More Destruction...

I started out the day with the goal of getting the end cabinet back in place.  The kitchen cabinets sit on top of the original kitchen floor of linoleum and luan, and when I had my contractor replace part of the floor underneath the cabinets from the water damage, he was working with the original floorboard.  So in order to put the cabinet back in place, I needed to basically add a piece of luan and linoleum to get the cabinet back to the height of the other cabinets.

The new floorboard was lower than the old floor of floorboard, luan, and linoleum.  But looking at the mold and drywall cracks behind this last piece, I wanted to make sure the floorboards below it was structurally sound.

Simple enough, right?

Note:  NOTHING is simple in this house.

Well, it was apparent that some of the water damage extended below the remaining luan.  Both Mom and Dad were over to help today, and when I mentioned it to Dad, I told him that I needed to pull up the piece of luan that was still visible (this sat underneath the left half of the cabinet that was removed).  I could see black mold on it, and judging by the condition of the drywall behind it, water had definitely been in this area, too.

Notice the black mold behind the dishwasher.  I needed to check the floorboards below the dishwasher to see what type of shape they were in...

So I decided to pull it up.  And, oh, the pain.  It was just another sinking feeling.  I saw all kinds of black mold (this house is covered in the stuff in various places), but what I saw more than that was absolute wood rot.  The water damage was so extensive that the floorboard was literally worthless.  Just as I did with the front door, I took a screwdriver and was able to push it straight through the wood.  NOT good.  Sigh.  Yet ANOTHER setback!

Look at all of that water damage!  And mold!  I could stick a screwdriver through the rotten wood into the crawlspace...again.

The water rot area had a bit of an arc to it, and it was starting to peak right where the dishwasher sat on top of the remaining linoleum.  I told Dad I was more than confident that all of the kitchen cabinets were going to have to come out.  If all of them were sitting on top of rotten wood, then it all needed to be fixed.  I was demoralized.  EVERY time I try to move forward on this house, I find something that either halts me or more often sends me backwards!

I headed down to the crawlspace to see the extent of the damage, and, my, oh my, it was definitely rotten.  But I couldn't contain my excitement!  The area was very localized, and the water rot did NOT continue to the rest of the cabinets!  Woo hoo!  (I later told Mom this was such a weird feeling.  I was so excited about bad news because it wasn't terrible news!  It's terrible to think that way!).  But I WAS happy to see that the cabinets could stay.  What a relief.

The water damage was extensive...yet localized.  So happy about that!  The cabinets to the left can stay!

The wood literally just flaked away when you pulled on it.

To double-check upstairs, I checked the area underneath the kitchen sink by removing the warped shelf, and outside of being incredibly dusty and gross, I didn't see any major water damage.  Just some more mold!  And a weird air vent that literally vented into a cavity underneath the cabinet and then came out a cut hole in the side.  What a weird way to do it.

The warped shelf below the kitchen sink.

And the weird air vent below the shelf that just vented into this cavity!  As Dad said, though, "At least your pipes would never freeze!"

Well, after removing the dishwasher and seeing the damage being localized, I think THIS water damage is not from the ceiling leak but from the dishwasher (or previous dishwasher) itself.  But here is where the project went from big to humongous.  The floorboards were rotten all the way to the wall (and from what I understood under the wall, as well).  Well, Pa disagreed with me and said that the wall studs don't sit on the floorboards.  I was pretty sure that's not how houses were built, though.  So we called my brother who confirmed Dad's belief that wall studs were attached directly to the floorjoists.  Hmm, but I have seen houses built before, and I just wasn't convinced.  So Dad and I sat down and started watching videos of how houses were built, and sure enough, my belief was confirmed.  The walls sit on top of the floorboards which sit on top of the floorjoists.

But that presented a HUGE problem.  My floor was rotten all the way to the edge.  And so in order to replace it properly, I had to pull out the rotten floorboards from underneath the wall.  And while that was taking place, the weight of that wall would be pressing down hundreds of pounds in that area.  I wasn't confident with the house staying up on its own, especially after hearing the urgency in my contractor's voice when he had a similar situation with the French patio doors.  In that area, the entire sillplate had rotted away.  Well, once I started clearing away the rotten wood, I realized that I needed to secure the house.  I had roughly three feet of area where the walls would be resting on nothing.  There was no other way I knew to do it except with jacks!

Yes, that is right, MY HOUSE HAD TO BE PUT ON JACKS to hold it up!  Un-be-lievable.

