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I’m going to be hardiplank-ing my home whenever this freaking snow melts, and I’m in the planning stages. One thing that has me vexed is what to do with my 85 year old window openings. A few of them are paralellogrammed from foundation movement (now fixed). The sides are pretty much plumb but the head and sill are sloping. The worst one is out about 1.5″ over a 46″ span. I have never seen a fix for this that looks good. I’ve only come up with 3 ideas:
1 – split the difference by tapering the window casings to compensate for part of the slop (1×6 casings planned with top molding detail ) and cutting the hardiplank for the rest.
2 – just cutting the hardiplank.
3 – disassembling the 85 year old windows and fixing the opening (sounds like a nightmare)
None of these seems terribly elegant. Any other ideas? I’m firm on keeping the original windows, they’re just too cool, wavy glass, wooden storms & screens and all.
But then again, I’m just
Mike, the idiot DIY guy
Replies
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Does the winter wind whistle through the opening between the jamb and sash or did the sash also become a matching skewed parallelogram with the jambs?
Do the job right. DISASSEMBLE! FIX! REASSEMBLE!
*Right. I can't see new hardiplank put on with windows that far out of level. Gotta do something else first.
*The windows are tight. I've rebuilt them using bronze spring weather-stripping and adjusting the bottom sashes (tops caulked in place) to fit the sills. I am doing it right. Re building them completely involves removal, new jambs and moldings, and all the interior trim and plaster associated with that. The time involved would be immense.Mike
*Mike, if you are adament about not resquaring the jambs, you are going to have to enter the realm of a boogerer.Luckily, you have mentioned some 1x6 boards. By splitting the difference and ripping these into parallelograms, you might be able to disguise a lot of the "problem". It'll never be perfect, but clever ripping will hide a lot. I once had to install hanging cabinets on a soffitt that was out of level by 1 1/2" in about 5' (the details are fuzzy, but I remember it was impossible). Since I didn't have any choice but to hang them I compromised a little here, and a little there. I made a bad situation presentable. The fussy die maker called my the "most compromising man" he had ever met!He thanked me as he paid me.blue
*depending on just how it looks you might try something i did once. i made the outside the 1x6 square and took all the slope on the inside. that let everything on the rest of the house go together right.by playing with the reveal and the casing i got it to look pretty good. not perfect, just pretty good, and i didn't have to dink with the new siding. if you want perfect you know that answer as well as i do.
*Michael, there's a thread going here about trimming off protruding inner jambs.http://webx.taunton.com/WebX?50@@.eed9cc3Maybe you could cut the outside of yours off and just side right over them. That'll give you the rest of the winter to fix them right one at a time. Living in the dark will be an incentive to get it done. It'll be warmer this way too. Come spring you can cut new square openings and redo the outside. Trying to out-booger the Blue, Joe H
*First, I'm a bonehead. That 46" window is out .5" not 1.5". I know guys, I squirm too with the compromises I suggest. It's just that with the age of the house, and the number of weird construction techniques I've uncovered so far, I'm really afraid that when I tear into them it'll be a mess. I guess that I can see more when I do tear off and peek under the sheathing to see what's there. The interior trim is no longer available, and always splits (gotta love that yellow pine), the plaster is brittle, etc. I think I'm just going to have to see when I get there. And blue, boogering is under rated. Sometimes the effort and time needed to do the 'correct' repair is totally out of proportion to the house and it's value. I paid $15k (yes, that is correct) for the place about 1.5 years ago. After about 1 year of full time work on the place, and when the exterior is done in the spring, the most I can expect in my locally depressed housing market is about $45k. High time and high dollar fixes don't make sense if I can 'booger' the problem to the point where it , a - works properly, and b - looks ok. Some things, like the electrical system, accept no compromises, took me a month to get mine right. Some things, compromising is the only sensible solution. Houses are machines. Some are Rolls Royce, Mine is an older Chevy. Thanks (to most) for the input, tho'.Mike
*Michael, ½" in 4 feet? You're good nuff for new constructions specs now. Side it. Joe H
*Yeah, that's different. 1/2", no big deal. 1 1/2", that's practically a dozer job. World of difference in 1".
*Michael, Though 1/2 inch in 4 feet is fairly insignificant, I've been faced with a similar dilemma while working for a picky architect on his old house. My solution was to remove the existing window stop on both the inside and the outside and cut a tapered piece of stop on which the casing could be mounted. Doing this allows you to hide the imperfection behind the rails of the window, while the casing is level in elevation. The only negative to this method is that the casing leg on one side of the opening will have to be removed (or carefully cut in place) and trimmed 1/2 inch.
