door jamb question

Refer to these pics in the URL below and in particular where the tape is near the bottom of the door jamb. Can I just splice out say 6" of the wood where taped and just splice in another or do I need to replace the entire jamb? Meanwhile I did a work in progress spackle job where the wood rotted (taped areas) to make it somewhat presentable till I decide how to really fix it.

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What size wood(s) is used for the jamb here?

Reply to
Doug
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You have more than just a jamb there.

As far as I can tell, you have the jamb and three pieces of trim.

- The jamb is usually 3/4 stock by whatever width the jamb is.

- The first piece of trim looks to be 1 x 2 stock

- The next piece of trim is maybe 1/4" by 2". Something like this, but with a bull nose to give it that profile:

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- The face trim may be the same material but without the bull nose.

Can you cut out the bottom and replace just the rotted sections? Probably. Hard to tell since we can't really see how it's all put together, but it seems like everything is just built up from the rough opening material.

You might even be able to find some vinyl stock in the same sizes or cut to fit so that it'll never rot again. Vinyl can be painted to match.

Hopefully you won't find that the rough opening material is rotted also, but you very well might.

Of course, the first question is this:

Why is the bottom of that entire area rotted? Does water collect there so that the wood wicks it up? If so you need to fix that first. If fixing the water issue is a real problem, then going with vinyl might be a really good idea.

Reply to
DerbyDad03

I dunno - what does it measure. My tape won't reach from here.

Whether you have to replace the jamb is dependent on how much of the existing jamb is rotted, and the condition of the rest of the jamb and the fit of the door. If you're going to splice something in, don't go with wood, go with one of the PVC wood substitutes, like Azek.

R
Reply to
RicodJour

Doug-

You might consider "restoring" the rotted would with:

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Scrape it down to bare wood, remove loose rotted material, restore & build up the areas that are missing. The "pint kit" gives you ~55 cubic inches of wood epox "paste" and 55 cubic inches of liquid wood (injectable / pourable liquid epoxy).

WIth this amount of wood epox you can create a chuck of solid material 5.5" x .75" x 12"...... seems like pint kit would be enough to do the job.

I'd leave a clean gap at the bottom so water cannot be wicked.

I've this stuff a number of time since the late 1980's. Never had a failure, never been disappointed.

All the comments about water, threshold slope, etc are valid.

With exterior wood applications, the rules are:

1) keep it dry 2) if you cannot keep it dry, design & install so it will dry (avoid situations where caulk traps water rather than providing water proofing)

Course of action will be influenced by age of door, expected / desired service life of the door system and how good a fix you want.

cheers Bob

Reply to
DD_BobK

Appreciate that Bob, thank you.

Reply to
Doug

I think water splashes around there from the overhead breezeway (no gutter) that connects to the roof above this door. I know a picture is worth a 1000 words here but it's raining right now so its hard to take good outside pictures right now. I will consider what you said. Thank you.

Reply to
Doug

It's raining right now so hard to take pics but the concrete slope should be sloping mildly to the left in the picture because there is a driveway on that side where the waterflow should carry it to the street. I think there is water that splashes there from the overhead breezeway due to no gutters. Odd thing is that the same thing is on the right side of the same door without a problem... go figure.

Reply to
Doug

Just to not repeat, see my other posts here. Hopefully without a pic, you will understand. Thanks.

Reply to
Doug

Get a longer tape . I'll look into Azek, thanks.

Reply to
Doug

rote:

There's a company that manufactures wooden door jambs with the bottom foot or so made from PVC. They save people from having to do the work

15 or 20 years later. In lieu of that, and at the very least, the back and bottom of the jambs and casings should be painted/sealed. Epoxy works well for sealing the endgrain prior to painting. Git-Rot is a very low viscosity epoxy which gets wicked up into the wood and is a good product for such an application

It pains me that people are still designing and using wooden door jambs and casings in high exposure areas. I see a lot of campgrounds that use unfinished cedar (hey, it's cheap!) in showers and bathrooms and the bottom sections are all rotten.

R
Reply to
RicodJour

Not just Azek, but any of the vinyl moulding products from various manufacturers that can be found in most home centers.

When I needed new trim for a few windows and a new storm door, I went with vinyl trim. It's staying white anyway, so I didn't need to be concerned with paint.

With the various styles of vinyl mouldings avaialable, you can build your own profile. Super glue works great on vinyl. It slides around a bit at first, but after 5 - 10 seconds it's solid.

Reply to
DerbyDad03

Hi Doug,

In my experience, this is a very common problem with exposed doors. Both door frames in our old house wicked up water at the bottom and rotted, and I just had to replace two of our entry door jambs last year for similar problems (both doors were less than five years old!).

The steel doors were still in good shape, so I decided just to replace the jambs. After seeing how common the wicking problem is, I chose to use composite door frames instead of wood. I measured the hinge sizes and locations carefully (to the nearest 1/32"), and special ordered new composite door jamb assemblies from my local Lowes. The new jambs came mortised ready to install my existing door.

While I had everything apart, I wanted to make the door opening as water tight as possible. So I also installed a PVC jamb sill from

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If any water should find it's way past the jamb and door sill, the jamsill tray will direct it out of the building instead of rotting the structure underneath.

I did find a little bit of rot under the door sill when I took the door frame out. Thankfully it was rather small so I was able to cut out a tiny section of the plywood siding and replace it with a small patch before installing the new frame.

Anywhere I had to add new trim (under the lower door frame, for instance), I used composite decking material. I couldn't find the PVC trim (like Azek) at our local stores, and the composite decking cut and fastened as well as wood.

The only hurdle with the composite frame and trim is that you have to scuff it up with sandpaper and use the proper primer to get the paint to stick. It took me the coat of primer and three coats of paint to cover the composite trim, but it turned out great.

Your installation is a little unique with the door set back in the opening like that. From what I can tell you have additional trim around the outside of the door jamb. I would use PVC or composite trim to replace any additional pieces. You also might need a spacer at the bottom to lift the door frame up slightly so use the jambsill pan, but it's hard to tell from here until the old jamb is out.

I suppose you could just cut away the lower 6-8 inches or so on each side and patch those in with PVC trim, but that seems like a lot of work for a jamb that might be leaking and rotting elsewhere. If you're going to fix it, you might as well pull things apart and make sure there is no further damage.

Good luck,

Anthony

Reply to
HerHusband

Where are you located? I may be near you.

Sonny

Reply to
Sonny

Just curious, what makes you say that? Answer: Houston suburb

Reply to
Doug

We've been getting storms almost every day and I just wondered if you would happen to be nearby. I do volunteer work, sometimes. If you would have been nearby, I would have offered direct help.

Sonny Lafayette, La

Reply to
Sonny

Shucks... very nice offer tho. Thanks Sonny, appreciate it regardless.... Doug

Reply to
Doug

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