This cOld House 6

The last couple of days have been very very busy around here. Dale started on the attic HVAC unit, cutting through ceilings for duct work and hauling the hardware upstairs to the attic. Hey did you know there's not a scrap of insulation between the attic and the the living space below??? There's a quick fix for some efficiency. I'm waiting on Rob's insulation guy (Rob - my general contractor,) to get me some numbers. Dale was missing today, working on fashioning ducts in the shop which worked out terrifically as the power (and water) was off in the house for most of the day.

Rick,(the carpenter who fixed the living room floor,) Larry and Bob Sr. have been tag-teaming on the beam in the garage. Rick and Larry built three support walls to hold up the cantilevered room over top and then mid-way through the second day Rick and then Bob worked to remove the beam that was all ate up. There were three 2 x 8 planks and a 2 x 4 involved, with one 2 x 8 remaining pretty solid. They replaced the remaining two and the 2 x 4 with three more 2 x 8 planks and hung the joists on hangers. The sub-floor was pretty ate up as well, but we can't really get to it as it is under the wall from above. Bob was confident that it wouldn't be an issue.

Tim the plumber was able to get all the water pipes out of the way, shutting down the downstairs bath until the project is done. He had to move some valves and add a couple to get it isolated and shut off, and then cut and capped the pipes. The electric remained in the way.

Right when Rick was getting down to the nitty-gritty pulling out the beam the electricians showed up. These were replacement electricians as the original guy was too busy to get to the panel to meet Bob's schedule. So Tom and crew swarmed in at noon and cut the power, ripping out the old 200 AMP panel, moving the meter and installing a new 200 AMP panel over by where the new A/C condensers will sit outside the old garage. Then they added a new 100 AMP sub-panel where the old panel was, and hooked up the rest of the house back to it. All of this took care of the main line which had to be moved out of the way of the beam replacement project, as well as various and sundry fire hazards discovered when we ripped down the drywall ceiling in the old garage. Tom is coming by tomorrow to see what all else needs to be done. (Making the plugs kid-safe, fixing the code issues in the kitchen, running new clean power to the A/V and computers, adding a phone jack so we can answer the phone in the living room.) Dan also said something about running some CAT6 (ethernet) around as well.

Rob and Co. (That's the two Rick's, Bob Sr. and Larry, so far,) will have no more to do once the beam is done until I get a firm bid on the new garage and the bathroom remodel. As it is we're about 2 good man-weeks into T & M (time and material) stuff and that makes me nervous. The living room floor had a price tag on it but they found more damage than anticipated, and I have only my own estimation on what the beam will cost us.

Tim the plumber had some good news for us in that we now have a pretty good plan on how to clean up the miles of pipes in the house. The girls bathroom is now a must do, for several reasons, but once it is done, we will have over half the house re-plumbed, (correctly and legally,) including all the supply in the basement. It will be great to get rid of all the old galvanized piping down there as it's corroding as I sit here, waiting to spring a leak. (Not to mention the 17 rusting valves in the laundry room alone.) He managed to replace the main shut off valves, install a pressure regulator and baffle, several angle stops and bring the kitchen gas valve up to code. Unfortunately when he reduced the water pressure from 115 PSI to the recommended 85 PSI, we lost all pressure to the upstairs fixtures. (The cold lines are almost completely corroded shut, which is why doing the girls' bath has moved up the priority list.)

I met with a landscape architect to work up a proposal for the front of the house when we tear it up to put in the garage. He seems to be right on track with what I outlined and I'm sure if he watches his spending, he'll do a bang-up plan for us. I meet with a different landscape architect tomorrow to do it all over again.

My other landscape guy dropped by today, (the one who did the clean-up on the yard) and I grabbed him to talk about the stretch of mud along the back of the house. He's working up numbers for me for putting flagstones down. Dan wants to get a second opinion on the catalpa tree, so I'll be calling around tomorrow to get someone out. It is not an immediate need - we can probably wait a year or two before we have to yank it down.

Today the gutters were cleaned for the last time this season. All the trees are now bare so we no longer have to fear a gutter back-up, (provided we don't have a problem with an ice dam.)

All in all we've had a pretty good week with no real surprises. (Although when Tim grabbed an old recirculating line to indicate it needed to be removed, it broke free of its moorings and fell on his head. He had to temporarily tack it back up.) As it turns out, once the termite-beam was removed, the joists were found to be solid, so we didn't have to replace any of them. I haven't had the heart to tell Rick we still have a soft spot in the living room floor behind a duct that he probably didn't see. (He is nursing broken ribs from a car accident last week and I can't imagine shimmying around my crawlspace would be very good for the ailment.) And Other Rick, (the one who worked on all the doors earlier in the week,) appears to have glued my back door shut, which will have to be freed. That back door really needs to be replaced, but we are holding off on frivolous stuff like that. It works just fine for now, (if you put your shoulder into it.)

I'm actually starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel. Of course, this tunnel is a detour I was forced into on my way to building a garage. Still, it's good we are taking care of these things in such a manner that they shouldn't bother us for another 30 years or so. I'm really quite thrilled that the plumbing has presented itself to be a short term project that won't be nearly as difficult as I had feared. And Dan, who is the voice of reason (budget,) also agrees.