Summertime Update

So I'm realllllly falling behind on posts. Things have just been really busy lately. I'm sort of back to work, but off again this week.

I picked up a complete DISASTER longcase clock to repair for a client (which will bring in some much needed cash). The clock is so badly damaged that it's almost as bad as if it had fallen face forward on concrete. It's now all fixed and ready to go. I'll be posting about it on the clock blog later. Here's one of the before photos:



So what else has been eating-up my time...

The farmhouse is still coming along nicely but slowly (I'm about 4 or 5 posts behind on it).

There was Canada Day on the 1st, and that same weekend was my friends' annual family & friends BBQ. Good food with good company.

I finished-up working on the shop hutch, but I'm not ready to post about it until I can dig-up all the photos of the build from the past... 4-5 years? I need to take better "finished" photos, and I want to recap the entire project within one post. Here's a teaser of the hutch:



I found some awesome antique light fixtures as a gift for my Dad's birthday, which was last week. One part was missing so I spent some time running around and assembling a makeshift replacement. These are "chain" light fixtures from the 30s or 40s. One of the socket bases that holds the shade was missing (new ones are 75$). Both shades, the one base, and all the chains were only 6.99$! Check out eBay and see how expensive these sell for normally. This was one heck of a great deal!



Dad was thrilled with them, and I had time to hang one of them for him right away. The second one needed a special adapter plate, so I couldn't install it yet.





I started a painting last night. I've been planning to start it for several months.



The painting is a cropped section of the painting "Selene and Endymion" by Ubaldo Gandolfi ca. 1770. I assume that the cherub is meant to portray cupid. In the full sized painting, Endymion can be seen below Selene, lying asleep in a cave. In Greek mythology Selene is the goddess of the moon, who fell in love with the mortal shepherd Endymion. There are several paintings and depictions of her, but I came across this photo a few years ago and really loved it. I have no particular interest in Greek mythology or moon goddess worship, I just liked the picture and I have several antique frames that need paintings in them, haha.

The painting will be 16" x 20" and painted in acrylics.

As soon as I have more time, I'll be posting several more farmhouse posts. I may condense some, and eliminate a lot of boring photos. You don't need to see drywall patching, or more electrical.

I also have a Westminster clock to finish repairing for another client (since Nov-Dec), a Victrola top to repair and refinish for a US client (from over a year ago), a client who needs me to order new gut lines (and install them) for an antique longcase clock, a possible cable replacement on another more modern longcase (I haven't seen this clock or even met the client yet), and I need to revisit (check) my friend's parents' longcase which stopped a while back. That same friend's father has an antique (scrap 1850s) piano that he's donating to me for parts.

So if all that wasn't enough to keep me busy, I thought I'd also include the facts that I have a queue of about 46 hours worth of audio podcasts to listen to, 64 TV show episodes to watch on top of my daily YouTube videos, and there are also 4 or 5 movies I want to watch, and I obviously haven't found the time to watch any of them.

Victorian Farmhouse - Days 5 & 6

With the following post, I'm now all caught-up with what's happened so far at the Farmhouse. For those who are curious about the "proper timeline" I'll just post that here (mostly for my own documentation):
Day 1 - March 20th
Day 2 - March 26th
Day 3 - March 27th
Day 4 - March 28th
Day 5 - April 1st
Day 6 - April 3rd

I think I'm headed to the house again this Saturday, but I haven't confirmed this yet.

***

On day 5, we really didn't get much accomplished. We went shopping for some electrical supplies, and did a bit of planning, but no actual physical work on the house. I think we actually only got to the house around 4pm. On the 6th day, we demolished the ceiling in the front hall (where the staircase is), and we started working on some of the electrical. Angie & Pierre also picked up a plain white vanity top for the bathroom, and a toilet.

For the most part, we're still waiting for the electrician to show up, as well as seek advice for a few plumbing issues (mostly to do with the kitchen, I believe).

