When my inlaws bought the house this doorway was boarded up and the frame long gone. The board was removed so that a new roof could be installed over the stairway opening a year ago. The yellow thing is a random piece of steel.



This doorway, being behind the house (there are two small structures behind the house ...) opens to a stairwell for the tunnel of doom that leads to the basement.



You'd like to see more and I can oblige.



Oh cool, is that a light switch? Of course it is, we're not heathens. It's one of several in the house that are original. The switch covers are Polyoxybenzylmethylenglycolanhydride. You know Bakelite as one of the first plastics.

Did you know that contains formaldehyde, and if Bakelite ever burns it turns to carbon, thereby becoming electrically conductive? And that the cloth wire insulation inside them all is surely frayed, and that frayed insulation can get hot and ignite? Good times. For fun, we go outside and play in the street!

Surely, an 83-yr old light switch in an uninsulated area barely protected from the elements no longer works? It does, as do several others inside the house (maybe 4 have been replaced, due to being in locations with heavy usage.)

Consider that, the next time you buy the 59-cent light switch made overseas instead of the one that sells for 2 or 3 dollars made in 'Merica. Just sayin' ...



That's a 3-way switch. The cabling leads to another one at the other end of the tunnel of doom. The gray paint on it and most of the inside brick is surely leaded, and covers everything in the basement except the cement floor.

You came here to help me install a door. I'm getting to that.

Is that door opening, um, "less than square"? If so, I want to be the first to vote to consider a sliding barn door type setup, or, a surface-mount roll-up door.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/19/2022 08:11PM by John B..

I'm thinking fallout shelter

Invite your enemy for a glass of wine in the cellar and brick it up.

Just be careful changing the light bulb. It's a long way down, and the light fixture is coming apart.



I don't understand how the original door frame attached to the brick. I see some areas where brick is partially absent, filled with 2x4, then what? On the right side, the first piece of wood is up top, under the outer lintel. Then there are 5 courses of brick, another piece of wood, then another 5 courses of brick, and another piece of wood etc.





But on the left side of the lintel it's just brick; no wood at that same location:





The left side shows nails in the wood ... like the frame went in and the mortar and brick was added around it ??



The threshold is rough cement at the level of where the top "step" would be:



Next up: Some initial measurements.

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John B.
Is that door opening, um, "less than square"? If so, ...

Oh great, now I gotta check for that?

Presumably what you're seeing is common parallax error from the wide angle lens my iPhone produces.

I'm curious to see more of the surrounding structure. It doesn't look insulated which seems like it would cause a fair amount of heat loss. IMO how you address this mainly has to do with how it affects the rest of the house. I hope the rest of the house is charming enough to compensate for this eyesore.

What part of the country is this in?

What are the doorway dimensions? Whats the width of the stairwell?

My gut reaction is to figure out how to put an insulated fiberglass door in but the larger context needs to be accounted for.

---

If that was in coastal California you could rent it out as a studio apartment for about $1500/month.

---

"In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion." (1987) -- Carl Sagan

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cbelt3
I'm thinking fallout shelter

The house precedes the invention of nukes, and at any rate all the tunnel does is connect to the basement.

My initial guess was some kinda back escape from "revenuers" knocking at the front door, however this doorway is less than 20 ft from what used to be the back porch and doors.

The HVAC return on the main level has no trouble whatsoever pulling up cold basement air, especially since there's no door to speak of atop that tunnel stairway.

It'll be 4 degrees on Friday. That's legit cold for TN. I'm seriously considering turning on a gas wall heater in the basement -- if it works -- so that the basement temp does not fall to freezing this weekend. I have no interest in the furnace, laundry, or water heater malfunctioning this weekend.

You can anchor the frame in the brick with fasteners. I think i can see holes where a nail-sized fastener was used. I might use something heavier, with a wall anchor of some sort. Grout between the board and the brick with foam or somesuch to minimize air loss and moisture penetration.

