Thread: Straightening an out of plum timer house

Is it that one wall is out of plumb or that the whole house is "listing" because the stumps have sunk for whatever reason????

I should have mentioned that I have just restumped the place. It was also needing to be levelled and now is. I expect the walls have been forced to lean as the chimney dropped on one side, this in turn pulled one side of the house inward, and forced the other side outward, in the vicinity of the chimney area. Even though the floors are now levelled, and the chimney removed, the house will not breathe a sigh and move back into the original position and straight.<O</O

So to answer your question, I want to just straighten one side and part thereof, and leave the other, it is in acceptable condition. Without using heavy machinery, or without stripping the place bare.<O</O

Maybe the question I should be asking: does anyone have any suggestions for lessening the visual impact (especially on the outside) of a leaning building?<O</O

Rgds<O</O

Originally Posted by nt900

I should have mentioned that I have just restumped the place. It was also needing to be levelled and now is. I expect the walls have been forced to lean as the chimney dropped on one side, this in turn pulled one side of the house inward, and forced the other side outward, in the vicinity of the chimney area. Even though the floors are now levelled, and the chimney removed, the house will not breathe a sigh and move back into the original position and straight.<O</O

So to answer your question, I want to just straighten one side and part thereof, and leave the other, it is in acceptable condition. Without using heavy machinery, or without stripping the place bare.<O</O

Maybe the question I should be asking: does anyone have any suggestions for lessening the visual impact (especially on the outside) of a leaning building?<O</O

Rgds<O</O

Some more info please. I had to do this once on a single fronted terrace house in East Malvern, Melbourne. Being a narrow house and having an iron roof made it relatively easy. We exposed the top plate of the wall that was leaning out, the bottom plate of the wall on the oppositte side of the house, connected the two with chains and a Tirfor winch from our 4WD's and then started winding the winch in. To our amazement, it worked like a charm.

A couple of new internal stud walls at the back of the existing house, which was the part that was leaning braced the back of the house quite nicely.

The extension we added to it, complemented the bracing of the internal stud walls.

HTH,

Mark.

Originally Posted by nt900

<O</O

Maybe the question I should be asking: does anyone have any suggestions for lessening the visual impact (especially on the outside) of a leaning building?<O</O

<O</O

Stand a bunch of Italians around it

could always plant a couple of plumb trees

sorry - couldnt help myself

now back to work

I had a similar problem with my place as a result of termite damage to the top plates. If your ceiling joists are running parallel to the offending wall then you could just use a couple of turn buckles and chain attached to improvised steel hooks fixed to the studs/top plate and the nearest ceiling joist ie: through the ceiling.(athough I have T&G lining on my ceilings which kept the joist straight not that there was much force required.)

you could always make the lean worse and call it a feature. I worked on a roof in noosa that was designed with a 450 mm sag in the ridge line to give the place an aged look .The house looked amazing when finished.