1930s doors smell like death

[Hoard Cannery]

Hi all

I bought some doors from eBay and paid £200 to have them dipped and stripped and neutralised.

They smelt pretty bad but I assumed that this was the paint and when stripped would all be fine.

6 months later they still smell like someone crawled inside and died. I had them in a storage room and they stank it out inside a couple of days. The smell is foul and hasn’t moved despite leaving them outside…

Not sure what else there is to do. It’s over £300 up in smoke if I bin them! Anyone have any experience?

 

[Munroast]

what type of wood are they ?

 

[Tigercubrider]

No idea of why they smell, but possibly use pallet wrap and loads of bicarbonate of soda to soak out the smell?
Buy the bicarbonate from a catering supplier in a big sack

 

[CJRatch]

You want something similar to Zinnser BIN a shellac sealer. They're recommended for stain blocking but also work with smells. Whether you can find a clear one you'll have to have a Google.

 

[Notch7]

Never buy doors that came from a morgue

 

[Hoard Cannery]

Possibly pine? They are super heavy.

 

[xm77]

Pitch pine?

 

[foxhole]

They are lightweight doors, if they are heavy they are still wet .

 

[Munroast]

Pitch pine?

pitch pine smells wonderful

 

[Hoard Cannery]

Maybe a hardwood then. Not wet, been indoors all the time. They stank, had the paint stripped off and still stank.

just wondered if anyone has had the same.

 

[Deleted member 174758]

In the 1930s some doors were still being made using glue made from animal blood (albumen glues, often iused on cheap plywood - woodworm love the stuff as do clothes moths) but hide glues (made by boiling bones from the slaughterhouse) were more common. Both can go rotten, so that could be the reason they smell (stored in damp place for prolonged period). When I started work in the 1970s we were still using hide glues for veneering, etc and when it went off it smelled terrible, as indeed it did if it got burned, something power sanders can do to it. Checking and refilling the glue pots and getting the glue boilers was one of my tasks in the morning - worst job was cleaning out the glue pots if they got burned or the glue had gone off (normally being left over the Wakes Week break in warm weather). Only thing to do is try sealing it in

Maybe a hardwood then.

They are softwood with peeled veneer plywood panels, so possibly Canadian in origin as a lot were imported in the 20's and 30's