Sunday, March 20, 2016

Demo - Part 1

The quote that we got to do the renovation included $2,500 for a dumpster and demolition. Why would we want to pay someone to have all the fun? Joe, our cabinet guy, recommended Dirty Girl Disposal for the dumpster rental. Dirty Girl is a woman-owned and operated waste disposal company. 


Dirty Girl dumpster


Our purple dumpster was named Athena and was not quite as pristine looking as the one pictured. Athena had apparently been around the block a few times, but she was a welcomed guest in our driveway, and we made good use of her during our demolition.



First cabinets removed.



Maura is great at stripping (wallpaper).


  
 Now, the serious stuff begins.


My good friend, Al, helped me tear down the drywall from the ceiling and wall and load it into the dumpster. Thank you, Al!


Living room ceiling down.



And the walls come tumblin' down.



The hidden doorway between the dining area and living room.


This was always a solid wall since the house was built. I had heard that we could have had an opening between the living room and dining area, but something that small just wouldn't have cut it.


Looking from the back porch, through the house, and out the front window.



Notice that I kept the power and cable for the kitchen TV in tact.


Paisley is still getting used to the new sliding door.


Pulling up flooring in the dining room.

I put down that plywood in the above picture back when I installed the laminate flooring so that it would come up level to the linoleum.


Pulling up the carpet and pad in the living room.


Kitchen floor through the years.
  1. original linoleum (1968)
  2. next layer of linoleum (?)
  3. another layer of linoleum (sometime between 1986 and 1998)
  4. laminate that I installed (1999-ish)


Ripping up the kitchen floor.



 Maura removing the old backsplash tile.



 And the dining room ceiling is down!



Little kitchen in the bubble.



If you recall, we originally weren't going to vault the ceiling, but then we decided to. First, we were just going to vault the ceiling in the living room. Then I thought it would make sense to do the same thing, straight across, so that the dining area and living room would be one big room. We were planning to keep the kitchen ceiling the way it was.

Shawn, a coworker who lent me his reciprocating saw to help with the demo (Thanks, Shawn!) said that I would regret it if I didn't continue the vault into the kitchen. The more I thought about it, the more I thought he was right. More money and more work, but what the heck, right? Go big or go home! Maura didn't need any convincing on this, by the way. Stay tuned for more destruction in Demo - Part 2!

Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Installing the Beam

Here's what our attic looked like before.




As you can see, we weren't using it for much. The access point to the attic was an opening cut through the plywood in the garage. Not that convenient, but better than the small panel that is in the closet of our bedroom.

In order to get the 18-foot LVL beam into the attic from the garage, we had to open the side window and slide each piece of the beam through it and up into the attic. Maura helped me get it up there.

Yeah, that beam's pretty long.


Beam moved up and truss cross-members removed.


Two pieces of beam nailed together.

Did I mention that I convinced Maura to let me try installing the beam, myself? I figured that if I couldn't do it, I would have to hire somebody. She probably figured that's what I would end up doing. Now, I just had to figure out how I was going to get that monster beam lifted up into place and installed plumb and level all by myself. It's not a lot of fun working in a cold, dusty, attic either.

My plan involved some of the biggest screw eyes I could find, a couple of ratchet straps, scrap pieces of wood, eight cinder blocks, two jack posts, and a bunch of determination. I screwed the a couple of screw eyes into opposite sides of the existing ridge beam above the LVL beam. I wrapped the ratchet straps around each end of the beam and hooked them into the screw  eyes. This was to steady the beam while I carefully lifted one end enough to slide some wood underneath it. Once I did that, I tightened the ratchet strap and repeated the process at the other end.

Ratchet straps attached with scrap wood under each end of the beam.


I repeated the above steps, lifting a little, ratcheting a little, and slipping more pieces of wood under the beam. This was a little tedious, and involved a lot of crawling back and forth. I had to check to make sure that this bad boy was safely supported throughout the process. Next came the cinder blocks.


One cinder block laid horizontally at each end.


One cinder block laid vertically at each end.


Stacking cinder blocks.


Stacking cinder blocks higher.


Here's where the jack posts come in.


Back to the better camera.


Once I got the jack posts up, I was able to crank them up so that the beam was solidly supported. That's when I removed the ratchet straps. Then it was time to install the permanent supports at both ends of the beam.

Cutout in living room wall and ceiling showing the post supporting the LVL beam.


Not-so-great shot of the post over the hallway holding up the other end.


I must admit, I was feeling pretty good about getting that beam installed by myself. I figured that if I could do that, the rest of the reno shouldn't be that bad, right?


Sunday, March 13, 2016

So Why Don't You Slide?

If you recall, our three of our kitchen renovation plans called for sealing the back door and installing french doors in place of the triple window in the dining room. While Maura liked the idea of french doors, I didn't like that the swing path would interfere with that of the porch door. It took me a while, but I finally convinced Maura that we would be better off with a sliding door. We ended up going with an Anderson 400 Series Frenchwood Gliding Patio Door that we ordered at The Home Depot. It was a nice door, indeed, and it should be for $1,600.

Here's what it looked like before.


Getting ready to assemble the door on the porch.


Ready to remove the windows.


Windows are out!


Good thing it wasn't too cold last November!


Slider installed.


Old back door removed and boarded up.




Saturday, March 12, 2016

Send Reinforcements!

Not long after Anthony specified what we needed for the structural work, the material arrived.



Sudbury Lumber dropped it right in our driveway. Luckily, our cabinet guy, Joe, showed up shortly after it was dropped off and gave me a hand moving it into our garage. Joe stopped by to take some measurements in the kitchen for our new cabinets.

Now that we had the lumber, I had to get busy reinforcing the floor joist in the basement. Since we have a finished basement, it was kind of tough. Just getting the 12-foot 2"x10" downstairs was a challenge in itself.


The doubled-up joist that saved me a lot of work on one side


The joist that needed to be doubled is to the left of the joist that is already doubled.


This is the same joist, on the right, looking in the other direction.


A tight squeeze, as you can see.


Luckily, I was able to utilize a conveniently located basement window.


Had to trim a little off a neighboring joist to get the new one in.


A few pipes in the way, too.


Getting there!


Had to trim the ends off of the doubled-up joists to get the new one in.


At this point, I was having a pretty tough time trying to get the new joist upright, along side of the existing one. I needed some mechanical assistance, so off to Lowe's I went. I figured I could get a jack post and crank up the existing joist just enough so that I could pound the joist in. I also ended up getting a couple of pipe clamps and a couple of 2-foot lengths of 3/4-inch pipe. I thought that I could clamp them across the bottoms of the joists and tighten them a little bit between whacks with the mallet.

Jack post and pipe clamp in place.





Mallet marks on the joist.


Looking good on this end!


Jack post moved to the other end, by the beam.


Not too shabby!


Looking good this way, too.


And it's in!


I figured that I wouldn't be needing the jack post anymore, so I returned it to Lowe's. Decided to keep the pipe clamps, though. Those could come in handy. I could always buy longer lengths of pipe for them, too. Installation of this floor joist was done over a 3-day period in October of 2015.