Stove, shutters and panelling - WIP

[TomB]

This is the renovation of what will be our sitting room and what was the dining room in the house we moved into a couple of years ago. The room was pretty shabby back then with damp in one corner, the chimney breast covered over, grim wallpaper/dado rail and imitation roof timbers nailed to the ceiling. Lowering the ground level outside, a bit of re-pointing and fixing the gutter fixed the damp problem. The rest of the work pictured I started an embarrassingly long time ago, but due to having a baby, changing jobs and numerous other hurdles it seems to be dragging on and on.
I think I’m past halfway now so I thought I’d post a few pictures in case it’s of interest to anyone else. It might also gee me up a bit to get it something like finished by the end of the year.

The damp in the corner (now fixed). Under the carpet were some asbestos tiles. They were only lightly bonded to the concrete floor though, so were pretty straightforward to remove without breaking. Still a pretty naff job though.

Tiles and most of the wallpaper removed. Apologies for the less than stupendous picture quality.

Boxing in of gas meter and pipes. You can just about see the pseudo-joists too.

I opened up the fireplace and found the lintel had been removed. Perhaps it was timber and they didn’t want it rotting behind the plaster. It was a filthy job breaking it all out.

Levelled the hearth…

Got a lintel cut at the local stone yard (Calvert’s at Leyburn). Installation was pretty easy as it was small enough to lift by myself.

Then a hearth from the same place. Hired a pneumatic paving slab lifter for this as it was really awkward getting it in.

Found a nice Coalbrookdale stove on eBay, stripped it down and tarted it up a bit. Turned out quite nice in the end. Got a mate to help me line the flue and fit the cowl (I hate ladders). I made and fit the closure plate but don’t have any photos unfortunately.
I got a plasterer in to do the plastering and he made a bit of an arse of it in places but I think I can hide the really bad bits with the panelling.

 

[Andy's Shed]

Very well done Tom, you're doing a great job there. I think a nice fireplace really makes a home, looking forward to your next set of pics.

 

[julianf]

I'm curious, for a selfish reason, how you chose the plasterer and what went wrong with the job?

(I do bits of plastering so it's market research, I guess!)

 

[TomB]

When I stripped off a bit of the plaster around the window I found the lintel had rotted to dust and we were in the slightly strange situation where the window frame was holding the wall up. I jacked it up and installed a pre-stressed concrete one which again wasn’t to arduous and earned me some hero points with my other half.

I treated the timbers I took down from the ceiling with preservative and recycled them as battens on the external wall so we could get some insulation in. I realise this is perhaps not the ideal way of doing it but we’re pretty skint at the moment so needs must.

I procured some kingspan that was going in a skip at work and installed that between the battens and the ceiling joists. It took ages as it was all in pretty small pieces!

One of the issues with the house is that it faces onto a busy road and we have old sash windows at the front which are really lovely but don’t do much for sound, or temperature, insulation. I’d sooner move house than remove them so I’m going to fit shutters to the inside to hopefully block out some road noise in the evening and make the room a bit warmer. These are the stiles, with the mortices cut. I borrowed my old man’s morticer to do them.

Tenons and grooves cut. First dry fit and fettling of the frames. Before I started I spent quite a long time drawing out a full size drawing of a pair of the shutters to hopefully get the proportions right and to use as a reference for a cutting list. Made the whole job a lot easier.

Fielding the panels by hand. Took a while but was really fun to do.

Produced a lot of shavings though!

Dry fit with panels.

Cutting rebates at the join between each shutter to block out light, sound and drafts. I’ll cut a small bead down the edge of one of them.

Rebates.

I think that’s it for now. I’m making the shutters and window lining from dawn unsorted redwood and it’s been the first job that I’ve prepped everything from scratch instead of buying PSE. It’s been really satisfying but has taken me ages.
I’ve installed the windows lining but don’t have any photos yet.

Cheers,
Tom

 

[TomB]

Very well done Tom, you're doing a great job there. I think a nice fireplace really makes a home, looking forward to your next set of pics.

Thanks!

 

[TomB]

I'm curious, for a selfish reason, how you chose the plasterer and what went wrong with the job?

(I do bits of plastering so it's market research, I guess!)

I’ll add some photos when it’s light, there are no lights in the room at the moment so can’t do it right now.

