Hi everyone!
Our demo team has pretty much completed their portion of our tiny cottage demo (to be honest there’s not a lot of house left!) and we are on to the next part of our remodel, reinforcing and replacing the existing framing. This will also be our chance to move any walls that we decide should go.
The first priority after leveling the house was supporting the front porch. When the house was leveled, the roof separated from the existing porch structure and supports. The porch also didn’t have an appropriate header across the front, and once leveled the supports it did have were either not in contact with the roof or only hanging by the very tips of nails. Here’s where we started after leveling.
The first step in repairing the porch was to brace the structure. Jordan placed three 10-foot 4x4s across the porch ceiling joists, parallel with the porch header. Then we placed six 4×4 uprights, to take the weight that should eventually be supported by the columns. From the side the porch appears to be angled or sagging slightly downward towards the front of the house, so we put a bit of pressure on it with the jacks to try to even out some of the sagging.
One of the nice benefits to reinforcing and appropriately supporting the front porch, is that we are going to get to lose most of the eyesore on the front of the house, that big low-hanging unibrow across the porch. By bracing the porch we were able to go ahead and rip off the overhang, and get our first look at the new profile of the house. We will be adding a header board across the front due to poor existing support, but it will still be significantly lower profile than the previous front porch.
Check out our progress with the old supports and overhang removed. It already looks like a different house!
We’re excited to continue with framing and putting in new cedar columns along the front of the house!
jordanpluskate 