Revealing the truth behind the lies...pt 2.

To add a little visual perspective to my wife's earlier post, I though it would be help full to add a few photos to illustrate our findings.

This all began with trying to repair the floor in the now infamous add-on section of the house. This proved to be a little more of a challenge than I thought.



If you look closely you may notice the the floor is listing to the left.




After removing the floor boards we discovered lots of nifty things. That were listed the earlier post.

1. The joists were of uneven sizes.
Yes, they where and I am not sure why but they were. I unfortunately removed them before I took a photo but you can get the idea.


2. The joists didn't overlap across the center beam.
This was particularly odd to me. Although not necessary as I have heard from some of the carpenters that I have spoken to. I think this is a think it is a good idea in this house due to the size of the center beam.





In this you should note that the joist barely sits on the beam and not nailed to the beam but rater it is nailed to the block of wood that makes it even with the other joists




All of the joists had this problem. It was a cause for some concern. I was thinking shear, a joist on top of a block of wood on top of a beam with 3/4" overhang does not seem safe if the ground starts to shake. (which tends to happen in the bay area.)

Chips and blocks where all over the place. I was as surprised on how much "board footage" was in the house. Why the floor board where different sizes deifies my comprehension. My guess is that the previous owner used what wood was available. Either it was not going for work for me.

Another nice find was the notches on the joists to make room for the water pipes. This I know for a fact this is BAD BAD BAD. There are rules and calculation about how you can but I go with DON'T.
Things like this may happen:











This split as my brother sat on it. If you can see the wood split right along the grain of the wood starting on the notch. If you want my advice, do not make notches in wood on the underside at all.

Here are some slick files that explain it:

Notching_&_Boring_Guide_A11.pdf
Fig 11 cut floor.pdf

After looking at these issues I admit I was a little muffed. I had some friends that are in the trades to take a look. Most of them said the same thing "This is some really shoddy carpentry I would not bother to try to fix it." I was rather sad to hear that because that is very much outside of my manpower and skill-level. It is hard to ignore the a carpenter and engineer and two stage hands.

Needless to day I had to look for a general contractor.
Lesson learned: It is surprising what can be hidden under Sheetrock.