I just saw a This Old House classic episode where they replaced some sills on a 100 year old house. Yes, they did stack the wood to make it the same height as the original piece of wood. They jacked up the walls. They did not have to jack up the entire house because of the way the house was framed, the walls and the ceilings/floors were able to be moved independent of each other. Very interesting but quite an undertaking. By the way, the owner wanted the house soooo much he did not get the house inspected prior to buying it. If he had, he would have discovered that ants and termites had been excavating for years into his sills.

yea I had the house inspected, he found a bunch of stuff, but everything he found was fairly obvious stuff that I had already found my self. So im not sure he was worth it. I think I saw the same episode you did, I watched it closley because of my sill situation, but I have no idea what that sort of thing costs. Also they were dealing with a baloon framed house and not a timber framed house, not sure what the difference would be in lagistics of jacking...

we have a small (2 bedroom, 1 bath, kitchen and sitting room) house and we replaced the sill on it. We did it ourselves (OK my brother helped and he is a builder!). But we just jacked up the house bit by bit and replaced the sills in 10' lengths. It was reasonably easy to do - just scary!

Sill repair/replacement is one of those things that seem frightening, but from all I can tell, competent workers can do it without too much trouble. Timberframe houses are the usual candidates for this.

I also am facing a sill project and here's what I've learned so far: talk to a lot of potential contractors.

Many have no experience working on old timberframe houses or any appreciation of how they're put together and would be perfectly happy to "learn" on mine. You need to keep asking around til you find a couple of old-house mechanics who know what they are doing, have experience with gentle methods of repair and house raising and really like working on old buildings. This is an area where contractor ignorance can do a lot damage to one of the essential components to your structire.

If you are looking for leads to workers, ask at your local historical society, ask at real lumber yards, ask other traditional tradesman (plasterers, for instance not sheet rock hangers) for referrals. In almost every place with any stock of timberframe buildings there are people who know what to do. It's just sometimes hard to find them, and sometimes they come from some distance (50-75 miles).

I would also ask for references and follow up with the former clients.

Yes, you can "build-up" a sill with pressure treat.

There are some good books (and magazine articles, c.f old numbers of Old House Journal) on old house care, with excellent info on sill work which will make you a better evaluator of proposed solutions. Do you need some references?

Good luck.
Molly~

PS: I've been searching for the right worker for a couple of years. Sill work, in most circumstances, is not an emergency (though it sure is worrisome), so it's worth taking the time to find the right guy. However, since it is usually done before a lot of other projects, it can take on urgency for that reason alone. My advice: take your time here, none the less, you really want to get it done right.

I've changed them out a couple times here in MN. It's not a big demand here as most of the older homes have been rebuilt or pushed over around here. We get some in the down town area of St. Paul every ounce in awhile. We use two ten ton floor jacks and a custom twelve foot solid white oak 6x6 I had made for a support beam. Trying to get it in the basement is another question. The whole idea to this is just releasing the pressure off the sill board to remove it and slide the new one in. We will pin strings across the floor joists so we can see how far the floor is off. We then attach string levels to see how plumb things are. Not that many houses from that date carry the bubble between the lines, but it gives us an idea of where we should go to. Ounce we get the strain off the sill we can cut it loose and drop it out. We then stack treated in its place using a sub floor glue between pieces and galvanized deck screws to hold it all together. We then slowly let the jacks down and tie it all back together. I know when many others do this they jack the floor to high. Plaster will crack and fall in many places if you aren't careful in what your doing. Nothing worse than a cracked wall or even a broken window. It's a tough job and we get around $500.00 for one opening and $200.00 for each other one! I even take out a special insurance rider on each of these in case something unforseen should arise. A bit scary if nothing else.

I found a couple timber frame specialists online, but they seem a little too much so to me, they dont stack presure treated because its not original and will only work with hand hewn 8x8 beams, seems a bit extream to me. But I would like to find somone experienced with timber frame houses. Im in northern Massachusetts, so there is no shortage of very old houses in the area so im sure there are people around used to dealing with them. Now that I think of it, dosnt This Old House have a contractos list of people they have used? Its a good thing this can wait a bit because the budget is going to take a little time before its ready for this project. From what Guy doorandwindow is saying here looks like I could do it for a couple thousand bucks. Thats not too bad. The previous owner left 3 12 ton jacks and another 6 ton jack, now ill take on most anything my self, but this seems like somthing that would be prudent to bring an INSURED contractor in for.