As usual, before I continue, some more mixed photos.

I'm pretty obsessed with old houses, so I'm constantly documenting as many of the little details as I can. Original hardware, construction details, and millwork are the things I really focus on. Since I'm used to working in fine cabinetry, I have just about every woodworking hand tool you can imagine, and this includes one called a profile gauge. You might have seen one of these at some point before, and not really known what it was used for. It's nothing more than a series of wires held in a tightly tensioned frame. The wires are pushed against a shape, and this gives you both a positive and a negative on each side:



Using the tool, I took tracings of all the historic mouldings in the farmhouse (with the exception of the plain rectangular ones upstairs).



Here's the list:
1. Secondary original casings
2. Primary original casings
3. Later casings on the living room archway
4. Later casings on the Kitchen addition doorway (as well as around the basement door in the kitchen)
5. Original rosettes
6. Later (non matching) rosettes on living room archway (on the office side)
7. Trim detail on staircase wall
8. Original baseboards on main floor

I think the only other thing that would be fun to have is a tracing of one of the staircase fretwork brackets. They're a fairly standard pattern, but it would be fun to have a life size copy.

Here's the "thumb latch" side of the "under stairs closet" door. Not the best picture I'm afraid (due to the lighting). There's one more of these on another door, but I think it's a bit different. I'll have to have another look. I don't remember which door it was.



Angelina posing with our hoard of crown mouldings for 40$!





As mentioned earlier, all the cement that had been slapped around the exterior of the stone foundation is being chipped off by our historic mason, and it's all getting repointed with lime mortar. It will also look a lot nicer with the stonework showing. This is the area where the small deck was.



The foundation in the basement (when I first saw it) looked a lot like what you see here. You could see that the stones all looked fine, and that the wall was straight, but almost all the mortar was gone.





The trees by the front porch are GONE! I was very happy to see these go. We still need to remove the rest of the dead vines. One of the vines actually grew THROUGH the small section of decking.



Here's another corner of the foundation.



Right, so back to the front hall ceiling. I originally really wanted to save all the original plaster work in the house since it was in pretty good shape, and there's not all that much of it (2 1/2 rooms). The decision to remove this ceiling was not a rash one, but rather a practical one. First, the adhesive was taking an eternity to scrape off. Even if we did scrape off all the glue, the ceiling still had a popcorn texture to sand down, and then re-skim coat and sand. Second, there was a large and poorly patched hole from an old heating grate or stovepipe in the centre (not easy to see). The third issue with this ceiling was the nail in the coffin; we had to run electrical through here, and there isn't easy access from anywhere else. Not just one or two wires, but several wires and boxes. Clearing out this small ceiling means that we can easily pass electrical into the office w/o damaging anything in there (original plaster walls and ceiling).



Pierre and I demolished this ceiling in about 30 minutes, but it took something like 2 hours just to clean up all of the aftermath. In the process we also managed to completely clog the furnace filter. Pierre loves to yank out nails and screws from boards, so I had him save all the lovely old square nails from the lath boards. I can use the nails for repairing clocks or antiques.



With this ceiling open, we now have easy access to run electrical into the office, as well as to a new light fixture and 2-way switch which will hang in this hallway. You will notice a gap in the strapping (which is 1 1/2" thick solid white ash, btw) and that's where a round vent or a stovepipe went through the floor. This corresponds with the patch in the master bedroom floor above.



This is a fixture that may end up going in this hallway. We don't like the newer (and very frilly) shades, but the fixture itself could look quite nice here. We will likely shorten the chains a bit). This is one of 2 fixtures that Angie & Pierre picked up at an auction for 15$. The house never had electrical originally, or even hanging oil lamp fixtures, so it's hard to say what would look best in here. Once the electrical is installed, the fixture can easily be changed later (and as often as we like). It would be fun to find some fairly "period correct" lighting (since there will only be 2 hanging light fixtures on the main floor, and one in the staircase that are very visible in the oldest parts of the house, but for now, money is being allocated to more important projects, so lighting can always wait a few years. This fixture is from around 1910-1920 and cost them nearly nothing.



