Hidden in the Walls!

Our master bedroom features a sitting room that is separated by a pair of pocket doors.  The doors have been taped shut since we bought the place.  Tonight I decided to remove the tape!!!  That might be a little dramatic, but it was a little suspenseful since we don't really know why they were taped up to begin with.  What secrets might they hold???  Some thoughts are:

Bees! We had a bee infestation and it is thought they might have found their way through the ceiling joints and into the room.

Energy - Perhaps these doors allow lots of cold air in from the unheated wall cavity.

Bats! - We get several bats in the house each year.  Maybe they find their way in from here...

Removing the grey duct tape turned out to be a pain.  It has dried out and will need manual scraping to remove.  I tried adhesive remover but it wouldn't reactivate the glue.  I guess I will add that to my project list.  Funny how everything with this house is complicated, lol.

Here are some pictures with captions.

Original hardware that matches the hardware downstairs.  Even a matching folding key.  Quite rare!

Whats that?  A newspaper!  It appears these doors were sealed on Saturday May 20th 2006

Very nice set of pocket doors!  Fancier molding on the master bedroom side and more plain on the other side.

Greenhouse Walls Reframed

I'm am making a concerted effort to finish up my outside projects before winter hits.  One of those projects is the 2nd story greenhouse.  It still leaks water into the kitchen below.  Over the past 30 years, water and insects have destroyed the 2x4 framing members and they all needed to be replaced.  I had done most of the demolition works earlier this year, but was dreading reframing it all.  Today I wrangled up a helper (Jimmy) and we made great progress.  Jimmy actually did most of the work.  We has lots of framing experience!

The wood is so rotten in just falls apart.

New 2x4 framing.  The siding will be replaced next year.

Jimmy framing up one of the walls.

Looking MUCH better!

Unexpected plumbing work

We had a little unexpected plumbing work pop up this weekend.  I went down into the basement to check on a wet spot I found a week earlier.  Turned out that it as a pipe that sprung a leak!  I made my parts list and made the trip to the big box store to get all the parts/pieces.  Wherever possible I have been converting the plumbing to pex tubing.  This leak provided me another chance to do some pex upgrades.  The leaking pipe was an old galvanized pipe that transitioned to copper.  I figure the copper work is about 30 years old so this galvanized is certainly a lot older than that.

The galvanized pipe just disintegrated when I touched it.  It was also more than 75% clogged.
The new runs are connected to small 4-port manifolds.  I love how new construction is using a single giant manifold centralized in the basement but that just isn't practical in a retrofit scenario.  Instead I have been using the small manifolds and have been locating them in the area that work is performed. When I did the plumbing for the master bath (work done from underneath in kitchen ceiling) I added them to handle all the bath fixtures.  Now this is my second pair that handle the kitchen sink, pot filler, half-bath, and guest bath/laundry.   They are nice because I always have leave an extra port for future upgrades, and I also can add cutoffs at the manifold like you see here:

I started to think about it after I finished this work and I do believe I have eliminated 98% of the old galvanized pipe.  The whole house is now either copper or pex. The only exception is a main line that runs from the meter across to the other side of the basement.  I have a feeling that if I can get that replaced, then I will in pretty good shape!

Everybody has one of these, right?

Well I fear that the neighbors are going to start talking about us behind our back...  Celia just bought an authentic embalming table off Ebay.  It came out of an actual funeral home in Mt. Sterling, IL that was relocating.  I haven't done any research but my guess is that is from the 1920's-1930's.
The big question everyone is asking us is "What are you going to do with an embalming table?" 
Initially it will be a Halloween decoration.  Our street is THE place for trick-or-treating.  Last year we had 1500 kids come by.  We plan on using it in the yard for some sort of gory display.  After that, we might try to incorporate it into our house decor. I think it fits pretty well considering our house operated as a funeral home from about 1935-1975.  It definitely would be a conversation starter...

Bevel Wood Siding Details

After the bees were removed, I was left with a rather large hole in the side of my house.  The damage included pieces of trim, clapboard siding, and crown molding.

Fabricating the trim pieces were pretty straight forward.  I used scrap pine that I had laying around for the edge boards and some preasure treated pine for the 2x3 sill.  The bevel (clapboard) siding turned out to be a bit of a challenge.  First due to the size I needed.  My siding has a 3" reveal (4" board size).  The big box stores don't carry a very big selection of bevel siding.  They only had 6" and 8" available.  I finally found some in-stock at an old-school lumber yard - Sheridan Road Lumber.  Very nice people and they were able to load me up with 10 qty 10' lengths of the cedar bevel siding.
Of course since nothing on this house is simple, I couldn't just cut this material to length and tack it up.  Instead, my existing siding features a fancy beaded edge.  I had to hunt down the proper router bit and setup my Shopsmith for routing.  Here you can see the before and after:

The crown molding has been the other big challenge.  The molding is a pretty common profile, but it is 6.5" wide.  Corsaw Hardwood Lumber had been asked to make a custom set of molding knives.  Then the unthunthinkable happened... My father died. This has been devastating to my family and has put everything on hold for some time now.  We are now getting back to working on some projects.  Its been several weeks now with no word from Corsaw's so I guess I will have to find someone else.  

Water Heater and Bees Update

In my last post, I was whining and complaining about how much daunting work I have ahead of me.  I am happy to report good progress since then.

1.  Hot water heater has now been installed.  It was a pretty big project to run electrical, vent, water pipe, and gas lines.  I am quite happy with how it all turned out.  The performance of the unit is top-notch too.

Old worn out water heater

Misc water pipes that were removed

2. The bee removal is done too.  We purchased a 30' scaffolding tower and hired a beekeeper to remove the bees.  I spent all day playing assistant and we removed an estimated 60,000 bees. 

New trim boards with coat of primer

It feels really good to have all of this done. So good in fact that after 1.5 years of paying mortgage payments, we have finally moved our family into the house.  We still have a lot of work ahead of us.  Immediately, I have to close of the huge holes  in the side of the house...  then I have to get back to working on the kitchen...

Is there an end to this tunnel?

The pressure is on to get this house into some sort of decent/habitable condition.   Mainly the pressure comes from myself. I don't think my wife is too anxious to move into a construction site, but I am sick of making mortgage payments on a house I cant live in.  Over 1.5 years now!  We have identified two must-fix issues that we absolutely must get resolved before we move in.

1. The bees have got to be removed. - We found a beekeeper.  Now I just need to get him up to the bees (30ft) so that he can do his work.

2. We need a new water heater.  Of course, I cant bring myself to just replace it with a regular tank.  Instead we are upgrading to tankless.  (difficult install and more $$$$).  This will require a new electrical circuit, which I have now completed installation of.  Next week I should be able to order the new unit.


<<<SIGH>>>>

And that would allow us to at least occupy the space.  Still no kitchen.  Our cabinetes are still slowly getting built.  We have new stove.  We have a new sink.  Once the cabinets are done then we could actually install them...