Once you have a frame, you can go with a panel or a door. Scratch built or cut something larger to fit, but everything about this looks non-standard.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/19/2022 08:58PM by Acer.

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mattkime
I'm curious to see more of the surrounding structure. It doesn't look insulated which seems like it would cause a fair amount of heat loss. IMO how you address this mainly has to do with how it affects the rest of the house. I hope the rest of the house is charming enough to compensate for this eyesore.

What part of the country is this in?

What are the doorway dimensions? Whats the width of the stairwell?

My gut reaction is to figure out how to put an insulated fiberglass door in but the larger context needs to be accounted for.

There isn't a lot of heat loss, because we don't normally heat the basement. Air is currently getting sucked into the doorway, down the stairwell, through the tunnel, into the basement, and then up to the main level from the HVAC's return sucking in air it needs for circulation.

As previously mentioned in another thread, the furnace/water heater/dryer do NOT use "inside air" to run -- so that's a huge plus here. (Well the dryer does take in air but since it's ventless, what air it takes in just goes out to the room.) Both the furnace (condensing) and the water heater (direct vent) have closed combustion chambers.

We're in upper middle TN.

Stairwell and brick/masonry width is ~ 27 inches. With framing I may only have space for a 23 or possibly a 24-inch door slab.

Modern doors will not be tall enough. The opening is 78 inches, so I'll make a transom over the doorway with a window to provide some light to the stairwell and give me the option of using a solid door with no windows.

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deckeda
.

It'll be 4 degrees on Friday. That's legit cold for TN. I'm seriously considering turning on a gas wall heater in the basement -- if it works -- so that the basement temp does not fall to freezing this weekend. I have no interest in the furnace, laundry, or water heater malfunctioning this weekend.

You might check where your water service is and whether it's subject to the weather. My neighbor is in Hawaii until the 26th and he's texted me and asked me to cover his water valve box that is open to the weather--it's below ground level but without a cover for some reason. Mine is a foot down below ground level and it has a cover. I might put some heat tape in there for the night. Just to be sure. We're supposed to get to 8 degrees on Friday here in NW GA.

Grab an exterior door from Home Depot/Menards/Wherever that fits the opening as close as possible. Shim the door frame if necessary. Use a masonry bit and tapcons to secure the door to the brick frame(3 on each side and 2 in the top minimum). Oh and make sure when you drill your top holes you miss the metal plates and go in between.

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C(-)ris
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>It'll be 4 degrees on Friday. That's legit cold for TN.

Its legit cold anywhere, particularly when the building standards aren't up to it.

I'd be tempted to properly insulate everything above ground but I bet the house has a lot of other projects so I might put up a door and call it done.

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deckeda
Stairwell and brick/masonry width is ~ 27 inches. With framing I may only have space for a 23 or possibly a 24-inch door slab.

Just take your time when framing and the job will be easy.

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deckeda
Modern doors will not be tall enough. The opening is 78 inches, so I'll make a transom over the doorway with a window to provide some light to the stairwell and give me the option of using a solid door with no windows.

A standard size for exterior doors is 24"x80", so more likely is trimming an inch off top and bottom of a standard one instead of ordering a custom door. The other standard height is 96", no idea where you are getting the idea modern doors aren't tall enough.

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mattkime

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deckeda
Stairwell and brick/masonry width is ~ 27 inches. With framing I may only have space for a 23 or possibly a 24-inch door slab.

Just take your time when framing and the job will be easy.

No need for framing that opening, secure the door frame straight to the brick. You can use shims and then expanding foam to seal the gaps.

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C(-)ris
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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C(-)ris

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mattkime

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deckeda
Stairwell and brick/masonry width is ~ 27 inches. With framing I may only have space for a 23 or possibly a 24-inch door slab.

Just take your time when framing and the job will be easy.

