Finishing any ideas?

I'm a bit stuck on the finishing of this place. I've got sloped ceiling, beams, short ceiling between the joists, walls and of course floor.

The carpenter of course wants me to finish with wood all over the place. He wants to rip 1" rough pine to 1/2" and put in one the ceilings and beams. But pine is so common and it will just look like plywood after awhile and end up painted.
The other problem is dust. I am getting sick from day after day of dust. Yes i know living in a renovated house was not the best plan but i saved on rent.
I was thinking drywall and paint. But now i think winter is upon us and i can not deal with dust and paint fumes.
So what i figure now is finish everything with hardboard and wall paper with textured wallpaper. Then paint next summer when i can open the windows of go camping for a week.
I'm thinking leave the beams exposed too. Here's the photo what do you think? This is what you might call 1/4 of the main floor, the other side of the house is exactly the same. Kitchen, study, living room. I'm thinking gets some nice hickory for the kitchen, would put drywall there for safety. My plan was to build my own kitchen bottom cabinet with granite tile system and finish with the wood, open shelves for dishes and pots and pans. I've already order the 2 burn flat top stove and under the counter fridge.

Oh my god Bryce, I have seen some of your other posts on this place and all I can say is to recommend that you get some professional help for it and stop hiring hacks to do your work.

I am sorry, I do not mean to be a Pri** but it looks like you have 2x6s @ 24" centers, spanning about 12' with a storage area with knee wall in about the center of the span. I hope you don't get much snow were you are.

Andy.

Andy.

Hi Andy i wish you could be more detailed with your answers. The 2x6" are supported by 2x4 along the kneewallm then and Pl to the main joistets of the ceiling. We've only added insulation and not putting wood up there. The only added weight are the 2x6" that are well supported, how much can that be?
The roof is metal and all the snow slides off.
I'm not sure what your point is?

So what am i suppose to do now? The only difference here is the 2x6's but i think are well supported?

Bryce; The 2x6 were only intended to carry the weight of the ceiling. Today in a new house you would find 2x10s if a floor is going to be added. Who ever built this area probably also removed an angle brace from the midspan of the rafters to above the barring wall. So now any flexing in the roof is piked up by these 2x6s and there is a possibility of dammage, evan heavy winds can do that.
That being said, we see a lot of stuff in old houses that don't make sense and they don't always fall down. By the look of the lumber up there it does look like it's it been there a long time.
The quick fix would be to double up the 2x6s. A new 2x6 along side the old one won't double the strength but will add alot.

Hi Neal, i got rid of the clowns and have new guys in today. That's exactly what they said!

While there at it have them put solid blocking between the joists directly under the nee wall. It is both insulation and fire stop and there should be bridging or blocking on any floor more than 7 ft anyway.

Actually those 2.5"x6.5" are plenty strong. I think we went through this before, what you see bowing is not caused by excessive weight but rather wick effect of the facia not being fixed and leaking for years. The other side is perfect straight.
For example there is a cracked beam (not the split in the basement) that i can hang from and it won't even budge. There is no new weight except the 2x6's and 7" of roxal. I see what your saying if there is heavy snow. But snow just slides of the metal roof. But didn't i just add support with new 2x6" and 2x4" along the knee wall? It's jammed in there it's not going anywhere. If it lasted this long why would it get worse? If anything the roof is much stronger now. Or am i not understanding you?
It's it fair to say i can just leave it and if some beam cracks in the future i could sister it or take further action? But why bother, even the cracked beam i can just PL or do nothing.


I think i'm going to get a dry waller to finish the ceiling. I'd like to keep beams open.
Is that dry rot? I sanded some off, can i just paint it over do i have to treat it or continue sanding. I rather not.

The new guys want me to go the permit route. I can help not wanting to have some inspector sniffing around on a regular basis. The new guys seem really effective though.
I need a rest from this project, maybe i just live with it for a while, it's not really so bad as a place to live. DIY and work with the neighbours. I just need the other side of the house framed and insulated. I walked into the permit office and filled the application, the clerk coached me on the drawings but then sent me away to do it properly. I spent 2 hours with new guy and we made nice computer drawings. I guess permit are good idea to be safe, but then again they seem like a cash grab. Then i'll be up for all sort of problems...

