Old Home Blog: Home improvement tips, house repair, restoration, renovation

Ice dams, roof rakes, and Spring money-saving tips

2009-04-09T20:44:00.001-05:00

As I've mentioned in previous posts, ice dams have plagued the gutters and downspouts on the north side of my old home.

Alleviating this problem requires a couple of different strategies, and some less-than-desirable work. First, I purchased a roof rake last winter to keep as much snow off the north roof as possible. Essentially, my roof rack is a 24-foot aluminum pole (in four parts) with an aluminum rake on the end which lets you drag snow off your roof. If you haven't guessed yet, the less-than-desirable work includes standing on the ground as you're pulling snow toward yourself. As the saying goes, “what goes up, must come down,” and when it's an avalanche of snow coming your way, it can be a cold, unpleasant experience. Oh the things I'll do to protect this old Cape Cod! Fortunately, the north side of my house is also the back of my home, so no one can see me dressed in full ski gear to perform this task (yes, including ski goggles!). But don't fret; practice makes perfect and you eventually learn how to properly control cascading snow.

In addition to the roof rake, I had also purchased heated cables expressly designed to prevent ice dams in home gutters. Basically, the low-voltage cables produce just enough heat to melt snow. When they're strung properly just above your gutters (with special clips that attach to roof shingles), the snow melts and won't accumulate into ice with changes in temperature. By keeping the roof relatively clean with the roof rake and using the ice dam cables, you can prevent ice dams and hug icicles that can cause significant damage to a home.

So, why am I bringing this up in the Spring instead of before winter and what exactly are the money-saving tips I mentioned? Well, for starters, I was proud of myself for taking the time to install the ice dam heating cabs last Fall prior to the onset of snow. I was also proud of myself for remembering to unplug the ice dam cables once the threat of snow had passed. That's money saving tip number one.

My next money saving tip is to look for a roof rake and ice dam cables now – in the off season – when retailers are likely to be reducing inventory. You might save yourself some money, and better yet, you'll be prepared for next winter!

Shopping for hardwoods and finding Birdeye Maple

2008-02-06T20:31:00.000-06:00

A couple of days ago I went shopping for some hardwoods to use in my woodworking shop. There’s not a pressing need for it immediately, but I do have a couple of projects in mind and thought I’d get the hardwoods in need well in advance of the projects starting so the wood has time to acclimate to our home’s environment.

My shopping list included two species of hardwoods: birdseye maple and cherry. I got motivated to go on a run for wood after learning that Allen from Milwaukee Woodworks had a new supply of birdseye maple in stock. While it’s not exactly around the corner for me, it’s worth the trip because Allen offers a great selection of popular hardwoods and great prices.

So what is “birdseye” maple? As the photo to the right shows, its maple wood with tiny “figure” that resembles small eyes... birds’ eyes. As you can see, it’s quite striking, although I’ll be the first to admit that a little bit of birdseye maple can go a long way. No worries for me, as I’m planning on using it in a relatively small project (keeping this project secrete from my wife keeps me from sharing too many specifics about this project right now).

It’s nice to kill the winter doldrums and offset my home improvement projects by bringing a stack of new hardwood into the basement. I’ve walked by the stack several times since getting it home, and each time I peer down and get excited about converting those simple boards into a thing of beauty.

You can see one of my recent woodworking projects in my post Woodworking beats home improvement - my new cherry nightstands.

Can a halogen light start a fire? Yes.

2008-01-29T12:51:00.000-06:00

A few months back, I finished our upstairs bathroom remodel (see all bathroom remodel posts) by added a new light soffit with halogen lights above the sink. You can read all the custom light soffit posts as well.

Those tiny halogen lights sure do put out enough heat, but are they capable of starting a fire? Simply put, yes. Please read on as I explain how.

I built the housing of that soffit out of pine wood and plywood, but the threat of fire in my particular situation did not come from the housing of the light soffit itself. It came from the bathroom door that was swung open far enough to be directly under the light. It only took a few minutes for the top of the door to get hot enough for my wife to ask me if I smelled something burning. Before I go on, let me give you some background information...

My wife asks me about once a month if I smell something burning, and typically it’s a false alarm. So, please forgive me if I initially wrote this off as the little boy crying wolf. However, after running trudging up the stairs to explore the latest purported fire, I realized there was indeed the smell of smoke. Initially, I thought it was my wife’s hair dryer overheating. Then I noticed the door directly under one of the four halogen lights.

Since the clearance between the top of the door and the halogen lamp is only two or three inches, the heat from the halogen bulb was significant enough to cause the wood on the top of the door to smolder. This had never been an issue before, because a small trash can that typically sits on the floor directly behind the door usually stops the door from swinging that far open. On this particular day, however, the trash can had slide under the adjacent sink, allowing the door to swing as far as the perpendicular wall.

The photos above show the halogen light assembly with smoke stains, the smolder mark on the outside of the door, and the smoke mark and cracked paint on the inside of the door.

In hindsight, I guess it wasn’t a good idea to rely on the trash can to stop the door from swinging too far, but I never imagined this type of halogen light fire scenario.

