Installing Cavity Sliding Doors

With no replacement ply arriving in time for the weekend the ceiling remains unfinished six weeks after work stopped on it.  A few phone calls to arrange some timber and work started again on site with the installation of the cavity sliding door units. I purchased the Hume Statesman cavity sliding door units from Bunnings about a year ago as I originally thought they had to be put in at the same time the frame went up. This was not the case, but the units had to be installed now so that I could sheet up the internal walls around them.

The cavity sliding door units are made up for a standard 90mm frame sheeted with plasterboard. As my internal walls are sheeted with 8mm MgO board and finished with 10mm of render I needed the door frame sections to be 10mm wider than those supplied on the units. Like the window reveals I intend to use the door frames as render stops. Having to change the door frame timber I took the opportunity to replace with with Tassie Oak hardwood to match the window reveals. I got the timber from Ison Hardware in Bridge St Nowra where they mill the timber on site, this enables me to get the non standard size of 19 x 126mm for my door closing jambs. The measurement of 126mm is made up of 90mm for the frame 8mm each side for the MgO board and 10mm each side for render. With the help of a little planing of the top of the jamb they all fitted together.

The timbers replaced it was time to install the units. The first one was not too difficult. I did a lot of levelling, the split jambs, the top jamb and closing jamb and the back of the unit, but will only be able to tell if I have done a good enough job once the doors are hung. Since I do not have the doors yet, I will only find out after the walls have been sheeted and rendered. I backed in behind the gap at the back of the unit and attached it to the frame with the framing gun. The unit was attached with screws at the top and I used brads to attach the closing jamb and to attach the cavity unit to the frame where they came into contact, taking care not to leave anything sticking into the section where the door slides.

First cavity sliding unit installed

Beautiful hardwood closing jamb

The second cavity slider unit was the difficult one as it had to be slid into a slot in the frame. There was not enough room to put it in with the top rail attached as per the instructions and the angles and small amount of space left around the door meant that the top rail could not be slid in either before or after the door. The only option was to take a small section out of the stud next to where the top rail would go, slide the top rail in sideways and attach the top rail to the cavity sliding unit after it was in place by twisting it slightly sideways to get the screws in. The stud that was cut was attached by a noggin just under the cut as well as just above it so that it was still held reasonably well even though it was cut. After the cavity sliding door unit was installed the cut stud was repaired with an extra piece attached to the side.

The awkward cavity slider unit installed

We also sanded and applied an oil finish to the timber reveals on some of the windows and one of the door jambs. We used Livos Ardvos natural wood oil. It was easy to put on with one of the pads used for edging and a fine paintbrush to fill in the corners. I was very happy with the finished colour and will do another coat of Livos oil after the walls have been rendered. I filled the screw holes in the window reveals with "Hardwood"colour wood putty, but the filled holes were very obvious as it never quite matched the variable colours of the timber.

Livos Ardvos Wood Oil

Oiled window frame

Oiled sliding door frame

A weekend of work on the build would not be complete without more render tests. After last time writing off the yellow colour  we came to the conclusion that we preferred a yellower colour to an orange or brown colour. With the existing Yellow render tests considered too dark/intense I tried some really pale versions. My new scales had not yet arrives (they were in the letterbox when I got home) so I was doing measurements using tiny cap fulls. Unfortunately there was not enough colour in these test of one and two cap fulls to 1/40th of a bang of render, to overcome the grey/green tinge of the render. So, further render test were done, including blending the Yellow and Sundance oxides together. When wet all these tests looked almost the same, so I will have to wait until they dry to see the results.

2% and 1% Yellow, 1% Sandstone, 4%, 3%, 1% and 2% Sundance oxide

Two and one cap fulls on Yellow oxide