Tag: mortar

Basement Front Window and Back Door

March 29, 2016 / / 0 Comments

With the floor in, the first order of business is to close up the basement. I put in most of the new basement windows a few months ago, but we couldn’t put in the door until the slab was in, and we left the front window open so that it could be used as a makeshift door during the work. I installed the buck for the front window first. It was a rare case where I could put the box together first and then put it into place whole, instead of assembling in place. The issue with the front window is the outermost wythe of bricks is a smaller opening than the inner two, leaving a gap to either side of the window.

Buck installed
Window installed
Gap mortared

I got the buck into place and secured it with Tapcon screws. I’ve learned a trick with Tapcons (at least when it comes to brick). I use my rotary hammer to drill the holes using an SDS bit because it’s much faster than my regular drill, but then I circle back with the regular drill and the drill bit that comes with the screws because it does a better job of removing the dust in the holes, so the screws will go all the way in. I’ve actually sheared off screws trying to force them into holes that have brick dust. I also use my cordless drill with a spade bit to drill about a half-inch into the buck so that the head of the screw is counter-sunk, and I use the impact driver to actually put in the screw, so I wind up with four power tools arrayed around me, but it gets the job done.

Footing repair

Footing repair

I rebuilt the bricks around the back doorway when I was working on the side windows, but my masonry skills aren’t so hot and it wasn’t very even. I used the laser level with a vertical line pointing toward the house to cast exactly on the brick that needed to be removed and used an angle grinder with a masonry disc to straighten it out. I did this grinding a few weeks ago before the new floor was poured because the grinder throws a lot of dust that we didn’t want all over our new floor before we’ve stained and sealed it. Once the floor was in I needed to address the footer area below the bricks, because we removed the original stone door sill and the opening was wider at the bottom. I used mortar to fill the gaps at the bottom and let it set up overnight. I used the leftover mortar to fill the gaps on the sides of the front window buck.

Installing the buck
Buck installed
Door installed
Plywood installed

With the doorway (mostly) even, I cut pressured treated 2×6 boards to build a buck for the top and sides, with sill gasket behind the sides. I used a router to cut dados from the side pieces at the height of the top of the door frame, since the doorway is a bit taller than the door. The left side fit great, but the right side had some sizable gaps behind the buck. I thought it would still work and screwed everything in place, but when I went to test fit the door I realized I was off by about a quarter-inch. I took the right side buck back off, and rather than grind the brick I planed the back of the buck so that it contoured to the bricks. This achieved the same effect and I was able to get the door installed.

There was still the matter of the rectangle above the door. Our plan is to cover the buck with PVC trim, and have a light fixture above the door. I needed a solid base to attach an electrical box, but it needed to be flush with the buck so that the trim would look right. I screwed some scrap 2x6s into the either side of the buck, recessed to accommodate the plywood. I used leftover pressure treated ¾” plywood from the first floor windows. With a little bit of adjustment I got it attached and screwed into place.

As usual, I still need to go around and seal with backer rod, caulk and spray foam, and I still need to get the deadbolt installed (once I re-key it). We’re planning to replace the satin nickel handle and deadbolt at some point with oil-rubbed bronze, but that can wait. These locks are ultimately destined for the garage (which we don’t have yet). This summer, once the PVC has dried out, I plan to go around and install PVC trim on the bucks of the windows and doors. For the first time since we bought our house, nothing is boarded up and we have proper windows and doors everywhere.

Side Basement Windows

November 11, 2015 / / 1 Comment
Old basement window

Old basement window

About a month ago I decided it was time to finally put in the side windows in the basement. The first step was to remove the existing windows and the “bucks” or the wooden frames that are attached to the brick basement wall. Unfortunately on the first window I found that the brick around the window was crumbling or straight up missing, and the stone sill was disintegrating. Realizing that I now needed to get the masonry repaired before I could install the window, I checked the others and discovered they were in similar condition, plus the back doorway needed some work as well.

We had the inside of the basement tuckpointed back in January, so I called up the masons and left a message. When I didn’t hear back I sent them an email. Finally I got a call back and set up a time to meet, but they never showed up for the appointment,or called. I contacted another mason but there were some communication difficulties and I went back to looking. I contacted two other masons, both of which came out to look, said they were interested and could do the work in a few weeks, and said they’d get me quotes in a few days. I never got quotes from either one, and with the declining temperatures (masonry should be done above 40°) I didn’t want to wait any longer. I decided just to do it myself.

Original sill
Sill and brick removed
Building up the wall
New sill installed

I took some time off work, picked up new limestone sills, tools, and a bag of mortar, and we already have a giant pile of bricks from taking down the chimney, and set to work. I knocked out the existing sills and took the brick down to a layer that was in good shape, scraping all the old mortar off. I was able to build the new sills up to a slightly higher level to prevent water from coming in off the sidewalk while still leaving enough room for the windows. The brick work was slow. I’m not very experienced, I had to run out in the middle to get another 80lb bag of mortar with my motorcycle, and there was a lot of time spent chiseling bricks into shape to fit. I also used the plastic bag method to squeeze mortar into some of the crevices in the sides of the walls, which worked surprisingly well. I also had to spend a fair amount of time grinding down existing bricks and mortar to get the openings the rights size, especially the back door, as well as one of the windows that had been previously repaired with concrete. The end result wasn’t beautiful, but it’s solid and it’s all getting covered up by the new bucks anyway.