No need for framing that opening, secure the door frame straight to the brick. You can use shims and then expanding foam to seal the gaps.

You both are saying the same thing, one from the presumption of creating a frame and one from the presumption of buying a door prehung (frame included.)

In other words if you're securing a frame to the brick, you're still framing the door.

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deckeda
one from the presumption of buying a door prehung (frame included.)

You want prehung.

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JoeH

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deckeda
Modern doors will not be tall enough. The opening is 78 inches, so I'll make a transom over the doorway with a window to provide some light to the stairwell and give me the option of using a solid door with no windows.

A standard size for exterior doors is 24"x80", so more likely is trimming an inch off top and bottom of a standard one instead of ordering a custom door. The other standard height is 96", no idea where you are getting the idea modern doors aren't tall enough.

Too tall for a given width is another way of saying it. a 24" door slab should only need 26 inches width, so 'm OK there.

But an 80" tall door slab requires just over 81 inches for the rough opening, and I have a max of about 78 inches.

Even if I could find a door slab that can safely be cut down over an inch, I'd have to also cut down the frame it came with.

I would hazard that it is a storm shelter—open from the outside and leads to the basement. Here in Oklahoma it’s a tornado shelter; there, a shelter from a wind storm. Same thing, different terms.

Is there a way to get into the basement from inside the house? Then a root cellar as well. With the apparent natural ventilation it could also be used as a “cooling chamber” in the warmer months of the year, especially if the house vents up through a high point in the house (larger homes built in the early 1900’s had a high point with windows/vents to naturally exhaust hot air during the summer, with cooler air drawn from outside or under the house) which fell out of favor with the advent of reducing drafts and saving energy. This is not a roof vent, as I’m not talking about venting the attic.

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Diana
I would hazard that it is a storm shelter—open from the outside and leads to the basement. Here in Oklahoma it’s a tornado shelter; there, a shelter from a wind storm. Same thing, different terms.

Is there a way to get into the basement from inside the house? Then a root cellar as well. With the apparent natural ventilation it could also be used as a “cooling chamber” in the warmer months of the year, especially if the house vents up through a high point in the house (larger homes built in the early 1900’s had a high point with windows/vents to naturally exhaust hot air during the summer, with cooler air drawn from outside or under the house) which fell out of favor with the advent of reducing drafts and saving energy. This is not a roof vent, as I’m not talking about venting the attic.

It's only a storm shelter if you're caught out in the backyard but can't make it the additional 20 ft to the house back door to get into the house. It's a 2-story house and I don't think they were worried about storms like that.

The house has a standard stairway down into the basement. Not sure I'd characterize the basement as a root cellar. It's got an old boiler, all the usual electrical and plumbing down there, the old coal room, a half-bath etc.

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deckeda

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Diana
I would hazard that it is a storm shelter—open from the outside and leads to the basement. Here in Oklahoma it’s a tornado shelter; there, a shelter from a wind storm. Same thing, different terms.

Is there a way to get into the basement from inside the house? Then a root cellar as well. With the apparent natural ventilation it could also be used as a “cooling chamber” in the warmer months of the year, especially if the house vents up through a high point in the house (larger homes built in the early 1900’s had a high point with windows/vents to naturally exhaust hot air during the summer, with cooler air drawn from outside or under the house) which fell out of favor with the advent of reducing drafts and saving energy. This is not a roof vent, as I’m not talking about venting the attic.

It's only a storm shelter if you're caught out in the backyard but can't make it the additional 20 ft to the house back door to get into the house. It's a 2-story house and I don't think they were worried about storms like that.

The house has a standard stairway down into the basement. Not sure I'd characterize the basement as a root cellar. It's got an old boiler, all the usual electrical and plumbing down there, the old coal room, a half-bath etc.

It has the old coal room. Is there a coal chute? or was it brought into the basement through the doorway to the tunnel of doom? Either way, the old boiler would have to be serviced.

