Home

Re-Roof

Long overdue!

190808.jpg

High on the list of necessities for our old house was a new roof, which finally happened last week.  We started hunting for a roofer in the spring, and it took until now to get one finalized, and get the job done.

In the end they did a great job, replaced the entire roof, new sheathing, felt and new shingles.  We also had all the eves and downspouts replaced and installed gutter guards to keep all the leaves out, which is a major issue here with 100 trees surrounding the house.

I created a gallery of the work in progress, click on the image below to start it up…

click on image to open gallery…..

new roof

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 | 08-19-2008 | 09:08 AM
Posted in: Our Old House | Picture of the Day | Comments (1)

Porch Construction Completed

Now the fun part….

click on images for large version….

ken ritchie construction

Early this week Ken finished up the lattice on the lower portion of the porches, finishing off the project. The results look great, we are quite happy with the way they turned out. A definite improvement over the rotting, crooked 120 year old versions. I wonder if these will last for another 120 years.

With the construction complete, the next step is all the finish work. I plan to do that work myself later this summer and into the fall. All the posts will be wrapped with poplar and railings installed. New gingerbread will be added along with a few other embellishments.

The ceilings inside will be covered with tongue and groove pine and varnished. Pot lights will be added, along with the obligatory porch swing. Once all the finish work is complete, new shutters will be added and the whole place painted. Still have not decided on colours, but I am envisioning four or five colours will be used.

270608c.jpg

Once the old, disgusting aluminum screen door was removed the original front door could be seen. Its in very good shape considering its age so we do not plan on replacing it, just restoring it as best we can. When the screen door was installed they hacked all the decorative trim off to fit it in place, pretty much ruining it. I don’t see much of an issue to re-create it so I will do that when the rest of the finish work is done. The door is a full 2″ thick and made of virgin pine, so it is a good candidate for restoration. Our concern is that without a storm or glass door we will freeze in the winter as this isn’t exactly a state of the art enclosure. Putting another glass door in front of this one would hide the door, so we are still looking for alternatives.

We would like to replace the glass with some stained glass, but we are still considering that.

The original mechanical door bell is still in place and works. Its an interesting feature, so we will rebuild that as well.

ken ritchie construction

270608d.jpg

At the back of the house our little vegetable garden is filling in nicely thanks to the endless rail rain we have been having this summer. Quite a contrast from the drought we had all last year.

270608e.jpg

A little perennial garden out back. Apparently these are yellow and white flowers.

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 | 06-27-2008 | 09:06 AM
Posted in: Our Old House | Picture of the Day | Comments (0)

Summer project(s)

This old Money Pit

170608a.jpg

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…

170608c.jpg

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.

170608b.jpg

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 | Comments (0)

« Previous Entries   Next Entries »