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Paine House - Virginia |
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 Background...
Our house was built in 1927, by Clarence Case, master
carpenter, of Purcellville. The first owner, Edith M. Alder, moved in November 1927. She sold the house in
June 1941. The house has had six other owners, including our purchase of the house in October 1983. We have the full history
of who owned the house since it was built. It is one of four houses
built in this style on our street and is registered (286-5001-0284) as a house in the Purcellville Historic District, National Register of Historic Places. It is a style and floorplan based on a Sears Roebuck kit home and our house is
a mix of the Carlin (catalog #3031) using its full width front porch and Lebanon (catalog #3029) using its shed dormer and first floor front door and window arrangement floor plans, first shown in 1918, revised by Clarence Case who combined these different
features of these two models, as well as expanding the size of the rooms, which are larger
than the Sears houses. I have created floor plan drawings in .pdf format, of the house as built, you can see them here.
Our house and the others are not actual Sears "Kit" houses, but were built
from materials obtained by Mr. Case and his brothers, including materials from earlier structures which had been disassembled. The
Case brothers built a number of houses in Purcellville, using a number of different designs, also including those made by
Aladdin and others of this period.
If you are interested in learning more about these homes, here is a list (updated 7/31/09) of books and webpage resources that I have found very helpful, that I suggest
you take a look at. It is updated as I find additional high quality resource material.
Our house has been updated over the years, including
wall and attic insulation, soffit ventiation, attic fan ventilation, 200 amp electrical service, complete re-wiring to
replace the original knob and tube wiring, new copper plumbing, and a dug-out basement in 1950, replacing the crawl space. Other
improvements to the house have been made, which most 82 year old houses have received. Fortunately, our house was never the
victim of remuddling, which we are very grateful for, as some of our neighbors houses were not so fortunate.
House projects...
Replacing the old original cement pads narrow walkway, built in
the early 1940's, with a much wider (5 foot) tumbled stone pavers walkway, to match the rebuilt front porch completed in 2007,
which was built by Kenneth C. Wine.
Restoring the front porch brings the house much closer to its
original look, when its construction was completed November 1927. We continue working to restore the outside to
as near its original appearance as possible, using modern maintenance free materials, such as Azek, Tendura, Trex and other
such products, along with the use of high technology Silyi-terminated polyether and Tri-Polymer caulks and sealants.
 Tendura Decking Failures -
There have been a number of comments about the Tendura decking products failing and that they
have been bought out buy another company. I am listing these web sites for your info. Our Tendura installation, completed
in October 2006, shows no signs of the failures discussed in these links, nor do the five other installations that Kenneth
Wine has since installed.
FineHomebuilding - Synthetic Decking (added Aug. 25, 2009)
If you have any additional information
about this observed Tendura problem, please contact me.
 The small strip of grass to the left of the walkway looks awful
and is a pain to maintain. It will be removed to allow for a much wider walkway and a deeper flower bed, matching the size
of the flower bed on the right side of the porch.
 The new stairway is much wider at 5 ft, versus an earlier replacement
which was only 3-1/2 ft wide... probably done at the time of the cement walkway, in the early 1940's and replaced again in
1983, just before we bought the house. So, the old walkway looks odd as it is not wide enough to match the new stairs,
which are the proper width, based on the placement of the original porch support columns, now replaced with new columns.
Below, the construction of the new walkway is nearing completion,
with each tumbled stone paver used in the curve of the walkway, cut with a diamond saw to make a perfect fit. Removal of the
old cement slabs and regrading the lawn area with the dirt under the tarp for installation of new turf will be completed next.
 The new five foot wide tumbled pavers 4-size pattern walkway,
installed by Anderson's Nursery, Berryville, VA. The new walkway changes the whole appearance of the house as you approach the porch and its greater width
gives the entry a very welcoming feel.
We would love to have been able to do the whole driveway with these pavers, but at $18,000
because of its large size, we couldn't do it now... but perhaps at a later time.
