On the upstairs bathroom door, the hinge holes were more or less stripped and the door sagged quite a bit. I used the toothpicks and wood glue method to repair the holes.
I took ordinary toothpicks, put wood glue on them, jammed them into the hinge holes, hammered them into place, waited 24 hours then cut them flush with and sanded them.
The before, as you can see the top hinge hole is the most damaged
With toothpicks
Turns out this door has been a problem for a long time, back into the home's early history as every screw was a different length add to the fact that they're all antique flat blades.
The top hinge hole was the most damaged and I just had to keep putting so many toothpicks in there, as it seems someone tried to put a really long screw in at one point, which didn't work and I had to put so much in that hole, I wasn't able to screw the screw back into that hole, and not having a drill, I had to get creative and hammer a nail into the hole to make a pilot hole! Ever since then, the door no longer sags. I did this back in October/November of last year and it's been fine since then.
While not pictured, it turns out the sag was a problem even longer than I thought it was, because almost all the doors, especially this one had the bottom cut off making the door a trapezoid :( I can't believe anyone actually thought that was a solution for a sagging door, especially back then (because the doors that were taken off the hinges in the 30s/40s that were in the attic since that time also are trapezoidal).
Too bad they didn't know about this easy fix.
We have 2 of the C20 Rimlocks which when the knob would turn, nothing would happen and the latch would be stuck inside the lock, therefore those doors (one being a bathroom door) woudn't stay closed. They had broken leaf springs. After some difficulty, I managed to find a local locksmith who stocked spring steel on hand and we matched the piece in size/thickness and I cut them into the proper length and replaced the broken springs. Works like a charm!
The broken spring:
Once repaired
An original unbroken spring inside another lock. Notice it has a slight bend in the lower portion, I wasn't sure about how to bend spring steel and was afraid of breaking it, so I didn't put this same bend in the replacement spring. Seems to work fine though.
Here's a quick video tour of our massive attic.
Well for the past few weeks I've been working in the upstairs bathroom stripping the paint off the door, door frames and window frame.
I managed to do most of the stripping with a heat gun, then I had to follow up on the stubborn spots with chemical stripper. I spent a long time picking out all the bits of paint from just about every corner imaginable with a utility knife tip. Then I sanded it with 100 grit, then again with 150 grit (220 grit was too fine) and then I gave it 2 coats of Minwax oil stain and used shellac to seal it. After sanding I used a rag with mineral spirits to remove the sanding dust.
BEFORE:
AFTER:
Unfortunately, the door and frames turned out a tad darker than I'd liked them to have turned out. The problem was I left the stain on a full 15 mins before wiping excess off both times, with the window, I did 15 mins, then 10 and it turned out just about right. The door isn't quite as dark as the photos make it out to appear, but it's a few shades darker than the rest of the wood.
I used Minwax Red Mahogany 225
As you can see below, the door's original color was on the dark side already. This door was only painted with latex, so it came off rather easily for the most part, I could pull entire strips up.
The door frame had a coat of oil paint and then latex over it. The original stain color of the door frames was lighter than the doors, I find this on many of our door frames. I would have liked to remove ALL the paint without chemical stripper (as it also removes the stain) as the original stain looked so nice.
But perhaps not, it seems a layer of the stain comes up with the paint so restaining would be necessary anyway.
Stripping paint off the window frame revealed there used to be a (I'm guessing) towel bar (there's 2 of those circular indentations) at some point in the past before this was ever painted. Then there is a second set of rectangular indentations of a later towel bar.
Also the paint shadowof casement window hardware and butterfly hinges before the original window was removed by the PO :(
On my project list is to restore the house to having wood heritage windows instead of modern windows - a little over half our windows were replaced with modern ones by the PO.
All the paint colors/layers. The green layer is a Victorian era paint color... Almost all the wood in the south part of the house is painted. I had wondered why for a long time, but after stripping this window frame I found that it had water damage... so it would seem the wood in the south section of the house was painted because of water getting in. This green paint was the toughest paint to remove of all. There were 3 coats, the green, a tan, and then the white latex paint on top.
As it was, only the window was painted at first, then someone came along and thought "since this is painted, might as well have the rest match" and sadly the rest was painted.
