Sunday, October 17, 2010

Retrofit - Week 14

Well, we are now into week 14 of my 12 week project. Not unusual. While things are taking longer, there seems to be a comforting pattern that things are ending up better in many cases than I had anticipated. The bathroom is looking great. The siding is looking great. The bedrooms are coming together and will soon look great.

After the siding, we are into the interior finishing stages with the windows and the remaining trims. We can see the lights at the end of the tunnel and I'll have to install many of them.


The most visible progress is the siding. All the green siding is complete. The East, West, South, and North Walls, and all three sides of the porch. Crisp!

South side in progress this week.



North Side complete.


However, there is still some caulking and sealing to accomplish. Diligent Mike is taking that on. Good man.
Not Pictured: The red shingles and sunburst because they are still not delivered due to snafus beyond our control. Next week, hopefully.

The Bathroom took shape last week starting with the sanding and clear coating of the floor. Then we could put in the vanity and the cabinet doors. Sweet. Todo: Baseboards, baseboard heater, toilet, countertop, sink, shower plumbing, shower tile, recirculating shower function, lights, outlets, mirror, toilet paper holder, shower curtain rod and curtain. Plus the laundry machines, shelves, trim, lights. In short, you'll see this topic pop up again.



The delayed siding gave us a chance to put the stoops together. Still needs real deck boards instead of old plywood, but it sure feels like an improvement already.

And Shawn put up the wall between the bedrooms upstairs as well as the wall above the chimney brick. This allowed me to spend the weekend wiring light boxes and outlets. Hopefully a good inspection will clear the path for the sheetrockers to hang, mud, and prime this week.

Here is a picture of the West door with the first layer of the polycarb side lights installed.



On the utility front, this here water heater has been converted to a hot water storage tank for my heat pump with the help of a couple hard to find fittings in place of the elements. We have also spent some time this week figuring out the drain plumbing for the recirculating shower. Once that looks photogenic, I'll get you a picture.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Retrofit - Week 13

13 weeks already??? At least we got excellent weather for this week so we could make bang-up progress on the siding.

Big news this week:
-Siding (how ex-siding!)
One thing slowing down the work is learning how to do the siding with a drainage gap behind it. We're making the gap with furring strips made from black, 4mm, twin wall polycarbonate. Here the picture shows aluminum window screen that will keep insects from inhabiting the space behind the siding.

-Chimney
-East Side
-West Side
-Windows sealed in a flurry of late night paint ladies and ready to install. Guess I don't have any pictures from this week.

-Bathroom sheetrock and painting
-Built the bathroom vanity per Amber's specs. This high class, custom unit has aged-cedar trim made from the boards from the wall, so this will match perfectly. The shelves will be used for baskets and the center space will have a curtain.
And the bead-board paneling is used on the cabinet doors above the toilets, and the panel below the edge of the tub. Can't wait to see it all in place.
-Basement Door and West door and North door, and the door between the kitchen and the porch was made to work nicely. The West door still needs the side-lights placed in.
-Chimney work - the cap on the brick section is complete! And more news: Just today, we got the flue liners in place.
-More exhaust ducting

-Living room beam stained


And late, breaking, news: Bathroom floor sanded and sealed (Pictures coming next week)

Barn raising a hoop house for 10/10/10

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Underground Air Exchanger II
















Wayne has finished the manifolds, and we have installed the system in the ground. Schrupp Excavating came out to dig the hole, and the whole crew pitched in to help. We installed the tube manifolds on the deep end, and Wayne's box manifolds near the SPARC. We are excited to see how a large scale system will work.

Sunday, October 3, 2010

Retrofit - Week 12

Big news: Siding Prep, Rooflets, New flooring in Addition, Phone wire clean up, Ultra enthusiastic window sealing ladies, Bathroom sheetrock, West door


-West Door: Why does Peter always have this look when dealing with doors? The door looks very nice, now.

More kitchen Cabinets- these are going to be so cool! The island will wait till we get all the big materials moved in and out of the house to avoid any excess wear on stuff.

And Adrien is helping to pick a new color for the shakes and sunburst.
The walls got some great prepping for the siding. These are cute little rooflets.


The addition got the new floor installed. Yay!
And after years of planning, I managed to finally get the communications wires tamed on a punch down block.

A couple of floors above this, I got the bathroom walls coated. The plywood panels behind the washer, dryer, and the shower are all intended to make the plumbing accessible for easier maintenance.

And the most enthusiastic part of the week was Lori Hemminger and her crazy crew of painting ladies who were AWESOME in getting the windows clear coated so they could be installed quickly. Working diligent late hours, they did an amazing amount of painting in one weekend.

Monday, September 27, 2010

RREAL addition II




The side walls are installed, and the crew is now building the outer walls. They will be dense-packed cellulose instead of SIPS panels.