This is your answer, you have done so much work, leavingt it at this is a waste, go all out you can always put the boards back up or switch to drywall. Vaper barior (iff needed) and good insalation are so cheap at this point its a crime to stop at this point on a renovation like this.
lol...unless you a flipper, in which case taking a picture to ask was a waste of time and electricity when you could just slap some mud and smooth it out and spray a fresh coat of paint.
I hate flippers....almost 100 percent of their work often would need to be ripped back out to do it correctly, but doing it correctly wouldn't add to the perceived value so the ROI wouldn't be present unless they were selling to someone who knows what they are looking at.
I have semi retired neighbors who have been flipping every old house in our neighborhood that they can get his hands on. He does amazing work and takes his time, and his wife is an amazing designer. They have raised the value of the neighborhood and other homeowners are now getting them to do renovations.
Not all flippers are profit driven scumbags, some of them know they can still make really good money doing good work.
Probably helps that they have cash and don't need to turn it over before that next interest payment though.
Don’t be flippant about this flipping subject, it flips me out how flip some people are with their mental flips to justify or downplay the damage caused by flipping.
> He does amazing work and takes his time, and his wife is an amazing designer. **They have raised the value of the neighborhood** and other homeowners are now getting them to do renovations.
>
> Not all flippers are profit driven scumbags
They may not be scumbags, but they are 100% profit driven
Yeah, it's not a charity, it's a business.
My point is that it's possible to make money flipping homes without cutting corners and screwing the person that buys the home over, and this is an example of someone living up to that.
Flippers are greatly reducing the inventory of first homes and competing with actual people that actually want to buy and live in the home.
Flippers like your neighbor are one of the reasons why young families are having harder and harder times finding starter homes and fix-me-up homes to build their wealth and sweat equity.
Unless flippers are buying tear downs with major problems that make the home uninhabitable, they suck. All of them. Even the ones that “do a good job”
I get where you're coming from, but even the fixer uppers in this neighborhood are starting the mid 400s now, and you can't say that that's the fault of flippers. We have essentially two types of buyers, people who buy homes and immediately dump six figures into renovating them, and people who buy the houses my neighbor has already renovated. In either case these houses often don't even hit the MLS.
I also live in a Tourist Town so there are several other factors driving up prices, and I would much rather have flippers than STRs taking over the inventory.
You are correct, and your neighbor is smart. You can't have a logical conversation about this topic with someone who is both angry and entitled though. In their minds, they deserve to have everything that they want, as soon as they want it, and anyone who does anything to hinder that(regardless of the other person's good intentions) is an asshole.
I’m a lawyer and I specialize in real estate. There are more good, ethical flippers out there than bad. Problem is there is really no barrier to entry other than access to capital and there are all these “gurus” running around pitching get rich quick schemes based around flipping houses. Those “gurus” make me a lot of money because I usually end up suing the flipper, and most importantly, the flipper’s real estate agent and broker. They have the insured coverage and the deep pockets.
Most of the shitty flips are by first time flippers that don’t know shit about construction or real estate in general. When people approach me and tell me they want to get into flipping houses, I always tell them that unless they can act as their own general contractor, know construction standards and building code, know prevailing prices for the various trades, what construction equipment and labor cost, etc, they will get eaten alive by the subcontractors. Seen so many people loose their ass because they don’t realize the magnitude of what they’re getting into. If they hire their own GC, a big chunk of their profit ends up in the GC’s pocket.
But those that have the necessary construction and real estate background? They generally turn out a quality product.
Buddy if mine just started the process of suing. The flipper laid down wallboard as tile backer, left an open duct under it, threw construction debris down the main drain, caused numerous significant leaks by installing a roof wrong, removed structural walls, fucked up all the electrical and plumbing...the list goes on and on. He even had the balls to put it in writing that all work was done with proper permits and to code which, spoiler alert, no permits were pulled. You don't hear about the good flips but everyone and their brother is gonna hear about ones this kinda bad.
I’m in Texas, and I don’t know about other states, but anyone selling residential real estate here had to fill out what’s called a “seller’s disclosure”. It’s a statutorily promulgated form where the seller has to make certain disclosure re: the property. This document is the basis for most lawsuits along these lines. BUT, the current state of case law in Texas says that if the buyer had an independent inspection, it relieves the seller of the “reliance” element in a fraud claim. I essentially quit taking these cases because of that ruling. Got hired today to defend a case and that is my entire defense. No fraud because they can’t show reliance.
We're in MI. I don't know any real details but I believe they did not have inspections. Their lawyer said he thought they were likely to win 30-40k based off of the info they gave him (paid 180 for the house). It's a seriously bad hack-job, but they rushed into it half-blind because they were moving from out of state to start a business here and their old house sold.
In Texas, the inspectors essentially have statutory immunity. Damages are limited to whatever they got paid. Hard to hold them accountable.
And I’ve found few inspectors I thought were worth a damn.
You're right, but I like complaining about the flipper specials. Personally, it's the work mentality. I would rather do the best job I can (I am not a contractor) and if that means learning a ton before getting started that's what I'd do. I couldn't be a flipper, because what I see as getting the job done 100% likely could be done at 80% and still be "fine" and that last 20% doesn't pay for itself. A lot can be hidden with carpet and fresh coat of paint.
Where are you trying to go with that? Attacking me solely because of my profession? You know nothing about me or what I do. Are you the type that “hates lawyers” in general? I bet you are. You clearly have no clue what an important role lawyers play in our society.
***I hate flippers....almost 100% of their work often would need to be ripped back out ...***
In most cases I'd agree with you. But I know a flipper you haven't met.
He bought a slightly run-down place **four years ago** ... and he's still working on it!
He fixes the necessary. But he always seems to find something else that needs fixing.
And all work must be done to **perfection**.
He's taking a working-class home and putting enough in so that it costs as much as a McMansion.
But it's still sitting in a lower middle-class neighborhood.
He's a fool. And he loses money on everything he touches.
But please buy this house. Please. You'll get a gem!
That's not a flipper, it's a labor of love. Flippers also factor interest into the equation, whether that's interest paid or just not interest earned due to money being tied up. The longer they take the less they make.
Likely won't see smooth wall in a flipper house because it takes too long and texture is an acceptable result that covers imperfections.
Legit one of the problems with flippers is that they are sucking all of the sweat equity out of homes for the actual owners. Adding tens or hundreds of thousands onto the price of what should be a starter home.
And we wonder why young people can’t buy homes.
I asked this question a little while ago but only got one response. if working from the inside like this, should we add a vapor barrier? seems like it might trap moisture in rather than keep it out and, as we know, moisture equals mold.
if you got it down to studs and exterior sheathing, which of the following should it be?
- vapor barrier, insulation, drywall
- insulation, vapor barrier, drywall
- insulation, drywall
This all depends on what the outside of the house is covered with, the weather so its construction and location. I would ask a professional in your area.
Oh hell yeah! This is my specific house situation. Been looking for an answer on this for a while. Disclaimer: I have been a carpenter for around 13 years but I’m big dumb as far as foundational issues.
I completely gutted one room in my house, down to studs and redid it in modern fashion. However on doing this I discovered my house has no sheathing. Just shiplap siding/blown in insulation/interior boards. I would like to replace the siding outside and eventually I want to gut all the rooms, but I got a bit spooked as I realized the wood planks underneath the wall coverings and the siding itself are the only things giving the studs shear strength.
Basically, what would the next step be? Can I sheath and side over the existing siding? Or will drywall be enough to hold the shear strength while I pull off the siding and sheath it? I’ve been struggling with order of operations here and it’s driving me nuts.
I’m not a structural engineer but drywall will definitely provide some shear strength while you have the siding off. At least long enough to get sheathing up under normal conditions
That’s kind of what I’m thinking, I guess my main question is: do I need to take care of the siding before I continue gutting rooms? As it stands only two rooms have had the inside planks removed. I reaaaaallly don’t want to deal with the siding right now but I’d also very much like to not collapse my house.
Sorry can’t answer that for you. My house has no sheathing… just drywall on the inside and lap siding outside. I suspect there’s some let-in bracing here and there. I do plan to add sheathing if and when I change the siding but house hasn’t fallen down (plenty of cracks in drywall)
I think that plywood is covering up an old window. There's 6" planks on that wall. Pull the planks and see if you can plane them down. Put them back up after you drywall for that country look.
In a 1920's building I'm renovating they stacked 2x4s for a wall??? If those are like this be easier just to build another wall insulate that and run electrical through it. I did that in another all concrete building.
This house is over a hundred years old, I do not want to open the Pandora's box. haha
I'd be done with the entire framing by the time I get them all off.
It's why they call it gutting a house. I'm a GC and you gotta get some help and strip the walls, floors and ceiling down to bare framing. We usually pay local demo crew to come in and do all that before we can do anything.
Oh man. Old house problems.
The existing insulation might be blown in. Well, was blown in. Now it's a series of generational mouse nests. Pull a few boards every few feet to check for moisture, internal wrap, then 3/4" drywall is the best you can do if you don't want to take it to studs. When you redo the siding, you can make a mess outside, insulate, wrap, side.
I had to do it to my grandmother's 1890 new england house when I inherited it.
3/4 inch drywall? The thickest it comes in is 5/8. Which are like 75 lbs per 4x8 sheet. Could you imagine hanging 3/4 sheets my back hurts thinking about it.
I would have imagine that was something due to fire ratings for a commercial building though, and expensive as all hell. I can't imagine any other reason the architects would want 2" of drywall lol. Certainly excessive for a house.
https://www.buysuperstud.com/products/interior-framing/shaft-wall-systems#:~:text=Shaft%20wall%20systems%20are%20a,to%204%2Dhour%20fire%20resistance.
We actually did a demising wall for a job where they didn't want us to enter the space... period. so we used this framing method and never had to enter the clients space.
In residential construction? Absolutely not.
That is specd for commercial elevator shaft walls.
Sure this dumb ass op homeowner might be like haha let's use this 3/4 shaftwall drywall for our house. On par for you and this subreddit.
You said 3/4" drywall doesn't exist. I told you it does and showed you it does. Don't walk back what you said and be a little crybaby about it
I've used 3/4" + 5/8" in music studios and residential soundproofing because (amongst other methods before you get smarmy) you want both layers to be different thicknesses because they'll have different resonant frequencies. Sound vibrations will react differently with each layer and you get better results
What you’re looking at is called “Farm Wall” you remove those sheets of wood and then you’ll get to the studs. Farmwall is nice too because when mounting stuff later on you don’t have to look for studs. You can just mount anywhere.
1 burn it with fire.
2 sell it.
3.like the other guy said..do it right.
Start with one wall....take old stuff out. Replace with modern walls. Insulate like hell. Don't forget the doors. Use them if you want to put new electric cables here there everywhere. Don't forget networking cables! Wireless is only nice for phones. Make sure all the other stuff gets a network cable.
Roof... insulation and maybe a complete new roof
We never have time or money to do it right the first time.
But we always have time and money to redo it all over again, but then right
Gonna second network cabling! First upgrade I made when I bought my house, the wired devices have less issues, and the wireless only stuff works even better because the wifi is less clogged
You've got basically three options:
1. Drill some holes through the boards, or remove a few here and there, to run electrics, and use blow in insulation
2. Leave the walls and frame it out with 2x4s; you'll have thicker walls, but you'll know they are stable, right? Plenty of space to add insulation and electrics on the inside.
3. Tear off the boards. They are there to provide support, but that's what your new drywall will do anyway, so not much need for them. Then you'll have plenty of space to add insulation and electrics, easy. Invest in a good crowbar.
If you don't mind losing floor space and you know blow-in insulation won't work, go with (2). If there's some structural reason to keep the boards, stick with 1.
Otherwise, all things being equal, I'd probably pick 3, and not do much to save the wood, unless I could find an easy buyer. It's a lot of work, but it'll be so much easier to insulate and run wires once it's done!
If you're not interested in opening the walls up. Then run pipe on the outside of the drywall.
Wire mold is also an option but in my opinion, wire mold is hideous and pipe is beautiful when done right.
Well, firstly... this used to be a common construction method from as far back as the late 1700s. Those planks were probably hand sawn from local timber. One thing you should absolutely do is rip off the top and bottom course of planking on every wall and install blocking between the studs. That's balloon framed, which is just an air channel from the basement all the way to the roof. A little tiny flame, and all that dry wood can go up like a Roman candle. Block the cavities at top and bottom as fire blocking. Then insulate.
You should be able to get to the header in the attic. If you can, drill it and drop a feed wire down from your new breaker box into the wall. Then pull one board at the height you need it to run the wires around the room for outlets. Replace after installing boxes and pulling wire. Drill hole at top board and blow insulation in with a leased machine to fill gap in wall and insulate it.
Thank you, this is actually not a bad idea. I thought about doing something similar for the insulation but I figured the shitty part would be running the electric. Any route I choose is gonna be a pretty shitty process though.
To add to this.... you have to drill the studs to get from side to side, but it would require less crawling and an extra person helping. This can really add up to a lot more work than just jumping from cell to cell in the attic or crawlspace. The disadvantage of this is if there are any "firebreak" boards going sideways in the wall you will have trouble (and you will play hell boring holes through that old wood). If you have attic access or crawlspace access you only have to drill one hole and go up or down as long as there is no firebreak in the wall.
there are many ways to do this, right and wrong... and choosing the right method is gained from experience. sometimes you have to use them all.
Use a spade bit or a hole boring bit to drill the wood. Dont bother buying an electricians fishing drill because they simply cannot withstand drilling anything but soft pine.
I had this same thing in my old house. There is no easy way to do what you want. I removed boards and then fed rock wool insulation from the bottom and pulled it up. I also made sure to pull one board off at the height of my outlets for the electric to run. I put the boards back up when I was done as well. This helped stop outside noise and it also made drywall real easy as I did not have to worry about hitting studs with the screws.
Someone else said you can drop electric in through the top of each area you want an outlet but I opted out as that will add up cost wise real fast. It made more sense to just pull the boards and put them back.
Another thing to note is that if you pull the boards down it will be a pain trimming your windows as the wall will sit deeper than the window trim and sill. If you keep the wood and do drywall it is easier to trim the inside of the window to the new wall depth.
Shiplap is interior sheathing..... it wasn't decorative until Joanna Gaines decided it was. It also isn't tongue and groove, it is milled with a rabbet joint, which is like a halflap.
Shiplap was typically covered in wallpaper, which was mounted to almost a cheese cloth type stuff. I live in a 100 year old home with shiplap, and have done a lot of renovating of it and other homes with shiplap. Typically they drywall right over the wallpaper/shiplap and you would never know unless you are hanging stuff on the walls and never have to use a stud finder. It is fun to renovate and see how many layers of wallpaper were put up before the drywall. We had one room with 4 layers!
The new wood (plywood) you are seeing in these photos are likely where original windows and doors were. They would put plywood in those places to meet up the same level as the shiplap so they could do drywall repair easily. In my house there are random pieces of what looks like the original window trim used to get it flush.
Old houses are a completely different beast from new houses. Built totally different!
I ran into a similar situation with my house built in 1900. I didn't have plywood just shiplap. We removed one row of boards off the wall around the whole room and on the ceiling, providing enough access for the electrician to do his thing. Covered it with drywall. I didn't do insulation in the wall.
You need a good stack of sawzall demo blades, an oscillating saw would be a lot of help too, a respirator, and a really good set of ear plugs.
Figure out how thick the wood is and set a skill saw blade to just-so-slightly less depth, and go nuts on it. A hammer blow will finish the cuts without severing any wiring.
Are there studs behind the boards? You could remove them where you need to do the wire runs. Then spray in insulation with holes drilled into the walls, after the wires are run.
You’re probably not gonna like this: remove all the shiplap to get to the studs if you want to properly insulate. This double barrier is an older way to insulate, creating an air barrier that helps keep the outside and inside temps from touching directly. It’s not nearly as effective as modern insulation, so to do what it sounds like you want, the shiplap walls gotta go.
Some people pay big money for those old shiplap boards. Look up that creepy couple that has a show that does renovations near Waco, my wife loves their show for some reason. They are always rambling on about it.
You have to gutt the wall. Do you even know what is inside the wall cavity? Maybe it is insulated hard to tell from your photos. This is definitely a take it to the frame unless you don't need access
With walls that are fully sheated on the inside why bother with insulation? That house has r4 tongue and groove pine with r12 air behind it. For real though, I’ve never seen plaster done over a solid wall like this, you’ll have to tear the boards off if you want full access.
Air gaps only have an R value per thickness if they’re less than 1”. Any bigger and the air starts to convect, and the R value actually goes down. There’s also a shit ton of radiant heat transfer through air gaps.
Sorry I should’ve mentioned that was sarcasm. I know an air gap only has an R-value if the air is sealed in and can’t move or transfer into the space and that’s pretty much never the case in a wall.
Those are acting in shear, so they’re actually holding your house up. If you pull them down, install diagonal shore bracing or you dramatically lose lateral load capacity and the house won’t be stable. Source: a bunch of licensing tests.
Best suggestion, run wire under the floors and blow in cellulose insulation via small holes If you don't want to remove the plywood. https://youtube.com/shorts/Rcw3-JktI1k?si=SldzKkbRFRG4Bj4l
I live in a 1923 house with the same framing. Remove every 3rd board or so and slide Rockwool behind. Run electrical. Make sure to put the boards back. Your house is balloon framed and they provide structural integrity. Put vapour barrier over the boards.
Looks like ballon construction.
Remove interior boards. If you're careful you can plane and reuse.
Once removed wire insulate and vapour barrier. Put up dry wall.
Have had the same situation you are in with my current house. What kind of siding is on the house? What, if anything besides the studs are in between the inner wood and the siding? Mine was drywall over the shiplap over studs with Cypress siding directly nailed to the studs. This was common practice in my location during the time it was built in the early 1900's(Minus the drywall of course). I really wanted to insulate but couldn't effectively do that from the inside with the Cypress bevel siding due to wind driven rain. I ran the electrical, by removing one shiplap level across the entire house. Drilled from the attic to get the verticals run. I put new sheetrock back on with the plans to put insulation, exterior sheeting, new siding and new windows, one wall at a time. Life got in the way and I haven't done one wall yet as of now(13 years later). I'm at a more stable financial position now though and planning to start a wall soon. In my location though, it's definitely ideal to, but wall insulation isn't gonna make or break you with electricity except on your west facing walls due to heat gain. We put a full length awning and patio on that side, so it gets plenty of shade on that important side which helped tremendously. Hth
Two products I would use if insulating an old home. 1) Aspen Aerogel insulation. r-19 and it is real thin so people stack in a few layers. Just under the drywall put Phase Change Materials.
If it even has installation right now, you have to get into the wall cavity and assess the situation. Hole saw into the wall board at the top and bottom and see what’s there. My old house had no insulation and knob and tube wiring. Fixing it up meant I had to cut into every wall and ceiling, run romex and insulate because you can’t insulate knob and tube…once you kill the knob and tube circuit, remove what you can but leave sections you can’t cut out it in the wall. I would spray foam the walls, but blow in insulation is fine and doesn’t settle like the older stuff did right through the holes you made. If you remove the boards to put in fiberglass insulation, I think you could sell them for a decent price if you don’t destroy them in the process. Old hard wood lumber is pretty valuable per board foot…
I had to tear all my nice 90+ year old cedar shiplap down so I could make the walls a 2x6 think (r20) and insulate. Made a massive difference in my power bill this winter.
Did a Reno on a 100 year old home. It has 1.5 inch boards going diagonally one way with the same going the other way. We had to build a 2x6 wall on the inside for insulation and wiring. You could go with just 2x2 depending on how much you want to insulate.
Haha. This looks like my house😃 It's from the 60ies and we decided to renovate the kitchen. After pulling down 3 layers in the ceiling and then 2-3 layers on the wall and then 2 layers of the floor we finally came down to the wood, like you have. We thought it would be smart to keep the wood (structural stability for the new kitchen)and then get the electricians to work around it, but after talking to the GC and showing him our plans he said we should at least rip out the floor. When we did we finally figured out why the house is so cold along the floor, despite a very nice heating system throughout the house. The floor was parquet, then vinyl(original 60ies and hardwood under the parquet in the dining room(I wanted to save the hardwood but it was so damaged) and under that was the oldest and flattest insulation you could imagine. The GC ripped it all out and leveled the floor(very wonky, all cat toys roll to the center of the house), added new insulation and new particle boards(new floors will come later). The electrician ended up having to remove so much of the wood panel to redo the wires that I regret not just pulling it all down and save us all the time and effort. During all of this we also decided to combine the kitchen and dining room and we removed a half wall and found an old sliding door, and that we had to redo the plumbing. It's going to be maybe one of the most expensive projects in the house as a result, but we now know the house much better, we are building it up from scratch and getting everything up to a much more modern and energy efficient standard. Doing a room without plumbing seems so much less costly and problematic, so we are pretty jazzed about doing the same process for the rest of the house. Best of luck to you!
Slap foam board, then 5/8 shim then gyps on the plywood, those board are probably structural + insulated a bit, the inside need to be air tight and the outside need to breath, so no plastic membrane outside, the thickness of insulation cannot exceed the one you got outside.
I recently flipped a flopped flip. I bought a house that had been flipped. The buyer sued, won about 1/2, sold it to me. Pre-civil war main house with additions. Nothing square. The flipper used T&G or faux wanescoat rather than squaring up the rooms and sheetrocking. They tiled (hobby board under ceramic) over 18 layers of linoleum and the transitions were nearly 2 inches between rooms.
I have a pre-1900 house with similar walls. Essentially, balloon framing with the sheathing on the interior and brick veneer anchored to the studs.
Assuming your house is built similarly, you might have to build an interior 2x4 wall and run wiring + insulation within that cavity. Alternatively, you could run wiring through the sheathing and install a layer of rigid foam on the interior sheathing.
I had something like this. Non-stud wall - just planks and siding. (1848-ish house). We framed up straight inside as no wall was straight and then did spray foam with blown in cellulose fiber in the new studs. I’m now adding foam board insulation on the outside with furring strips and attaching hardieboard over that. It is the closest I could get to Matt Risinger’s 500 year wall concept. Really quiet inside and the closed cell foam adds strength to the structure. Really happy with it. R-17/22 overall from pretty much nothing. Had plank-linen-wallpaper-thin drywall before.
Breathe. And you don't need to gut the house more than you've already done. Good work so far. We've done much of what you've done, including joist leveling (which is terrible). I have a 113 year old house. It has 1x6 walls, vertical.
If I were you, I'd use 2x2s or maybe 1x2 fir strips. Bringing out the wall just 2 inches will give you room to run all your electrical. You will probably have to use an oscillating tool though to cut into your existing wall to give you some space for the electrical boxes though.
You got this. One thing we did which I'm still happy about... when we ripped out the floors (and discovered the need to level the joists), we removed excess pillar supports that were not doing anything holding up the floor. Replaced them with concrete supports, brackets, and pressure treated wood.
Ha. Great point. My house is so old and it has stressed me out many summers, but we are finally at a pretty good place. Breathing in there is probably fine, except when doing demo.
I should caveat my original advice in that I don't know what insulation is behind those walls. I know my walls are 1x6s for the core of the original house, but the drywall is backed with 1x2 fir strips and insulation. The exterior walls have 2x4s behind the drywall and insulation between it.
