Will be away from the board a few days. New kitchen!

[Buckshot]

..............The computer is at teh end of the kitchen, and we're getting a new one. New floors, cabinets, sink, faucet, garbage disposal, paint, etc & whatever else.

Tomorrow the demo crew shows up to demo out all the old stuff to the walls, including the existing floor. Then Wed & Thursday I get to patch and repair. Then prep and spray a primer coat. Friday the tile guys come and put down a new floor. I don't know when I can walk on it but sometime Sat or Sun I have to put on the new paint.

It has to be done by Monday regardless, as Tuesday the new cabinets get installed. I have to do all the wiring and plumbing hookups, and part of that is a dishwasher since we've never had one before. Then Thursday the granite guys come to install the new countertops so that means plumbing in the sinks. I'm no plumber so THAT should be a real slapstick routine. I envision about 6 trips to Lowes buying stuff I can't use or don't need before I get it halfway right.

Then Saturday we're leaving for Sierra Vista, AZ to sepnd a week wth the folks. I already told Donna that the only stuff in her kitchen that may work is the stuff that plugs in, and maybe the stove, since I've done that before :-)

.................Buckshot

[dromia]

Good luck with the kitchen upheaval mate, I don't envy you.

Enjoy the break, you'll need it after the Kitchen. :-D

[scrapcan]

All of that and you have to think about the idle machine tools whispering sweet nothings in the garage also. man you will need the vacation and a few cold bubbly ones to calm the spirit.

[carpetman]

Buckshot----"The computer is at the end of the kitchen,and we're getting a new one. New floors,cabinets,sink,faucet,garbage disposal,paint,etc,whatever else". WOW that is one fancy computer. Will the garbage disposal replace Ctrl,Alt,Delete?

[dragonrider]

Wow that new milling machine cost you a bundle huh? (grin)

[Wayne Smith]

Slow down, Rick! Plumbing isn't that bad, especially if a psychologist can do it! Your dishwasher hooks into your drain, mine into the garbage disposal. Water supply is direct from like your sink, just hook into those. Do the rest of the stuff one step at a time. You'll get it done.

[Heavy lead]

Yup guys, I feel your pain. I'm a licensed builder and mechanical contractor. I owned my own business for about 10 years and did pretty good. With the housing bubble blowing up I sold my business and went into another field, but still carry my licensing. I've built every house I've lived in and I cringe when wifey watches HG tv, but she gets her hands dirty and knows how to someb%tch with the rest of us when she smacks her hand with a hammer. Usually a nice home project ends up with me getting a new gun, so what the heck. You gotta make the deal guys, make the sale!
HG TV is just like porn, makes normal people think they have the talent to do abnormal things!

[xyrth]

buckshot, where do you live? i have people i can call for plumbing advice (professional pipefitters), but the best advice i can give you is to pick up a used laptop for <$400 so you're not tied to your kitchen for a computer ... i use mine in the garage and all over the house. but then again, i'm a geeky kid, so i gotta have my computers.

good luck!

[Buckshot]

...............Appears I'm back for a couple days :-). These kitchen Re-do people the wife signed a contract with are beginning to look more and more like the Keystone Cop outfit I signed up to do the room addition, HA! Nice people but................

Tuesday they were supposed to demo out the entire kitchen. Cabinets AND flooring. Supposed to be here at 0800, so that meant I had to get up at the ungodly hour of 0700. At 1000, no show, so I called the kitchen outfit and they pull a Sergent Schultz, but will check. Nada. About noonish I get a call from Heckle & Jeckle Inc, the demo guys who are sorry but got hung up. I wonder, 'hung up doing what', if they were supposed to be here at 0800?

Would between 2 &3 be okay? Fine with me, YOU'RE the guys doing the work. I figured they'd be here till 2200 easy :-). At FOUR O'CLOCK they pull in with a pickup and camper shell already half loaded with junk. About 1800 they let me know they're only doing the cabinets and the floor demo won't be till Friday. Well hell's bells, I already have the refrigerator sitting out on the patio along with the stove. We spent ALL DAY Sunday, and I spent ALL DAY Monday unloading and boxing everything in the kitchen and humping it outside.

So we've had no stove and have to run outside to the patio to get anything out of the icebox, while it at least, could have remained in the house another few days. The computer was a big snarley mess on the dining room table. Homer & Jethro get done about 1930 and split. During their time here they borrowed my framing hammer, jiffy bar, and used the wife's broom, dust pan and my Shop Vac to clean up.

http://www.fototime.com/71DB0760F80A8EE/standard.jpg

SUNDAY

http://www.fototime.com/1DFC3381C096F05/standard.jpg

MONDAY Everything out on the patio.

