Hi everyone. CJB at the wheel today. SMHRB is where we gather to discuss the wonders and frustrations of home ownership and home repair. We harbor all levels of experience and expertise from, "How do I reverse the direction of my electric drill?" to "Sure, I've jacked up a house! It's easy." (Yes, that would be the person I'm looking for today.) Please feel welcome to join in with questions, advice or empathy. Everyone is welcome.
I have to admit that I had a much more indepth diary planned, but plans go awry, as we all know. I'll share what I do have down below.
Many of you are familiar with the fact that we live in a 1916 Sears kit house. Like humans of a certain age, houses can begin to "sag" after a time. Ours has a definite case of gently concaving floors and tilting stairwells. The problem is exacerbated by the deterioration of the beam holding up the stairs. The contractor that we brought in a few years ago explained about the habit of building "open" staircases where one side of the stairs isn't really attached to much. This is okay for a few decades, but then things start to succumb to gravity. Add to this the fact that the bottom of the central beam in the staircase has, at some point, suffered water damage and that, when we moved in, we brought a grand piano and stuck it right in the corner in question. Well, you can see where you might begin to have the makings of a funhouse.
Here are some pics of the stairs:
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You can see that the stairs list, sinking to the right.
Insert here a bunch more pics that I took. I tried to get them to insert, but photobucket has made a bunch of changes and I could NOT get the pictures to cooperate. I'm sorry!
So. We're assuming that if we ratchet up the beam and then shim it, we can then go back and plaster all of the walls that crack, shim and block crooked and squeaky stairs and repaint and then sit around and highfive and drink beer. Let me know if this sounds like a reasonable scenario and/or if you have any suggestions regarding this process.
The next thing is the house itself. If you drop a marble in the kitchen by the back door it will, slowly at first and then with increasing momentum, send it self barreling toward the interior of the house. In fact, I just lost my favorite marble under the stove testing this theory.;-)
The whole house settles in the middle. So. The hub wants to ratchet up the beam in the basement. Here's a pic:
Or not.
The beam splits in the middle of the room. Because there are two beams, you can really see that the whole affair appears to already be higher in the center of the room.
Yeah. That's where I get stuck. If we ratchet the whole affair up, well... I'm stuck. MrCJB wants to get one of those big poles that you corkscrew up and raise everything. And... Oh, I'm tired.
Help