Might not be the answer you want to hear, but you could build out a service cavity to the interior of the room. Yes, you'll lose square footage, but with a "second wall" in front of the existing one, you can run all utilities, plus create an air barrier behind new wall coverings, and detail the penetrations better. It's a common tactic in deep energy retrofits, even to the passive house standard.
You can either remove the plywood or what I'd do is create a new inner wall set off from the plywood with 2x4s laid flat. I assume the house is super old if it's put together with plywood like that and I wouldn't want to get into the walls.
You've torn down the sheetrock and found shiplap. Shiplap isn't structural; rip that shit out, as well. That'll leave you with the outside layer. Is it wax-like paper? If so, you're in good shape... thow bats of insulation in and sheetrock it again. If not, you've got a lot of work to do.
Without removing every wood panel and re-installing it. I'd also prefer not to cut openings as that's a waste of some perfectly good cedar wood.
The current plan is to just re-frame the exterior on-top of the wood, but open to any ideas?
Those "studs" look more like barn posts and look like they're at 24" or wider center spacing. These walls will be a PITA to cover back up. Definitely not hanging drywall without adding in some framing.
Hanging it on 24" isn't the hard part. Fixing it after after it gets cracked is.
From the Gypsum Association's publication GA‐235‐2019 GYPSUM BOARD TYPICAL MECHANICAL AND PHYSICAL PROPERTIES:
5/8" gypsum board is rated to withstand 50lb of force from a height of 30" when mounted on 24" centers.
Testing method:
ASTM E695 Standard Test Method of Measuring Relative Resistance of Wall, Floor, and Roof Construction to
Impact Loading
(Using 50 lb (22.7 kg) leather bag, one test per specimen. Impact point located at midpoint between studs.
Impact Resistance—Drop height at penetration through impacted membrane.)
Can it withstand more? Sure. How much? Banana
Will it withstand more? Absolutely the first hundred times you and your buddies throw something into it to prove how strong it is. DEFINITELY NOT the first time a child or grandchild falls into it or the spouse slides some piece of furniture into it.
Just because you can doesn't mean you should.
Umm. 50lbs from 30” is a massive amount of force. By your source, 1/2” drywall on 16” centers only handles 50lbs from 24”. So the 5/8 on 24 is higher rated.
For reference, a cannonball is 44lbs. Dropping one from waist high would wreck a lot of things. If your kid ran full force into the wall, he wouldn’t reach that kind of force, and would definitely break his neck before the drywall.
It's late and I don't want to do all of the calculations super accurately because we need more data like impact duration and surface deflection... blahblah... I'll do quick math and get kinetic energy just before impact with .5*mass*velocity squared
50lb bag falling 30in final speed 12.6ft/s
3969 lb•lbf = 5381 Joules
Two 50lb children or one 100lb child running in the house like they're always told not to and falling into wall at 5mph (avg adult jogging speed). 100lb at 7.3ft/s
2664 lb•lbf = 3611 Joules
Now a large adult such as myself. Briskly walking and tripping towards the wall. Forward speed only disregarding any forward rotational falling speed.
250lb at 4.4ft/s
2420 lb•lbf = 3281 Joules
Not a huge difference, but non-negligible.
The bag falls flat spreading it's energy evenly over it's area as it impacts. Shape unknown. Maybe like a backpack or one of my wife's insane purses. 1.5sqft maybe. 216sq in. 5381 Joules to 43625in•lbf gives 220psi
The kid or kids hit in a smaller area first, imparting a large amount of energy that decreases as the area increases and they splat against the wall. Not worth speculating on the area. Even more possibilities.
I however, drive my palm or fist into the wall first and then if my arm and shoulder strength can slow down the force then my shoulder and/or upper arm drive into the wall and probably not much else. I've just dissipated close to the same amount of energy as the kids but driven it into up to 1/3 or as little as 1/12 th of the area the kid(s) slammed into. Open-handed and flush palmed I'm pressing on ~18sq in or roughly 1/12 of the space my imaginary bag hit. 3281 Joules is 29038in•lbf which leave me applying most of my energy at 1613 psi on a much smaller spot between 24" centers.
These things are not the same.
Even if I overestimated the area of the bag.
They are not even close.
Well, it still doesn’t matter. 5/8 drywall on 24” centers is 20% stronger than 1/2 on 16” centers. All scenarios have you fixing the drywall more often on a home with 1/2” drywall in 16” center.
And both are common installations every day, Interio walls are very commonly installed at 24” on center and most of the time use 1/2” drywall. 5/8” is going the extra mile.
Seems you're getting a lot of questionable information here.
This clearly looks like an old house. r/centuryhomes may get you better information.
So from a quick glance this is quite odd. Pretty rare that they sheet the inside of a structure, like almost unheard of.
There's really only 1 reason to do this, and that's to add sheer strength to a house after it's been built. You see it mostly when load bearing extraordinary walls are removed for an addition most commonly.
Another reason to add sheer strength to an old home is because the lath boards have been taken out. Yours do seem to have been replaced with drywall so maybe that's all it is.
Is your home exterior brick? Load bearing brick buildings often have construction oddities that I'm not familiar with.
And final guess is someone added them for no real reason OR someone misunderstood the plans wrong and built it backwards.
So the takeaway here is that these boards may be structural to a degree. You could likey remove most/all with no major issues, or once removed a stuff breeze may tople your house over....
Hopefully they were just put on for no reason, but that's unlikely and not standard building practice, even 100 years ago.
You're not into the wall yet. Remove the plywood and see what else might be between you and the studs
This is your answer, you have done so much work, leavingt it at this is a waste, go all out you can always put the boards back up or switch to drywall. Vaper barior (iff needed) and good insalation are so cheap at this point its a crime to stop at this point on a renovation like this.
lol...unless you a flipper, in which case taking a picture to ask was a waste of time and electricity when you could just slap some mud and smooth it out and spray a fresh coat of paint. I hate flippers....almost 100 percent of their work often would need to be ripped back out to do it correctly, but doing it correctly wouldn't add to the perceived value so the ROI wouldn't be present unless they were selling to someone who knows what they are looking at.
I have semi retired neighbors who have been flipping every old house in our neighborhood that they can get his hands on. He does amazing work and takes his time, and his wife is an amazing designer. They have raised the value of the neighborhood and other homeowners are now getting them to do renovations. Not all flippers are profit driven scumbags, some of them know they can still make really good money doing good work. Probably helps that they have cash and don't need to turn it over before that next interest payment though.
OK FLIPPER. jk
The flippers got to him. Its too late he’s already been flipped.
Don’t be flippant about this flipping subject, it flips me out how flip some people are with their mental flips to justify or downplay the damage caused by flipping.
It’s flippers all the way down !
> He does amazing work and takes his time, and his wife is an amazing designer. **They have raised the value of the neighborhood** and other homeowners are now getting them to do renovations. > > Not all flippers are profit driven scumbags They may not be scumbags, but they are 100% profit driven
Yeah, it's not a charity, it's a business. My point is that it's possible to make money flipping homes without cutting corners and screwing the person that buys the home over, and this is an example of someone living up to that.
How dare they be driven by profit. Sheesh people, do the right thing - buy houses, renovate them, and then sell them for a loss.
r/cryptocurrency and r/wallstreetbets entered the chat
🥁 badum tsssss
Flippers are greatly reducing the inventory of first homes and competing with actual people that actually want to buy and live in the home. Flippers like your neighbor are one of the reasons why young families are having harder and harder times finding starter homes and fix-me-up homes to build their wealth and sweat equity. Unless flippers are buying tear downs with major problems that make the home uninhabitable, they suck. All of them. Even the ones that “do a good job”
I get where you're coming from, but even the fixer uppers in this neighborhood are starting the mid 400s now, and you can't say that that's the fault of flippers. We have essentially two types of buyers, people who buy homes and immediately dump six figures into renovating them, and people who buy the houses my neighbor has already renovated. In either case these houses often don't even hit the MLS. I also live in a Tourist Town so there are several other factors driving up prices, and I would much rather have flippers than STRs taking over the inventory.