Unfortunately, the baseboards are not originals, but very close reproductions in wood and were directly painted, so with the heat gun I have, which won't remove paint from any wood that was originally painted, the baseboards had to stay white for now... Unless I can get a hold of something else to remove that paint, otherwise I have to leave them painted.
For some reason, the bathroom window sill had the corners cut off on the inside!?! I have no idea why this was done, and thankfully it's the only place where this was done and it was done long enough ago that it predated the very old, Victorian green paint layer.
The door after being fully stripped and sanded
The door frame after sanding (I did some more sanding after this to get it all even)
Unfortunately, some paint in the crevices between the door molding and frame molding coudln't be removed, but thankfully the stain covered over it pretty well and it ended up looking really sharp. That extra white molding around which I didn't strip was modern wood which like the baseboards was originally painted and woulnd't strip. It was put when they drywalled this bathroom (I have no idea why, just about everywehre else in the house is still plaster thankfully) and the drywall wasn't as deep as the plaster so they added those to hide the gap - I do plan to replaster it someday as I simply loathe drywall.
Staining the door
First coat is completed. I wish I wiped the second coat sooner as this color was so close to what I wanted.
I need to bring down the original closet door from the attic and strip and refinish it sometime.. the closet had a hollow core foldout door which I have removed.
I used Zinsser bulls eye clear shellac
The contents were really dark until I stirred it, then it turned light
Shellac on the door (this is about the actual color of the door, which isn't too bad when the lighting doesn't make it look almost black)
The window frame with all the paint stripped
I used Elmer's stainable wood putty on the gouges and areas that had holes
This is the window sill part that was water damaged, the wood could just be dug our with your finger. I sanded it down until I got to better wood.
The window after 2 coats of stain, this time I left the first coat for 15 mins, then wiped, 2nd coat for 10 mins then wiped it off. I shellaced everything and am really loving the restored wood!
BONUS pic:
A view from the attic at the original bathroom plaster walls and ceiling since they dropped the ceiling by a foot. I do plan to restore it all original someday. I do like that all the old ceilings were painted, I absolutely hate white ceilings of today. The worthless vent which they dropped my ceiling to put in, doesn't even work!!
Well, aside from the west gable which I have removed most of the siding off of, I also removed some siding from the south end of the house, around back.
Please excuse the clutter, this is our back porch and we moved everything there for spring cleaning just before this began.
The before shot:
First removal:
Original beauty of the clapboards exposed once again!
Notice the missing bead and cove molding from the fascia board and in the section adjoining the verge board with the eaves. I also discovered (not pictured) that we had a beltline around the house just above the bottom verge board (which is not visible due to this modern porch being constructed above it's level.) I do plan to tear off this back porch (which is rotting due to inferior building practices and modern wood and recreate the back stoop which it originally had.
The strange thing is it seems someone painted the eaves (latex over the old chipped paint
Ah, more joys of siding! All the muck and debris that finds its way into the siding only to rot your wood!
The window side, sadly with butchered crown molding and sill corners. I will be having replacements made for these
I have no idea what would have been here!!?
These flimsy siding nails, about 1/3 of which the heads which are paper thin broke off forcing me to nail them flush with the clapboards as I coudln't remove them once the heads broke/
A profile shot of the bead and cove molding that was removed for the siding. For some reason this section had the moldings butchered very badly, in other parts of the house they just covered over them. I have no idea why this side was butchered so severely. Other parts are only missing sill corners and crown molding.
A cracked clapboard - most likely when the siding was put on. sadly the piece was not to be found :(
A view of the brown paper over the sheathing boards. Until this can be repaired properly, I put duck tape over it for the time being to keep the water out.
The old cracked, blistering paint from 1923 showing the original gray Victorian paint underneath.
An original brush hair still stuck in the paint after nearly a century!
Unfortunately my cheap heat gun won't take this paint off, so this project is more or less on hold until I can get something better like an infrared paint remover or something. And paint scrapers have had limited success.
In a few spots in our home, I found old handwriting on the wood!
In the upstairs sewing room closet door on the inside, I found this:
It appears to read Wm. G. Faye Mfg. Co, St. Louis, MO (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong)
And from the basement, there's a hole cut under the grand staircase and on the stair treads I found boards with writing on them as well:
