Getting Ready For The Sheet Rock

Well some of the last few things are getting done and soon we'll be putting up the sheet rock. Today I had to climb into the addition attic and pull out the stove power supply, we'll use in again once the wall in is installed. I spray foamed the window and around the exhaust vent pipe, put back the insulation and taped everything up. I also put up the Safe & Sound insulation in the ceiling, as it is below our bedroom we don't need to hear what's going on if one of us is up earlier than the other.

The addition attic is in great shape, here you can see the blown in insulation.

Walls sealed up ready for sheet rock.

Sound dampening insulation is much more dense than the pink stuff, and a little harder to put in, and as this is a small room it really wasn't that bad.

New Header Installed

After about 3 weeks of holding in place the temporary header has been replaced. I am talking about the one between the kitchen and dining room. The old one wasn't high enough and was not holding anything up. The header is made of two 2 x 8's glued and screwed, and up tight to the floor joist, with two 2 x 6 posts on either end. The opening is 77 inches wide and 94 inches high. About the same width as before but a bit higher.

New header and posts in place with the old ones still holding the load. The center 2 x 4 in the picture was used to hold it in place while we measured and cut the support posts.

Everything in place and all temporary supports out. There is still a little bow in joist that I couldn't get out and didn't want to push our luck. After all it probably took 100 years to get it there in the first place. Besides, ReBecca still wants some of the old charm and character of the house to show, and I agree.

Always Need Ventilation

A small but important job got done today, the vent pipe was cut out and installed for the bathroom exhaust fan. It went in well, I pulled the siding away, cut the hole, cut away the siding to fit over the outside plate, put the extension pipe on and secured it in place.

The pipe is rigid from the outside cover thought the wall, I'll cover it with an insulation wrapped flexible hose that goes from the fan over this pipe. Trying to keep the cold out.

The vent fitting is a bit larger than a normal one, like the one in the lower left side of this picture that was for the dryer. This type has four flaps that push out when air is force out. The one we have has a styrofoam ball that is pushed up and then rolls back into the opening for a tighter fit and less prone to letting cold air in.

Let The Light Shine In

The bathroom window is finally in. After a bit of work building the framing, header and sill plate, it fit great. The siding came off without too much trouble and went on the same. Like most jobs where they put vinyl siding on, the old siding isn't taken off, and that was the case here as well. The old cedar shingles are still on the house, they just put ¾ inch Styrofoam panels on to level it out and nailed the siding through it. I guess it adds to the insulation layers????

Frame work being put in place.

The old siding still in place.

Finally cut out the opening.

It lines up with the west windows in the kitchen, great for cross breeze.

Window installed and siding put back, you would never know.

Getting Ready To Open It Up

Well it has been a bit slow on the "Project" these past few days, golf weather has been good and there is the lawn that needed to be addressed. Before ReBecca brought in live stock. It talks a bit of time to get some of the equipment needed to handle the this size of a lawn and then return it. And Murphy's Law always plays a roll and I had some trailer light problems that took some more time to work out, and are not corrected, yet.

Anyway back to the title, I have started to get ready to install the bath room window and exhaust fan. I built a bulkhead for the vent hose above the toilet and removed the siding in preparation for the window.

The exhaust fan vent tube bulkhead.

Getting things prepared for the window. I still need to add a header and sill plate.

Siding pulled off, the window will be closer to the left side.

Powering Up

First off the reason there hasn't been any posts this past week and a bit is because I drove to Ontario to surprise my Mother for her birthday last week. It was a great time and I needed a little break.

Well I wouldn't say the title is accurate, more like cleaning up and re-configuring, lights and plugs in the bathroom. I moved a few things around to suit the changes we made and long the way I changed how things were wired, made it safer. One of the junction boxes in the basement was feed off one breaker and had four lines coming out of it. They were not over loaded, in fact one only had one plug on it, I didn't like how that was done so with a few changes to some of the lines that weren't being used I reduced the need for this many wires to run out of one junction box. Wiring isn't hard to run, it just takes a little time to get it in place and safely out of the way.

This is were the one of three main lights will go and I have a feed line for the exhaust fan in place above the tub.

I moved the light switch over a bit and added a separate one for the fan. The wires hanging out are for a GFI plug and the switch for the light that will go over the sink.

Getting Some Of The Little Things Completed

It hasn't been too busy these past few days but the work is getting done, especially some of the little things. I had to relocate the dryer plug to the addition side, which required a new wire to make it there, an easy job. I run some PEX plastic pipe up from the basement into the wall beside the drain line for the upstairs bath, and I remembered to mark one line at both ends so I'll know which is hot and which is cold. Finished off some of the glue work, I glued up the fittings for the tub but not all of them because there may be a need for adjustments once the tub is secured in place and I have the flexibility to make them before final glue up.

As promised there is the updated picture of the upstairs drain lines final glue up, and the new water lines in place. You can see the new dryer wire, all colour coated now for different power requirements.

The water lines running up through wall. I also added a support for a towel rack beside the sink, a more solid method of holding it in place over the plastic inserts.