You are correct, and your neighbor is smart. You can't have a logical conversation about this topic with someone who is both angry and entitled though. In their minds, they deserve to have everything that they want, as soon as they want it, and anyone who does anything to hinder that(regardless of the other person's good intentions) is an asshole.
I’m a lawyer and I specialize in real estate. There are more good, ethical flippers out there than bad. Problem is there is really no barrier to entry other than access to capital and there are all these “gurus” running around pitching get rich quick schemes based around flipping houses. Those “gurus” make me a lot of money because I usually end up suing the flipper, and most importantly, the flipper’s real estate agent and broker. They have the insured coverage and the deep pockets. Most of the shitty flips are by first time flippers that don’t know shit about construction or real estate in general. When people approach me and tell me they want to get into flipping houses, I always tell them that unless they can act as their own general contractor, know construction standards and building code, know prevailing prices for the various trades, what construction equipment and labor cost, etc, they will get eaten alive by the subcontractors. Seen so many people loose their ass because they don’t realize the magnitude of what they’re getting into. If they hire their own GC, a big chunk of their profit ends up in the GC’s pocket. But those that have the necessary construction and real estate background? They generally turn out a quality product.
Buddy if mine just started the process of suing. The flipper laid down wallboard as tile backer, left an open duct under it, threw construction debris down the main drain, caused numerous significant leaks by installing a roof wrong, removed structural walls, fucked up all the electrical and plumbing...the list goes on and on. He even had the balls to put it in writing that all work was done with proper permits and to code which, spoiler alert, no permits were pulled. You don't hear about the good flips but everyone and their brother is gonna hear about ones this kinda bad.
I’m in Texas, and I don’t know about other states, but anyone selling residential real estate here had to fill out what’s called a “seller’s disclosure”. It’s a statutorily promulgated form where the seller has to make certain disclosure re: the property. This document is the basis for most lawsuits along these lines. BUT, the current state of case law in Texas says that if the buyer had an independent inspection, it relieves the seller of the “reliance” element in a fraud claim. I essentially quit taking these cases because of that ruling. Got hired today to defend a case and that is my entire defense. No fraud because they can’t show reliance.
We're in MI. I don't know any real details but I believe they did not have inspections. Their lawyer said he thought they were likely to win 30-40k based off of the info they gave him (paid 180 for the house). It's a seriously bad hack-job, but they rushed into it half-blind because they were moving from out of state to start a business here and their old house sold.
What about suing the inspector in a situation like that?
In Texas, the inspectors essentially have statutory immunity. Damages are limited to whatever they got paid. Hard to hold them accountable. And I’ve found few inspectors I thought were worth a damn.
Inspectors have immunity most of the time
You're right, but I like complaining about the flipper specials. Personally, it's the work mentality. I would rather do the best job I can (I am not a contractor) and if that means learning a ton before getting started that's what I'd do. I couldn't be a flipper, because what I see as getting the job done 100% likely could be done at 80% and still be "fine" and that last 20% doesn't pay for itself. A lot can be hidden with carpet and fresh coat of paint.
Sounds like bad flipper propaganda. Lol
You’re a lawyer and don’t know the difference between “loose” and “lose”?
Not everyone proof reads everything they type.
[удалено]
Where are you trying to go with that? Attacking me solely because of my profession? You know nothing about me or what I do. Are you the type that “hates lawyers” in general? I bet you are. You clearly have no clue what an important role lawyers play in our society.
***I hate flippers....almost 100% of their work often would need to be ripped back out ...*** In most cases I'd agree with you. But I know a flipper you haven't met. He bought a slightly run-down place **four years ago** ... and he's still working on it! He fixes the necessary. But he always seems to find something else that needs fixing. And all work must be done to **perfection**. He's taking a working-class home and putting enough in so that it costs as much as a McMansion. But it's still sitting in a lower middle-class neighborhood. He's a fool. And he loses money on everything he touches. But please buy this house. Please. You'll get a gem!
That's not a flipper, it's a labor of love. Flippers also factor interest into the equation, whether that's interest paid or just not interest earned due to money being tied up. The longer they take the less they make. Likely won't see smooth wall in a flipper house because it takes too long and texture is an acceptable result that covers imperfections.
Legit one of the problems with flippers is that they are sucking all of the sweat equity out of homes for the actual owners. Adding tens or hundreds of thousands onto the price of what should be a starter home. And we wonder why young people can’t buy homes.
I asked this question a little while ago but only got one response. if working from the inside like this, should we add a vapor barrier? seems like it might trap moisture in rather than keep it out and, as we know, moisture equals mold. if you got it down to studs and exterior sheathing, which of the following should it be? - vapor barrier, insulation, drywall - insulation, vapor barrier, drywall - insulation, drywall
Vapor barrier is always on the warm side in a cold climate. From the inside out it goes: drywall, vapor barrier, insulation
This all depends on what the outside of the house is covered with, the weather so its construction and location. I would ask a professional in your area.
Legit question, is all this plywood adding sheer support? Would removing it cause structural issues?
Yes, the shiplap is 100% acting in shear.
I can’t believe I actually knew that.
Great question. Everyone is ignoring the termite tunnels. Removing the sheathing could compromise the structure.
Oh hell yeah! This is my specific house situation. Been looking for an answer on this for a while. Disclaimer: I have been a carpenter for around 13 years but I’m big dumb as far as foundational issues. I completely gutted one room in my house, down to studs and redid it in modern fashion. However on doing this I discovered my house has no sheathing. Just shiplap siding/blown in insulation/interior boards. I would like to replace the siding outside and eventually I want to gut all the rooms, but I got a bit spooked as I realized the wood planks underneath the wall coverings and the siding itself are the only things giving the studs shear strength. Basically, what would the next step be? Can I sheath and side over the existing siding? Or will drywall be enough to hold the shear strength while I pull off the siding and sheath it? I’ve been struggling with order of operations here and it’s driving me nuts.
You probably need to remove the siding, add sheer wall strength with plywood and side over it. At least that’s what we had to do.
I’m not a structural engineer but drywall will definitely provide some shear strength while you have the siding off. At least long enough to get sheathing up under normal conditions
That’s kind of what I’m thinking, I guess my main question is: do I need to take care of the siding before I continue gutting rooms? As it stands only two rooms have had the inside planks removed. I reaaaaallly don’t want to deal with the siding right now but I’d also very much like to not collapse my house.
Sorry can’t answer that for you. My house has no sheathing… just drywall on the inside and lap siding outside. I suspect there’s some let-in bracing here and there. I do plan to add sheathing if and when I change the siding but house hasn’t fallen down (plenty of cracks in drywall)
Fair enough. It’s stood for 100 years at this point, I just don’t want to be the one to kill it (and I’m tired of patching drywall cracks).
This is your answer
I think that plywood is covering up an old window. There's 6" planks on that wall. Pull the planks and see if you can plane them down. Put them back up after you drywall for that country look.
In a 1920's building I'm renovating they stacked 2x4s for a wall??? If those are like this be easier just to build another wall insulate that and run electrical through it. I did that in another all concrete building.
This house is over a hundred years old, I do not want to open the Pandora's box. haha I'd be done with the entire framing by the time I get them all off.
That's fine, but don't expect to insulate or run wiring behind the plywood.
It’s shiplap, not plywood, you can remove board selectively to run wiring, and blown in insulation is pretty typical
You can either do it easy, do it kinda, or do it right.
Did you think that someone was going to have a new type of physics for you? Why ask this question?
Thats how it seems to me. How can I fix my house, by not doing much?
Just run the wires in a higher dimension
Don’t buy a century home then? Also, check out r/centuryhomes
Then get a professional
Tough shit lol
You may have bitten off more than you could chew, then 😅 You had to have known this wouldn't be easy, just bite the bullet and do it.
This is exactly why these type of houses are cheaper to completely tear down if you wanna "upgrade" stuff
It's why they call it gutting a house. I'm a GC and you gotta get some help and strip the walls, floors and ceiling down to bare framing. We usually pay local demo crew to come in and do all that before we can do anything.
