right way to do a half fast fix?

[Nate Nagel]

I'm trying to tighten up my garage a little bit... there's two windows on the lower level that were installed in a block wall with brick facing. Unfortunately whoever did this didn't have a freaking clue what he was doing, and to make matters worse, he was using brick with holes in it, not solid brick, so a lot of the half bricks are really messily split. There's gaps all around, and they were just shoved full of fiberglass insulation - the only thing that kept this from being a rot factory is that the upper level overhangs the lower level by about a foot. I dug out most of the insulation and spray foamed the heck out of it. What would be the best way to finish this off - just trim the foam with a knife and paint right over it, or should I put a skim coat of caulking over it before paint? I will need to go back and caulk some places where the gap was appropriate and I couldn't get the spray foam nozzle in it.

I know the RIGHT thing to do would be to knock out the brick and have a mason come back and do it right, and then have a window guy put new windows in (and if I were going to do that, I'd relocate both of them so that they'd not interfere with walls and/or the stair stringer like they do now... yeah, really...) but this is a garage, after all, and I have stuff to spend my $$$ on in the house...

ideas?

nate

[David L. Martel]

Nate,

Sorry but I don't understand your problems. Perhaps some pictires of these gaps or whatever would help. Why are you insulating your garage? It sounds as if you want to somehow seal around these windows but why that's a problem is not clear. Is it the framing of the windows that is bad? Were these half bricks installed backwards

Dave M.

[N8N]

because I am running a dehumidifier in it now to keep my tools from rusting, car upholstery from mildewing, etc. (I live near DC where simply leaving something in an unconditioned space will ruin it) and am considering adding a heat pump to make it a little more usable in the summer/winter. The walls are already insulated and sheetrocked on the inside.

the windows just don't fit their openings. The gap ranges from 1/8" to 3/4" between the window trim and the brick, and it was never caulked.

Some of them were, yes. It looks like someone started to lay the brick for smaller windows and then decided to put bigger ones in and instead of knocking out the brick and starting over they just busted the ends of the bricks off. It looks "OK but not great" to about 3/4 of the way up the windows (double hung BTW) and then it all goes to heck in a handbasket.

Now that you mention it, I wonder if it might not be advisable to try busting the half bricks out and replacing them; I have never done anything like that before though so I don't know if this is a fun afternoon DIY project or a can of worms I don't want to open.

nate

[HeyBub]

Maybe some really wide faux trim?

[N8N]

Hmm, that gives me another idea, I could conceivably built a frame out of 1xwhatever around the brick opening and then use trim on the face of the brick, kind of like you'd normally see on the inside of a window? then the gaps would be small enough to caulk and I'd just fill the void with foam before putting the face trim on. Maybe...?

nate

[HeyBub]

How about faux shutters? They would certainly be wide enough.

If it weren't windows, I'd suggest the trick that architects use to disguise design or construction flaws: vines.

[N8N]

That would certainly cover up the ugliness, but wouldn't do squat for weathersealing which is actually my highest priority. Appearance, eh, it'd be nice if it looked nice, but I don't really care. The garage isn't visible from the street (save for the main door) nor is it visible from the neighbors' yard, nor is that side of the garage really visible from inside the house or on the deck.

I'm still diggin' the trim idea, I don't know why I didn't think of that before. In fact, a PO actually trimmed around the roll up door with some plastic trim boards (and did another half fast job on that too; he put the boards up but didn't foam behind them or caulk them to the brick, nor did he install a weatherseal between the new trim and the garage door...) which might just be the ticket - and I think I dug some up when cleaning up around the garage. they are these white plastic "boards" that look like one-bys but are definitely not made of wood. I think I've seen similar stuff at Lowe's in the trim section. Anyone use these, and I guess the real question is, are they homogeneous, e.g. is there any problem with ripping one to make it fit the space between the surface of the brick and the existing window? (I guess I can find out myself with a little test later, if I get motivated...) If those will work well, I could just buy some more of those, and also some surface trim of similar material to finish off the face. It'd look a little weird without trim at the bottom of the window (because that actually has the brickwork done correctly) but like I said, I don't really care all that much.

Heh. That, believe me, would be easy to achieve. I've been ripping out mile-a-minute vine like mad; it's aptly named.

nate

[aemeijers]

can you post some pictures somewhere? We can give better ideas when we can see what the problem is.

-- aem sends...

[Colbyt]

Most of the faux wood products can be sawn like real wood. Ripping or cross cutting should not be a problem.

Colbyt

[Nate Nagel]

I'll try to get some up this weekend... I just foamed up some of the gaping cavities (I ran out of spray foam last night; I woefully underestimated what it'd take to do this) so if I take a pic now all you'll see is gloppy expanding foam all over the place. I don't feel like going back out there at the moment, either - despite the fact that I don't have any standing water back there, the area by the garage is a veritable skeeter-fest at the moment.

nate