Building a Bilco Cellar Door for old farmhouse.

[tmajor]

The old house, where I grew up and my current house, both have outside cellar-ways. These houses were both built 120 + years ago, using field stone for the foundations. The doors over the cellar-way, were always constructed of wood, which had to be replaced every so often (fairly frequently, actually). Another thing, since they were built over field stone, they got pretty big. In this case 7' x 7'.

They weren't too durable, regardless of what method of construction and paint you used.

I created my previous door with aluminum over plywood, which lasted ?? 15 years. The moisture from the ground on the lower edge of the door, seemed to take it's toll. I was thinking, I could leave it go until spring, but I "nudged" the lower edge with the truck tire, while bringing in coal, so had to get to work on it.

This time, I made a mortised skeleton frame and covered it with painted metal roofing. It went together pretty good, with a few exceptions. Since the old side frames were still intact, it took some planning to get the corrugations to work out. I used the old strap hinges, but couldn't figure out any way to cover them under the roofing, so left the hinge pivot exposed and with a brake, bent the edges of the roofing to go down over the frame. Then, I installed foam weather sealer tape in the joint. If I could have come up with some concealed hinges, like the Bilco doors use, that would have worked a little better ... maybe. Car hood hinges might work, as well.

It turned out pretty good ... I might have to change the color slightly. And of course, the edges of the metal can be somewhat hazardous.

So, I don't know how this will work out, but give it some thought, if you find yourself in the same situation. Actually, even with the heavy PT 2x4s, the doors are relativity light.

 

[davedj1]

A couple of things, it looks good though, they sell metal "j" channel to cover the edges. What we do a lot is form and pour on top of the stone to get a nice flat surface to mount an actual bil-co door.
You maybe could put some door hinges on the under side? The kind with removable pins.

 

[kude]

I was looking for a Bilco precast dealer in Northern Illinois because I would like to install an exterior door for my basement. I have a lot of heavy items in the basement i could then use my tractor to cable out up the steps. So far, I haven't found a contractor to do the work. One concrete guy gave me a price of $5000 for non precast, which is ridiculous.

 

[ronjhall]

I like your idea of using barn metal.
After I retired. One of my first projects was to make make a better entrance to our Michigan basement. Used BH to dig entrance. Made the whole entrance out of 12" wide cement blocks. Bought a Gordon cellar door assembly. Got doors a Menard's. Ordered 18" extension form Lowes. My cost with all the material was around $700.

 

[tmajor]

I have considered digging out the existing cellar-way and replacing the foundation and door with a commercial one. However, part of the steps are formed from the ledge out-cropping behind the house. It certainly wouldn't be a simple "back hoe" project. It would become, either jack hammer or dynamite project.

Also, to have a custom Bilco door built for the existing foundation, would probably cost a small fortune.

As I get older, I try to follow the "KISS" rule, more often. (Keep It Simple, Stupid) :laughing:

 

[Fixemall]

Places like Autozone sell rolls of plastic door edge guard that is pre glued that will fit right over the sharp edges.

 

[tmajor]

Places like Autozone sell rolls of plastic door edge guard that is pre glued that will fit right over the sharp edges.

:thumbsup: I was thinking of something like that. Just hadn't put my finger on it, yet.

 

[tmajor]

I made one more addition to the doors today. I felt, I had 3 options for the bottom of the door: Do nothing, put a piece of wood across the bottom to keep out ?? weather, mice, chipmunks, etc., or use some hardware cloth for mice restriction and to allow some ventilation.

I doubt that sealing the door would make much difference in temperature .. it's going to be close to ambient temp. in that area. Plus, I have an insulated panel at the bottom of the cellar well.

The area has a high amount of dampness, due to the field stone, ledge, etc..

So, I went with the hardware cloth.