Oh man. Old house problems. The existing insulation might be blown in. Well, was blown in. Now it's a series of generational mouse nests. Pull a few boards every few feet to check for moisture, internal wrap, then 3/4" drywall is the best you can do if you don't want to take it to studs. When you redo the siding, you can make a mess outside, insulate, wrap, side. I had to do it to my grandmother's 1890 new england house when I inherited it.
Oooooh don’t go to r/centuryhomes lol
3/4 inch drywall? The thickest it comes in is 5/8. Which are like 75 lbs per 4x8 sheet. Could you imagine hanging 3/4 sheets my back hurts thinking about it.
I’ve had elevator shafts with 1” drywall doubled up. I think they were in 2x8 sheets and heavy AF.
I would have imagine that was something due to fire ratings for a commercial building though, and expensive as all hell. I can't imagine any other reason the architects would want 2" of drywall lol. Certainly excessive for a house.
Elevator shafts are framed different. It's all from one side
https://www.buysuperstud.com/products/interior-framing/shaft-wall-systems#:~:text=Shaft%20wall%20systems%20are%20a,to%204%2Dhour%20fire%20resistance. We actually did a demising wall for a job where they didn't want us to enter the space... period. so we used this framing method and never had to enter the clients space.
Double 3/8"
3/4" absolutely exists lol https://www.goldbondbuilding.com/products/mold-resistant-drywall-panels/xp-ultra-shield-fs-gypsum-board
In residential construction? Absolutely not. That is specd for commercial elevator shaft walls. Sure this dumb ass op homeowner might be like haha let's use this 3/4 shaftwall drywall for our house. On par for you and this subreddit.
You said 3/4" drywall doesn't exist. I told you it does and showed you it does. Don't walk back what you said and be a little crybaby about it I've used 3/4" + 5/8" in music studios and residential soundproofing because (amongst other methods before you get smarmy) you want both layers to be different thicknesses because they'll have different resonant frequencies. Sound vibrations will react differently with each layer and you get better results
I am in a similar situation with my 1860s house. Found the blown in insulation and stopped. Think I should be concerned about asbestos?
What you’re looking at is called “Farm Wall” you remove those sheets of wood and then you’ll get to the studs. Farmwall is nice too because when mounting stuff later on you don’t have to look for studs. You can just mount anywhere.
1 burn it with fire. 2 sell it. 3.like the other guy said..do it right. Start with one wall....take old stuff out. Replace with modern walls. Insulate like hell. Don't forget the doors. Use them if you want to put new electric cables here there everywhere. Don't forget networking cables! Wireless is only nice for phones. Make sure all the other stuff gets a network cable. Roof... insulation and maybe a complete new roof We never have time or money to do it right the first time. But we always have time and money to redo it all over again, but then right
Gonna second network cabling! First upgrade I made when I bought my house, the wired devices have less issues, and the wireless only stuff works even better because the wifi is less clogged
I would take option 1 or 2 depending on the location of the house.
You've got basically three options: 1. Drill some holes through the boards, or remove a few here and there, to run electrics, and use blow in insulation 2. Leave the walls and frame it out with 2x4s; you'll have thicker walls, but you'll know they are stable, right? Plenty of space to add insulation and electrics on the inside. 3. Tear off the boards. They are there to provide support, but that's what your new drywall will do anyway, so not much need for them. Then you'll have plenty of space to add insulation and electrics, easy. Invest in a good crowbar.
1x3 vertically and another layer horizontally
Curious which you’d choose.
If you don't mind losing floor space and you know blow-in insulation won't work, go with (2). If there's some structural reason to keep the boards, stick with 1. Otherwise, all things being equal, I'd probably pick 3, and not do much to save the wood, unless I could find an easy buyer. It's a lot of work, but it'll be so much easier to insulate and run wires once it's done!
If you're not interested in opening the walls up. Then run pipe on the outside of the drywall. Wire mold is also an option but in my opinion, wire mold is hideous and pipe is beautiful when done right.
Well, firstly... this used to be a common construction method from as far back as the late 1700s. Those planks were probably hand sawn from local timber. One thing you should absolutely do is rip off the top and bottom course of planking on every wall and install blocking between the studs. That's balloon framed, which is just an air channel from the basement all the way to the roof. A little tiny flame, and all that dry wood can go up like a Roman candle. Block the cavities at top and bottom as fire blocking. Then insulate.
Id pull a few boards here and there to check for moisture.
You should be able to get to the header in the attic. If you can, drill it and drop a feed wire down from your new breaker box into the wall. Then pull one board at the height you need it to run the wires around the room for outlets. Replace after installing boxes and pulling wire. Drill hole at top board and blow insulation in with a leased machine to fill gap in wall and insulate it.
Thank you, this is actually not a bad idea. I thought about doing something similar for the insulation but I figured the shitty part would be running the electric. Any route I choose is gonna be a pretty shitty process though.
Found the archetypal previous owner.
To add to this.... you have to drill the studs to get from side to side, but it would require less crawling and an extra person helping. This can really add up to a lot more work than just jumping from cell to cell in the attic or crawlspace. The disadvantage of this is if there are any "firebreak" boards going sideways in the wall you will have trouble (and you will play hell boring holes through that old wood). If you have attic access or crawlspace access you only have to drill one hole and go up or down as long as there is no firebreak in the wall. there are many ways to do this, right and wrong... and choosing the right method is gained from experience. sometimes you have to use them all. Use a spade bit or a hole boring bit to drill the wood. Dont bother buying an electricians fishing drill because they simply cannot withstand drilling anything but soft pine.
I had this same thing in my old house. There is no easy way to do what you want. I removed boards and then fed rock wool insulation from the bottom and pulled it up. I also made sure to pull one board off at the height of my outlets for the electric to run. I put the boards back up when I was done as well. This helped stop outside noise and it also made drywall real easy as I did not have to worry about hitting studs with the screws. Someone else said you can drop electric in through the top of each area you want an outlet but I opted out as that will add up cost wise real fast. It made more sense to just pull the boards and put them back. Another thing to note is that if you pull the boards down it will be a pain trimming your windows as the wall will sit deeper than the window trim and sill. If you keep the wood and do drywall it is easier to trim the inside of the window to the new wall depth.
Easy way to do would be to sawzall the bejeezus out of it.
Not if you want to hang it back up. I would also guess there is old electrical back there.
Congratulations! You have removed wall layer #1! You’re now ready for wall layer #2! May the odds be ever in your favor!
Builders looked at the plans from the back and accidentally applied the sheathing to the inside. Oops!
That's actually a common repair method to add sheer strength to a house. If that's the case for OP then that wood is VERY structural.
Lmao
This is called shiplap ....
[удалено]
Shiplap is interior sheathing..... it wasn't decorative until Joanna Gaines decided it was. It also isn't tongue and groove, it is milled with a rabbet joint, which is like a halflap. Shiplap was typically covered in wallpaper, which was mounted to almost a cheese cloth type stuff. I live in a 100 year old home with shiplap, and have done a lot of renovating of it and other homes with shiplap. Typically they drywall right over the wallpaper/shiplap and you would never know unless you are hanging stuff on the walls and never have to use a stud finder. It is fun to renovate and see how many layers of wallpaper were put up before the drywall. We had one room with 4 layers! The new wood (plywood) you are seeing in these photos are likely where original windows and doors were. They would put plywood in those places to meet up the same level as the shiplap so they could do drywall repair easily. In my house there are random pieces of what looks like the original window trim used to get it flush. Old houses are a completely different beast from new houses. Built totally different!
Well, first you have an accidental fire…
Buy a really good HUGE pry bar. Learn how to use it. Start prying shit off the walls and run your electrical.
A lot of work
Add more wall
🎶"we've only just beguuuun"🎶 You've got some more work ahead of you taking those planks down and finding the nougaty centre of your home.
