# making your own base moulding



## joecaption (Nov 30, 2011)

I work on 100 plus year old houses all the time with orginal moldings, and have worked on 100's of other houses and never had any issues with the basemolding unless it was flooded or was eaten up by termites.


----------



## oldrivers (May 2, 2009)

really, youve never been in a bathroom and seen base that was warped or shrunk or had opened miters from shrinkage etc ? i see it all the time in houses maybe its the climate change here 20 below in winter to 100 in the summer . maybe people dont use the vent enough for the shower steam ?


----------



## oldrivers (May 2, 2009)

getting closer , but need to do some more detail work the things that take the longest on a project . not sure if needed to do this but couldnt find a good enough piece of trim that matches the bullnose and wanted the same trim throughout the house but the original is made out of mdf which i wasnt confident in a wet area .


----------



## oldrivers (May 2, 2009)

here are some other random pics of bathroom . i went really cheap on this project but am pretty happy with it so far .


----------



## Missouri Bound (Apr 9, 2011)

NIce job oldrivers on the base. But what the kind of swamp do you live in where you have mold in your bathroom? If you have mold in any part of your house you have greater problems than wood trim. :laughing:


----------



## zircon (Sep 24, 2007)

Molding looks great. How did you make it?


----------



## oldrivers (May 2, 2009)

Missouri Bound said:


> NIce job oldrivers on the base. But what the kind of swamp do you live in where you have mold in your bathroom? If you have mold in any part of your house you have greater problems than wood trim. :laughing:




bathrooms are very high humidy areas . water gets everwhere from steam . water finds little gaps and crevices and soaks in . overtime mysterious odors start to apear etc . trying to prevent as much of that as possilbe . most wood is not sealed on the bottom or backside and i think mold starts on it . just my opinion though . its not just mold its the breakdown of materials moisture causes, paint peels , varnish etc fades overtime .


----------



## Missouri Bound (Apr 9, 2011)

oldrivers said:


> bathrooms are very high humidy areas


Believe it or not all of us know that. If properly vented and you have no leaks and it's cleaned once in a while there will be no mold. Mold occurs when areas aren't allowed to dry for one reason or another. If that's the case_ * as I already said you have greater problems*.:whistling2:_


----------



## oh'mike (Sep 18, 2009)

OLD DRIVERS----I want to see how you made that----there are times that would be real nice to know---

Look at the number of views---lots of others are waiting---


----------



## joecaption (Nov 30, 2011)

Only reason I can see this being a good idea and take all the extra effort would be to try and copy an old style base that's no longer avalible.
In 40 something years I've never once had to replace baseboard from rot or mildew unless the house was under water from a hurracane.


----------



## creeper (Mar 11, 2011)

joecaption said:


> Only reason I can see this being a good idea and take all the extra effort would be to try and copy an old style base that's no longer avalible.
> In 40 something years I've never once had to replace baseboard from rot or mildew unless the house was under water from a hurracane.


 
JOE:

Geez..Just let him live his life. 

He's making something and is choosing to share it with us. He knows what he is doing. 
He will figure out if the effort is a good idea or not.

At least he posted a picture


----------



## mterry (Oct 17, 2012)

Look really good! And I think it's a great idea for a wet area. Good job


----------



## SeniorSitizen (Sep 10, 2012)

creeper said:


> JOE:
> 
> Geez..Just let him live his life.
> 
> ...


Just unbelievable isn't it.

A guy tries something new and does a fantastic job renovating a bath area. He gets criticized from A-Z while not only providing some great pics he even told where he is located.


----------



## oldrivers (May 2, 2009)

its pretty simple actually , first i measured to see what the longest piece i needed was then i measured the base height width etc , i then made a box to set the original baseboard piece in tight on 4 sides , and made it double thick high .

, i then placed the original piece of trim in the box and screwed it from the bottom so it stayed flat . then i put a very light coat of oil on the piece so the bondo wouldnt stick to it . then i just started mixing small batches of bondo and filled in the box until it was level and full . after it set up i then pulled that out of the box and had a reverse profile of the trim piece. then i removed the original piece from the box and put the reverse piece back in . 

then i repeated the whole process over and over until i had enough to do the whole base . i did get some pits etc that had to be filled in but i just used bondo like usual , i also had a tube of auto body putty for very small scratches etc .. it did take some patrching and sanding etc to get it nice enough . then i aplied a few coats of primer and sanded inbetween coats . 

attaching it i predrilled some holes with one of those counter sink tools and used screws . then refilled those holes with bondo . 

what really made it work good was the paint i used= rustolium paint plus 2x ultra cover spray paint in a can semi gloss . sticks to just about anything and flows nice with no brush marks . 



also i dont mind the criticism because it makes me learn more in the end its all good . antoher thing is the bondo easily machines files to whatever you want to match it to and can be patched if mared easily touched up buts its pretty durable impact wise . 




i do appologise for my lack of writting skills in advance though .


----------



## oh'mike (Sep 18, 2009)

That's going to come in handy when I need to duplicate missing antique moldings---

Your system is similar to that of plaster work---


----------



## zircon (Sep 24, 2007)

I've always been a fan of Bondo. Believe it has many, many uses besides auto body repair. I consider it to be the thinking mans duct tape.
With regard to replacing missing antique plaster moldings, I watched my neighbor one time take a piece of sheet metal, cut and file it into the pattern of the molding. Then he put plaster in a line where the molding was missing and ran his profile from one existing piece of molding to the other. He said that was how the old time plasterers did it.


----------



## oh'mike (Sep 18, 2009)

Yep---I saw a picture from a top trim guy---he cut and filed an old drywall blade for that purpose--very effective


----------



## r0ckstarr (Jan 8, 2013)

Nice work! :thumbsup:


----------



## jackie treehorn (Jan 27, 2009)

Another use for bondo! Great job!


----------

