Summer project(s)

This old Money Pit

The absence of posts to the site lately can be explained with the image above. With the arrival of summer I decided it was time to start work on the exterior of our old (1890) farm house. The porches on the front of the house were in pretty bad shape when we bought it. The main porch at the front door was crooked and starting to rot. The porch on the side had a new floor built, but the roof was falling off.

By an incredible stroke of luck, a custom carpenter moved in next door and set up shop (literally, 2500 sq. ft. worth). That helped quite a bit as I prefer to have the main structures built professionally so they don’t end up crooked or something. I am doing all the grunt work tearing off the old porches and trucking them away. That was finished over the weekend.

When Ken (the carpenter next door) finishes all the main construction I will do the finish work which will include adding on new gingerbread and cladding the pressure treated posts. When done it should look pretty good. Check back in two years or so…

This is the condition of the porches before starting last week. The new designs will be quite different as we will be using a traditional spindle handrail along the fronts, which will help show the front door better, which is quite nice, but buried under the old design.

This was what the front of the house looked like when we bought it two years ago. Stunning isn’t it….

In addition to all that we will be redoing the roof, rebuilding the chimneys, adding new shutters and painting it.� Oh, and the landscaping.

Check back in 4 years….

-T.

About the Author:

I'm your host, Tim Warris, a product developer in Port Dover, Ontario. Since March of 2007 I have been documenting the construction of the former CNJ Bronx Terminal in HO scale. For my day job, I design track building tools for Fast Tracks, a small company I own and operate. Fast Tracks makes it fast and easy to hand lay your own trackwork. Stop by our website to learn more!

Posted by: Tim | 06-17-2008 | 11:06 AM
Posted in: Our Old House | Picture of the Day