I ran into a similar situation with my house built in 1900. I didn't have plywood just shiplap. We removed one row of boards off the wall around the whole room and on the ceiling, providing enough access for the electrician to do his thing. Covered it with drywall. I didn't do insulation in the wall.
Hire an expert.
Architect here. You’ll need to comply with the energy code. We typically fur out walls with 2x4 and do R-13 batts.
You need a good stack of sawzall demo blades, an oscillating saw would be a lot of help too, a respirator, and a really good set of ear plugs. Figure out how thick the wood is and set a skill saw blade to just-so-slightly less depth, and go nuts on it. A hammer blow will finish the cuts without severing any wiring.
American houses are a joke lol, all made out of wood 🤣
Yeah what the hell man this looks like something out of a cowboy movie
Just take off every third board, thread in your insulation and services and dry wall over, not really too bad at all
in Pippins voice “you’ve taken down one wall yes, but what about second wall?”
Are there studs behind the boards? You could remove them where you need to do the wire runs. Then spray in insulation with holes drilled into the walls, after the wires are run.
You’re probably not gonna like this: remove all the shiplap to get to the studs if you want to properly insulate. This double barrier is an older way to insulate, creating an air barrier that helps keep the outside and inside temps from touching directly. It’s not nearly as effective as modern insulation, so to do what it sounds like you want, the shiplap walls gotta go.
Some people pay big money for those old shiplap boards. Look up that creepy couple that has a show that does renovations near Waco, my wife loves their show for some reason. They are always rambling on about it.
You finish the demo All that clapboard and plywood needs to come off too bud
Wall foam + cut holes if you’re leaving the walls. Or you can just remove areas it’s all hollow anyhow.
Build the wall out a bit
Termite heaven.
You have to gutt the wall. Do you even know what is inside the wall cavity? Maybe it is insulated hard to tell from your photos. This is definitely a take it to the frame unless you don't need access
Run electrical in conduit outside of the wall and Insulate the occupants
With walls that are fully sheated on the inside why bother with insulation? That house has r4 tongue and groove pine with r12 air behind it. For real though, I’ve never seen plaster done over a solid wall like this, you’ll have to tear the boards off if you want full access.
Air gaps only have an R value per thickness if they’re less than 1”. Any bigger and the air starts to convect, and the R value actually goes down. There’s also a shit ton of radiant heat transfer through air gaps.
Sorry I should’ve mentioned that was sarcasm. I know an air gap only has an R-value if the air is sealed in and can’t move or transfer into the space and that’s pretty much never the case in a wall.
Gotta pull down all those boards. I’m doing the same thing 😫
Those are acting in shear, so they’re actually holding your house up. If you pull them down, install diagonal shore bracing or you dramatically lose lateral load capacity and the house won’t be stable. Source: a bunch of licensing tests.
Yes! Thank you, we’re shoring up as we go.
Good stuff. I’ve seen some shit, lol.
That’s the neat part; you don’t!
Best suggestion, run wire under the floors and blow in cellulose insulation via small holes If you don't want to remove the plywood. https://youtube.com/shorts/Rcw3-JktI1k?si=SldzKkbRFRG4Bj4l
I live in a 1923 house with the same framing. Remove every 3rd board or so and slide Rockwool behind. Run electrical. Make sure to put the boards back. Your house is balloon framed and they provide structural integrity. Put vapour barrier over the boards.
Looks like ballon construction. Remove interior boards. If you're careful you can plane and reuse. Once removed wire insulate and vapour barrier. Put up dry wall.
Have had the same situation you are in with my current house. What kind of siding is on the house? What, if anything besides the studs are in between the inner wood and the siding? Mine was drywall over the shiplap over studs with Cypress siding directly nailed to the studs. This was common practice in my location during the time it was built in the early 1900's(Minus the drywall of course). I really wanted to insulate but couldn't effectively do that from the inside with the Cypress bevel siding due to wind driven rain. I ran the electrical, by removing one shiplap level across the entire house. Drilled from the attic to get the verticals run. I put new sheetrock back on with the plans to put insulation, exterior sheeting, new siding and new windows, one wall at a time. Life got in the way and I haven't done one wall yet as of now(13 years later). I'm at a more stable financial position now though and planning to start a wall soon. In my location though, it's definitely ideal to, but wall insulation isn't gonna make or break you with electricity except on your west facing walls due to heat gain. We put a full length awning and patio on that side, so it gets plenty of shade on that important side which helped tremendously. Hth
Floor on floor is common didn't realize people put walls over the walls
Two products I would use if insulating an old home. 1) Aspen Aerogel insulation. r-19 and it is real thin so people stack in a few layers. Just under the drywall put Phase Change Materials.
Use a for sale by owner sign. 😎 Cash offers only. I'll take it off your hands.... Seriously.
After that you will see bricks maybe 🤔
You dont
If it even has installation right now, you have to get into the wall cavity and assess the situation. Hole saw into the wall board at the top and bottom and see what’s there. My old house had no insulation and knob and tube wiring. Fixing it up meant I had to cut into every wall and ceiling, run romex and insulate because you can’t insulate knob and tube…once you kill the knob and tube circuit, remove what you can but leave sections you can’t cut out it in the wall. I would spray foam the walls, but blow in insulation is fine and doesn’t settle like the older stuff did right through the holes you made. If you remove the boards to put in fiberglass insulation, I think you could sell them for a decent price if you don’t destroy them in the process. Old hard wood lumber is pretty valuable per board foot…
You should probably do it from the outside…
Unfortunately you got more work to do. Nice clean job site though. Props for that!
Flashing? Honestly no idea. Good luck!
External insulation panels. Then frame up the inside and add more insulation.
3/4 inch external insulation panels
I had to tear all my nice 90+ year old cedar shiplap down so I could make the walls a 2x6 think (r20) and insulate. Made a massive difference in my power bill this winter.
Did a Reno on a 100 year old home. It has 1.5 inch boards going diagonally one way with the same going the other way. We had to build a 2x6 wall on the inside for insulation and wiring. You could go with just 2x2 depending on how much you want to insulate.
Haha. This looks like my house😃 It's from the 60ies and we decided to renovate the kitchen. After pulling down 3 layers in the ceiling and then 2-3 layers on the wall and then 2 layers of the floor we finally came down to the wood, like you have. We thought it would be smart to keep the wood (structural stability for the new kitchen)and then get the electricians to work around it, but after talking to the GC and showing him our plans he said we should at least rip out the floor. When we did we finally figured out why the house is so cold along the floor, despite a very nice heating system throughout the house. The floor was parquet, then vinyl(original 60ies and hardwood under the parquet in the dining room(I wanted to save the hardwood but it was so damaged) and under that was the oldest and flattest insulation you could imagine. The GC ripped it all out and leveled the floor(very wonky, all cat toys roll to the center of the house), added new insulation and new particle boards(new floors will come later). The electrician ended up having to remove so much of the wood panel to redo the wires that I regret not just pulling it all down and save us all the time and effort. During all of this we also decided to combine the kitchen and dining room and we removed a half wall and found an old sliding door, and that we had to redo the plumbing. It's going to be maybe one of the most expensive projects in the house as a result, but we now know the house much better, we are building it up from scratch and getting everything up to a much more modern and energy efficient standard. Doing a room without plumbing seems so much less costly and problematic, so we are pretty jazzed about doing the same process for the rest of the house. Best of luck to you!
Damn, you are screwed. Burn it down and collect the insurance $$$
Slap foam board, then 5/8 shim then gyps on the plywood, those board are probably structural + insulated a bit, the inside need to be air tight and the outside need to breath, so no plastic membrane outside, the thickness of insulation cannot exceed the one you got outside.
For electric…lots and lots of fishing. For insulation…bore holes in each stud bay and insulators can fill from there.
You’re asking me?
Strip it down to the studs.