To keep this from happening again in the future, I’ve added the trusty door stop that mounts neatly to the door’s hinge pin from Ace Hardware. Who knew a three dollar door door stop hinge pin could also be a fire preventer. Live and learn.

And just to clear the air (no pun intended), I’ll never take my wife’s concern over the possible smell of smoke lightly ever again. I promise.

Splinters and cuts no more - all purpose work gloves and the justification to buy a pair

2008-01-17T22:08:00.000-06:00

Enough is enough. I’ve finally put my macho man status on the shelf and purchase a pair of all purpose work gloves. (Note: macho man status never really existed.) What made me finally break down? Read on...

When I returned to work after several days off around the holidays (days I spent working on our Cape Cod, naturally), one of my co-workers commented, “I can tell what you did over the holidays” as she pointed to my right hand. I retuned to my office and counted the number of cuts on my right hand alone: six. They weren’t big, just large enough to be noticeable to others (apparently). But that one comment wasn’t enough to push me into the all-purpose work glove camp.

The thing that really made me buckle was working with some bead-board plywood. You may recall that I used beadboard plywood for our upstairs bathroom ceiling last winter. That batch of beadboard plywood was good quality, free and surface splinters. However, the two sheets I bought recently were of lesser quality and had multiple surface splinters. In the course of 24 hours I planted at least eight splinters into my hands. It didn’t matter what I did, that plywood was out to break me. Transferring the material from the van to the garage for cutting... ouch!... one to the palm. Hanging the beadboard plywood... yikes!... another to the palm. Sanding the plywood prior to priming (this one was the worst)... inadvertently, yet forcefully, jamming a splinter into the side of my pinky as I try to sand the surface of the rough bead board plywood. Not just once, but at least four times.

Despite all these splinters, I still hadn’t reached my breaking point. Since I managed to remove all those splinters, I was willing to live and learn.

Then came the final straw... a splinter that could not be removed and will live with me for the next few weeks...

Have you ever had a splinter on the inside tip of one of your index fingers? For me, it was my left finger. Not a big deal, you say? Well, try typing sometime with a splinter in your index finger. Each time I’ve hit the letter F, T, G, Y, V, or B throughout this Old Home Blog post, I’ve felt that little splinter. Seriously, scan this post for the number of times those letters have been used. Each time I hit those letters I get a little reminder of my perceived toughness. (By the way, I type the right way... no hunting and pecking here, so putting pressure on this little nuisance is unavoidable.)

With this tinny little shard of wood buried within my index finger, I put my tail between my legs and set off for the Home Depot. At first I felt a little embarrassed to be browsing the end cap with the glove selection. Granted, I own leather gloves for heavy-duty projects, and clothe gloves for light duty jobs around the yard. However, the all-purpose glove is different. They look as much like gloves for playing baseball or football than working around the homestead. But I was resigned to my fait and had to be any pre-conceived notion about the silliness of these gloves behind me. I scurried to the self checkout lane, quickly made my purchase without witness, and headed home.

Seriously, am I buying work gloves or some “lady product” for my wife at Target? What’s my problem?

Then it hit me on the drive home: Me getting a pair of gloves like these is really no different than a wide receiver on an NFL football team wearing a pair of gloves throughout the season. I can understand wearing gloves in temperatures below freezing, but they wear them throughout their entire season. If they can wear gloves to do their job when it’s 80-degrees, yet somehow still appear to be though, then why can’t I?

Stand up with me, fellow home improvement not-so-tough guys and embrace the all-purpose work glove.

Woodworking beats home improvement - my new cherry nightstands

2007-12-21T06:42:00.000-06:00

It’s been a while since I’ve shared any of my experiences repairing and maintaining my old Cape Cod home. It’s not that there haven’t been things to do around the homestead. Far from it. I’ve squeezed in a few tasks over the past couple of months, but my primary focus has been on my hobby of choice: woodworking.

That’s right, I’ve finally hidden myself away in the dark recesses of our basement to spend time where I love to most: my woodworking shop. The project? Two new cherry nightstands for our master bedroom, made from curly cherry (shown to the right). Naturally, there’s a story behind why we need new nightstands and of coarse, our charming old home plays a large roll in this story.

You see, ever since we’ve moved into our Cape Cod over five years ago, the nightstand for my wife’s side of the bed has not been next to the bed, but rather tucked away in the dormer adjacent her side of the bed. Turns out, the two cherry nightstands that I had built roughly ten years ago for our then new, modern, and spacious ranch home were WAY too big for our current old house. Who would have guessed that nightstands with 24-inch-side tops would someday become too big? In hindsight, you could land a small aircraft on those nightstands (or accumulate a lot of books or magazines, in my case).

What made me finally tackle a new pair of nightstands? Like most anything else in life, all it took was a little inspiration. That inspiration came from an article in Fine Woodworking magazine. The May/June 2007 issue of Fine Woodworking featured a story on applying a wax finish to furniture. On the issue’s cover was all the inspiration I needed. A modestly-sized nightstand with two drawers for storage... perfect! (See the cover image at FineWoodworking.com. http://store.taunton.com/onlinestore/item/FWW070601.html)

Only one problem with the inspirational photo: the story was about applying a finish to the particular nightstand, not how to build it. That meant I had to draw plans based roughly off the photo in the magazine. While that can be a challenge and certainly adds time to the project, the process of drafting plans helps keep you sharp, makes sure you stay keenly aware of attention to detail, and gives you an enormous sense of pride when the project is complete and you can say you built the nightstands from rough sawn lumber with your own plans.

