellow pine.  Smells great to cut.  Like you said, it is also full dimension, which makes it difficult to put new wood into old cavities.  I will re-use as much of what you see.  That said, they used a lot of barked up wood (would not fly today) and the underlayment is garbage wood.  

I hadn't thought about using an angle grinder.  Doesn't that get real dusty real fast?  Usually I can get the weight of the plaster to start breaking the metal lathe and then I use a beat up pair of tin snips to help it down.  

I just came back from the steel place.  I've got to do some of my real paying work today and start baking pies.  Friday we will build the temp walls, cut out the old and put in the beam.  Hopefully by Saturday we will be buttoning it back up.

[Fresh Pants]

Like actual baking pies? 

[angler]

Like actual baking pies? 

That might be a bit confusing.  I don't bake pies for a living, but I need to make 2 apple and 2 pumpkin pies for T-day, after I bill my clients for some work and finish up a proposal.  From scratch.  Butter is currently chilling.

[Fresh Pants]

That might be a bit confusing.  I don't bake pies for a living, but I need to make 2 apple and 2 pumpkin pies for T-day, after I bill my clients for some work and finish up a proposal.  From scratch.  Butter is currently chilling.

 

Would be funny if you did bake pies for a living though...
 

[angler]

Would be funny if you did bake pies for a living though...
 

I figure in a different life I would have been a pastry chef.  I love to bake.  The hours suck though. Most pastry chefs I know get started very early in the AM.

[sbrguy]

well castles, that is when they really knew how to build a place..   think you could do any remodeling in those thing? ha, not without and invasion

[CapnCrunch]

I usually shit and vomit
















a lot

[angler]

Update.  Wanted to get it all buttoned back up yesterday, but I lost my assistant to grading exams.

Support walls and beam in place


Support walls out, beam in place, wiring done, etc.


With dog.....