100yr old home, attic rafters and wood slats are blackened, but I can’t tell if it’s just old wood, or damaged from possible fire. The ceiling joists and sheathing have been replaced.
If I rub my hand across it, the black does kind of transfer, but there is no smoke smell.
I tried scraping into it, and it’s very superficial.
Thoughts? Thx
That is almost certainly fire/smoke damage. Not much doubt in my mind.
That’s what I thought too, but there was no scorching or scars anywhere, so it’s prob just smoke…
And actually, all the crawlspace floor joists, beams, and subfloor were replaced too… just curious if they basically rebuilt everything, why not just do the rafters too? Haha
Looks like smoke/fire damage from here.
I think that’s just the rough sawn lumber.
I just wasn’t sure if anyone has ever seen wood discolor this much over time… otherwise, I will put suspected fire damage,
Thx!
One of the towns that I inspect in has a ton of pre 1900 to 1910 houses. It’s almost routine to find fire damage in the attics. They burned whatever they could back then to heat the homes and caused a lot of flue fires.
Same ol’ reason, $$$$
Seen this before in older homes. Curious, no way to research (because of age), reported it as possible old fire damage appears structurally sound.
Report what you see, if it appears sound move on.
Disagree. I have seen this hundreds of times. That is ‘charring’ that you see, just not in detail with the poor quality pic(s).
Considering the substantial weight that has been added to the roof structure (OSB sheathing), it should be called out for review by a SE, as obviously a Roofer or Contractor doesn’t know what the hell they’re doing (did) here!
From my many observations over the years, the majority of times that ‘char’ is observed, significant repairs are necessary!
I concur but the rafters bow and the skip sheathing have been through the grinder. Not much meat on the bones.
+1 on that.
@dhorton2 what you have may be SMOKE damage not FIRE damage. Yes yes, smoke/fire have a relationship. But maybe this is just discolored and no flames reached it.
Most common thing I see is that the immediate rafters at the chimney have been sistered or replaced. Everything else has light charring and/or smoke damage.
So many buildings where starting over would have been the $$$ wise choice…
I scraped a couple, and fresh wood was just barely under the surface. That’s why I believe it’s just smoke.
Thought I had a pic of the scraping, but I guess not.
