SonicChicken blog

Four days ’til our final inspection. Our last two tradesmen (for phase 1A) were out today–masonry and HVAC.

Kevin McKeever is our mason. He came out yesterday to salvage as many of the old bricks from our original chimney as possible. This morning he and his assistant built the chimney up about seven feet, installed the counter-flashing and chimney cover/spark arrestor. They mixed the old bricks in with new ones, and it blends very nicely.

José Miranda (of Alpha Services) is our HVAC contractor. He came out today to install the A/C condensor–I was surprised at how much work was involved in this process! The copper pipes between the attic and the condensor were filled with nitrogen, soldered, evacuated, then filled with refrigerant. The unit is powered by a 40 amp circuit and code requires a power cutout box, so: mount the cutout box to the wall, wire the circuit up to one side of the box and the unit to the other side. The control circuit was wired to the condensor (outside) and the FAU (in the attic). Finally, José tested everything. (IIRC, testing alone took most of an hour.) For the first time since this house was built 60 years ago, it now has central heating and air conditioning. The weather is too mild for either heating or cooling right now–it’s about 72°F, so I guess we’ll have to wait for a heat wave to really test the A/C.

Meanwhile I’ve been busy myself. I got the dishwasher bolted into its cabinet last night. It was a lot tougher than I thought it was going to be, because I couldn’t get the darn thing plumb and level. I finally realized that either the power or water line wasn’t in its proper place, so when I tried to lower the back of the unit it was getting stuck on the water or electrical line. We pulled the unit all the way out of the cabinet, taped both the water and power lines in place on the back of the unit, and slid it back into the cabinet. After that the adjustments were easy, although the cabinet opening is just a little too short (maybe 1/8″) for us to get the dishwasher perfectly plumb. But it’s pretty darn close.

I also got one of the attic fans finished. The other one is mounted in the gable, although it’s currently wired with a temporary appliance cord. The important thing is that they both work. They’re keeping the attic much more tolerable and extending the time I’m able to work up there. I should have no trouble finishing the other tasks in the attic this weekend.

Final inspection punch list:

• Install smoke alarms. The wiring is done, except for power feed. Other than that, all I need to do is put up the ceiling mounts and attach the smoke alarms.
• Install fluorescent lights in the kids’ closets. Wiring is done, just need to put the fixtures on the walls and hook them up.
• Finish installing second attic fan.
• Finish wiring and test the whole-house fan.
• Clean up the light- and switch wiring for the attic lights.
• Wire and install ceiling light in entry.

We’ve had a couple of relatively minor setbacks over the last two months. Back at the beginning of March we went to pick up some stuff from our storage unit in Galt (about 30 minutes south of Sacramento). I noticed that the radiator temperature gauge was red-lined all the way back home, so once we unloaded the truck and let it cool off a bit, I took it to our mechanic. His diagnosis: a blown head gasket, among other ills. The repair estimate was almost $2,000. I love this old truck, but it’s over 20 years old with a quarter million miles on it, and I’m pretty sure this is just the first of many expensive repairs. So it was time to buy a new truck:

I haven’t gotten rid of the old truck. In fact, after watching the bonus features on Who Killed the Electric Car?, I’m thinking about converting it to an electric vehicle. I’ll need to pull the motor et al, anyway, so perhaps I can sell those “scrap” parts to help pay for the conversion.

Our next problem was our clothes dryer. It’s been taking quite a while to dry the clothes lately–usually two full cycles per load. We checked everything we could think of, but we couldn’t figure out what the problem was. Last week the dryer crapped out completely. Another 20- to 25-year old device, so we decided to just buy a new efficient unit. Barb did the research on this and decided to buy an LG dryer. We designed the laundry room for our electric dryer, but we had a gas line plumbed in “just in case”. Well, “just in case” happened! We couldn’t get an electric LG dryer for at least a week, so we decided to try the gas dryer. I had to make some changes to the gas line coming out of the wall, but after a few trips to the hardware store I managed to get the gas line and a new rigid duct connected to the dryer.