So the heck with this, I move the reefer back into the kitchen. Today they woke me up at 0800 wanting to demo the floors.

http://www.fototime.com/61DE92764A3F53E/standard.jpg

FLOORS DEMO'D BTW, that's MY square nosed shovel they borrowed to get all the old tile into MY wheelbarrow to move out to their truck :-)

The tile won't be in until Monday (they were SUPPOSED to be laying the NEW TILE today) so it will be Tuesday next week. However, that will not be entirely all bad. Our house was built in 1951. The inside walls are button board and 3/4" of concrete plaster. When Laurel & Hardy removed the old cabinets they generated quite a few sizeable craters in the plaster. Not really their fault, but they're handy to blame for my several days worth of work.

And since the cabinets have been in place since shortly after WW2, they have seen several coats of paint on the wall, and ceiling. Once they were removed there is this nice thick paint coating is SOME places, but not ALL places along the walls and ceiling:-). A belt sander melts the paint and loads the belt. Bummer. A vibratory sander would be a career lasting until the 2nd coming. Also the baseboard tiles, when removed today, also removed the paint they were stuck to, and a nice 5" tall band of exposed concrete plaster was exposed.

Spackle just wouldn't cut this type stuff, so to date I have used almost a full 3.5 gal box of Lightweight General purpose joint compound.

A bright light however is that the room addition is almost done:

http://www.fototime.com/EA57CCA77D70119/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/1CF1E7D633AB663/standard.jpg

Today the windows went in and the interior got it's texture coat. Monday the outside gets it's finish color coat and the interior gets it's primer/sealer coat. All the contractor stuff should be done next week. I don't think I've set down in a month! I will be SO glad when this is all done.

...............Buckshot

[Bret4207]

Dang Buck! You have my sympathies. Currently SWMBO is prepping the whole downstairs for a new floor while I try and get some haying done. Plus the new roof needs to go on and a section of the barn and the whole machine shed needs steel roofing. Then there's firewood, more hay, foundation work, trim work........

Just wanted ya to know you're not alone man! A guy I used to get on the radio pointed out that the one sector of the economy that keeps going all the time is the home repair biz. I think he's right!

[LIMPINGJ]

Buckshot's experience with home remodeling sounds about normal. No one on time, don't have their tools and if I have to do any plumbing I found it better to buy a couple of everthing then takeback the items that were not needed. Takes fewer trips to the plumbing supply store.

[kodiak1]

Buck doing the samething here but am doing it myself on days off.
Have two more cabinets left to build and then put them in.
So far so good.

Good luck Ken.

[Wayne Smith]

Had two bathrooms to re-do, completely re-design the master and new floor, tub, surround, counter and sink in the other. They are back to back, some damage to the subfloor, and the only two full baths in the house.

Very competent contractor did one completely in a week before they started on the Master. That one took some extra time because they couldn't do what they/we wanted due to the placement of the vent. Moved the drains, so needed an inspection. That one took a week and a half, but we had the other one to use.

We are quite pleased with the contractor, his men, their work, and his price.

[Buckshot]

................Dang this is taking a LOOOOOOOOOOONG time! We went to Sierra Vista, AZ to visit my folks and brother, and a couple nephews. It was nice to be away from all the bother and business going on. We were gone from 8-30 to 9-4 so I guess the contractor on the room addition decided to NOT do what he said he was going to do, while we were gone.

Since we got back on the 4th (actually about mid-night 9-3) the stucco sub-contractors showed up at 0700 to put the final color coat on. However no breakers in the new sub-panel, and no new one in the main panel. Foundation vents still plugged with insulation, no insulation blown into the attic yet, and dirt still scattered all over the back yard.

On the 4th the kitchen cabinet people were supposed to be here to swap out an incorrect one, align all the cabinet doors, and detail all the drawers, and then do some final trim moulding, set some proud nails, putty and stain. IE: FINISH!

Instead of cabinet guys, the granite guys showed up a day early, as they weren't scheduled till Friday. I suppose it didn't really matter except I had to take power off a receptical in the wall and make a 2.5' run down and put in a receptical box below the countertop. This way the cord from the stove and dishwasher could be plugged in out of sight, and the upper one would be readily useable. I thought I'd have Thursday for that. NOT!