As you can see from the photo at FineWoodworking.com, the author’s nightstand was made from highly figured curly maple. I chose curly cherry and a natural finish because the rest of the furniture in our bedroom is made from cherry.

So, with this project almost behind me (the second nightstand still needs its finish), I need to focus on the homestead again. Ice dams again.

As for the fate of the old cherry nightstands, they made a perfect Christmas gift for my in-laws.

Unclog a dryer vent clogged with laundry lint

2007-09-02T20:20:00.000-05:00

Ever had your clothes dryer turn off well before your clothes are dry? Likewise, have you noticed lint built up on the wall behind your dryer? If either of these are occurring, it’s time to take a look at the lint within your dryer exhaust for possible clogs.

This project is a little different for Old Home Blog because it wasn’t performed on my 1939 Cape Cod. My friend Rob recently asked me what I knew about dryers. He had done some reading online about why his dryer would turn off shortly after starting. Essentially, he feared his dryer exhaust was clogged resulting in his dryer turning off prior to overheating. Lucky for him, his modern dryer has a thermostat which will cut its power if it gets too hot. Imagine if his dryer didn’t have an automatic shut off for overheating and he had thrown a load of laundry in the dryer and left the house for the day. I imagine 15 or 20 years ago his house would be a pile of ashes right now.

Prior to going to Rob’s house, he gave me the following prognosis of the dryer vent:
His laundry room is on the first floor of his ranch home.
The dryer exhaust vent goes into the wall, then up to a vent on his roof.
As if the vertical rise of the dryer vent isn’t bad enough, once the vent goes into the wall, it makes an immediate 90-degree turn to the left before going vertical. This turn to the left made it hard for Rob to maneuver any type of cleaning device into the exhaust duct. Rob had tried a dryer vent cleaning kit that he had purchased from the local Ace Hardware, but he couldn’t get the “brush on a wire rod” to work around the goofy 90-degree corner in his wall.

With all of this in mind, I set off for Rob’s house with only my electrician fish tape and a roll of duct tape. Since the design of the dryer exhaust duct made it difficult to get any traditional dryer duct cleaning device into the space, I figured I might be able to work the fish tape up into the space and see if I could loosen the clog.

To get started, I wrapped some duct tape around the end of the fish tape with the sticky side out in an attempt to loosen any big lint balls clogging the dry duct. The photo on the right shows me working the fish tape up into the dryer exhaust vent. Click on that image to see the larger version and you’ll notice that my plan resulted in some minor success. You’ll also notice the lint on the wall behind the dryer. I assume that since the vent was clogged, any small gap in the dryer exhaust hose (between the dryer and the exhaust hole in the wall) was blowing whatever lint could make it out of the hole into the room. I guess the lint on the all could have been Rob’s first sign of a problem, but in all fairness, when was the last time you looked behind your dryer for signs of a problem?

Since working from the dryer port in the laundry room wasn’t resulting in much success, I decided to take the project to the roof. The photo to the right shows me trying to loosen the dryer clog from the roof. In hindsight, I could ask the same question you might be asking yourself right now: why am I the one on Rob’s roof, and not Rob? Good question.

The fish tape really wasn’t doing anything notable, so Rob and I hatched another plan to loosen his dryer vent clog: forced air. Rob has an electric leaf blower, so we decided to see if using forced air through the dryer exhaust hole would move enough of the lint up and out of the vent on the roof. We worked from the exhaust hole in the laundry room. We put the end of the leaf blower into the dryer vent and I held it in place with an old towel. (The towel would keep the lint from flying back into my face!) I gave Rob a nod and he turned on the power.

Wow, it worked! The photo to the right shows the results up on Rob’s roof. You can see that using the leaf blower not only unclogged the vent, it was powerful enough to blow the lint a good six feet from the vent. The forced air was the best way to clean out the clog dryer vent in Rob’s house. Since the dryer exhaust vent took two turns (the 90-degree turn mentioned above, plus another jog once it got up into the attic) plus had to climb well over 12 feet to the vent on the roof, I have a feeling that cleaning the dryer vent of lint is a task that Rob will need to perform on a regular basis.

Checking your dryer vent for clogs is a task you should consider doing a couple of times a year. Remember how you see ad campaigns around Daylight Savings Time reminding you to change the batteries in your smoke detector? That bi-annual event would also be a good time to check your dryer exhaust for clogs. If you think about it, the two go hand in hand: Keeping your dyer vent clean will keep your smoke detector from going off.

Home improvement motivation... summer style

2007-08-26T10:55:00.000-05:00

It’s been a long, hectic summer filled with distractions that have kept me away from many home improvement projects. Between weekend events to spend time with friends and family and full-fledged vacations, it’s been hard to tackle some of the outstanding projects in my Cape Code rejuvenation quest. (And by outstanding, I mean unresolved, not spectacular.)

