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[davidlong]

Like all DIY jobs on an old house, you start one thing and discover something else.

I have just discovered that the bottom section of the door frame between the living room and the porch is rotten. It looks like there is woodworm and the internal section of the frame has been reduced to nothing more than dust. The timber is also slightly damp which I suspect has exacerbated the problem.

Should I replace the whole side of the frame and treat the rest of the timber for woodworm or should i cut away the bottom half and treat the remaining piece?

Either way, does anyone have any advice for replacing the door frame?

Regards

David

[thedoctor]

Its much easier to replace the whole side David but there is obviously a problem with damp in the wall which needs addressing before you do anything else. If this is an older property it may be that this wall is on foundations without any form of DPC in which case it might be an idea to see our project on injection a dpc yourself in this area. It may be you have a leak in a radiator nearby or something but either way you do need to get to the cause of the rot rather than continue to deal with the effects.
To see how to fit a rame go to our door liners and frames project helped by our projects on fixing to masonry and pilot holes and countersinking.

[Scoie]

Hi David, i would love to know what you decide to do as i have the same problem with my porch door - the bottom 1 1/2 feet of either frame is rotten! Ive heard terms like scarfing which is splicing in new section of frame but now ive read the above comment by the diydoctor i might replace the whole of both sides! i need to suss out prices of frames and the scope of the job now, but its a job im quite looking forward to undertaking!!

Cheers

Scoie

[T E Partington]

i would strongly reccomend not installing a chemical dpc, the house was designed to pull damp through the brickwork and breath to atmosphere, the problem will probably be lots of layers of vynyl warterproof paint that can't breath, if you install chemical dpc's you will get excessive warter below resulting in damaged floor joists crumbling brickwork and frost damage in vented floors, for the door frame you can splice in new sections to replace rot but when woodworm is about you are better off ripping out and burning, treat all new timber for woodworm and surrounding area's but generally woodworm dont like new timber anyway, when the beetle's fly in may and september they will simply look elsewhere, dont forget to install dpc between door frame and brickwork (the black plastic bricklayers use in the walls or expanding foam is waretproof) and strip off vynyl paint and use proper warter based emulsion.