Hi All
First off let me tell you how useful this site has been. As my name suggests, I'm quite the DIY Guy. After some good research, I decided to buy one of Lowes' Thermastar replacement windows. For those of you wondering, the window is about what I expected. Living in MA I ordered DH, Low-E, Argon, and Tempered. I renovated my bathroom and this was one of the last things I needed to do. So, my questions are:
When I ordered the window I gave the guy my rough-opening measurements, but their computer cut the frame size down by 1/4" in width and height. Was this appropriate?
When I fitted the window, had the window been exact to my rough opening, it would have fit like a glove, square too. (one nice thing about my house is that my window openings are all very square and level).
So with the gap I followed the instructions to shim the areas where the screws go in. Not a big deal except now I end up having these shim ends extending into my bathroom. So I do my best to cut them short so that they end up flush with the inside of the window...I have to be a perfectionist b/c if the shim is a bit short, it will push into the jamb and fall to the bottom. The window has about a 1/8" lip around the frame area on all sides (inside and out) so this creates an increased gap between the frame and the jamb. I hope this is clear as this is where I need some info from an installer. Did I shim this correctly? Or was I supposed to push the shim past the lip so that it is against the frame? If so, how do I do that? Keeping tension and remaining square. Or does it really matter? It's not clear in the installation directions and pictures.
The instructions also do the above with the top two screws...makes sense, then shim as needed. I feel compelled to shim at all areas because of I just screw in the lower screws, they will pull the window out of square. Or do I just screw them in enough to hold the window in place, but not pull on the frame in any way?
Wow, a book of tips on installation would be great.
Anyway, the window is in, square and level and shimmed at all screw points and seems to be doing fine. It was instantly noticeable what an improvement this was over my single-pane, wood windows.
Any help out there would be appreciated.
thanks!
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