And yes, that part of the world has long been known for the occasional wind storm. Not nearly as much as over here, but it would get a storm once in a while severe enough to cause damage. The older folks there could tell you, and have quite the discussion about whether it was a tornado or not. It appears in the last few years that "tornado alley" has begun to shift a bit further east with increasing storms in the southern states.

When I was a kid, it was uncommon; after my grandmother passed in the early 1970s just such a storm hit and took out the 20-30 year old oaks in the front of the old house she lived in. That was in central Kentucky. So no, "worried" isn't the term I would use but it could have been used as such. And as far as making it the 20 yards or so into the house... yeah. Back in the day when there was zero warning that something was on the way an outside door to the basement of the house would be quite welcome.

I didn't say that it WAS a root cellar, but that it could be used as one.

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deckeda

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JoeH

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deckeda
Modern doors will not be tall enough. The opening is 78 inches, so I'll make a transom over the doorway with a window to provide some light to the stairwell and give me the option of using a solid door with no windows.

A standard size for exterior doors is 24"x80", so more likely is trimming an inch off top and bottom of a standard one instead of ordering a custom door. The other standard height is 96", no idea where you are getting the idea modern doors aren't tall enough.

Too tall for a given width is another way of saying it. a 24" door slab should only need 26 inches width, so 'm OK there.

But an 80" tall door slab requires just over 81 inches for the rough opening, and I have a max of about 78 inches.

Even if I could find a door slab that can safely be cut down over an inch, I'd have to also cut down the frame it came with.

You must be seeing some weird door slabs, pretty much all of the wood panel doors I have dealt with could easily have 2-3" or more in total trimmed off their height. Many have more available to take off the bottom than the top. They are not like interior hollow core doors. If you wanted the door in fiberglass or steel, then you would probably need to custom order one for the odd height.

You have the choice of either getting a prehung door and frame or buying just the door and creating your own frame. Cutting down a frame is just not that hard.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/20/2022 01:04AM by JoeH.

Say, by any chance your house wasn't formerly owned by a guy named Bruce ?

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davester
If that was in coastal California you could rent it out as a studio apartment for about $1500/month.

here on lunguylund, easy $3000.
especially since it's furnished ...
if ya put in a "source" of exterior light, $4000.

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!#$@@$#!

proofraed by OwEn the c@t.

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Fritz

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davester
If that was in coastal California you could rent it out as a studio apartment for about $1500/month.

here on lunguylund, easy $3000.
especially since it's furnished ...
if ya put in a "source" of exterior light, $4000.

Is there off-street parking? Add another 20%

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deckeda
There isn't a lot of heat loss, because we don't normally heat the basement. Air is currently getting sucked into the doorway, down the stairwell, through the tunnel, into the basement, and then up to the main level from the HVAC's return sucking in air it needs for circulation.
.........
Stairwell and brick/masonry width is ~ 27 inches. With framing I may only have space for a 23 or possibly a 24-inch door slab.

Modern doors will not be tall enough. The opening is 78 inches, so I'll make a transom over the doorway with a window to provide some light to the stairwell and give me the option of using a solid door with no windows.

As others have said, modern doors are 80" tall. You can leave the opening untouched by securing the door frame to the outside of the brick, leaving the opening at 27". You will find that the full 27" may come in handy in the future. Put another lockable door in the basement opening if you like.

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Ed (modelamac)

I think I will just put an OUT OF ORDER
sticker on my head and call it a day.

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Diana

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deckeda

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Diana
I would hazard that it is a storm shelter—open from the outside and leads to the basement. Here in Oklahoma it’s a tornado shelter; there, a shelter from a wind storm. Same thing, different terms.

Is there a way to get into the basement from inside the house? Then a root cellar as well. With the apparent natural ventilation it could also be used as a “cooling chamber” in the warmer months of the year, especially if the house vents up through a high point in the house (larger homes built in the early 1900’s had a high point with windows/vents to naturally exhaust hot air during the summer, with cooler air drawn from outside or under the house) which fell out of favor with the advent of reducing drafts and saving energy. This is not a roof vent, as I’m not talking about venting the attic.