Our washing machine is the same age as the dryer, and it isn’t performing as well as it used to, so we picked up an LG front loading washer along with a stacking kit so we could put the dryer on top of the washer and reclaim some space in the laundry room. We were a little concerned about the LG washer because of a few negative comments that Barb saw on the web. Most of these claimed the washer was noisy. I noticed that the manual is quite explicit about installing the washing machine perfectly level, especially when installing on a wood-framed (versus concrete slab) floor; otherwise, it’ll make noise that can be heard throughout the house. So I grabbed my 2′ level and asked Barb to keep an eye on the bubble while I adjusted all the feet. It took less than 5 minutes to level the washer, a task made especially easy due to the offset wrench that LG included in the parts bag. I ran a small test load of laundry per the installation instructions, and the only time the washer made any vibration noises was right at the beginning of the spin cycle.

I’ve got to tell you, this washer is pretty freakin’ amazing! It uses very little water, it’s extremely quiet, the clothes are just barely damp at the end of the wash cycle (so they don’t take very long to dry), and clean! Even Caitlin’s socks! (She’s brutal on them, always walking around in socks/no shoes. Being a parent is pretty aggravating sometimes!) We’re using the same detergent etc as before, so I think the change can only be due to the new washing machine. By the way, the best price we found was at Sears. Just one final note–don’t bother with the “venting kit” that they offer. It’s just a piece of flex ducting and an elbow. You’d be better off using rigid ducting, and the parts are cheaper at a hardware store even if you have to buy a pair of tin snips to cut the duct to length.

So over the last two months I’ve lost a couple of weekends to non-remodeling “emergencies”. The clock is still ticking on our permit, and I have to call for our final inspection within two weeks. Fortunately I’ve been spending some of my spare time working on the house. I’ve got about half of the windows trimmed out. (What a difference! It really makes a room look finished.) Next week we have the mason coming out to extend our chimney up to the required height; Don and J will pour a concrete pad for our A/C unit and finish a few other things, and José will be out to finish the A/C installation. And I’ve got about a dozen little electrical jobs to finish off. Time to quit blogging and get to work!

Insulation was installed on Wednesday. Wow, what a difference! It’s quiet, and the temperature in the house is much more stable. (Not so cold in the morning nor hot in the afternoon.) I thought they were only going to do the walls at this time, so I didn’t prep the ceiling and left some attic/ceiling wiring work undone. But when I got home that night, I found that all the “open” ceiling (i.e. bare joists without drywall) had batting insulation installed. Rats! That made it even more difficult for me to finish the wiring that night.

The drywall started going up yesterday morning. Artisan Drywall is our sub, and they’ve been outstanding! Ron (the owner) and one of his guys even came out and helped us finish clearing out much of the house in order to keep the project on schedule. Ron hired out a separate company to hang the drywall, and they made quite a bit of progress yesterday. They were back pretty early this morning, and they should be finished putting up our walls early this afternoon. (Ceilings were already finished yesterday.) Ron and his crew will be in next week to tape and texture the drywall.

I had to straighten up two studs in our one-and-only hallway, (one on each side of the hall), because they were bowed enough that the drywall would crack if they tried to attach to those walls. One side of the hallway is merely a partition wall, (not load-bearing), so I was able to correct that one pretty easily by making about 5 cuts with a circular saw to bowed-out side of the stud. (A picture or diagram would be very handy here…) This relaxed the stud enough that we were able to push it into alignment with its neighbors, and the drywall guys screwed a sheet of drywall to the back side of the stud to hold it in place. (Took maybe five minutes to fix.) Of course the other stud was on an exterior, load-bearing wall, so I had to plane down the high spot and put some drywall shims in a few places. I did manage to fix this wall, but it took the better part of an hour fiddling with the power planer, a 4′ straightedge, and many drywall shims. Added bonus: a huge mess of wood shavings from the planer stuck to the wall insulation and sprinkled all over the floor!

Our plumber came out yesterday afternoon to connect the gas line for the new furnace. He’s doing us a big favor to pull this off on short notice, so I stayed out there and helped him. I was amazed at how easy he made it look, but like any skilled trade I imagine it’s all about the know-how and proper tools.

