Odd Baseboard/Trim Problem

**grattorney** · 07-25-2003, 12:40 PM

Would welcome the advice of the collective Brain Trust.

I recently renovated the kitchen floor and an attached hallway floor in my house. Underneath the linoleum and 3/8" underlayment was an oak floor that was in good shape. The floors are refinished and turned out well. It is the trim that is the problem.

The baseboards themselves go all the way down to the oak floor. The casing/trim on the three doorways that open to the hallway, however, only goes down to the height of the old linoleum floor. It is almost as if someone sawed off 1/2" from all these trim pieces to install the linoleum (which is probably what they did).

Now that I am back to the original floor level, how do I fill this 1/2" gap between the floor and the casing/trim? Trying to simply fill this gap with shoe moulding would look rather odd. I also thought about making the gap larger (by sawing more trim off) and filling the larger gap with some kind of decorative square blocks that would make some visual sense (although they would not match the rest of the house. These are alternatives to replacing all the trim around each door, as I have not been able to find the same moulding anywhere (my house is 50 years old). If I started replacing trim on these doors, it would be very difficult to know where to stop.

Since everyone here is smarter than I, chances are you all will have a better idea.

All advice taken at this window.

Thanks.

Brian

**DaveZ** · 07-25-2003, 12:58 PM

If it works with your trim, add a plinth block that is slightly taller than your base molding

If that wont work and you have some more of the casing and it's whitework and the bottom of the existing casing is fairly clean cut, you could cut a small piece and wedge it in there.

**Lou_williams** · 07-25-2003, 06:33 PM

One thing you could do is try to find the trim in the inside of a closet. You could then replace that trim since it won't be seen and use it where it will be. The best but much more expensive solution is to have new molding milled to match. If you have a shaper you could do it yourself. Get the profile onto paper, There are things that you can by to copy the profile. Then you can have the profile cut into a shaper cutter. Then mill as much as you want.

Lou

**TDHofstetter** · 07-25-2003, 10:27 PM

Hi, Bri.

You could put rosettes all 'round the doors...

You could use ... you're gonna paint, right? You could use ... bondo... after taking a casting of the casing with which to shape the bondo fillers...

You could do something imaginative & artistic with moldings ...

You really CAN, if you try, reproduce almost any molding out there with a little effort. I've been called upon from time to time to repro old moldings using a table saw & a router & a block plane.

-- Tim --

If you require the approval of others,
You probably don't have your own.

**grattorney** · 07-26-2003, 08:09 AM

>One thing you could do is try to find the trim in the inside
>of a closet. You could then replace that trim since it
>won't be seen and use it where it will be.
>
>Lou

See. That's why I come here. You people are so smart. Thanks for all your advice. Lou's suggestion of taking some of the molding from an inconspicuous spot will be the most time-effective and cost effective solution. Proving once again that Occam's Razor prevails.

Thanks for all the advice, my friends.

Brian