Month: February 2025

I’m really not sure why they built the upstairs with this weird little crooked landing area.  Was it a feature?  Did they run out of lumber?  Was there not enough headroom in the first floor?  (It already intrudes at a 45° angle halfway through the bathroom entrance.)  Was the last step too steep, so they added a little landing?

We tore off the top layers to see how this thing was built.  It seems that the entire set of stairs are attached to the floor joists by two lag bolts.  Hmm.  And the top step, the landing, is kind of resting on the ceiling boards of the first floor.  It’s not framed very well. 

Another trip to the landfill, this time with 596kg, mostly old wood and plaster.

After the dump run, FT and I worked on tearing out the rest of the ceiling nails from the roof trusses. 

 2/15/2025 12:52 PM      3246190 1403 3 Ave N Lethbridge AB up 20250215_125209 roof trusses.jpg
 2/15/2025  5:17 PM      2660152 1403 3 Ave N Lethbridge AB up 20250215_171757 roof truss ceiling nails.jpg
 2/15/2025  5:18 PM      1102801 1403 3 Ave N Lethbridge AB up 20250215_171820 Allan pulling roof truss ceiling nails.jpg
 2/15/2025  5:18 PM      3472656 1403 3 Ave N Lethbridge AB up 20250215_171829 Floyd pulling roof truss ceiling nails.jpg

And this is how the living room, kitchen, and bedroom look now.

Almost finished!  (Right.)

After a bunch of cleanup – mostly removing plaster from the lathe boards on interior and exterior walls …

… we began removal of the living room / bedroom partition.  It was not a load bearing wall.  It had no top plate, and studs were side-nailed to the ceiling boards. 

So why remove the partition? 

The old bedroom will become the new kitchen, and the old kitchen will become the new bedroom.  The kitchen and existing living room will become one room. 

• The new kitchen / bathroom load bearing partition will extend outward farther (westward), adjacent the living room / new bedroom partition.
• The LR/BR partition will also be extended another 18″ or so (eastward), leaving only one rafter tie (or ceiling joist) without support.  It will also be moved to accommodate a larger living room and more evenly transfer offset loads down to existing load bearing partitions in the main floor. 
• The existing stairway / new bedroom partition will eventually be moved to support this last rafter tie. 

In this way, more load will be transferred from the roof to the 6×6 beams in the basement. 

Of course, as things are exposed during renos, this plan will likely evolve.