New house, new renovation project :)

[JEWC_Motorsports]

Here's a couple items that may assist you with your chain sharpening. It takes most people a while to get the hang of it, and even longer to get the hang of keeping the chain out of the dirt. Once you hit dirt it will dull the chain instantly, pushing harder only makes it worse. Best solution is to stop and sharpen rather than fight a dull chain but it takes time for that to sink in with new saw users.

This, im still learning not to hit the dirt. If i do i just swap chains.

 

[moostang09]

May I asked why you moved into a neighborhood with beautiful trees only to cut down all of them in your front yard? Just curious.

 

[terry5357]

Hire a stump grinding service those stumps will be toast in a day, nothing but wood chips..... And man, you have a great piece of property, I am very envious sitting here stuck in suburbia with a garage full of my wife's craft CRAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Gabe]

May I asked why you moved into a neighborhood with beautiful trees only to cut down all of them in your front yard? Just curious.

Well, see, I didn't like them.
And while that might be enough of a reason, my girlfriend agreed that they were an eye sore too, and we both want a wider driveway, so they were in the way.
As it turns out, a lot of those trees were either dead or starting to die, so taking them down may have potentially just saved huge headaches down the line, in case one or more of them would've fallen.
And there's still a couple hundred more trees on the 1.2-acre property, the plan being to leave most of them alone (there are a couple tall dead pines in the back that need to be taken down, but that will wait till the spring)

Hire a stump grinding service those stumps will be toast in a day, nothing but wood chips..... And man, you have a great piece of property, I am very envious sitting here stuck in suburbia with a garage full of my wife's craft CRAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks ... actually my next-door neighbor stopped by yesterday and said they were gonna be renting one soon, I said to let me know, maybe we'll go in on it together and we both save some money.

Gonna find out if I can rent the grinder and not a company to do the job - there's a tool rental business nearby.


Today my GF and I spent a couple hours at the house, she tackled the front yard, got rid of the last of the small branches and leaves and other crap that was all over the yard, and used her pretty little red gardener's cart to transport it all, way out in the back yard into a nice pile to be dealt with later, or just forgotten about, in the back woods of the property.

I spent my time inside.
Bought 3 sheets of plywood, used one today to replace one of the sheets I started removing yesterday.
Didn't use nails like the old sheet was secured with, but I screwed it down with 2.5"-long #9 screws, about 7-8" apart.
Feels nice and solid, and certainly much better than the old panel I took out.
And no more mortar/thinset from the old tile.
Before I put another new panel down I plan on installing more insulation in there, as I wasn't happy to see it missing from half the floor.

 

[terry5357]

ie: insulation. I need to do the same with our house. Our house was built and 97 and the insulation was blown in and a piss poor job at that. Before I replace the AC units (down stairs was a 3 ton and up stairs was 2) and replaced the upstairs 2 ton with a 3 ton, I was paying close to $600 a month during heat of the summer, now its down to High $400's. I know it sounds like a lot but we have a pool that runs a good bit during the hot months. Any way back to insulation, I'm thinking about having more added but not sure how I would do that unless I had more blown in. Our house has steep gables and steep vaulted ceilings...... not sure how to access areas that are not accessible from the tiny attic. Last 2 story house and last pool, both are a PITA!

 

[Gabe]

ie: insulation. I need to do the same with our house. Our house was built and 97 and the insulation was blown in and a piss poor job at that. Before I replace the AC units (down stairs was a 3 ton and up stairs was 2) and replaced the upstairs 2 ton with a 3 ton, I was paying close to $600 a month during heat of the summer, now its down to High $400's. I know it sounds like a lot but we have a pool that runs a good bit during the hot months. Any way back to insulation, I'm thinking about having more added but not sure how I would do that unless I had more blown in. Our house has steep gables and steep vaulted ceilings...... not sure how to access areas that are not accessible from the tiny attic. Last 2 story house and last pool, both are a PITA!

I contacted a company here locally that does energy audits, guy came down and checked out the house, had a blower door installed on the front door of the house (basically a fan built into a canvas door that fits into the door opening via an adjustable frame), and blowing outward it measures how much air the house circulates.
We were at about 5000.
Perfect house number is 952.
That, along with oil usage and other criteria, got us qualified for the Energy Star program sponsored locally by the electrical company, which will now pay 50/50 of the work needed, up to $4,000
We're gonna have new windows installed, half the labor to be charged to them.
We're gonna have new insulation blown-in into a couple of spots in the exterior walls - half to be paid for by them.
Other insulation to be installed in the attic, and other work we're doing.

So yeah, see if there's companies in your area that do energy audits.
You might just be looking at a small part to pay to get all the work done.

 

[moostang09]

Cool, thanks for answering Gabe. I was just curious. Dead trees are a pita.... I know first hand. I had a big buy out front that was on it's last leg. Every storm or high wind would knock 5-10ft branches off. Annoying and dangerous, we chopped her down.

 

[Shotokan1509]

Mind saying what energy audit cost?

 

[Gabe]

Mind saying what energy audit cost?

$100 if the house was eligible for the program, $300 if not.

Cost me $100 ... the guy was there over 2 hours ...

 

[terry5357]

Gabe, thanks for the tip. I will absolutely check into an energy audit!