One of the biggest feats of the summer has been tackling the roof leaf into the dinning room ceiling. A few weeks ago I went out onto the sunny porch off the bedroom directly above the dinning room and started exploring. To quickly catch you up, as previously mentioned in my Getting started post, I had already cut a hole in the dinning room ceiling in an attempt to pinpoint where the leak was coming from. (And also to keep the sagging plaster from giving way and dropping onto the dinning room table. You can see a photo of the sagging plaster in the link above.) This hole has been there for over a year as I tried to surmise the situation and calculate the best plan of attack. Essentially I unable calculate a great plan of attack, and with my wife’s patience wearing thin due to the hole in her dinning room ceiling, I set off to the sunny porch with hammer and crowbar in hand.

Let’s start by showing you the doorway where the leak is coming from. With the dinning room ceiling opened up, I could tell the leak was coming straight down and not running from another area. The spot right above the leak is the door. It must be pursued. The photo to the right was taken on June 11. (June 11?! See what I mean by summer getting away from me? It seemed like just a couple of weeks ago.) Note the garden hose in the picture. Prior to destruction I pinpointed one last test spray on the right side of the door and confirmed that it was dripping into the dinning room.

Initially I was only going to remove the screen door and the casing board on the right side of the doorway, but later I noticed that the siding was installed in a less-than-desirable manner. You see, the siding butted up against the door casing. After a little research, I discovered that the end of the side (in this case, up against the doorway) SHOULD be capped off with a vertical J channel. (Here’s a great Web site that shows the various siding installation pieces. Click on the house drawing to view their useful animation that shows which side components are used on a home.) With a J channel, any water that works its way along with siding towards the door will be hit the J channel and head down to the rubber roof.

While seeking out a solid filler to use at the base of the right side of the doorway, I discovered Bondo Home Solutions All-Purpose Putty. That’s right sports fans; the same people who brought you the great two-part body filler to bring your cherished rust bucket car back to life also make a similar two-part filler for applications around your home. In my case, I used it at the base of the door casing on either side of the door. On both sides of the door the wood had rotted away and had previously been patch with something that didn’t withstand the test of time. I’m hoping Bondo’s All-Purpose Putty will stand the test of time. However, I’m not just leaving it exposed to the elements. I added flashing at the base of the door casing that should bring rainwater away from the door threshold and out toward the rubber roof.

When I was finished with the right side of the door and ready to move on to green pastures, I started poking around the left side of the door. Frankly, the wood door casing was in even worse shape than the right side. I ultimately removed it, along with the adjacent board that’s alongside the right side of the window. I also removed the two short pieces of aluminum siding below the window.

In the photo to the right you can see that I installed two new boards and filled some of the larger gaps with the Bondo All-Purpose Putty. In this spot, the Bondo will be primed and painted to reduce exposed to Mother Nature.

Below the window, I replaced the old aluminum siding with HardiPlank cement fiber siding. It’s relatively cheap, comes pre-primed, and should withstand the test of time (something I’m certainly looking for in a product for this home improvement project!). The only downfall of using this product is cutting it. Understand how hard this stuff is before cutting it with your best blade on your circular saw or compound miter saw.

At this point the only thing I need to do is prime the boards on the left side of the door. Once I do that (hopefully later today), I can re-hang the screen door and put a lawn sprinkler up on the sum porch to see if my handiwork actually worked. If it the roof leak is fixed, there will be a domino effect around our house: the dining room ceiling will get fix and the hardwood floors throughout most of our first floor will get refinished. We’ve been putting off refinishing our floor because there’s currently a water mark on the hardwood floor in the dining room below the leak. The dinning room floors connect with the hardwood floors in the front foyer and the back hallway, which in turn leads to the first floor bedroom and den. Basically, once you start refinishing the floors there’s no place to stop.

Getting the heavily-worn floors refinished will give our entire first floor a new breath of fresh air. We’ve held off on refinishing the oak floors until the leak was fixed. Hopefully that time is finally upon us!

Custom wooden light soffit installation

2007-06-21T06:49:00.000-05:00

With the wooden light soffit built, it’s now time to install it above the bathroom sink. But first, it was primed with Kilz latex primer and painted with one coat of white latex paint.

In my Custom wooden light soffit installation preparation post I mentioned that I’m mounting this light soffit with T nuts along with compatible machine screws so I can lower the entire light soffit assembly should it ever need maintenance (or it I get sick of the look 15 years from now).

The screws needed to work with the 10-24 x 9/32 T nuts were 10-24 x 2 SS machine screws (pan head, slotted). The photo to the right shows the T nut with the compatible machine screw.

With a little help from my wife, we were easily able to hold up the custom light soffit and install the machine screws through the face of the light soffit and into their t-nut.

