02/19/2023
How it started/how it’s going…
Yesterday was my first time in the giant excavator, and I intended to demolish the wood-framed addition while, fingers-crossed, not damaging any of the original stonework of the main house. I had watched an hour of YouTube videos and taken my medication, so I felt pretty confident. I’ll spare you any melodrama: there was *some* damage, but well within my acceptable tolerances.
It’s always been our plan to remove the addition. It provided a couple nice curb-appeal features: the wood shake siding; the interesting, multi layer rooflines. But the foundation had given out, giving the floors a fun-house feel, not to mention being soaked with cat p*e. Cringe. It also covered up most of the outside of the north stone wall, so removing it would be the only way to make any necessary repairs. Ultimately, there just wasn’t anything worth saving, given the investment we intend to make in the rehabilitating the old stone house.
So we spent some time over the past few weeks investigating how the two structures tied together and severing those ties. There were two doorways, one upstairs and one downstairs, that connected the two structures, so we removed their trim and baseboards. We demoed most of the joining walls, looking for structural connections. For the most part, there just weren’t any. The wood floors connected through the doorways and of course the roofs tied together, but otherwise they were essentially two independent structures. So, from the attic, I used my chainsaw and Sawzall to cut a line through the roof deck and top plates just north of the chimney, hoping to isolate it from any damage. Electrical wires and gas lines that spanned the two structures were cut. We also went through and salvaged anything of value that was easily removable: the vinyl windows, interior doors and hardware, a couple window air conditioners, light fixtures, and some electrical service equipment (meter box, mast, main panel).
With the excavator on site, I sized up my approach and got to work. I spent the first hour moving the concrete slabs and sidewalk out of the way, as a little practice on the controls, but also to clear a spot for the debris pile. With a lot of demolition projects, one can just concentrate the debris right back on top of itself, here I wanted to very deliberately move the debris away from the main house, being careful to not push anything at or against the stone. Attached here is basically a before-and-after view. In subsequent posts, I’ll add some photos and videos that Jessa, my spotter, took while she kept a close eye on any unacceptable movement on the stone house.
Overall I’m really happy with how well and quickly it went. We chewed through the entire structure in just under a couple hours. (I actually feel like this was slow because I still don’t have mastery over the controls so worked slowly and deliberately, and took frequent stops to check the progress up close.) As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, there was a little damage, and unfortunately it was completely avoidable. In the lower doorway, I hadn’t taken the time to sever the wood flooring. I didn’t figure it would be a strong enough connection to do any damage. But I misjudged: the flooring was actually connected to the door framing and the door framing was connected to some wooden blocks embedded in the stone. So when the dining room floor was broken through, it loosened up and crumbled some vulnerable stone between two old openings. The interior column of stone still stands, but we’ll want to reinforce and rebuild this area before it’s able to get any worse.
Otherwise I’ll call it a success and look forward to getting the giant pile of debris pulverized and hauled off. Special thanks to Rick Lowry for delivering the excavator and providing me loads of tips. It makes me confident knowing he’s at hand to get me out of a mess. And to Jessa for spotting and documenting the demo.
