Surveying Damaged Timbers

This is the puzzle we're trying to put back together. This picture was from when the house was disassembled in the early 90's.  

This week we started surveying the timber frame for missing parts and damaged parts. Braces are the big unknown, but of the major timbers, we need to repair one of the eight posts, and three of the eight girts - the 28' cross-beams that make up the bents. Each section of the frame is called a bent, and has two posts interconnected by the two girts. 

The ties between the bents are half missing - we have three of the six, and need to make the other three. We also have one missing post for the purlin beams that hold up the rafters mid-span. 

The damaged post after Tom carved it back to solid material, Two faces had good seats still, but there's a section about 5" x 6" that had to be carved away from the outside corner to reach solid oak. 

 

This is a break in one of the girts.  

Same timber from the top. 

I had the local fabrication shop cut us up some steel plate and angle iron to piece this back together. We may add some wood to the rear just to restore a stud mortise, but the steel will provide the strength needed to put the timber back in service. 

 I bought $100 of nice galvanized bolts, and promptly dumped them in Muratic acid to remove all the plating. They will rust up nicely to not draw attention to the repairs they will be anchoring. 

  

This timber had two big pockets of decay from water damage. We'll just cut them out and fill in with some similar antique oak and glue it in with gorilla glue. 

 One of the areas of decay cleaned up - now just need to cut and fit a patch.