vaulting a cieling?

[robgil]

This is the plaster board ceiling in one of my bedrooms, its un-plastered and has been badly lined with paper , its rubbish basically.

Chances are there may well be a damaged lath and plaster ceiling behind. Depending on whats behind it i woulkd like to vault it right up to the top.
What am i likely to find up there? obviously a lot of cob webs but do you think the daub infill's in the rafters might go all the way up to the top? i doubt they do so how can i get a fix to put more daub or plaster in? i can see there being nothing but thatch in there.

 

[Moo]

I'd be inclined to cut a neat hole in the plasterboard and have a look with the aid of a torch.

 

[Nigel Watts]

The plasterboard must be nailed into something - some joists presumably. Unless you are planning on ripping the whole lot off it might be an idea to try to locate the joists before making your hole - which would need to be between the joists. You should be able to do this with one of those electrical gadgets used for detecting metal and electric wires behind walls which will detect the metal nails.

 

[robgil]

i have a feeling that if the old ceiling isnt still there then who ever put up the plaster board also put up things to nail it to. Battens acting like purlins then perhaps fixing rafters to them? from other houses ive seen there might only be a single tie beam up there.
perhaps if i cut a small hole big enough to get a camera up there..

 

[middi]

I'd be inclined to cut a neat hole in the plasterboard and have a look with the aid of a torch.

That is exactly what I would do.

If you are really lucky it could be w/daubed right up to the apex with exposed collars above the existing ceiling.


Middi

 

[robgil]

I hope you are right Middi ,that would make it so much easier.

 

[Gervase]

The plasterboard is probably nailed to the collars of the A-frames. What lies above may be smashing, it may not. The only way you're going to find out is by having a look.

 

[robgil]

right then guys ,l this is not what i was expecting. no tie beams or collars , new joists to support the plasterboard fixed just below what looks like the original purlins but what really looks odd is how fresh it all is. no soot, and the internal wall of the room goes right up to the apex of the roof and is lime washed/painted right up to the top? why would they build the wattle and daub wall right the way up to the top? (it does have a couple of holes in it though).
i can see a tie beam over by the chimney in the gable end wall, perhaps any collars were removed when the joists were put in?
(just waiting for slowbucket to load up my photos)

 

[middi]

Waiting anxiously for the photos !!!!!!

Middi

 

[robgil]

on 73 percent, not long now. pour your self another drink sir.

 

[robgil]

Here we go,

this is a rough plan showing the lay out of the house , the room in question is marked with an a.

the photos are taken tight to the interior wall facing towards the gable end.

this is looking up at the interior wall , it goes all the way up and is solid apart from a few holes , and its painted, why bother painting it?

this shows a purlin , complete with pegs holding it to the rafters,

it all looks really clean for a 16c cottage , no soot at all , anywhere.

looking straight up,

the new joists,

the good news is i can get up there and do any pointing on the chimney and the timber's do look in decent condition, but they dont look like oak , oak to me should be grey , could they be elm?

 

[robgil]

right then , i just masking taped my camera to a stick and poked through the hole , the other internal wall doesnt go right up to the roof and i think i can make out some collars.

no soot in that part of the house either, i am guessing its had a whole new roof at some point, or it never had an open hearth and was built when the chimney was built, would they have built a chimney on a cottage like this in the 1500's?.

this is the same photo after a few adjustments.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

Very interesting pics Rob - not a lot of expertness to add from me I'm afraid though.

However, I'm puzzled the wooden frame with the brink infill in the external wall, that is now presumably the Victorian chimney. If this was a window or some other opening originally, why does the frame extend right into the rafters? If it wasn't a window, what was it and why is it infilled with brick now?

 

[Moo]

Going by Rob's excellent diagram, I don't think it's brick infill at all. My guess is that we're looking at the interior wall of the chimney, which was added to the house. Perhaps one of our history gurus could date the bricks?

 

[robgil]

i have a feeling its the chimney as well. in sixteen seventy something the person who lived here was ordered to repair his house, there was only one family living here so my guess is half the house was in ruin. the right hand side of the diagram looks totally different from the left hand side and i have found charred wood buried beneath the concrete floor i my guess is it burned down, and perhaps the original chimney (if there was one) on this side collapsed. The whole house has moved in the direction of the new chimney as well at some point , its leaning quite dramatically against the newer chimney.
the lack of soot in the roof though has thrown me a bit.

ive just had another look and the wall above the ceiling doesnt look painted at all , its daub but looks quite light in colour.