 The house is changing color, too, to a darker 1926 yellow (a shade
lighter than Dodonna Manor in Leesburg) and the trim color is being changed from dark green to white, as can be seen on the second floor windows, on
the driveway side. The dark green, while color correct for this 1927 house, collected too much heat, damaging the paint and the wood. Some years ago, (estimated to be early
to mid 1960's) installation of aluminum triple-track storm windows caused the original exterior wooden window shutters
to be removed and discarded. They will be replaced with working shutters and will be used during the summer to reduce heat
gain into the house.
The first floor is already fitted with custom internal Petit Industries
(now known as Climate SEAL) insulating windows, which are superior to double glazed and were installed when we removed
the triple-track aluminum storm windows in 2002, allowing the old (pre 1910) original 6-over-6 panes double-hung windows with
their wavy glass to be seen. Many of the triple-track windows had been improperly installed, as the aluminum window mounting
screws were too long and had gone clear through the prime window stops and into the prime windows, making them inoperable!
We added 6 tons of #67 Crush & Run gravel in 2008, to compensate
for the older gravel compressing into the ground. The driveway was widened and lengthened to the rear of the garage in 2006, installing
a base to support a 10 ton dump truck, for the delivery of our firewood, which can be seen in the above picture, behind the
pickup truck. A few neighbors have asked why we don't blacktop the driveway (and create another water
run-off and heat island problem!) but we say it wasn't blacktop in 1927 and it's superior to blacktop in terms of ease of
maintenance and it doesn't create problems for the environment!
Update July 18, 2009
Yesterday, NPR Radio ran a story about the effects of dark colored roofing and all the blacktop
we put down and its cost to us in energy useage, versus using much lighter colored materials and saving huge amounts of energy.
If you're concerned about what your house may be doing to the environment, you should listen to this NPR story.
 Aluminum foil faced one-inch thick foam insulation panels visible
in the shed dormer windows on the second floor, are placed between the outer wooden storm window and the inner main 6-pane
window, to greatly reduce the solar heat gain from the light colored roof and potentially higher cooling costs. In the winter,
these panels are stored and the sun is allowed to contribute its heating strength, reducing winter heating costs. This 1927
house, with its modifications, is an extremely efficient building.
A white roof -
During the process of painting the roof in 2005 (it was a dirty
dark silver/gray, having originally been silver), first with a white primer coat, we noticed that the attic fan wasn't coming
on anymore and I suspected the thermostat had failed. I found that nothing was wrong with it... the white roof was reflecting
so much more of the sun's rays, that the attic temperature wasn't getting high enough to activate the fan thermostat! A condition
I was working for, having lived in Tucson some 50+ years ago while growing up and seeing many white roofs... including
the white pebble roof on my father's adobe brick home.
 And while preping the roof for paint, don't overlook those standing
seams that have been walked on and have become bent over during the years, no longer vertical, or "standing" up. They have
collected dirt, excess paint and all sorts of stuff which can lead to the base of the seam rusting, as shown below, creating
some small areas or holes that will leak! Clean them out and seal any leaks.
Rebuilding the windows -
As stated above, the house has windows that came from earlier buildings
that were being torn down at other locations, such as the windows below that came out of a Pennsylvania school building in
1925 and are of a design not built after 1910.
 In this close-up, you can see the decades of paint that has been
applied, the failed paint surface condition and failed window glazing, along with the installation of aluminum triple-track
storm windows in the 1970's, which required that the original wooden shutters be removed, since the storm windows were not
the correct design to use for retaining the shutters. Additionally, the storm window frames were not correctly installed,
as they used mounting screws too long for the wooden window stops and the screws penetrated the stop pieces and went into
the window sash, making it impossible to open some of the windows, such as this one... and the previous owners just kept painting
them shut with each application of paint!
