Kitchen Timber Frame

[malcolm]

Just for a bit of fun - look what I found behind plasterboard and gypsum plaster in the kitchen. It is part of the original outside wall of my house dating I guess from the late 16th or early 17th century and complete with wattle and daub in good condition. As you might imagine from the photo the room next door has a much lower ceiling height.

I think the kitchen was added on by Georgians. I guess it was them who hacked a door through the timber frame (which is useful as I wanted a door). It looks like they finished the wall with a really thin skim of plaster or just limewash - there is a build up of about 1mm of lime on the beams and wattle and daub which was applied after the door was put in. I don't think any original finishes remain.

I had thought about leaving some of the timber exposed with the daub protected by lime plaster, but the gypsum plaster is proving very difficult to remove from the timber frame and exposed timber might not be practical in a kitchen. I might cover it up again sensitively and have my feature wall somewhere else in the house.

 

[88v8]

Great find!

Our kitchen has a fully exposed timber frame, original to the house. And some wattle/daub.
One has to resist the temptation to cover it with wall cabinets, which is why we don't have any.

Ivor

 

[malcolm]

Could you post a photo for inspiration Ivor? (Or anyone else.) I have plenty of time to decide what to do with that wall - I have drainage, new windows, insulation, and the outside walls to sort out first which can't be completed until lime season.

The wall is reasonably straight so I could run some cabinets with nice oak doors along with an upstand behind and have exposed timber with a lime finished infill further up. I don't think we are having wall mounted cabinets, instead the utility room will need to be packed with storage.

Any ideas on how to remove gypsum plaster from wood? I think they might have used the sticky plaster basecoat (for difficult surfaces like a 400 year old timber frame). I had hoped water would help and it does a bit but perhaps I haven't tried leaving it for long enough.

 

[Andys]

I sympathise with you on the gypsum plaster Malcolm, there's definitely a market for some sort of anti-gypsum Kryptonite.

I'm trying to remove 20mm of a gypsum/vermiculite mix on expanded mesh on top of lime/hair plastered wattle and daub - making slow and steady progress thinning the plaster layer using an oscillating multitool with a toothed scraper blade. And I'm just about out of the doghouse after the draught blew IN the open window and filled the house with a dust cloud :roll:

 

[Toby Newell]

Any ideas on how to remove gypsum plaster from wood? I think they might have used the sticky plaster basecoat (for difficult surfaces like a 400 year old timber frame). I had hoped water would help and it does a bit but perhaps I haven't tried leaving it for long enough.

Scraper. Another scraper. A third scraper. Abrasives. Patience. Bacon sandwiches. Vouchers for RSI clinic.

On larger timbers they even may have helpfully hacked small regular lumps out of the wood to aid adhesion. If you are lucky mind.

Still. The gypsum, being alkaline would have given a nice deep soda wash colour to the timber when you get to it.

(sorry I have not the 'before' shot) 250 - 400yr old oak


you cannot, of course, ever remove 100% of the plaster - 550 - 600yr old oak

 

[malcolm]

I think the gypsum was podged on about 15 years ago replacing lime plaster, but the timbers were hacked for a key for the lime.

How did you renovate the 250-400 year old beam - is it finished with Shellac? Mine is exactly the same age. Yours looks suitably smooth and dust free which would suit a kitchen.

 

[Toby Newell]

I think the gypsum was podged on about 15 years ago replacing lime plaster, but the timbers were hacked for a key for the lime.

How did you renovate the 250-400 year old beam - is it finished with Shellac? Mine is exactly the same age. Yours looks suitably smooth and dust free which would suit a kitchen.

Details on my website, results here: http://newellwoodworks.co.uk/wordpress/?p=491 which I hurriedly did for a recent beam query.

Further advice in my articles on my website (or lesser versions on here) basically hand scrape with tungsten carbide scrapers, hand sand with blocks or sanding machines (most gunk is removed via scraper and is very, very hard work, do not attempt unless you have a strong back, you need to use maximum force) finished with coloured shellac and traditional beeswax. I did approx 150 linear metres on that job, the pictures on the blog show mostly the kitchen, elm and oak with one large pine beam in the middle, almost all beams are oak, elm with some pine.

Can't honestly remember how many coats I applied, it took me weeks longer than anticipated and I lost money on the beams, I think I quoted to apply three coats but ended up applying four, five or six with one or two coats of wax, seeing as I invested so much of my time with them I just did what was required to make them look great.

Each individual beam will have a slightly different porosity so whilst some beams may get smooth with three coats, some require five or more, basically you just keep coating, sanding and coating until it feels lovely and perfectly smooth, then you sand them lightly again with a worn fine sanding sponge (180 grit or finer) and / or with fine wire wool 0000 grade (if they are fairly flat otherwise the wool will get caught up in the interstices) and apply a very thin layer of wax. If you value your sanity I would advise against beam sanding but they do look totally amazing, perfectly smooth and they appear to glow. Worth it in my opinion, only if I had several hundred meters of beams in my house I would paint the smaller ones black and sand only the larger beams as features.

Toby

PS Another important point to note is use your judgement, many historic beams have been heavily munched mostly by woodworm (common furniture beetle, little holes) and so some or all of the surface may be friable, you can gently hack off the really crumbly bit until you get to solid but still hole ridden timber. My judgement is as long as I get back to stable wood I don't take back any more, of course you can't really sand the honeycomb parts and you have to very, very liberally coat and dab them with shellac as they soak up enormous amounts of finish. Some beams will be totally clear of worm damage and will only have shakes and little holes dents etc whilst some will have a few honeycomb areas and some will almost be 100% thank Crunchie its Friday. You just have to take care with the Crunchie type parts. That is the main problem with blasting, the customer who got me to strip and restore the 550 year old beams in the bottom picture (above) had previously had his lovely A frame bedroom beams blasted, most of which had considerable worm damage, of course, the blasting stripped away a large percentage of this honeycomb type timber totally ruining the beams and leaving them dry and withered, luckily he found me before he had the downstairs done, stripping very old beams with a lot of worm damage really cannot be left to a man in a spacesuit with an industrial compressor finishing the job in a day blasting every inch willy nilly the same, you will have to take care to sand each different part of the beam according to it's condition and the number of holes it has.

 

[malcolm]

Thanks Toby, I tried my old and tired scraper and it seemed effective with a bit of effort. I'll invest in a better scraper.

I've not made up my mind whether to leave some of the wall exposed in the kitchen but will almost certainly leave some frame exposed in the bedroom in the old part of the house where it looks like the timber frame is just lime washed behind layers of wallpaper, so the tips will be handy.