Wilbursan
Member
I don't know anything about old home construction so this may be way off base, but isn't it possible those homes didn't leak as much back then as they do now? It's been over 200 years - I'd expect some "shrinkage" in the wood.
Interesting thought. I'm no expert, either, but I do know that the wood they used back then was much, much denser than the lumber used nowadays because it was cut from old, slow-growing native trees in virgin forests. You can't, for instance, build a covered bridge these days without metal reinforcement because lumber comes primarily from fast-growing non-native trees. Or so I've repeatedly been told.I don't know anything about old home construction so this may be way off base, but isn't it possible those homes didn't leak as much back then as they do now? It's been over 200 years - I'd expect some "shrinkage" in the wood.
Interesting! Yes, there's very little old-growth forest left in the country, certainly almost none in places loggers can get to. Vermont is the Green Mountain state, but it was nearly denuded 150 years ago or so, and although a lot has been allowed to grow back since then, it's still mostly fairly young forest except on the steeper mountain slopes. But I have a pair of maybe 200 yo sugar maples on other side of the foot of my drive, and they are totally awesome.Off topic a bit but I was watching a show some years back about a company that was making a bunch of money retrieving logs that sank in the Great Lakes centuries ago when the area was first heavily logged. Seems what was considered expendable waste back then was worth a fortune now because the wood was slow-growth trees and very dense which is extremely rare now.
....we had almost 400 continuous acres in New Hope, and you better believe I did some deer hunting there....
I think you're very foolishly turning an observation of a few individual situations into a very broad generalization. Bottom line, the larger homes were typically built for people who had the option to buy the best materials, and the whim to build it where they chose. The smaller homes were typically built for less affluent, who used what they could afford. Again, a generalization surely wrong in some cases, but also surely more correct than assuming smaller houses and cheaper houses might be for some reason built better.I actually think smaller, old homes, especially in the north, were often built a hell of a lot more solidly than newer ones or larger old ones. There's a very elegant large 1790s house "next door" -- ie, 1/4 mile up the road -- that was built right on the very top of the ridge, and the folks who live there now say it's drafty as hell and the wind in the winter roars right through it up there. My modest little farmhouse half the size was nestled on the SE side of the same ridge, protected from both N and W winds. The farmers who built my place 175 years ago couldn't afford the ego-boo of living in a grand big place on top of the ridge, and they were, I'm sure, a hell of a lot warmer in the winter than the fancy people who built where they could dominate the landscape. (And it may well be that builders in those days were just as willing to take advantage of foolish people with more money than sense as they are today.)
The leaks have just moved, I suspect, but I'd guess most are tighter overall today than they were back then. Structural timber set in a stone wall srinks, but doesn't leak now more than it did then, because the wall has been undoubtedly re-pointed or poridged many times since. What leaks now is old doors that have cupped, or forced out of fitting properly by sloppy repairs and paint build-up, or windows loose and worn. Hopefully storms have been added to those windows, which would have originally had none, and it's exceedingly rare to find an original door of this age on the exterior. Most now have insulated attics, sealed off eaves, and improved other areas originally left loose. Heck, we have a roof you can't see light thru now, which was not a case with the cedar shake roof kept on this house until 20 years ago!I don't know anything about old home construction so this may be way off base, but isn't it possible those homes didn't leak as much back then as they do now? It's been over 200 years - I'd expect some "shrinkage" in the wood.
I think you're very foolishly turning an observation of a few individual situations into a very broad generalization, blah, blah, blah
LOL... okay!Are you familiar with the word "often"? Hint. It doesn't mean "all" or "always."
As an example, my family home was a *very* large old home. It had its issues, but draftiness wasn't one of them. Etc.
Nope, have never had a lick of that, and the interior windows ain't exactly new.
The only issue they've given me is that the storms themselves develop a thin coating of frost in the unheated 2nd floor rooms.
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