Today I encountered a wall framed with 2X4s stacked horizontally with 1″ sheathing on the interior and exterior. This house is circa 1930. It is a farmhouse style built in a dense neighborhood with other similar looking houses. Has anyone else seen framing like this? Seems like a huge waste of materials and very time consuming. Thanks, Mark P.S. Weird forum format.
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I was in a house in Eastern Ontario which was built of hardwood boards laid flat, one course aligned to the inside wall surface, the next course aligned to the outside wall surface. Each course was nailed down to the one below. It made a wall about 10" thick from boards about 1" x 6". All this stuff had been sawn by a water driven mill.
I have never been able to think of a harder way to build a house.
Ron,
It seems difficult to me also. Imagine all the nails!
Mark
We always thought that this might be a good way to use up scraps, 2x4's as short as 6" nailed on top of each other at the end of the work day. I never thought that this would be good for anything but a shack.
I was back there today and I did notice a great deal of short scraps. I'm only replacing windows, but I'd love to strip the siding and uncover the framing. There are some walls in the attic which are not finished to the interior side and it gives a few more clues. I guess I'm in denial that they built a 3 story house this way.
Mark
I lived in a town in CO that had always been a mill town - lumbering. A lot of the smaller workers places built about 80 years ago were made of stacked scrap like that.
I grew up in Los angeles. Up in the hiils you would find houses built patially with orange crates.
Before they covered all the farmland with "civilization" there were lots of orange groves.
So some of these houses up in the hills that are so prized are falling off the hill and are partially made from orange crates! When they were built the best houses were on flat ground. Only the cookiest people lived in the hills. Maybe that still holds true.
Many old grain elevators in Manitoba, Canada where I grew up where build this way. They started with 2X10 stacked them up, then 2X8, 2X6 and 2X4 all stacked up.
I worked for as farmer when I was a teenager. My first paying carpentry job. He had taken an Elevator apart and used some of the lumber to build an octagonal grain bin. We stacked up the lumber nailing as we went. Even re-used the nails that he had handicapped guys straighten (He paid the organization to do this). It was a lot of nailing.
Thanks for all the replies. I haven't been able to find a name for this type of construction or any other info.
Piffin, thanks for the heads-up about Breaktime Classic!
Mark