Sounds like you have found the right guy this time. Hacks never want you to have a permit. The good guys sometimes will make small changes with out a permit. Your house is so far away from code and they don't want to sell you a bunch of changes that the inspectors would let slide.
What ever you added to the nee wall will make everything stiffer but keep in mind all that weight and some of the roof weight is on those 2x6s.
Are you thinking you can drywall to the underside of the sheeting? In a word no. Run the drywall across the bottom of the joists.

Na they are just another version of the old guys. They want to get the permits because they know there will be plenty of things wrong to make money on.
If we've been practically blowing the place up in the last 3 weeks and no peep why would i need a permit now? Basically for what i'm doing a permit is not need anyways, only for putting a sliding door or deck.

So, here's what i'm thinking now, leave the walls on the other room as is good old cord wood. Why spend all that time and money to try and get the same look?
My question is how cold will it be if i just insulate the slopped ceiling with R30 or R40? i think i could eventually have foam sprayed on the outside. I guess that would be a problem for the siding. Does anyone know about that ?
Do you all think it is a crazy idea? How much support would that insulation require up there? 2x6 or 2x8 or even stringers would work, since i'm on my own now. I think it is best to just DIY now slowly and consider it like a part time job for myself.

I think i'm just going to prime all that wood then paint it a red/brown. Sanding would probably kill me.

Around here the building inspectors are the home owners safety system. Like everyone here, your contractors look at your house and say it's so far away from code where do you start. All you want to know is what you can do to make it safe and livable and looks good too. Everyone looking will see different things that are wrong. The problem your having we all have a different idea what needs to be done.
I've done work in some pretty sad houses with permits and when the inspectors walk thru, they try not to look at old things that were not part of the permit. Sometimes they see things that they don't like and stop and look but don't say anything unless asked.
A homeowner doing things without permits dosn,t bother me much if he has complete trust in his contractor or has a good understanding of structure or plumbing or wiring and knows mostly what he is doing.
So may I suggest you do some research, there is lots of information here and other places. You need to calculate the load on the 2x6 floor joists and then check the span load for 2x6 rough cut old growth fir and make an informed dissision and then look at fire stopping and attic or roof ventulation. You will also want to take a good look at the wiring to see if upgrades will be wanted while you have it open, same for plumbing.
I have seen your frustration show up,but keep in mind people are trying to help and what ever we want to learn tends to cost money and time.

The load is only the insulation, the 2x6's, drywall. Is that really a load or cosmetic?

If you look at the weight if the floor upstairs the nee walls the drywall the flooring the funiture or what have you and people that might be up there. Half of that weight is hopefully landing on bairring walls. The other half is landing on the 2x6s, divide that in half for each side of the house. The nee wall replace what would have been angle bracing to the center of the rafter from the bairring to prevent sag in the rafters so what ever load from the roof is now landing on the 2x6s. This calculation does not want to be close. If it won't be strong enough to carry 1000 lbs of drywall it is just simply not strong enough.
http://www.homeadditionplus.com/attic_info/How_to_Finish_an_Attic.htm

Hi Neal. Like i said nothing has change in the house, the article you mentioned is about a conversion. If fact much less weight now. I removed huge amount of material from the flat ceiling including drywall and stringers, ceiling tiles. It has been used like this for years. Inside the space of the knee wall was also a massive amount of loose insulation.
All the weight was on the beams before - now it is more supported by 2x6" and the new structure. It will 26x5= 125 sq on each slope. 1/2" drywall weight about 1lb so total about 300 lbs not 3000.

The drywall weight will be held by the 2x6's still that means there is half the amount of drywall that was there for the last 20 years. All the drywall just hanging right from the main beams, now it will be on the slope, much better support. No weight on the beams. Remember the sagging is caused by long pass water damage.
In summary there is much less weight on main beams and attic structure now. The structure has been significantly beefed up due to the 2x6 added support.

btw, what you know about declaring this place a heritage building? I have a feeling it could be due to the cord wood.

The flat ceiling was collar ties and should not have been removed.
http://www.managemylife.com/mmh/questions/112690-collar-ties

The collar ties are just fine thanks:

The are we are talking about is in the far left bottom of this picture.

I think hardboard would be a good solution light weight. But drywall would be fine too a bit hard to install.

Well the final decision is yours.