# Veneer columns for my front awning



## joeyboy (Apr 10, 2007)

Well, you may've seen the old school columns that support my awning in another thread, but here they are again for reference. They were one of the biggest things in the front yard that screamed 'old'!

So, I built veneer columns around them. Essentially, they're just big, wooden boxes. The boxes were made of plywood (waterproof/resistant sealed) and pressure treated lumber. They were made sturdy, and once in place, they were heavily reinforced with all kinds of 'L' braces and stuff (I literally spent almost $150 on just the metal reinforcement pieces and all the tapcons). The boxes fit in between the slab and the ceiling perfectly, needing to be rubber malleted into place. They were assembled around the old columns, which are still in tact inside these wooden veneers. Once assembled, they were screwed into both the ceiling and the concrete base (lots of tapcons! Must say how much I hate working with tapcons, if I could offer advice on them it's this - buy an extra masonry bit incase you hit rebar and mess your bit up, and drill the hole 1/4" deeper than the tapcon screw, and then use compressed air (I used my computer duster spray) to get dust out of the hole).

Once the box was assembled/secured, we screwed some wood on the top/bottom to make the base/top pieces. The entire thing was then heavily caulked, and tar paper/lathed. I have applied 1 base coat of stucco so far, but will do several more and then the final finish coat (tan pigment impregnated white stucco, with a 'travertine' finish).


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## joeyboy (Apr 10, 2007)

Oh, fyi you can see that the house is still just sitting there with the base coat on as well, but in a few weeks the house, columns, mailbox, etc will all be finished with the tan stucco, travertine style. Also note that the bottom of the columns seem to be floating in the air - the only reason I haven't moved the mulch/earth back into place around them is because they've still got stucco coats coming)

I may actually post a pic of my finished stucco wall, but I've only got 1 wall done, and it's under tarps for curing now, so I'll post that when it's ready.


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## Tscarborough (Mar 31, 2006)

This and your mailbox look great. Buy yourself a rubbing brick, and hit all of your stucco the next day to get rid of the high spots and ridges. It will save you time and stucco on the final coat.


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## joeyboy (Apr 10, 2007)

THAT'S WHAT THOSE THINGS ARE!!! Yeah I'll buy one asap lol!! I did my first wall's finish coat yesterday, some spots I had to use sooo much to make it flat over the bumpy base coat (finish coat = crazy$, since it's white stucco + color powder). That'll help a lot, in fact, half way through the wall I was using my small chisel/trowel to smash off some of the thicker chunks that were causing problems.


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## gma2rjc (Nov 21, 2008)

How does everything look now that you're done?

It's been a couple years, but I was just wondering.


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