Family Room – Wall Repair

In the beginning of 2024 we discovered a leak in the wall of the family room behind our video projector screen. There had apparently been a leak in that wall for many years that we not aware of as it was behind the screen for the video projector. We discovered signs of a leak on the floor behind where the video screen was located. Upon investigating, we discovered an access panel that when removed was soaking wet and full of black mold. We tore into the wall and ended up having replace a 12 foot section of wall due to mold on the paneling and the 2 x 4's that made up the wall. We hired a plumber who did the repairs for us and we discovered that there was apparently an issue since the house was built in the mid 1960's. There was no solder in the bottom of the drain line when he removed the leaking part. We got that all fixed and also had him do some more work in the plumbing in the ceiling since we opened up the ceiling to check all of the other plumbing. Most of the plumbing was available by simply removing the ceiling panels in the dropped ceiling, but the original problem spot was what was the drain line behind the wall. We removed all of the old material and rebuilt the wall adding better insulation and since the wall was open I also did some rewiring of ethernet cables and HDMI cables and speaker wire so that it now would run behind the wal and to where we needed to have the new connections. We rebuilt the wall and then would have to deal with new stain for the new wall and replacing the baseboard (which we ended up replacing for the total room). The baseboard was added after the floor was done and we had to mix three different stains to find the right color to work for the room. We also ended up re-staining all of the paneling in the room as there had also been different colors in the wall panels due to the paneling that was used. Here are photos to go with the rebuilding of the wall.