Unfortunately we didn't get very far with the electrical. I had forgotten that we need 2 lengths of 3-14 wire for the 2-way switches, and we also bought the wrong type of hexagonal light fixture boxes (we got the kind made for conduit cables rather than standard Romex wiring).

I did, however, get several boxes ready.





I had to make a small(ish) hole in the hallway wall to drill through the top plate to pass the wires. I was also not sure if there were horizontal braces in the wall (so far just the standard "fire wall" at 48"). Because old plaster walls have so many lumps and inconsistencies, the stud finder tends to be very unreliable.



Pierre stayed busy by installing plaster buttons where they were needed (near casings and electrical boxes, as well as on each side of any cracks). He also helped me pass wires in the walls and ceilings, and took out around 1000 nails from the old lath.





I didn't love the idea of cutting an outlet box into the original tongue-and-groove wainscoting of the living room, but I also can't stand not having enough outlets in a house. Code also requires a certain number per room, and per wall. Luckily I can cut nice clean holes with my multi-tool. I can't imagine how much of a pain it would have been without it.



That's it for now. Hopefully the next time we're at the house I'll be able to get a lot more of my wiring passed. The electrician still can't tie most of it into the panel until we know if it's being relocated, but there are lots of connections and boxes we can install in the meantime.

A Small House Update - Light Fixture in the Guest Bedroom

I've had the fixture for the guest bedroom (or spare room, formerly "the laundry room/kitchen" upstairs) repaired, rewired, and ready to install for at least 2 years or more now. I was originally going to wait until the ceiling and drywall in this room were finished before installing it, but it was looking so sad just hanging in the basement gathering cobwebs that I decided to just install it now. It also helps with the low (crappy) lighting situation in this room. This is a small room (maybe 9x9) and it has no windows. Originally it would have had two windows, but one is now blocked by the building next door, and the second one has been converted into the door leading down to the driveway and garage at the back of the house. I plan to eventually replace the steel door with a salvaged one that has a window in it, which will give the room a bit of natural light.

There's no real way to create nice shots for this fixture, since the ceiling is unfinished (and reinforced with screws/washers to counteract the sagging, and the room is also filled with junk at the moment. These are the best I could do, and at least you can get an idea of how this looks.

This type of 1910-20s fixtures is called a "gravity" shade fixture, although that isn't necessarily the best term. The globe in held in place with special clips that clip (and screw-tighten) onto the rim of the glass shade, while also carrying the bulb socket and a chain link. These fixtures are more commonly found in dining rooms, living rooms, er even places like stores and banks (with very long links). They occasionally have only 1 bulb (sometimes hanging down in the centre, or a bulb each (like this one).

End of Year Wrap-Up

Ho boy, I've been lazy with my blog and updates, and I sincerely hope you guys and gals haven't abandoned me, or given up hope on this blog, since there's still so many more projects left to do (and hopefully some big ones coming this year).

This post is going to wrap-up a whole bunch of projects I've talked about this year, but that I haven't posted any photos of yet. These mainly include mundane/uninteresting projects, but I'm still posting them for you (and for my own record keeping).

First, OLD projects. I mentioned making a bit more progress on the "shop hutch" earlier this summer. This included fitting all the doors (old windows), installing the hinges and knobs, and installing some old salvaged crown moulding to the top. I still have the 4 bottom doors to cut and fit (just plain flat doors), and 3-4 drawers to make in the centre opening.

Another project that I never showed is the large (9 foot tall) storage rack/shelving unit that I made (which is standing in the left corner next to the hutch in this photo below). It's hard to tell the scale, but trust me, it's massive. The hutch is 97" tall (a hair taller than your average 8 foot tall ceiling), and the shelving unit is a foot taller than this.