The photo to the right shows the screws were countersunk into the plywood face. I used a forstner drill bit to create a recess for the screw head and for the 1/2-inch wood button I’ll use in my next post to cover the screw head. The beauty of the forstner drill bit is that it provides a very clean edge and leaves the bottom of the drilled hole flat, not pointed. You see, forstner bits don’t look like traditional drill bits. They’re typically larger sizes (1/4-inch and up) and have a cutting head on the end, as opposed to a spiral cutting shaft like a typical drill bit. The circular cutting head is flat at the leading edge (tip), which is what lets you drill holes that are not only clean around the parameter, but also flat at the base of the drilled hole.

At this point you might be wondering how I was able to get the screws to align perfectly with the t-nuts hidden behind the wooden soffit. I did use a little trick. Prior to mounting the t-nuts to the two-by-four mounting boards (as mentioned in my Custom wooden light soffit installation preparation post), I held the light soffit (with holes for the mounting screws already in place) up into position. Then I had my wife take each screw and push it through its hole. Each screw had paint applied on its tip, so when the screw went through its mounting hole and hit the two-by-four, it left the exact location of where the t-nut needed to be installed. We used a paint pen to apply a small amount of paint to the tip of the screw, but you could also use finger nail polish. Whatever paint you use, don’t use too much or it will smudge against the two-by-four and won’t give a good reference point for drilling the hole for the t-nut.

With the light soffit mounted, we now need a couple of coats of paint before the final trim and screw buttons are installed. More on that next time.

Custom wooden light soffit installation preparation

2007-05-24T07:26:00.000-05:00

With the custom wooden light soffit for above the upstairs bathroom sink assembled, it was time to determine my plan for installation. The weight of the soffit box isn’t too much of an issue, but the wiring for the individual bullet light cans is a little concerning. The wiring starts at one end and works its way down the line to all five cans, then onto the power source.

I’m not certain this soffit is a long term solution for the bathroom, and since I don’t have an abundance of faith in the $11 halogen light cans (purchased from Lowes), I wanted to make the entire soffit removable. Therefore, the line running from the last can to the power supply was left longer than normal so I can bring the entire soffit down in the future. To accomplish this, special hardware was used to allow me to screw the soffit into place, yet give me the flexibility to bring it down at any point without marring the soffit or the adjacent walls. More on that in a little bit.

Since the light cans stick up beyond the height of the new light soffit, I had to make room in the existing plaster soffit. The photo to the right shows the recess created for the new soffit lights. To the right is the rectangular opening for the original light fixture. That opening provided space for three of the five halogen light cans. To the left are the two holes I had to cut in the plaster to make room for the other two lights.

Cutting ceiling plaster is a true joy. It’s hard as a rock, it kicks up all sorts of dust, and the dust drops down directly into whatever tool you’re using to make the cuts. I have a Dremel rotary tool that will never sound the same again after using it to cut holes into the ceiling of our kitchen a few years back. Don’t think you can do this job with any type of hand saw; plaster eats hand saws. The photo to the right shows the thickness of the plaster I removed for reference.

To cut through my plaster I used my brand new Black & Decker Fire Storm reciprocating saw, shown to the right. Looks like I’ve owned it for years, doesn’t it? Actually, that saw was brand spanking new before those two holes were cut! That’s how much dust I’m talking about. With a carbide-tipped bit in place, the reciprocating saw made short work of the plaster. I’m really impressed with the performance of that Fire Storm saw. It’s apparent Black & Decker put a lot of thought into its design because it’s extremely easy to switch blades or adjusted the cutting depth. For around $65 (on clearance at Lowes after the holidays), it was a great buy, especially since I had a $50 Lowes gift card! Maybe someday soon I’ll show how I also use my reciprocating saw to prune trees (a tip from my dear old dad), but for now, back to the soffit.

With the holes cut, I had to figure out how to mount the soffit unit in place so it could be removed in the future. To accomplish this, I used T nuts (tee nuts) along with compatible screws, shown to the right. If you look at the photo of the holes cut for the light soffit again, you’ll notice that I mounted a short piece of two-by-four on either end of the soffit area. Each two-by-four was affixed to the framing for the original plaster soffit with countersunk screws. In turn, each two-by-four also holds two T nuts. Each T nut is affixed to the two-by-four by drilling a hole large enough to hold the barrel end of the 10-24 x 9/32 T nut used. With the hole drilled, the barrel end is inserted into the hole and the T nut is secured into place using brad nails through the three holes in the circular face plate of the T nut.

With the T nuts secured to the two-by-four, I can now use the compatible screws to go through holes in light soffit face and into the thread barrel of the T nut. The beauty of this is that I can remove the soffit as many times as I want without the fear of marring the face of the soffit or the surface of the underlying two-by-four (think of the damage done by a wood screw after you’ve driven a screw, removed it, and re-driven it). With the T nuts, I can carefully send the screws through the plywood face of the light soffit and into the T nuts, adjoining the plywood to the rigid surface of the two-by-fours. I’ll show the final install in my new post.

PLEASE NOTE: In my next post, Custom wooden light soffit installation, I share how I determined the location of the t-nuts on the two-by-fours to assure the machine screws would align with the t-nuts.