All the window sashes and window trim has been rebuilt by stripping them to bare wood,
filling damaged areas; regluing joints; building new stop strips where necessary; fitting 3M V-Seal to the stops to significantly
improve window sealing; applying two primer coats and reglazing the glass using a Tri-Polymer product; then two coats
of premium acrylic latex semi-gloss paint. These windows have lasted 100 years and with this restoration and care over the
coming years, they'll last another 100 years!
 This close-up of the window shows that the aluminum storm window
has been removed and an interior thermal/acoustic window, manufactured by Climate SEAL can be seen mounted inside the original prime window, allowing the wonderful character of the original 100 year old window
to be seen. Note the window glazing, which is now a flexible Tri-Polymer sealant.
Because of the large amount of interest by other owners
of old homes, I have created another webpage that details my Window Restoration Work, including
the replacement of original style wooden exterior window shutters, which is linked here.
 Above, the 1960's style front door is being modified to look more
like the front doors of the 1920's, using a small 6 pane window sash with old wavy glass, found in the basement. Some original
1920's front doors remain on houses in our neighborhoods, but not very many.
 Window trim painting continues, changing the color from dark green
to brite white. The dark color has cooked the wood in the summer, especially on this south side, so wood restoration is necessary
before painting. The umbrella is necessary to prevent heat gain from the sun while working on the wood surfaces... as well
as protecting the worker!
 Work now begins on the shed dormer windows on the roof. Difficult
because of the slippery metal roof... which is accomplished by a professional painter friend, Julian Worsley, who I've hired to handle all second story work.
At this point the upper right dormer windows have been power sanded and
primed with two coats of 100% acrylic exterior primer and all joints recaulked with T-Rex (no longer distributed, use SoudaSeal 25). Unfortunately, what I've used in the past, White Lightening 50 year Tri-Polymer
is no longer made, but T-Rex appears to be an excellent replacement and may be better... time will tell, of course, and we've
had a lot of failed caulk over the past 25 years on this house, especially on the south side, so we know what works and what
doesn't, inspite of advertising hype about products lasting 50 years, which they don't!
The single pane exterior storm window (mounted in front of the 6
pane interior window) PVC seals have died after 4 years. They have been replaced with EPDM weather strip seals brought
back from the Netherlands, in 2007, purchased at GAMMA, a fantastic DIY Home Center, vastly superior to our stores here in the U.S., which seem to concentrate on stocking lowest
cost items and not quality products or materials.
The left dormer window trim has not yet been worked on, as
they're still a green color. I am rebuilding the window sills, since they are easily worked on by leaning out of the window
from the inside. Rebuilding is necessary due to the sun and heat damage. Fortunately, all the window sills on this old
house are all old growth oak, as shown below with very dense and close growth rings, so damage is only about 1/16 inch
deep into the very hard surface. However, the previous products for resurfacing exterior wood surfaces, such as these window
sills, has failed! I won't go into details here, but will be happy to talk about it if you're interested. Fortunately, all
the trim is old growth southern yellow pine. Another reason why old houses are better houses... the wood trim doesn't rot
from weather damage after only 7-10 years of age, requiring complete replacement!
Our inability to obtain old growth wood, locally, during the porch rebuilding, was the primary
reason we went with treated lumber, faced with protective materials, such as Azek, which does not require painting. A win-win
construction method, in my opinion.
  Painting finished November 1, 2008
Finally, just in time ahead of the weather turning much colder. Lots of work and only the detail
can be seen in person, but it's done. Special thanks to my friend Julian Worsley, a painter for 19 years, who made himself
available to handle all the second story work, which I can no longer do because of balance problems on tall ladders and
second story heights.
The next step is to measure and order new wooden window shutters to be installed on the ground
floor windows, used on the south (driveway) side to stop sun entry during the summer. Shutters installed on the porch won't
be closed, of course. What color? Dark green or black?
May 8, 2009 UPDATE
The shutters have arrived and painting and installation is beginning. Shutter installation
and notes are here on the Window Restoration webpage.
Need to talk about any of the above? |
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