Cellar Door Project

       The cellar door project began maybe in 2018?  Mice in the basement always brings the problem to top priority.  (https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/7358692302968743913/1273023153080464776

     I had made repairs to the door before and had staved off the tide of unwanted furry rodents.  Replacing the old siding opened gaps over the cellar door.  They boys took off two layers of siding, the vinyl, then the old wood siding that went on when the house was built.  They put back one layer of siding.  There was a gap.

     Mice, like water, always find the way.  Water has to follow the laws of gravity.  Not mice.  They can crawl, jump, survive falls.  If there is a way in, they find it.

         I had made some repairs to the door.  I beefed up the rotted lower end in the spring of 2019.

      One day last spring (2020), the grandchildren and I were in the basement looking for something, ball bats and gloves? One of them pointed out a dead mouse in a trap.  It was time.

     I knew the door had to be rebuilt.  I had bought treated lumber to replace the framework probably two years ago.  It lay in the garage in a stack low enough that an automobile could drive over it and not snag it.  I had the frame planned out.  It was just a matter of getting to the job.

     What to use for the door?  I have been contemplating that for a couple of years.  My preferred method would have been to cover the four-foot opening with a chunk of boiler plate or other metal thick enough to bear two or three hundred pounds and skip the wooden door.

      The metal was available at a steep price and the shipping more than doubled that.  I settled for a 4 X8 sheet of plywood.  (The photographer forgot to snap a shot of the door without the covering.)

    Then the problem was, what to cover the raw plywood with.  I followed several leads trying to track down some sheet metal that was over four feet wide.  I thought I had found it a roofing company.  We even ordered it. 

     Two days later, the salesman who placed the order called and said he could get nothing wider than four feet.  Well, actually 46 inches, he said.  That won’t work.  The door itself is four feet wide.  Add 2X4 frame on either side of the door and four feet is over  six inches short.  He cancelled the order for me.

       Ultimately, I  fell back on my roofing experience.  Two sheets of roofing metal would easily cover the doorway, with a big overlap to discourage any moisture entering.  That is what I did.

     We have been mouse-free for a couple of months.  The new plywood got a little wet in the Labor Day storm with the old sheet metal covering it.  Mother Nature hasn’t blessed us with the chance to test the moisture resistance of the new roof covering the new plywood.  I guess she figures if I could put things off for a couple of years, why can’t she?