Custom wooden light soffit construction

2007-04-10T10:25:00.000-05:00

To build the custom light soffit that will hang above my upstairs bathroom sink, I’m using architectural trimwork from my local Home Depot. The box will be constructed out of pine rabbetted stool, that’s typically used for a window stool. Once the box is build, I’ll attach a piece of trim to the two front edges to add some visual appeal to the box (the left and back sides of the box will be flush against walls).

For more on the two pieces of moulding I’m using, read my Custom wooden light soffit post.

While the rabbetted stool is designed to be laid flat when used as a window stool, I’m standing it up on edge and using it as the sides of my soffit box. The box is simply made my cutting the four sides with bevels on each end. The photo to the right shows one of the sides with the bevel cut on a compound miter saw.

Once the four sides were cut to length, I used my router table to cut a channel -- or “dado” -- in the inside bottom edge of the rabbetted stool. This dado with hold the 1/8" plywood that will serve as the bottom of the box, and the light fixtures will be installed in the plywood. The photo to the right shows the rabbetted stool. The red arrow shows where the dado was cut.

Cutting the dado on my router table was tricky because the inside of the rabbetted stool isn’t flat. If you enlarge the image above you’ll notice there’s a bevel that moves inward from the top edge down to the area by the red arrow. When I laid that side of the rabbetted stool face down on my router table, it wouldn’t lay flat.

The solution to this problem was tapping one of my steel rulers down to my router table, parallel to the router bit. As the photo to the right shows, the ruler lifted the beveled side of the rabbetted stool and meant I could safely cut the dado.

I used a straight router bit that matched the thickness of my plywood to cut the dado in the rabbetted stool. Next, I cut the plywood to fit the box and then determined where I wanted the light fixture “cans” to be placed within the plywood. Once the position of the cans were marked (using a template provided with the lights), I cut the holes in the plywood with my jig saw.

Now the box is ready for assembly. Assembling a box with four sides and a bottom can be tricky. Since I wasn’t in a big hurry, I glued the front of the box to the two sides and let it dry over night. By doing so, I only had to worry about two joints (where the back of the box met the two sides) and the plywood bottom during final glue-up. It also meant I didn’t have to use long pipe clamps to hold the box along its length. I used small, and much more manageable, hand clamps during the initial glue-up to hold the corners together with a 90-degree square while the glue dried.

To finish assembly of the soffit box, I slid the plywood into the dados on the sides of the box and in to the dado in the box’s front, then applied glue to the bevels of the box’s back piece. I secured the back of the box to the sides with a couple of brad nails. To drive those nails, I used my Porter-Cable BN200A Brad Nailer, a great tool to own for situations like this where you want to quickly secure something into place.

Next time I’ll show how I installed this wooden light soffit into place above my sink.

Back on track

2007-03-28T21:14:00.000-05:00

I can’t believe it’s been almost two weeks since I’ve posted an update. The primary reason for my absence has been tax preparation. Oh how I enjoy that process.

Another thing that kept me away was the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. It’s not the highest level of play on earth (am I the only one who expects an athlete to make a wide open 15-foot shot, i.e. a free throw?), but it is the most exciting sporting event of the year.

There were also a couple of days away from the house for some rest and relaxation, and spell of warm weather that sent me outside to enjoy life outside the bounds of this Cape Cod and its issues.

On the organization front, I acquired a copy of Adobe’s new Photoshop Lightroom, a powerful software package that helps you manage your digital images with keywords and metadata. In addition to help you get organized, Photoshop Lightroom also has some advanced image editing tools similar to that of Adobe Photoshop. The problem I face is that I have a few years worth of photos that need to have keywords and metadata applied. Once I installed Lightroom, I got hooked on getting organized. Still a long way to go, but so far Lightroom has completely won my respect and is probably ranking up there with some of the best software I’ve ever purchased. If you need a tool that will help you keep your images organized while also offering editing tools, I’d highly recommend Adobe Lightroom. You can learn more about it at Amazon.com.

On the home improvement front, I helped a friend clean out his clogged dryer vent a couple of days ago. And when I say clogged, I mean clogged. That was a collection of other peoples’ lint the size and magnitude of which I hope never see again. He’s lucky the dryer knew when to shut off or it could have overheated and destroyed the entire house. I actually took the camera with on that little expedition and will be sharing our process for unclogging his dryer vent sometime very soon.

I also need to get you up to speed on the upstairs bathroom project. With the new wooden light soffit in place, I need to share how I accomplished that. Hopefully I’ll have that for you in a couple of days.

Custom beadboard ceiling, reprise

2007-03-15T18:09:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week I shared the progress of my new custom beadboard ceiling with a friend of mine, Ed Blysard. Ed is a fellow woodworker and turns some amazing custom pens (see his Renaissance Writing Instruments Web site). After reading my post about the new beadboard ceiling Ed pointed out that I should consider priming the back sides of the panels. After all, if there’s moisture in the air, it will find its way behind those wood panels. Considering the humid conditions of a bathroom, I think he’s right. Who knows what could happen to the boards and beadboard plywood if the back sides are left un-primed or un-painted.

Come on, Ed, I thought I was almost done with this project!