 

[Gabe]

Gabe, thanks for the tip. I will absolutely check into an energy audit!

You're welcome buddy .....


I spoke with a couple wood-working friends and apparently I really should've put adhesive like Liquid Nails or equivalent on top of the joists before screwing down the new plywood sheet in the living room ... the adhesive keeps the squeaking to a minimum, keeps the wood from shifting.

So next time I work on the house, I guess I'm lifting that new panel so I can lay down beads of adhesive, then put it back down and screw it back down.

Ugh.
It sucks but you learn from your mistakes, right?

The top of the stairs is a high-traffic area and the old panel squeaked a LOT, even with some new screws in it ... don't want that happening again.

 

[Gabe]

No work done on the house today, but the GF and I went by there, ended up shoveling the whole driveway by hand.

The snow blower was having a VERY hard time throwing the VERY wet slush that we got overnight.

Hope it gets better cuz I wasn't happy with its performance after spending $1400 on the damn thing

It DID start on the first pull every time I started it though

 

[mfergel]

I contacted a company here locally that does energy audits, guy came down and checked out the house, had a blower door installed on the front door of the house (basically a fan built into a canvas door that fits into the door opening via an adjustable frame), and blowing outward it measures how much air the house circulates.
We were at about 5000.
Perfect house number is 952.
That, along with oil usage and other criteria, got us qualified for the Energy Star program sponsored locally by the electrical company, which will now pay 50/50 of the work needed, up to $4,000
We're gonna have new windows installed, half the labor to be charged to them.
We're gonna have new insulation blown-in into a couple of spots in the exterior walls - half to be paid for by them.
Other insulation to be installed in the attic, and other work we're doing.

So yeah, see if there's companies in your area that do energy audits.
You might just be looking at a small part to pay to get all the work done.

Wow. Wonder if they do something similar in town here.

 

[Shotokan1509]

No work done on the house today, but the GF and I went by there, ended up shoveling the whole driveway by hand.

The snow blower was having a VERY hard time throwing the VERY wet slush that we got overnight.

Hope it gets better cuz I wasn't happy with its performance after spending $1400 on the damn thing

It DID start on the first pull every time I started it though

Slush is just a pain all around, our old Toro that can usually throw pretty well would basically just bubble it out the shoot when slush.

I cheated, I didn't bother shoveling since it got warm yesterday let it all melt.

 

[TRC51]

Congrats on the house. Side loader garages are awesome. Why? Because you can add a nice shop at the end of the driveway where it turns into your attached garage!

Just sayin....

 

[Gabe]

Slush is just a pain all around, our old Toro that can usually throw pretty well would basically just bubble it out the shoot when slush.

I cheated, I didn't bother shoveling since it got warm yesterday let it all melt.

Yeah I really didn't wanna shovel, but going by there today, I'm glad we did.
The driveway was mostly dry pavement, with just a few small icy patches.
If we didn't shovel, the whole thing would've been a sheet of ice.

Congrats on the house. Side loader garages are awesome. Why? Because you can add a nice shop at the end of the driveway where it turns into your attached garage!

Just sayin....

Thanks man ... and yeah, I'd love that, but I can't add anything like that beyond the driveway - the leach field is there, so I can't excavate to flatten the ground.
But there's room on the other side of the house

 

[Gabe]

Today I went back to work on the living room floor, replacing the plywood sub-floor with leftover mortar on them, from the old floor tile that was in the one section in the living room.

First thing I did was pull up the panel I installed yesterday, so that I could apply construction adhesive to the tops of the joists, then re-installed the panel. Ended up using more screws than yesterday, that panel is 100% solid!

I then removed and replaced the next 2 panels, and added insulation under them.

One of the large joists had a few cracks through it from the old nails, so I grabbed a couple 2x4's from the old bathroom soffit, and screwed them into the side of the joist to "sister" it and strengthen it.

Today's progress in pics:

And the 3 different kinds of nails I've found in the sub-flooring:

 

[mfergel]

You're like me. I wood screwed the hell out of some new subfloor I had to replace in part of my house.

 

[Gabe]

You're like me. I wood screwed the hell out of some new subfloor I had to replace in part of my house.

I finished the living room panels today, and I STILL have a squeak in one area, but it's not the wood, it's the baseboard heater, luckily one that we're planning on removing.


Today I went back attacking the popcorn ceiling in the bathroom, and after about a half-hour fucking with it I gave up and decided "new ceiling" and tore down the whole ceiling drywall, popcorn GONE
I started putting up new moisture-resistant drywall, but I ran out, so this is how the bathroom ceiling looks like now:

Then, since I was in a demo mood, I went into the green bedroom and removed the drywall from the closet enclosure, since that will be moved outward so it will become just-about a walk-in closet:

Then I went to the kitchen, and removed some drywall there too, along with starting to remove some of the linoleum flooring, which, lucky-ME, was glued down onto a thin-wood sub-floor which itself was nailed to the actual plywood sub-floor:

 

[i am ryan]

Then I went to the kitchen, and removed some drywall there too, along with starting to remove some of the linoleum flooring, which, lucky-ME, was glued down onto a thin-wood sub-floor which itself was nailed to the actual plywood sub-floor:

PLEASE tell me you're gonna take down that wall in the kitchen and open that space up.