Concrete walls not square - How to frame

brockmiera

Ok so I started framing my basement this weekend. I have framed the bathroom walls parallel with one another and the room is perfectly square (diagonals)

I was laying out the walls for the back room and found that if I frame a wall square with my other two walls it will end up about 1/2" away from the concrete wall. Not usually I wouldn't worry about it except there is a window in the middle of that wall.

Now Im thinking if I frame the wall square with the other two then my window sill will be skew. How should I handle this?

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GBrackins

I'd frame it square like you shown in your sketch. where the window is located I'd frame the opening perpendicular to the back wall (stud wall). one side of the window framing would be a little longer than the other side, no big deal, just take accurate measurements.

my humble opinion

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Gary

"You get what you pay for, and sometimes free costs more!"

Dorado

I never framed anything in my life (pretty much) but I think you should keep the window sill even and not worry about the corners of the walls being square. The window sill skew would be more obvious.

brockmiera

The thing is it will only be about 1/8" difference across the width of that window. I have no doubt that I will be the only one that will know. Now I have to decide if knowing the walls aren't square is worse than knowing my sill is skew.

Any pro framers out there ever run into this? I'm sure there are. How is it handled in the field?

I think I"d rather have the room square. But I'm not framing it until tonight so I'll hold off for others to chime in.

Dorado

In the photo it looks like the window is more than 1/4 the width of the room, but now I see you used graph paper and you're saying it's 1/4 the width, so I'm not so sure now. I know a corner of my bathroom wall is pretty far off square but I didn't notice it until I tried mounting a square toilet paper holder there. If you're putting anything square in the corner, then definitely keep the walls square.

brockmiera

Yeah the photo might be throwing you off. The window in the third picture is in the bathroom. That wall is good to go. The window that I am concerned about is about 12' to the right of that one in the back room (not a bedroom because of improper egress) You can just see the corner of it in the second picture. That wall is 11'-6" and the window is 32" wide. So it is 23.19% of the wall. Just under 1/4 of it. So I guess by that math it would be 1/16" of an inch out of square for the window sill. I guess with those measurements I've made my mind up.

drtbk4ever

If you go with the room out of square, it may show up with your flooring and/or ceiling choices.

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Bill

A DIY Noob that knows just enough to be dangerous.

brockmiera

Yeah that was also a concern. For now we are doing carpet in that room so no problem there. Drywall ceiling so that would make it a little tougher. I'm just going to frame it square and worry about those window returns later.

brockmiera

Well I ended up framing the room out square and just as I thought I was only 1/16th of an inch off. I'd say that is acceptable.

cleveman

Aren't you able to get any beer out there to drink?

It is very rare to find anything square, let alone level, flat, plumb, whatever.

brockmiera

Yeah we can get beer but I'm a whiskey man!