Basically, round the lintel is miles off being straight i.e. the plaster overhangs the lintel at one end and is about ten mm behind it at the other. He also left corner bead exposed and hanging over the end of the lintel. I’ve managed to tidy it up by sanding and I’ve gently ground back the corner bead so it doesn’t stick out any more. The rendering on the inside of the fireplace recess is rough as dogs and he managed to render over the plastic that he put down to protect the hearth so I had to cut it free! He also blathered the lintel in plaster which took me ages to remove with a wire brush which didn’t do the lintel any favours. It’s a bush hammered finish on the lintel mind, so is sort of semi-rustic anyway so if doesn’t really matter but still, it was pretty shoddy.
I don’t want to talk him down too much as he did a perfect job on the rest of the room, turned up when he said he would, was quiet when he worked and charged what he said he would so he wasn’t a complete nightmare, it was just the detailed bits were pretty shonky.
Hope this helps.

 

[thetyreman]

looks really well made tom, I want to make similar shutters for one room here so watching with great interest!

 

[TomB]

I'm curious, for a selfish reason, how you chose the plasterer and what went wrong with the job?

(I do bits of plastering so it's market research, I guess!)

Hi again,
In answer to your other question, I chose him as he had done loads of work for someone I know, including some pretty tricky lime work so I’m pretty sure he can do good work.

This is one end of the lintel…

And this is the other.

Perhaps I’m just being picky? I know very little about plastering so maybe it’s fine and I just need to get over myself.

 

[TomB]

Window lining fitted.

I don’t have a laser level and could get close enough to the wall to sight across it so I checked for twist by placing a pin in each corner and running lengths of cotton across diagonally. They just to say touch so I think it’s pretty spot on. The screw holes and knots in the lining will be covered by a second layer of timber that will be added (and hopefully scribed a bit better!!) once the shutters are in position.

 

[julianf]

Hi again,
In answer to your other question, I chose him as he had done loads of work for someone I know, including some pretty tricky lime work so I’m pretty sure he can do good work.

This is one end of the lintel…
View attachment 145206
And this is the other.
View attachment 145207
Perhaps I’m just being picky? I know very little about plastering so maybe it’s fine and I just need to get over myself.

I'm on some plastering forums and, whilst it's not flawless, you would be astounded by what some people get stung for.

On your job it looks like the corner bead hasn't come down the whole way to the lintel. This could be an error or it could be that the wall was imperfect and the bead, if following the wall, would overshoot the lintel, and it may have been a conscious choice to cut it short and bevel in the plaster in an attempt to even out the error in the least offensive way.

So it may have been a mistake but it may have been the chap trying to do the best with what the situation was.

If it was the latter he may have done well to explain that and give you further options.

 

[TomB]

Hello again,

I’ve been pretty tied up over the last couple of weeks but did get a few hours this weekend to work on the shutters. I find towards the end of a job I sort of slow down and avoid finishing it for some reason, so I had to force myself to get on with it yesterday. I’m glad I did though as it’s not a million miles off being finished now.

First of all I put a small bead down the length of the stiles where they meet one another to soften the look of them a bit. I don’t have a beading plane so I just used a sharpened screw in a bit of scrap wood then rounded over with a smoothing plane (I don’t have a block plane either).

Then trimmed the panels to length with the track saw. I spent ages making sure they were as square as I could possibly get them.

Then I installed the side main hinges on the panels using the trusty Katsu Curry router to hog most of the waste out and finished with a chisel.

The hinges are 75 mm x 75 mm solid brass projection hinges from Conquest Ironmongery. When they arrived I was worried they were far to big and heavy but once in situ they looked fine.

Then same method to install the central hinges. These were just big standard brass butts from Screwfix. I used the thickness of my engineers square to gauge the distance between each panel.

First fit.

Pretty pleased so far.

 

[rogxwhit]

First of all I put a small bead down the length of the stiles where they meet one another to soften the look of them a bit. I don’t have a beading plane so I just used a sharped screw in a bit of scrap wood then rounded over with a smoothing plane (I don’t have a block plane either).

I love this approach. It's a fine antidote to those who feel that they must spend hundreds of pounds on unnecessary tackle to do the simplest task. Full marks!

 

[rogxwhit]

Let's have a review of the sound attenuation sometime. It could turn out that you need draughtstripping round the shutters, since any air gap tends to be a sound-gap too.

 

[thetyreman]

really well done! looks superb.

 

[TomB]

Let's have a review of the sound attenuation sometime. It could turn out that you need draughtstripping round the shutters, since any air gap tends to be a sound-gap too.