 

[robgil]

Very interesting pics Rob - not a lot of expertness to add from me I'm afraid though.

However, I'm puzzled the wooden frame with the brink infill in the external wall, that is now presumably the Victorian chimney. If this was a window or some other opening originally, why does the frame extend right into the rafters? If it wasn't a window, what was it and why is it infilled with brick now?

could that not just be the way in which the frame was constructed? the only reason for an opening there would be for a smoke hole but again there is no soot.

 

[Penners]

Rob, judging from your photo my bet is that the new joists are softwood. They were probably added when the plasterboard ceiling was fitted.

There are several aspects to this that would make me hesitate to consider vaulting the room.

Firstly, were you thinking of removing the ceiling joists? I certainly wouldn't do that, given the apparent lack of any structure that ties the roof above the ceiling. Even if you introduced additional purlins and inserted a few collars between them, you could risk breaking the rafters just below purlin level.

Secondly, the removal of a bedroom ceiling would severely limit your options for insulating the building. Inserting insulation between the vaulted ceiling and the roof is invariably a less-than-ideal compromise, whereas you can pile in loads of insulation above a floating ceiling.

Thirdly, even if you were able to introduce some moderately successful form of insulation into the vaulted ceiling, it's undoubtedly going to be more difficult to heat a vaulted room. The warm air always tends to accumulate in the apex of such rooms, making them toasty a few feet above head height while remaining chilly below.

If you want to emphasise the timber-frame character of the room, you could insert new plasterboard panels between the existing ceiling joists so that you have a "beamed" ceiling, but - speaking for myself - that's as far as I would go.

 

[middi]

Hi Robgil.

Just had a chance to look at you pictures, ( been fishing all day and didn't catch a fish )
After scrolling the pictures up and down various times one thing is very clear. The cottage construction is not by any means "cathedral" standard joinery but certainly a cut or two above scantly built constructions (as these have all fallen down by now) . The kind of construction you have is the type that makes beautiful old cottages exactly what the word imply- beautiful-
It is not dimished in historical importance nor in charm. That is the type of cottage construction one would find the in 16th, 17th or early 18th C which could have been used for an array of uses such as living accomodation/ animal shelter/hay loft storage/ sleeping quarters etc.. in any combination.These buildings were upgraded or downgraded as to their use according to need, hence hatches,doors, openings or closed openings, chimneys, rafters ( removed or added) all need closer investigation and tell tale signs looked for in trying to determine it's living history throuhout it's life.

The chimneys have probably stopped the building from leaning too much perhaps to a point of collapse and I totally agree with Penners, do not displace the collars as the rafter purlins are not of great dimensions therefore the typical "sagged" and " spreaded" roof will be minimised.


Middi

 

[middi]

......forgot to add, have a closer look at the " gold" looking rafters grain . Oak does assume a golden colour when not subjected to the elements, well ventilated and away from direct sunlight.

Middi

 

[robgil]

thanks guys, ive been thinking about the joists a lot and i too would be worried that if i removed them then the roof might spread. there are two massive wall plates either side of the room , one on the gable end and the other on the opposite wall, these would probably help but perhaps wouldnt be enough to prevent sagging in the middle of the rafters around the purlins. It wouldnt surprise me if the new joists have become supports over the years. perhaps if i did go down this road i could fit in some new/reclaimed collars that would be more fitting and within keeping. the room from gable end to internal wall is 10 feet so its not a huge span so i might get away with one or two? providing i can find a good fixing for them.

The other issue of insulating is something that i would be inclined to be a little less worried about to be honest. The thatch is said to be a pretty good insulator and i doubt it would have such a great heat loss that heating the room would become a problem, obviously it would be less efficient but i doubt i would be sitting here in the cold, as it stands i am probably heating up the attic space anyway to some extent and i was quite surprised last winter at how the room holds in the heat. but yes ,i have to admit it could be better.

Another problem i would face is filling in between the rafters, i have seen plaster board used with great results and a skim of plaster over the top, daubing it all might prove messy and time consuming, i wouldnt even know what to fix the daub to , i doubt i could fix it straight to the thatch.

so , its not a straight forward job at all , but neither will plastering the ceiling thats already here..