Crown moulding detail:



Again, this entire hutch is just crudely built, and was made entirely out of SCRAP wood, and junk parts (other than the hardware). The crown moulding was free.



Next I'll show the work that was done in the back staircase. This "room" is hard to photograph, and there's also some junk in there currently (old doors, and a bicycle) so the photos are likewise awkwardly taken.

Basically, if you can remember YEARS ago before I gutted this room, the ceiling was horribly sloped (see photo). This was because the wall with the window ended on the flat roof, which has a 1:12 pitch. The made it very awkward for the drywall, and this was why it was all crooked. It also didn't transition well into the straight lower section (garage ceiling). I spent a bunch of time basically calculating the new angles, and arranging a set of guide wires, and installing new 2x4s in the correct locations. This fixed the ceiling, and once the new drywall is installed, it will look great. I also insulated the whole space, and installed (or started installing) a vapour barrier.

Before:



Now:





I spent a considerable amount of time relocating the light fixture to the centre of the room. Originally (you can spot the old hole) it was near the top of the door. Now it's closer to the centre of the ceiling, and if I want, I can install a hanging fixture which won't interfere with the door.



I still have that back wall to insulate (it's only the thickness of a 2x4 though (and I have no idea why since all the other walls are 3 1/2" deep).

These are the wood strips around the windows that I needed to install. The drywall will end next to them, and they will be completely covered by the new mouldings. You can also see one of the two new outlets I installed (in case I want to have Christmas lights in these two windows - and somewhere to plug a vacuum, etc).



By far the biggest undertaking this year was the rebuilding of the entire 28 foot long exterior wall of the garage. Over the past few months I've been installing insulation and vapour barrier on it in preparation for drywall (the entire interior of the garage will be finished in drywall, and painted, along with window and door casings (eventually).





I also installed new (old fashioned and inexpensive) light fixtures. These are new octagonal boxes fitted with plain porcelain fixtures and clear bulbs. They're on 2 circuits, one having 4 lights, and the main one having 6.





Next, I have a few fun woodworking projects to show off.

For about 1 or 2 years (or possibly even longer?) I've been making do with this metal rod to hold my rolls of toilet paper, all the while planning to make a suitable replacement for the missing original. Since I was making this new, I decided that it should match my curly maple vanity (most antique ones are just painted black).

Before:



After examining several photos of original toilet paper holders, and even buying a beautiful old set of chrome bathroom accessories (the holder was not the same size though), I found a fairly simple way to reproduce the roll holder. I used spare clock door handles for the knobs, and added some wider flanges on their bases. These were then threaded, and matching brass inserts were made for the wooden rod. The inserts were hammered in place (very snug friction fit), and then I finished the parts to match the vanity.





The brass knobs were antiqued with a thin spray of coloured lacquer.



You can see how the reddish brown is a perfect match to the vanity (I used the same wood, and the same stain).



Then I finally made the top display shelf for my Cherry Bookcase. I may want to change around the display in there, but currently I have 2 small clocks, several old alarm clocks that were in my grandfather's old things, and 3 of my early whale oil lamps (and books).



The shelf was made in pine, and bevelled on the front edge to make it look a bit thinner. I also had to make a curved cut out at the front to allow room for the two door catches. I painted the shelf to match the backboard.



Lastly, I have just two more oddball bits of news to share.

First, I was THRILLED to find one store that still had a bit of tintable oil paint for sale. As some of you might know, pretty much ALL oil based (alkyd) paints have been taken off the market, except for spray paints, and a few "Rust Paints" like Tremclad. Unfortunately, I still haven't painted the upstairs floors (there's the spare room left), and I still need oil paint.

The man was able to match the colour through the computer (I knew it was Florence Brown off the top of my head) but when I got home, I noticed it's not the same shade. AT ALL. It's fine though, since I'll simply use it for the first coat, and I should have enough of the "L" Room floor paint to do the second coat.