For the life of me I couldn't find my masonary bits so I grabbed a spare regular 3/8" bit and managed to drive it through 3/4" of concrete plaster and 1/2" button board. The poor bit is really hurting :-). Put the carbide coated blade in the Sawzall and made the hole. Naturally I didn't have a tiger box to put in (as I thought I was going to have all Thursday :-)), so I had to jump in the car and go one right now. Got it all done before they had to put in the backsplash.

Donna talked the granite guy into giving her granite all the way up to the bottom of the cabinets, and on the cabinet ends, instead of the standard 6" height, for the same money. I'm afraid there's enough granite in the kitchen that it may break loose from the house and flop over it weighs so much now, ha!

Cabinet guys never showed up or called Friday so I finished up the closet in the room addition then had to get some neglected yard work down. Actually I was trying to stay as far away from the wife as possible (sorry ladies). She doesn't handle frustration well, and since the cabinet people and the room contractor had fallen down it was all going to somehow or the other end up being my fault, since they're male and I am too. Kinda like I'd get assaulted by a default kind of deal. Someone handy to holler at.

http://www.fototime.com/78E1D9D47DC906B/standard.jpg

This is what it looked like when we left for Arizona and naturally upon our return.

http://www.fototime.com/F7BC6BDE13C430B/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/DD232B8FDAB1B82/standard.jpg

I created all that mess by my oneself. That's a dishwasher laying there on it's face in the middle of the floor. I did manage to get the range hood in Saturday afternoon. The dinks who did the original one only vented it into the attic, the morons! So I got to go up on the roof and cut in and install a vent and then pipe it. It's never easy for me <sigh>.

Sunday I dollied in the dishwasher, dropped the sink into it's hole and opened the box the garbage disposal was in and took it out. That's it (left photo, foreground sitting there).

http://www.fototime.com/DB59AFE68E5AD8A/standard.jpg

Here's the sink after being caulked, with 228 lbs of lead (give or take) sitting on it. Why the lead? It rocked. Maybe a whole 32nd of an inch if that much. It's a cast polymer something or other with a "Titanium Ceramic/Epoxy coating" I suppose when the underside of the flanges were ground it wasn't PERFECT!!!!!!!!! SWMBO didn't like that. I tried to explain that once it was caulked it wouldn't do that. Heck, you had to LAY on one corner to make the opposing one lift that tiny fraction of an inch. But it wasn't PERFECT!!!!!!!!!!!!. Sheesh, women!

Now I can handle wood and build stuff that usually doesn't fall down or lean. I can wire with the best of'em, but plumbing is as foreign to me as conversing in Swahili. If I can't fix it with Drano I'm truly screwed. So here I am with a dishwasher, a double sink and faucets (with a sprayer dealie) AND a garbage disposal. All this stuff individually is bad enough, but somehow or the other it all has to work together. And I'm responsible. SWMBO knows of my previous plumbing jobs. These have without exception resulted in leaks of varying severity. From drips to full blown geysers of Old Testament Biblical proportions.

I was so overcome with the complexity of it all I accomplished zip for several hours. Like dancing in peanut butter. Lottsa action but nothing much accomplished. I finally settled down with a plan. The sink is in the middle so I couldn't start there and work out in 2 directions. Nor could I start with the garbage disposal because it's dependant upon the sink. By default it was the dishwasher.

I also reasoned that if it was UNDER the counter in the morning, the War Department would consider that major labor had taken place. Besides it had an electrical cord I could wire and then plug in. Plus 2 hoses to connect and merely stick through a hole (I made) in the side of the cabinet to reach under the sink. Since it didnt really involve HOOKING ANYTHING UP it would be a large visual accomplishment.

The other part of the plan consists of me calling my brother in law who manages rentals, and knows plumbing inside and out.

....................Buckshot

[rugerman1]

.............

I was so overcome with the complexity of it all I accomplished zip for several hours. Like dancing in peanut butter. Lottsa action but nothing much accomplished.

....................Buckshot

creamy or crunchy?:rolleyes:

[Wayne Smith]

Ah, Yes! Isn't it nice to have competent in-laws?

[xyrth]

never, ever, ever leave a contractor unmanaged (or without liquidated damages) unless you know him personally, or have something huge over his head.

kitchen's looking great though :)

[Maven]

Rick, Hmm, a contractor not doing what he said he would? Who'd a thunk it? Around these parts, it's a miracle if they even show up. Believe me, I feel your pain!!!

[crazy mark]

Rick,
I hope you remember to knock out the plug in the garbage disposal where the dishwasher hooks up. I know 2 Hospital Engineers that couldn't do that and they both were supposedly plumbers. I kinda embarrassed them over that one. I was then accused of trying to humiliate them. Mark