The floor was so rotten you could literally stick a screwdriver straight through the wood into the crawlspace.  Soft, soft, soft.

The floor has been removed!  Now I had to figure out a way to get the floorboards removed from UNDER the wall.

The damage was extensive.  But I was thankful my bottom sill plate was still sound (albeit discolored) as well as the floorjoists.  That missing piece front and center is negligible, so VERY happy about that.

The floor just crumbled in my hands.  No tools needed.

Looking up at the bottom of my kitchen wall.

And I noticed my house had sunk at least 1/2" in this area as when I looked at the bottom plate of the wall resting on the rotten wood, one 3/4" floorboard had compressed down to 1/4" from the weight of the wall on one floorjoist.  The one to the left was the worst.  The joist to the right showed rotten wood, but it hadn't compressed.  But looking at the two next to each other, it was apparent the weight of the wall just crushed the wet wood!  And the obvious reality was that I would have to jack up the wall in order to slide a new piece of floorboard underneath the wall.  My oh my, what an unforeseen project.

The floorboard literally crushed by the weight of the house.  This is supposed to be 3/4" thick, but after getting wet, it just sunk and sunk and sunk.

The other floorjoist still had the roughly 3/4" board intact, although it showed signs of being wet previously.

The wall stud was nearly resting on the floorjoist it had compressed so much!

Mom and I headed to Harbor Freight to pick up a couple of bottle jacks (and to allow me to decompress a bit!), and then we headed to Lowe's to pick up new floorboards.  Seriously, what a mess.

Once back at the house, I realized I was going to have a pretty big problem with what I wanted to do.  In a perfect world, the wall plate was one solid 2 x 4" from left to right, and I would just jack up the left side to the left of my hole and do the same on the right side, as well.  The wall would lift, and I would simply slide a brand-new solid floorboard under the wall.  Perfect.  But what I quickly figured out was that the wall stud ended basically at the end of my hole.  So if I tried to jack up the wall, it would lift the wall to the left!  And on the right side, in the sill where I needed to jack up the wall, I had a foundation bolt in the way!  Nothing is ever easy.

But it had to be done.

I'm not sure how we are going to do it, but for now, the walls are jacked up.  And they DID raised a bit, although you could greatly feel the tension on the jacks.  How heavy is a two-story house?!

The wall is raised!  I can't quite get a 3/4" floorboard underneath there just yet, but it's moving up!

I might be able to get a floorboard under there now!

The right side raised much easier.  A new floorboard should slide right under!

The day was getting late, and the frustrations and sore legs were high, so we called it a day although it was already evening.  Mom and Dad had been feverishly working on the main floor while I spent the entire day in the crawlspace, and I was thrilled to see some of the work that had taken place while I was ripping out rotten wood.  Mom had cleaned out the kitchen dining room area and dusted and removed all of the books and bookcases from that area.  It looks so much better.  The stovetop was also cleaned, and our first meal was cooked on it for lunch.  I'm happy to report it works great!

The dining room is coming back!  Looks great, Ma!

The stove cleaned up great, too!

The first meal cooked in the new house!

Mom had also vigorously cleaned and painted the back of the cabinet that Dad and I had salvaged.  We knew it had black mold, so after lots of bleach, she painted the area with a thick primer.  So it's now ready to go back in.  I'm sure they both did plenty more that I am unaware of, but I was focusing on cleaning out the rotten wood.

No more mold allowed!

And after they left, that's what I did deep into the night.  I wanted to be ready to install new floors tomorrow, and so I brought out nearly every tool from my garage in order to cut, chisel, rip, and pry out the wood and nails.  Those nails were TOUGH to get to.  As you can imagine, the original contractor secured the edge of the floorboards to the edge of the house with nails!  Those nails were now sitting in between a sill plate and bottom plate and very hard to get to!  And unbeknownst to me, the right portion of the wood (about the last 16 or so inches) was actually decent wood.  So whereas I just pulled out the rotten wood from the left side of the hole, I had to really chip away to the right side.  It was SLOW work.

The house is being held up by jacks overnight!

All of the various tools used for removing the nails under the wall.  Such work.

But I got it all out and ready for a new floor tomorrow.  I have a garage door project first on a rental property, but I'm eager to get this all wrapped up!  What an exhausting day!  I am so ready to start constructing and putting back together rather than taking apart.  I've owned the house for more than four months now, and I am STILL taking it apart.  When will the switch begin?!