My original colour is on the left, and the new (lighter and less reddish) is on the right.



The last bit of news was a failed house explore that I'm still sad about.



This is a gorgeous, and rather large house near the outskirts of town. It has been slowly decaying for at least close to 10 years, and just this past year or so, part of the front porch has rotted and collapsed. I wasn't sure at first if it was really abandoned or not (and I'm still not 100% sure - you'll see why in a minute), but it has a rotting roof fascia, at least 2 or 3 broken or open windows (note the basement window on the side of the house is tilted open), and from walking by it, it looks largely empty (almost no curtains, and no visible furniture). One of the attic windows is wide open (and according to Google Maps has been wide open at least since summer 2013).

I went to go look at this place about a month ago, and it was quite cold outside. Despite the fact that the house appeared completely abandoned, there was a sign on the side door (which looked ajar) that said "Private Property", and it appeared that the house was still be hooked up to electricity (the meter was still there, and looked to be working). This left me quite confused. There was also a boat parked in the open-front garage at the back.

I was just about to head for the side door when a man across the road yelled at me: "Hey! That's Private Property!" So I just told him I was looking around, but he kept an eye on me, and I just left. I assume he might be the owner, and I *SHOULD* have just asked him, but he really didn't seem too friendly so I don't think I'll be headed back there. I had gone around 10am on a Tuesday, so if this guy wasn't at work then, he's probably retired, or he works from home. Since he's already spotted me, it's too risky to go back. I don't want to get caught or have the police called on me, so it's not worth returning, but part of me REALLY wants to see the inside. I guess it just wasn't meant to be.

Other than this house, I've pretty much exhausted the supply of abandoned houses in town. There are around a dozen, but all of them are sealed-up tight.

Insert Whitty Title Here

I don't know how people on other blogs manage to come up with all sorts of witty and interesting titles for their posts. I suck at it, and usually don't even try, but I didn't want to call this "Another Boring Update".

As promised, here are the two completed antique grates. One is original to the house (the one in the green living room), and the other identical one was installed to replace the large and poorly located floor grate next to the front door.

If you missed it, and wanted to see how I did that, go see these posts (in this order):
http://my1923foursquare.blogspot.ca/2013/01/secret-project-revealed.html
http://my1923foursquare.blogspot.ca/2013/01/office-floor-new-look-for-2013.html

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I had one missing thumb latch from my original grate, so I had a new copy cast in brass. I had paid 50$ for the second (and complete) grate, and unfortunately, it cost 45$ just for the casting. I could have just bought an entire new grate for an extra 5$, but I would have needed to travel out of town to go get it, and I hadn't gotten a quote for the casting, so I didn't think it was going to be that much.



Here's the final product. Grate closed:



Grate open:



Office grate:



In other news, I decided to spend last night with some lovely antique lighting. I used my two whale oil lamps, paired with old mirrors to double the light.



This prompted me to look for my other whale oil lamp AGAIN. I had another nice clear lamp that I've had packed away, and I couldn't find it. I looked for it on 3 or 4 occasions over the past month or so, and I finally found it this afternoon.

I wasn't happy with how I found it though...



Broken in half.



I actually discovered that the lamp was already broken here, and previously repaired. There was a thin layer of clear adhesive, and I spent about 30 minutes scraping it off and cleaning the joint. I plan to re-repair the lamp with Hxtal, which is a specialty glass adhesive used by museums. It's very expensive, but it's supposed to make an incredibly strong repair, and be crystal clear. I've been meaning to buy some to repair a broken clock glass (hand painted) from the 1840s, so this is another excuse for me to buy some.

This fine lamp also has a completely ruined original pewter collar, which I will need to replace, along with a burner. Unfortunately it's not a standard size, which will make my restoration job incredibly difficult. The lamp is from the 1830s or 40s.