I got power up to the FAU late last night, and the HVAC contractor was out this morning to fire up the furnace. We have heat! We’ll have to turn it off while the drywallers are sanding, but we’re pretty much climate-controlled at this point. After 2½ years without central heat, it’ll be a huge improvement!

On the “even more good news” front: I just spoke with our cabinet maker and let him know that the drywallers would probably be finished by next Friday, and I asked if he would be ready to install our cabinets on the following Monday. He responded, “Yeah, but would you guys be okay with me coming in on Saturday instead?” Heck, yes!

On the downside, Barb and I gave up on hosting Thanksgiving this year. There’s no way the floors will be finished in time, and we don’t really want our 10-month-old nephew crawling around on the unfinished floor. So once the addition is complete we’re going to host a post-Thanksgiving dinner–all the same food, and hopefully all the same people, that we would be having for the real turkey day.

One more minor problem: we lost our Internet connection again yesterday, but I’ll probably be able to get that working again over the weekend. And hopefully we’ll have more time for pictures (and blogging!) now that the bulk of the remodeling work is behind us.

Aside from a few minor glitches, it feels like we’ve finally crested the hill that is our addition/remodeling project. Looks like Barb and I will even have a chance to sit around and enjoy a glass of wine some time this weekend.

I’ve been busy working on the wiring lately, so I haven’t posted anything for a while. This turned out to be a good thing, because Don and J Moreno read my last post and hadn’t seen anything new on the blog, so they dropped by for a visit last weekend. Sorry for not sending out personal invitations to all of our friends/family! We really appreciate the company (and a chance to rest and chat!), so drop by any evening or weekend–More than likely, at least one of us will be home and working on the project. You can call ahead if you don’t want to take a chance on missing us…

Serious construction on our addition/remodel began on 12 April 2007, almost 24 weeks ago, although it doesn’t feel like it’s been that long. (At least to me–my family may feel differently.) Our next major milestone is rough frame inspection, which includes rough electrical, plumbing, HVAC, and (since we’re getting a stucco exterior) lath inspections. Here’s how the project is going right now:

Rough plumbing is all but done. We need to connect the new water heater’s T&P valve to its drain pipe, and we need to tie the old vent pipe from the garage sink into the kitchen vent stack. There’s no plumbing in the shop, so nothing to do there.

I spent last week doing electrical wiring and made a lot of progress, but I didn’t quite finish. Now I’m back to working on the project during lunch and in the evenings. Even so, I hope to finish during the coming weekend. Mostly it’s just little stuff remaining: an outlet or two in one room, a few lights in another, etc. The only big electrical job remaining in the house is the kitchen, and that’s only a “big” task because I have to do some framing first. We need to add some furring strips to the old kitchen-garage wall, I have to frame in the openings for two doors that we removed, and I have to re-frame the ceiling joists where the range/hood vent will poke into the attic. After that, it’s just a matter of dropping a few dedicated electrical circuits for the microwave, range hood/blower, dishwasher, and garbage disposal.

I haven’t done much of the electrical in Barb’s quilt shop, although I did get the most difficult job done–the three floor outlets. (The worst part was snaking 12-3 Romex through the conduit. The second worst part was kneeling on the concrete to wire up 3 outlets. The third worst part was paying almost $60 each for the brass floor plates. “Ouch!” to all three.)

The HVAC was finished a few weeks ago. I wish I’d finished the wiring before all the ductwork was installed! It’s been a bit of a pain having to crawl under the ducts, whereas I used to be able to walk upright through nearly all of the attic. Live and learn, I guess…

Barb and I took our salvaged doors out to U.S. Building Materials last Saturday for new jambs and hinges. While we were there, we ordered our gable vents. Those should arrive next week. We’ll need to have these installed before the stucco crew can apply lath and building paper. But before we can put up the vents we’re going to have to finish sheathing the gables! We learned a few tricks when we did this on Barb’s quilt studio, so hopefully the house gables will be easier for us to knock out.