Back door before
Filling gaps
Grinding down one side
Not pretty, but better

I let the mortar set up for a few days before I started on the windows themselves. I framed new pressure treated bucks and put them in with sill gasket and Tapcon screws. Sarah helped me fit the windows and shim them, then I went around and put in backer rod, caulk, and spray foam in all the crevices. I plan to install PVC trim on the exterior at some later date, but we need to figure out what we’re doing about the parging that covers the outside walls, if anything. The side windows are all fixed picture windows so they don’t open, but they let in a lot of light, especially in the case of the back side window that’s been boarded up since we bought the house.

Grinding the edge flat
Buck framed
Installed
Exterior (before caulking)

I still have to tackle the back window, but it’s a bit more complicated because it has courses of bricks above it, unlike the other windows that go up to the underside of the first floor framing. That means I need to put in a steel lintel (three actually, since it’s a three-wythe wall). I plan to tackle that this coming weekend.

Back Yard Cleanup

May 1, 2014 / / 0 Comments

Our back yard has been collecting material from the house. First we excavated the new footings in the basement, which resulted in a large mound of clay. Then, between the chimney removal and removing the brick fire blocking during subfloor install we added a giant pile of bricks and mortar. We removed the mortar from all of the good bricks and stacked them in a neat cube, but the broken and crumbling bits we just piled next to it.

Clay, bricks, mortar (and Derek)

Clay, bricks, mortar (and Derek)

In addition, we had an old raised garden along one side of the yard. It wasn’t the lovely cinder blocks that made us want to get rid of it now so much as the dirt itself: full of shredded plastic bags from rats nests, broken glass, bottle caps, an oil filter, bullet slugs, you-name-it. Sarah wouldn’t plant vegetables in it, so we used separate planters. She was planning to put a shovel-full of dirt into our garbage toters every week, but that was going to take forever. Instead we decided to get another dumpster (#4 if you’re counting).

Our beautiful garden

Our beautiful garden (and Derek)

An added incentive to take out the garden sooner rather than later was that the wooden fence was bent into the neighbors yard because the dirt was piled directly against it. The small suspended fence you see above was screwed to the posts of the larger fence behind it.

Piles cleanup up

Piles cleanup up

In addition to cleaning out all the clay, mortar, and broken bricks I shrink-wrapped the stack of bricks to make it a bit safer for Derek to be around. I don’t want anything to fall on him if he tries to climb on it. We were supposed to get a 10 yard dumpster for heavy debris, which is fairly short. I was hoping to make a simple ramp so that I could dump wheelbarrow-fulls into it. Instead they brought a 15 yard dumpster and said not to fill it up all the way. That meant it was too tall for a ramp and I had to instead carry three or four buckets in the wheelbarrow and then empty them over the side one by one.

Garden removed and fence fixed

Garden removed and fence fixed

The dumpster was delivered midday Thursday. By midday Friday I was exhausted, so Sarah came down and filled the buckets while I carried them out. The work went faster and it was a lot easier than doing all of it (not counting Derek’s assistance). We finished up Saturday morning, though the dumpster was blocked by a car and they wound up not picking it up until Monday. I’m interested to find out how many tons it wound up being.

Dumpster nearing the "two-thirds full" line

Dumpster approaching the “two-thirds” limit

We’re excited to have our back yard opened up a bit. With all the crap we’re doing to the house, the back yard —ugly as it is— is one of our favorite places. We didn’t have much of an outdoor space of our own at our condo. Having room for a table and chairs, a fire pit, a sandbox, and room for some small garden beds and compost bins still feels like a treat. Our other impending cleanup activity is the scrap metal pile in the basement. That won’t entail a dumpster, but like this will be a lot of work. Our house has more tons of material to disgorge before everything’s said and done.

Bay Leveling

February 27, 2014 / / 3 Comments
Removing floor boards

Removing floor boards

The pre-subfloor leveling isn’t quite done yet, and the bay window on the front of the house brought its own set of challenges. For starters, the joist running across the very front of the house (and across the widest part of the bay) is embedded in brick, meaning I couldn’t jack it up the way I did most of the others. There’s also a gap of nearly two feet between that joist and the joist in the center of the bay, which is considerably wider than the 16″ that most of the joists are spaced. Finally, the old floorboards rested directly on top of the brick foundation and extended under the bay walls, whereas in most of the balloon-framed house, it only reaches the edge of the wall.

Level? ish?

Level? ish?

