Installation in Brick Construction

[joelpat]

I'm buying my first brick house. It is a row house from the 1920's.

I'd like to replace the old windows with something a) more modern b) more efficient c) in better shape.

The house a couple of doors down is being gutted. They have torn the windows out, and framed the brick opening with PT 2x6, that appear to be nailed into the brick.

Is this the right way to go about it?

[steeve]

hi,
i m not a pro, but normaly a window has its own frame attached to the wall, and an upper brick header for support. there's always a space in between the boards/sheeting and the bricks, which are attached with nails or clips every so rows.window casing should fall in about half way to the brick.add all those...and it will give you the size of your window sill...hope it helped. :wink:

[roger g]

I believe years ago when they built solid brick homes ( now it is brick veneer) they used to place the window frame on a row of bricks and bricked AROUND the window. Every couple of brick rows they would drive a nail into the window frame at the mortar level, cover the nail with mortar and brick until the window was surrounded. There was no wood stud anywhere, on the outside wall, to nail in a window as we do now. Which is why they called them solid brick houses.

roger