Custom beadboard ceiling, part 2

2007-03-11T11:10:00.000-05:00

Building this beadboard ceiling meant I got a chance to do some work in my basement workshop. For the past couple of months this bathroom project has meant a lot tasks that are not all too enjoyable; primarily applying joint compound and then sanding it. Since I made the beadboard ceiling from a 4' x 8' sheet of beadboard plywood and 1" x 4" "clear" pine (that is, no knots) boards, I had the opportunity to use a variety of my woodworking tools. This was a good thing.

Again, the frame of the ceiling was made with 1" x 4" clear pine boards that had a rabbetted lip along one edge to hold the plywood in place. The sketch I mentioned in my Custom beadboard ceiling, part 1 post was invaluable when it came the time to start milling the boards. The photo to the right shows my router table set up with a 3/4" straight-cutting bit to create the lip. The board shown is one of the middle support sections.

Before I move on, I want to mention how invaluable of a tool a good router can be. With the right bit, and there are literally hundreds to choose from you can take a common board and turn it into a unique piece. To see what I mean, check out the router bit selection at Amazon.com; 9,033 bits to choose from at the writing of this piece! My router is a Bosch 1613EVS plunge router. I’ve had it about four years and consider it to be one of my favorite power tools. Every time I use it I walk away with a great sense of satisfaction. See the more modern Bosch 1617EVSPK Plunge Router kit at Amazon.com.

OK, back to the project at hand. Once I had the four outside boards of the frame and the one middle divider milled, it was time for assembly. If my router is my favorite power tool, the next item I’m going to mention is easily the favorite jig I own.

The photo to the right shows the assembled frame in my workshop (notice the pile of dust on the floor under my router table from milling the frame’s boards). It only took me about 15 minutes to take the milled boards from individual boards to assemble, ready-for-use frame. How was I able to do it so quickly? The Kreg R2 Rocket Pockethole System.

Pocket holes have long been used by cabinet makers as a way to build strong joints with screws, yet conceals the screw heads below the surface of the board. Kreg Tool Co. makes a variety of pocket hole kits; mine is the Kreg R2 Rocket Pockethole System.

Here’s how the process works...
Clamp the Kreg jig to the board that will receive the screws and use the provided drill bit to drill the holes. The depth collar on the drill bit (seen on the right side of the photo) is positioned based on the thickness of your board (to assure you don’t drill through the face of your board.

With the jig removed you can see the clean holes that the Kreg Pockethole System produces.

Use the same clamp (which is provided with the kit) to hold the two boards together and drive the screws into their holes. I add a little dab of glue for added strength. Viola; you’re done. The trickiest part for a large project like this was finding a way to keep all the boards supported during assembly.

With the frame built, I cut the beadboard plywood down to size and installed the panels into position. To secure the plywood panels to the frame, I added wood glue to the lip of the frames and then drove 5/8" brad nails through the plywood and into the frame. To drive those nails, I used my Porter-Cable BN200A Brad Nailer. This might seem like a frivolous toy, and frankly, when I purchased it I thought I was being a little irresponsible. However, I’ve got so much mileage out of the brad nailer that I’d recommend it to any woodworker or home improvement junkie. It makes hanging trim or assembling special projects like this beadboard ceiling quick, neat, and solid.

As a write this it’s becoming clear why I enjoyed this project. Not only did the beadboard ceiling panels help us solve the ceiling’s problems; and not only did I get a chance to spend some quality time in my workshop; I also got a chance to use three of my favorite woodworking tools: my router, my Kreg pocket hole jig, and my Porter-Cable brad nailer. Finally; fun returned to a project!

Once the beadboard panels were painted, I secured them to the plaster ceiling with spring-loaded wall anchors. If you take on a project like this, you’ll have to determine what type of fastener works best for you.

With the ceiling complete, I can now go back to work on the light box I was supposed to be working on. For a recap of where that project stands, read my Custom wooden light soffit post.

Custom beadboard ceiling, part 1

2007-03-07T20:30:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in my last post, the problems with the primer and joint compound on the ceiling meant I had to come up with a new solution for the ceiling. My wife and I agreed on a beadboard ceiling, but the layout of the ceiling is such that this project, like most projects, meant a custom solution was needed.

To see what I mean about the layout of the room, read my Upstairs bathroom primer post and enlarge the photo of the bathroom’s blueprint. From the blueprints you can see that the primary portion of the bathroom – basically from the bathroom door to the far side of the closet door – is standard ceiling height and essentially a rectangle.

The ceiling near the window, while called “Arched Lower Ceiling” on the blueprints, is actually a flat ceiling that’s about a foot lower than the other side of the bathroom. The tricky part about this portion of the bathroom is that the area isn’t a rectangle or square. If you look at the blueprint, you’ll notice on the left side that the wall "jogs" in almost two inches as you move from the shower nook toward the window. (I assume it’s like this because the window area is one of the dormers on the front of the house.) That little jog meant I had to build the frame for my beadboard ceiling to fill that odd little area.

Once I had the dimensions from the bathroom written down, I took the time to create rudimentary drawings to help me with the construction of the two frames. This took a little time, but it was immensely helpful in the end because it helped me with the following particulars:

How long to cut the 1 x 4" clear pine boards that served as the sides of the frame.

