A Holey Adventure

In 2022 I removed the brick chimney above the Carriage House kitchen. The bricks above the roof got tossed to the ground. The bricks in the attic portion were left sitting on the floor of the attic.

I do not like a messy attic.

But how to get the bricks out? The only option seemed to hand each brick out to somebody in the Sunroom, toss some of the bricks into a 5-gallon bucket, and then take them down the stairs and out. Then repeat this a number of times.

Ugh.

This has been nagging at me so, yesterday, I implemented a  solution:

 

I cut a big hole in the attic roof. The bricks were easily removed and tossed to the ground!

 

Yes. I am kidding. Sorta. Yesterday I arrived to find Eric working on a repair to the kinda flat sunporch roof.

 

With that done, it was onto finding out why the south roof over the attic leaks. I have been able to capture most of the water these past ten years by having a big plastic bus pan inside the attic. After removing some shingles this mess was discovered.

 

The mess quickly got worse. While the plywood sheathing was about 20-years-old, the 1×6 boards proved original to the 1894 structure. Cool.

 

With the rot gone, and a hole in the roof, it seemed timely to remove the bricks in the attic! Then some new 1×6 boards were screwed in place…

 

…and new sheathing installed. We tarpapered over the whole and will soon install new shingles. Thanks, Eric!

 

 

 

6 Comments

  1. Barb Sanford on February 15, 2024 at 11:41 am

    Excellent solution. And I’m always happy when you can find and fix a leak. Water does a LOT of damage.

  2. Barb Sanford on February 15, 2024 at 11:42 am

    Hi, Ross. I caught a tiny typo in this line: “I cut a big hole in the attic roof. The brisk were easily removed and tossed to the ground!”

    I’m sure “brisk” should be “bricks.”

    As always, feel free to delete this comment after you make the fix.

  3. mlaiuppa on February 15, 2024 at 5:03 pm

    Yay! Two birds.

    BTW that’s what my roof looked like underneath when the three (on one side four) layers of roofing shingles were removed. Turns out I had cedar shingles and two layers of asphalt shingles on the north side and three layers of asphalt shingles on the south side. (That’s another story).

    To meet code they had to remove everything, then put down plywood and then shingle. It’s supposed to last until I am dead.

  4. mlaiuppa on February 15, 2024 at 5:07 pm

    Looking at that photo again, I think your water problem is the flashing and that window. Notice how the window trim butts right up to the roof? I think when the water runs down it hits that trim, then stops and puddles long enough to get under the flashing and then seep under the shingles and rot the boards underneath. The siding is rotten under the window too.

  5. Leigh on February 15, 2024 at 11:01 pm

    Cleared the attic and fixed the roof. Yeeehaw! Well done, Ross ans Eric.

  6. Dan Goodall-Williams on February 16, 2024 at 10:17 am

    I’m so glad that you have someone helping you! You really are at the point that help is necessary. Plus I’m glad the roof was repaired.

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