Curt - If you have access, definitely replace the bad lumber if it is threatening to affect the structural integrity of the house. When you replace that one obvious member you may find that other adjacent framing members have been infected as well and their damage may not be significant enough to warrant replacement or they may not be as easy to remove. Remember that dry rot is a fungus spread by spores and even if you remove the "bad" part of an infected piece of lumber the spores have migrated about a foot into the "good" lumber. These are just waiting for a source of moisture to take up housekeeping. This was the problem that I had when I bought my home. My front deck, a second story cantilevered deck, sits on the extended ends of two 8X12 girders that support my second story. After I removed the deck I found that the exposed ends of these girders were badly infected with rot and termites and as much as 1" of the top surface of these beams were either infected with rot or just plain missing. Another similarly sized member perpendicular to these, supporting the front wall of the house, was infected along all the length of its' front face. To replace these would have meant dismantling much of my second story. The typical fix I have seen to effect a repair would be to cut away the bad sections of the top of the girders that support the deck and replace the missing volume of wood with new lumber sandwiched to the top these members and/or to possibly "sister" full size lumber on both sides of the missing area to make up for the missing volume. Next, one would poison the remaining infected wood in hopes that there would be no further spread. In reality, because of the aforementioned hidden dormant spores, a future infestation would be highly likely. Luckily, while surfing the web about methods of dry rot containment, I came upon the site for "the Rot Doctor". This fellow has developed a 2 part wood based epoxy with the viscosity of diesel fuel. One can "paint" this epoxy onto the damaged wood letting it soak into the grain thus saturating the damaged area and beyond into the grain of the first few feet of the "good" wood. When the Epoxy "goes off" and fully cures, in about 24 hours, the damaged area is plasticized with structural strengths likely exceeding that of the original wood, plus, the spores in the infected good wood have been sealed off from moisture or plasticized as well. To effect my repair, I dug into the tops and sides of the exposed girders to make sure that I had open or exposed all the "tubes" created by those voracious little termites, but I left a fair volume of the pithy material infected with rot. I also drilled a number of small holes into the surface of the bad areas to give my repair material a good foothold. Next I painted on the thin epoxy and drenched the wood with the stuff until it was saturated and would no longer accept more of the epoxy. After that cured, I used clear packaging tape as a dam or form on the sides of the girder, extending a bit above desired height for the top of my reconstructed girder. I then mixed up some regular viscosity epoxy mixed with "mill fibers" (ground up fiberglass) and filled the forms. After grinding down the patched areas to match the surrounding wood with my disc sander, it is hard to tell that a repair has been made. The infected vertical face of the girder along the front of the house was painted until saturation with the thin epoxy as well to seal it up from further infestations. Wherever I had wood touching wood as I rebuilt the deck, I would treat those areas with the epoxy to make sure that any trapped moisture would not begin the process again. I was even able to reuse a couple of the original 2X12X20 redwood joists for the deck by treating a few of the infected areas where the wood was pithy but it was still dimensionally good. This repair has lasted about 7 years now with no signs of degradation and is constantly exposed to the elements, including direct sun and some minor standing water. So you see that this may be a good way of effecting a permanent repair to any of the possibly infected framing members, or possibly you wouldn't have to replace anything if you can get good access to all the sites of infection. I hope that this helps you effect a permanent repair if you decide to purchase this property.
Go to this site... http://www.rotdoctor.com/ I use the CPRES product. In fact, I keep a quart kit around for an occasional spot repair. It has come in handy in many occasions on my stuff and my neighbors as well. I suggest that you read up on the material on his site. It is very educational. You will be a rot expert! ;^) Barry -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Curt Raymond Sent: Sunday, May 14, 2006 6:57 AM To: Diesel List Subject: [MBZ] OT: House repair Considering the other topics we hit on here.... My wife and I are looking at a house, MBZ content: its got a 3 car garage, no more paying for repairs I can do myself! Anyway theres this one house we really like, its in our price range and I think the seller will move on price to make it very affordable. Yesterday we really went through with a fine toothed comb. Its an old house so of course there are problems but theres one that sort of scares me. At the front of the house theres one sill beam thats rotted pretty bad. The owners have allowed dirt to get pushed up against the house so water has gotten against that beam. Its not broken yet but it would definately want to be replaced. I don't *think* it would be a big deal, its accessable from the bottom and the top, I'd figured to clean the dirt away, jack the house just a bit to take pressure off the sill, pull the bad and put in new but.... I've never actually done this sort of thing on a house, all my experience is with camps. Anyway anybody ever replaced rotted sills? -Curt soon to be first time homebuyer