*Fred, your ideas are about the same as I am thinking. It'll never be perfect, but it can become sorta okay.blue
*Oh shoot Michael.......1/2" ?!!!!That doesn't even qualify as out of square yet....That's not boogerin'...hell thats b perfection!blue
*Rick, that sounds like good boogerin' techniques to me....do you have your Masters in Boogerin' too?blue
*Blue, I,ve done my share of boogerin', though it's not my preferred method. I specialize in restoration but sometimes there is just nothing better than a good booger..... Enjoyed your framing post, though I don't envy you those Michigan winters. I have family in Kalamazoo. All the best. Rick
*Rick, I would not frame in Kalamazoo. They get so much more lake effect snow.I'm watching for another boogerin' project...stay tuned.blue
*Gosh, only a 1/2" in 48"? That is easy to hide, almost standard with some framers I know.Yeah, what you call "boogerin'" is "journeyman knowledge" to my antiquey crowd. Difference between an amateur and an journeyman? The journeyman knows how to hide his mistakes.
*If I ever make one Fred (a mistake), I'll know how to hide it!blue
*Oh...so your the one founding the New Religion! I bow at your feet oh holy one.LOL
*You can arise now O'Follower Fred....blue
*You want to see he holy grail of boogering? Come to Pittsburgh and I'll show you my father's house. Original structure built as three rooms by an illiterate coal miner 100 years ago without a level or tape measure. No foundation for the first 80 years or so on one part of the house. Three additions over the years, one built by another illiterate coal miner with used lumber and nails during the depression. For the first 70 years it had an active spring well in the basement. T&G SYP on the inside walls. It's fixed up as nicely as possible now, but imagine working on a house with the front wall 8" out of plumb and where stud spacing varies from 13" to 20" randomly, and each stud up to 1" out of plumb in random directions. Took him a week of full time work just to hang (not finish) the drywall in a 9'x10' room. He wants me to help him tear off the aluminum siding and the insulbrick under it to hang new vinyl this summer. I'm terrified what we'll find.Picking boogers and fixing up shacks,Mike the idiot DIY guy
*Blue:So Sorry: I just edited my post and find I misspelled a word. It should have been: holey.Mike:That reminds me of a job I worked on as a kid. Nothing was square, plumb or even the right length. Whenever a stud wasn't long enough the answer was: "Ah, just stick a shim in it". If it wasn't flat: "Ah, they'll never notice when the carpet is on". But, when it came time for the hardwood floors...sheer perfection. All in the attitude I guess.
*O.K., how 'bout this for out-of-square window openings?My 1920-ish home has a bay wall with three double-hung windows. The inside sill and bottom trim of each window extends to touch the adjacent one, forming a continuous piece.Extensive termite damage required rebuilding parts of the center and right sections of the wall and window frames. I'm just about ready to do the final installation, but have run into an unexpected problem.The left supporting 2x4's of the center section slope outward, away from the house, from the floor to the header about an inch over a 9-foot vertical rise. The right side, which I replaced, is plumb.So, the problem I face is how to insert a rigid 4'x5' window into a wall built with a twist and still have the sill align with the other two windows, and the edge trim set flush against the wall.Any ideas?
*Blane, you probably have to put the right side back in it's original position, or re-work the left side. Basically, un-plumb the right side.One of the challenges of remodeling is to know when to be stubborn about plumb, level and square, and knowing when parallel is more important. All too often, those that are afflicted with the "perfectionist" disease, can't compromise their vlaues enough to get through a remodeling job as you describe without tearing everything out and starting over. That isn't called remodeling, that is called "building new". Your situation calls for some master boogerin'. If you can get this done, and make it look acceptable, without replacing the entire bay, you'll be well on your way to a masters degree in Boogerin'. After your done, post some pics if you want to get your degree. I can't bestow the degree without proof that you actully can booger properly. After all, I have my (low) standards.blue
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I'm going to be hardiplank-ing my home whenever this freaking snow melts, and I'm in the planning stages. One thing that has me vexed is what to do with my 85 year old window openings. A few of them are paralellogrammed from foundation movement (now fixed). The sides are pretty much plumb but the head and sill are sloping. The worst one is out about 1.5" over a 46" span. I have never seen a fix for this that looks good. I've only come up with 3 ideas:
1 - split the difference by tapering the window casings to compensate for part of the slop (1x6 casings planned with top molding detail ) and cutting the hardiplank for the rest.
2 - just cutting the hardiplank.
3 - disassembling the 85 year old windows and fixing the opening (sounds like a nightmare)
None of these seems terribly elegant. Any other ideas? I'm firm on keeping the original windows, they're just too cool, wavy glass, wooden storms & screens and all.
But then again, I'm just
Mike, the idiot DIY guy