One Big Load

Well we have finally dumped all the old plaster, laths, drywall, sheet rock, dust, dirt, old toilets, did I mention plaster, laths that have been accumulating since Feb 21st when I started pulling down the house. We stored in the shed 48 bags of debris and 19 bags of wood shavings that I got from the floor board restoration part of this project. So we got in a 22 foot dumpster and had to unload every bag so it can go as construction waste, other wise it would be $32 a tonne more to dispose of. I'll find out soon how much we had. Having one large dumpster saved us many trips, and with the gas prices today the rental of this container was well worth it. A couple of pictures of the old material we pulled down and after I run a shop vac through the house it will be clean, at least cleaner and we can start to put it back the way we want it.

The best location for the container, right out the front door, easy to carry out the drywall, but it was a little trip with the wheel barrel from the shed. Thankfully they were in bags.

We started loading from the front, piling the old bat insulation and putting the old laths to keep them from blowing away.

This is all we had for the container, anything smaller wouldn't have worked. I had to cover it with a few tarps on the weekend, we got some snow and I didn't want the stuff wet adding to the tonnage.

It's Getting Closer

Well the kitchen is completed and I found a couple of new developments. We wanted to fix the dip in the ceiling between the kitchen and dining room, this meant once the old support beam was exposed we could brace the ceiling, jack it up, replace the old header and supports and we'd be done. It still is going to happen but there is one step the turns out to easier then I thought. The existing header isn't holding an load, in fact the one side was resting on an old 3 x 4 post and the only thing holding it in place was drywall, I quickly screwed a 2 x 4 in to hold it in place. No wonder the ceiling sagged and the bedroom above had a dip in the floor. I am hoping we can straighten it out a bit before we put down the floors.

With all the interior walls down I was able to see where the old wiring went and ReBecca and I tracked it down, and pulled it out. Some were still live but that didn't take long to correct. ReBecca is going to recycle the copper wire, maybe into her art.

Kitchen wall, interesting wall paper and access to the chimney.

A closer look at the wall paper.

This is the kitchen side of the header, I don't know if you can see it or not but they just nailed the two 2 x 10's together in place and through the old sheetrock.

You can see the protruding nails after I removed the sheetrock.

The kitchen wall that I thought we could remove, ReBecca noticed that it is tight up to the ceiling and the strapping. We don't need the extra 4 inches that bad.

This is the low point between the main beam and the header, I can see right under it, not even touching.

This is what we pulled out of the walls in the kitchen and dining room, and all the way into the attic, an nice little pile of copper wire.

Demo Days

No I'm not trying out new golf clubs, at least not yet, I mean demolish days. We got a 22 ft dumpster in and have been busy filling it up. ReBecca started with the 45 bags that were in our shed of stuff from the ceilings and the old kitchen counter. I started with the old walls and ceiling from the bathroom and moved on to the walls from the kitchen and dining room. Yesterday was the kitchen and remainder of the bathroom, today was the dining room, the outside walls at this point. Tomorrow I'll work on the remaining inside walls, this will give us a good look at the wiring and we think recover a bit of space in the kitchen, I'll explain in the next post if it's true. There was one surprise and no it wasn't a wiring surprise, these I am expecting now. I found a Robbie Burns Highland Whisky bottle in the wall, still in tact and yes it's empty. As for wiring, you'll see what was uncovered in the kitchen, I'm happy they are all disconnected.

The bathroom ceiling with the drywall pulled down exposing the old plaster.

All the lath and plaster pulled down, the drywall in the back is removed from where we are going to put in a window.

This picture and the next few are of the kitchen walls.

Nice bit of wiring?? The boards were the old wall from the bathroom.

Dining room walls cleared off.

This header between the dining room and kitchen is nice and strait, too bad they didn't' get it up tight to joists, a little sag we are going to have to try and straiten out.

Our Robbie Burns Highland Whiskey bottle, at least they were happy when they worked on the house.

Starting Demo Again

Well after taking a couple of days off after working on the floors, we are getting started with more demo work. First thing is to get the plumbing disconnected to the kitchen and bathroom. The kitchen was easy, the old sink and counter came out easily, but I have been looking at the bathroom and it looks like this will take some time as the all the lines in this area come together, including the addition. I'll have to do a little exploring first to see whats what and how I can disconnect the water and drain lines so we can keep the addition on line. Then everything will come out, demo the room and restart anew.

Here are the before and after pictures of the kitchen sink and counter area.

More Surpises

Well the kitchen and dining room are down, and as we have found throughout the house, more interesting wiring configurations. I'm being polite. These little surprises are not really bad, once the weather gets better and we pull down the walls, we'll have a better look at were everything goes and to get it cleaned up and safe. Here is how the last half of our week went.

Dining room exposed.

Nothing a few garbage bags and a shovel can't handle.

Our dining room surprise. Mike Holmes would have a cow if he saw this many hidden boxes.

Interesting wiring configuration. One of the wires don't go anywhere, it just stops at the wall.

The kitchen pulled down, lots of wires, old and new.

A special treat, a vent pipe not going anywhere. Gratefully it was capped off, and not venting to the void between floors. Gag.

Pulling down the House

Well not really pulling down the house, just the ceilings on the first floor. I've managed to pull down the living room and the hallway. I knew there was old lath and plaster in the living room and hall but the amount of dirt and grit that builds up over a 100+ years is amazing. Precautions were taken, tyvek suits with hoods were warn, respirators, goggles, work boot, and gloves to protect from falling debris and boards with nails. Here is what we were left with after the ceilings were pulled down. A few surprises but not too bad, at least now we can clear them up safely.

Living room, south east corner.

North end of the living room, with load bearing beam.

Hallway with two layers of plaster removed.

Hallway cleaned up.

A little surprise by the hall light, a hidden junction box.

Here is ReBecca, pulling nails after vacuuming all the old material out from between the floor joists. It brought back memories of the Star Fighter exercises we did in Germany. For those who remember, closed up to top high and ready for work, just another day at the office.