Hi,
Yep, you’re absolutely right, they’re not stopping much sound at the moment. My plan is to add 20 mm PSE on the inside lining of the window reveal so the shutters effectively sit in a rebate. Then I’ll add rare earth magnets in routed hidden holes in both the shutters and the edge of the rebate to pull the shutters tight against the edge when closed. There’ll be a pair of magnets on the bottom rail that when the shutters are folded back holds them together.
Im not sure this makes sense but hopefully it will with some photos when I do it.
I got the idea from Bradshaw Joinery on YouTube, I’ll find a link in a bit.

 

[Adam W.]

Hi again,
In answer to your other question, I chose him as he had done loads of work for someone I know, including some pretty tricky lime work so I’m pretty sure he can do good work.

This is one end of the lintel…
View attachment 145206
And this is the other.
View attachment 145207
Perhaps I’m just being picky? I know very little about plastering so maybe it’s fine and I just need to get over myself.

No, you're not being picky, you should get him back to finish it properly.

He may tut, but ultimately he is employed by you to do a finished job.

 

[rogxwhit]

My plan is to add 20 mm PSE on the inside lining of the window reveal so the shutters effectively sit in a rebate. Then I’ll add rare earth magnets in routed hidden holes in both the shutters and the edge of the rebate to pull the shutters tight against the edge when closed.

Sounds a good idea, I wonder if it'll be enough? The outer panels will need clearance down their edges to close, though, which will leave slight gaps. You could always add a draught strip (the type that's retained in a groove) to the pse ...

 

[TomB]

I’ve fitted the magnets to the shutters and window lining. It was pretty straightforward and has worked really well, pulling the shutters nice and snug against the lining. They make a satisfying thud too when you close them too. I added the magnets top and bottom, at the bottom each pair of shutters has a pair of magnets that are facing opposite ways so that they hold the leaves together when the shutters are open. I don’t think I’ve explained that at all well but if you check out Bradshaw Joinery on the tube it should make sense.
Routing the pockets too the lining and shutters.

I tested the noise reduction during the day today. With the shutters opened the average noise level ~600 mm from the window was 57.0 dB with a 15 minute test duration. With the shutters closed gave an average of 41.7 dB. Subjectively the difference is huge, it’s still possible to hear the traffic noise but it’s very much reduced and I think once the room is full of furniture and whatnot it’ll be great.
I’ve added the architrave and extended the apron forwards and to the side as I wasn’t happy with the wiffly little thing I started with. I’ll fill the screw holes when I paint them.
Just need to fit some brass knobs and we’re about finished. I might add a small stopped chamfer to the inside edges of the frame to soften the lines a bit though. It never ends!

There’s fitted bookcase to make and install next, then it’s just the panelling and skirting boards. It’ll definitely be finished for Christmas, I just don’t know which one…

 

[Agent_zed]

Nice job on the shutters. I'm making some cedar ones that will be external (sliding across). It seems to be such a sensible Idea. Reduces sound and light, reduces heat loss in the winter and heat gain in the summer.

 

[TomB]

Right, I think the end is in sight. Apologies it’s taken so long to post an update, I have so little spare time at the moment that what was supposed to be a fairly quick job has ended up taking about two years!

Once the shutters were installed I made a start on the fitted bookcase to the left of the chimney breast. It’s nothing fancy, the carcass is 18 mm hardwood ply with the shelves set in housings on the uprights. The dividers are just glued and screwed in place. The very bottom shelf is large enough to take vinyl records and the one above it is also nice and deep to store board games etc. I scrounged some oak from my old man to make the bit between the upper and lower shelves, it was proper old hedgerow stuff though with grain going all over the place so was a pain to machine. It looks okay now it’s in though.

I then set about battening the walls ready for the panelling. This was fairly straightforward but crushingly dull. I added so foil backed insulation before attaching the bead and butt T and G.

Clagging on the panelling was great fun and really quick. I added a reeded moulding around the door to match the shutters.

There was a fiddly section round the back window. I should have thought ahead and extended the window board a bit before the plasterer arrived but I didn’t so I had to extend it which wasn’t ideal. I think with some careful decorating it’ll look okay in the end.

In the opposite corner there is a gas meter that needed boxing so I decided to make the boxing a bit bigger than necessary so provide some storage for blankets and whatnot. I used counter hinges that lie flush with the top so it can be used a side table as the sofa will go next to it.

I then added some coving to the ceiling and that’s it done really, aside from the second fix electrics and decorating (not my favourite activity).

It’s so nice to finally clear all the mess out and light the fire.

Thanks for following along, I hope it’s been of some interest. I’ve really enjoyed doing (most of) it, though I’m looking forward to doing some outside jobs now!

Cheers,
Tom