When we rebuilt the bay windows, I noticed the floorboard situation and debated replacing it then, but between doing only one window at a time and the corner studs not being replaced, I decided against it. That meant the first step was to use an oscillating multi tool to cut the floorboards back at the wall edge. Then I glued shims to the top of the existing joists and added some blocking joists to better support the gap between joists.

Shimmed, Reinforced, Re-mortared

Shimmed, Reinforced, Re-mortared

Questions sprang to mind of how to control air and vapor infiltration through the foundation and through the gaps in the wood, and how to insulate the bay properly. We’ll be spray-foaming the cavities in the wall, and on the sides of the house we’ll spray foam the top of the foundation wall to air seal it to the wood, but here that isn’t an option because the brick comes all the way up to the underside of the floor. The exterior rigid insulation doesn’t help either because it doesn’t extend over the brick.

Front shim and spray foam

Front shim and spray foam

I decided to attach an inch-thick shim to the inside edge of the brick wall (on top of sill gasket) that will support the subfloor. In front of the shim, and along the top of the brick on the sides of the bay, we’ll fill with spray foam. I’ll also glue the outside edges of the subfloor to the framing to further seal everything. Hopefully that will be sufficient, since it will be damn difficult to do anything about it with the subfloor in place.

When I initially test fit the shim I realized that the brick was —perhaps unsurprisingly— uneven. In order to properly support the shim I had to mix up some mortar and straighten out the top of the foundation. That meant waiting a couple of days for the mortar to set up, but then I was able to drill some holes into the brick and secure the shim with Tapcon screws.

First piece of OSB

First piece of OSB

I went through a few cans of “big gap” Great Stuff, since the real spray foam won’t be for a bit. Fortunately it’s so cold that it cures slowly, giving me ample time to even it out. I got the first of three pieces of OSB down that go into the bay. I took my time and worked out the dimensions exactly, accounting for all of the unevenness of the studs. There’s still a small gap along the edge of the angle, but I’ll fill that with caulk. The important part is it’s secure, level, and insulated. I’m considering whether I should exchange the one piece of blocking in the center with two, since that would be a more proper 16″ spacing, plus there’s a good chance I’ll wind up putting an electrical outlet in the floor there. One of the reasons to use screws instead of nails is you can change your mind without too much hassle.

Chimney Removal, Part 2

December 2, 2013 / / 2 Comments

All right, back to the chimney. In Part 1 I got up on the roof on a particularly stormy and unseasonably warm day (at least is started that way), took the top of the chimney off, and patched the roof. This was followed up later in the week with removing the portion of the chimney in the attic. A couple Saturdays ago we took out the second floor portion, which has the added wrinkle of us living there. To prevent dust and debris from coating all our stuff, we started by taping up some plastic sheeting.

Plastic walls
Matt looking in

With that in place I started work up in the attic, taking out a few feet of bricks before finally breaking through the plaster. At that point I switched to the second floor and a step ladder. Sarah spent most of the day on brick duty, where I lowered buckets of bricks down using our pulley system and she emptied them into the first floor, though she did try her hand at brick removal. I wound up doing most of it with a pry bar, forgoing the air hammer and the accompanying dust and noise.

Matt removing chimney 2013
Sarah removing chimney
Almost there
I can see light coming through!

We needed to get the whole thing done and patched in a day because it’s gotten cold outside and a giant hole into an uninsulated attic when you’re already relying on electric heaters because you don’t have heat is a really bad idea, mmkay? We finally broke through into the first floor around 7 pm. With that milestone reached it was on to framing and drywalling, which I think we wrapped up around 10. Sarah’s in charge of getting it mudded and painted. So far we’ve got the first coat on. I picked up the flexible paper corner bead and we like it better than the metal corners.

Giant hole (that’s plaster, not more brick)
Framing
Drywall
Sarah mudding

From there it was on to the first floor, where I took down another eight feet of bricks early last week while Sarah broke mortar off of bricks we’d already taken out. Will was over this past Saturday and finished it off, getting the top of the chimney down into the basement. Along the way we found that the best process was to knock the mortar off the bricks straight into the chimney. It’s bad enough hauling down buckets of bricks without having to also deal with the heavy, dusty, crumbly mortar. There’s an opening at the base of the chimney in the basement where we can just shovel the mortar out and take it into the back yard in a wheel barrow.

Chimney gone

Chimney gone

Our back yard has gotten even more attractive as of late. Now in addition to the giant mound of clay from the footings that’s been gradually melting (currently covered in leaves), the paint bucket planters, the garbage cans full of compost, and the scrap metal, we’ve added a tarp-covered stack of OSB, both a pile and a giant stack of bricks, and a pile of mortar. It’s quite the beautification program we’ve got going.

Beautiful back yard

Beautiful back yard

Oh well, that can wait for another day. We still have impressive piles of bricks and mortar in the first floor that need to be hauled out, along with the rest of the mudding, sanding, and painting to get the second floor looking respectable again. We’re planning to use some of the bricks to make the base of the columns under the front porch. The rest we’ll probably sell.