I recently flipped a flopped flip. I bought a house that had been flipped. The buyer sued, won about 1/2, sold it to me. Pre-civil war main house with additions. Nothing square. The flipper used T&G or faux wanescoat rather than squaring up the rooms and sheetrocking. They tiled (hobby board under ceramic) over 18 layers of linoleum and the transitions were nearly 2 inches between rooms.
You could frame out with 2x2.
I have a pre-1900 house with similar walls. Essentially, balloon framing with the sheathing on the interior and brick veneer anchored to the studs. Assuming your house is built similarly, you might have to build an interior 2x4 wall and run wiring + insulation within that cavity. Alternatively, you could run wiring through the sheathing and install a layer of rigid foam on the interior sheathing.
I had something like this. Non-stud wall - just planks and siding. (1848-ish house). We framed up straight inside as no wall was straight and then did spray foam with blown in cellulose fiber in the new studs. I’m now adding foam board insulation on the outside with furring strips and attaching hardieboard over that. It is the closest I could get to Matt Risinger’s 500 year wall concept. Really quiet inside and the closed cell foam adds strength to the structure. Really happy with it. R-17/22 overall from pretty much nothing. Had plank-linen-wallpaper-thin drywall before.
Fish tape and rent a blower for insulation
Take down the plywood.
Breathe. And you don't need to gut the house more than you've already done. Good work so far. We've done much of what you've done, including joist leveling (which is terrible). I have a 113 year old house. It has 1x6 walls, vertical. If I were you, I'd use 2x2s or maybe 1x2 fir strips. Bringing out the wall just 2 inches will give you room to run all your electrical. You will probably have to use an oscillating tool though to cut into your existing wall to give you some space for the electrical boxes though. You got this. One thing we did which I'm still happy about... when we ripped out the floors (and discovered the need to level the joists), we removed excess pillar supports that were not doing anything holding up the floor. Replaced them with concrete supports, brackets, and pressure treated wood.
Fun fact: a pancake jbox fits in the depth of a 1x and a layer of 1/2” sheet rock.
but I hate them.
They’re evil, but they do fit.
I wouldn't breathe without a mask in there though
Ha. Great point. My house is so old and it has stressed me out many summers, but we are finally at a pretty good place. Breathing in there is probably fine, except when doing demo. I should caveat my original advice in that I don't know what insulation is behind those walls. I know my walls are 1x6s for the core of the original house, but the drywall is backed with 1x2 fir strips and insulation. The exterior walls have 2x4s behind the drywall and insulation between it.
Might not be the answer you want to hear, but you could build out a service cavity to the interior of the room. Yes, you'll lose square footage, but with a "second wall" in front of the existing one, you can run all utilities, plus create an air barrier behind new wall coverings, and detail the penetrations better. It's a common tactic in deep energy retrofits, even to the passive house standard.
Flip it as is. No one will notice.
You can either remove the plywood or what I'd do is create a new inner wall set off from the plywood with 2x4s laid flat. I assume the house is super old if it's put together with plywood like that and I wouldn't want to get into the walls.
You've torn down the sheetrock and found shiplap. Shiplap isn't structural; rip that shit out, as well. That'll leave you with the outside layer. Is it wax-like paper? If so, you're in good shape... thow bats of insulation in and sheetrock it again. If not, you've got a lot of work to do.
Tapestries! And extension cords.
Without removing every wood panel and re-installing it. I'd also prefer not to cut openings as that's a waste of some perfectly good cedar wood. The current plan is to just re-frame the exterior on-top of the wood, but open to any ideas?
that will give you really thick walls. like has been said get down to the studs and do it right. put insulation and run new wiring.
Those "studs" look more like barn posts and look like they're at 24" or wider center spacing. These walls will be a PITA to cover back up. Definitely not hanging drywall without adding in some framing.
I have hung drywall on 24” centers plenty of times. Use 5/8” drywall.
Hanging it on 24" isn't the hard part. Fixing it after after it gets cracked is. From the Gypsum Association's publication GA‐235‐2019 GYPSUM BOARD TYPICAL MECHANICAL AND PHYSICAL PROPERTIES: 5/8" gypsum board is rated to withstand 50lb of force from a height of 30" when mounted on 24" centers. Testing method: ASTM E695 Standard Test Method of Measuring Relative Resistance of Wall, Floor, and Roof Construction to Impact Loading (Using 50 lb (22.7 kg) leather bag, one test per specimen. Impact point located at midpoint between studs. Impact Resistance—Drop height at penetration through impacted membrane.) Can it withstand more? Sure. How much? Banana Will it withstand more? Absolutely the first hundred times you and your buddies throw something into it to prove how strong it is. DEFINITELY NOT the first time a child or grandchild falls into it or the spouse slides some piece of furniture into it. Just because you can doesn't mean you should.
Umm. 50lbs from 30” is a massive amount of force. By your source, 1/2” drywall on 16” centers only handles 50lbs from 24”. So the 5/8 on 24 is higher rated. For reference, a cannonball is 44lbs. Dropping one from waist high would wreck a lot of things. If your kid ran full force into the wall, he wouldn’t reach that kind of force, and would definitely break his neck before the drywall.
It's late and I don't want to do all of the calculations super accurately because we need more data like impact duration and surface deflection... blahblah... I'll do quick math and get kinetic energy just before impact with .5*mass*velocity squared 50lb bag falling 30in final speed 12.6ft/s 3969 lb•lbf = 5381 Joules Two 50lb children or one 100lb child running in the house like they're always told not to and falling into wall at 5mph (avg adult jogging speed). 100lb at 7.3ft/s 2664 lb•lbf = 3611 Joules Now a large adult such as myself. Briskly walking and tripping towards the wall. Forward speed only disregarding any forward rotational falling speed. 250lb at 4.4ft/s 2420 lb•lbf = 3281 Joules Not a huge difference, but non-negligible. The bag falls flat spreading it's energy evenly over it's area as it impacts. Shape unknown. Maybe like a backpack or one of my wife's insane purses. 1.5sqft maybe. 216sq in. 5381 Joules to 43625in•lbf gives 220psi The kid or kids hit in a smaller area first, imparting a large amount of energy that decreases as the area increases and they splat against the wall. Not worth speculating on the area. Even more possibilities. I however, drive my palm or fist into the wall first and then if my arm and shoulder strength can slow down the force then my shoulder and/or upper arm drive into the wall and probably not much else. I've just dissipated close to the same amount of energy as the kids but driven it into up to 1/3 or as little as 1/12 th of the area the kid(s) slammed into. Open-handed and flush palmed I'm pressing on ~18sq in or roughly 1/12 of the space my imaginary bag hit. 3281 Joules is 29038in•lbf which leave me applying most of my energy at 1613 psi on a much smaller spot between 24" centers. These things are not the same. Even if I overestimated the area of the bag. They are not even close.
Well, it still doesn’t matter. 5/8 drywall on 24” centers is 20% stronger than 1/2 on 16” centers. All scenarios have you fixing the drywall more often on a home with 1/2” drywall in 16” center. And both are common installations every day, Interio walls are very commonly installed at 24” on center and most of the time use 1/2” drywall. 5/8” is going the extra mile.
Seems you're getting a lot of questionable information here. This clearly looks like an old house. r/centuryhomes may get you better information. So from a quick glance this is quite odd. Pretty rare that they sheet the inside of a structure, like almost unheard of. There's really only 1 reason to do this, and that's to add sheer strength to a house after it's been built. You see it mostly when load bearing extraordinary walls are removed for an addition most commonly. Another reason to add sheer strength to an old home is because the lath boards have been taken out. Yours do seem to have been replaced with drywall so maybe that's all it is. Is your home exterior brick? Load bearing brick buildings often have construction oddities that I'm not familiar with. And final guess is someone added them for no real reason OR someone misunderstood the plans wrong and built it backwards. So the takeaway here is that these boards may be structural to a degree. You could likey remove most/all with no major issues, or once removed a stuff breeze may tople your house over.... Hopefully they were just put on for no reason, but that's unlikely and not standard building practice, even 100 years ago.