It's only a storm shelter if you're caught out in the backyard but can't make it the additional 20 ft to the house back door to get into the house. It's a 2-story house and I don't think they were worried about storms like that.

The house has a standard stairway down into the basement. Not sure I'd characterize the basement as a root cellar. It's got an old boiler, all the usual electrical and plumbing down there, the old coal room, a half-bath etc.

It has the old coal room. Is there a coal chute? or was it brought into the basement through the doorway to the tunnel of doom? Either way, the old boiler would have to be serviced.

And yes, that part of the world has long been known for the occasional wind storm. Not nearly as much as over here, but it would get a storm once in a while severe enough to cause damage. The older folks there could tell you, and have quite the discussion about whether it was a tornado or not. It appears in the last few years that "tornado alley" has begun to shift a bit further east with increasing storms in the southern states.

When I was a kid, it was uncommon; after my grandmother passed in the early 1970s just such a storm hit and took out the 20-30 year old oaks in the front of the old house she lived in. That was in central Kentucky. So no, "worried" isn't the term I would use but it could have been used as such. And as far as making it the 20 yards or so into the house... yeah. Back in the day when there was zero warning that something was on the way an outside door to the basement of the house would be quite welcome.

I didn't say that it WAS a root cellar, but that it could be used as one.

There's a coal door, not a chute. It would have landed on the floor of the coal room and they would have shoveled it into a hopper that fed the boiler. The hopper and boiler still exist but are long out of service or practicality. The house next door had no hopper, no coal door, and no tunnel of doom.

A tornado came through some yrs ago. President GWB paid a visit.

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JoeH

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deckeda

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JoeH

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deckeda
Modern doors will not be tall enough. The opening is 78 inches, so I'll make a transom over the doorway with a window to provide some light to the stairwell and give me the option of using a solid door with no windows.

A standard size for exterior doors is 24"x80", so more likely is trimming an inch off top and bottom of a standard one instead of ordering a custom door. The other standard height is 96", no idea where you are getting the idea modern doors aren't tall enough.

Too tall for a given width is another way of saying it. a 24" door slab should only need 26 inches width, so 'm OK there.

But an 80" tall door slab requires just over 81 inches for the rough opening, and I have a max of about 78 inches.

Even if I could find a door slab that can safely be cut down over an inch, I'd have to also cut down the frame it came with.

You must be seeing some weird door slabs, pretty much all of the wood panel doors I have dealt with could easily have 2-3" or more in total trimmed off their height. Many have more available to take off the bottom than the top. They are not like interior hollow core doors. If you wanted the door in fiberglass or steel, then you would probably need to custom order one for the odd height.

You have the choice of either getting a prehung door and frame or buying just the door and creating your own frame. Cutting down a frame is just not that hard.

All sounds good, thanks.

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modelamac

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deckeda
There isn't a lot of heat loss, because we don't normally heat the basement. Air is currently getting sucked into the doorway, down the stairwell, through the tunnel, into the basement, and then up to the main level from the HVAC's return sucking in air it needs for circulation.
.........
Stairwell and brick/masonry width is ~ 27 inches. With framing I may only have space for a 23 or possibly a 24-inch door slab.

Modern doors will not be tall enough. The opening is 78 inches, so I'll make a transom over the doorway with a window to provide some light to the stairwell and give me the option of using a solid door with no windows.

As others have said, modern doors are 80" tall. You can leave the opening untouched by securing the door frame to the outside of the brick, leaving the opening at 27". You will find that the full 27" may come in handy in the future. Put another lockable door in the basement opening if you like.

Ooh that sounds interesting. I'll explore how to attach a frame to the outside.

Or, rent a cutter and remove some brick!