Powdered House

I finished demoing out the ceiling in the diningroom bay addition yesterday.

Me: "OH MY GOD. It's powder. This was a beam."

EMT J (as distinct from Wiring J): "Is that like cancer for a house?"

Me:"Yes. Hopefully, it's operable, and not terminal."

We discovered the dryrot. Lots of it. In a place I was hoping against hope wasn't dryrotted. And after I stopped swearing, I made a plan of attack.

There was a leak from the rain gutter, maybe 30 years ago, that was allowed to EAT AWAY THE SUPPORT MEMBERS of about a 2'x8' section of the bay roof. And the roofers who "fixed" it just put up a really heavy sheathing board over the hole (I'm guessing 1" ply, since I can SEE it through the approximately 2x1 foot ragged hole in the old tongue and groove sheathing). The 4x4 beam that runs across the face of the wall has been reduced to powder in one place, and to an uneven 1x4 in others. The crosspieces that allegedly rest on it are damaged, so they really more hang near it.

The bay is literally being held up by the roof sheathing resting on the house sheathing (thankfully, some hard wood in big planks, topped with good solid wood lap siding). Oh, and the windows, with their trim.

Shudder. SH@# F@#& D#^* M@&^*@#$^$@#!

So, we have a lot of yanking of trim and reframing to do, which puts us back a good week or two, optimistically. Last night, we bought a shopvac to "demo" the powdered wood with, plus some filter bags to catch the yuck. Today, we are off to buy the replacement lumber.

Good thing we already have a nice stash of salvaged 2x4's. We'll need them to build the temporary supports.