How deep and wide to make the rabbetted lip on the 1 x 4" boards to support the plywood.

Where any oddities in the room where, like the placement of the bathroom fan in the primary portion of the bathroom as well as the notch for the wall jog in the window portion.

VERY IMPORTANT>>> If you make a drawing for your beadboard ceiling framework, just remember that your finished piece will be hung upside down. Keep in mind that your drawing will most likely be created looking down upon the paper, while the finished ceiling will be hung from the underside of the paper. Make sense? That’s why you’ll notice on my drawings that I included North, South, East, and West to help keep the framework’s orientation correct (I also did the same thing on the actual boards themselves). Plus, you’ll notice that my drawing goes North, West, South, East, opposite of the traditional map style of North, East, South, West. That way, then I went into the room to get an idea of how the drawing compared to the actual room, I flipped the drawing over my head and look at it as though it were the frame’s finished side. If I hadn’t done this, the opening for the bathroom fan may have wound up on the East side of the room, instead of the West. I hope all of this makes sense.

My custom beadboard ceiling is made from beadboard plywood (shown to the right). To support the beadboard plywood, I built a custom frame that would not only hold the 3/8” beadboard plywood in place, but would also give me a rigid structure to fasten the framework to the ceiling.

Since the plywood would sag in the middle if I were to only use a frame around the outside, I also included a board down the middle of the frame. This was also necessary because of the bathroom fan in the primary portion of the room. I’ll jump ahead a little bit and show you the finished frames so you can get an idea of what I’m talking about. If you enlarge the image to the right, you’ll notice the framework on the left is a rectangle (for the primary portion of the bathroom), while the framework on the right has a notch protruding from the lower left side. This is the frame for the window section of the bathroom, and that notch will fill the notch area mentioned above. You’ll also notice in the photo that the frame for the window section doesn’t have a support board on the top side. This was intentionally left off because the beadboard on that side of the frame will snug against the window trim and I didn’t want a support board to cover the window’s trim.

Next time I’ll cover how I milled the lumber, assembled the pieces, and hung the finished ceiling.

Hiatus / failure resurgence

2007-03-05T19:33:00.000-06:00

Actually, I’m not sure I’d call it a hiatus, because I was hardly taking a break from the home remodeling. To the contrary, over the past week I’ve done little in my free time except for work on the house. I guess it was just a hiatus from updating the site. Let me bring you up to speed...

In my last post, The light at the end of the tunnel, I mentioned I had finished my portion of the upstairs bathroom project. Talk about jinxing myself! The final phase of the joint compound work was to repair the flaking ceiling paint on the short ceiling (shown to the right). It was a week ago Saturday when I finished the joint compound work in the bathroom and turned the project over to my wife so she could start painting.

That night she put a coat of primer on the walls and ceiling in the bathroom. The following morning we notice the primer had some adverse reaction to the joint compound in a couple of places on the ceiling. Enlarge the photo to the right to see the result. The primer had bubbled up in a couple of small areas. I’m not certain how it happened, so I’m not even going to speculate. All joint compound repairs on the walls were fine, so I think it was a problem in areas where a very thin coat of joint compound went over the old paint on the ceiling. Once the primer went on the thin areas of joint compound, I think the paint primer didn’t adhere for some reason. Again, I am just speculating.

With that paint problem at hand, we needed a solution, and fast because we were having a family party at our house six days later (this past Saturday). Here were our choices:

Try to fix the bubbled-up paint: No way. I had already put a lot of time into that ceiling, both skim-coating the small area of the ceiling in the one part of the room, and repairing cracks in the area over by the bathroom fan (read my post Upstairs Bathroom Primer to see the layout of the room). Once the primer was on the ceiling, I had little faith that I could repair the problem spots and then have the subsequent coats of primer not bubble up like the first coat did. In other words, I wasn’t going to put more time in only to wind up in the same spot a day or two later. We were under the gun to get this fixed, for good.

Alternative ceiling: Yes. What could we use as a ceiling surface in a Cape Cod home that wouldn’t look like we were trying to hide a blemish, but rather add more charm to the room? Hmmm... we stood there and stared and stared at that damn ceiling. Then it hit us: beadboard! Yes; we’ll go with a beadboard ceiling! We’ll give the bathroom a nice cottage feeling. Why didn’t we think of this a month ago?

With the idea in place, I had to think of a way to install a beadboard ceiling in our bathroom and make it look like it was meant to be from the beginning. I also had to figure out a way to attach it to our rock-hard plaster ceilings with some type of anchors.

In the next few days I’ll share how I did it. For now, I’ll share a photo of the completed ceiling, just to prove that it all worked out.

It all worked out, but it meant we had to stay up past midnight every single night last week to finish the project. The family party went without a hitch and everyone loved the bathroom’s new look. (See the Upstairs Bathroom Primer link above for a before photo, including the nasty old metallic wallpaper.)

Now we just need to finish off the last few little projects that didn’t get wrapped up, including the wooden light box above the sink. More on that and the steps involved with building the new bead board ceiling coming soon.

The light at the end of the tunnel

2007-02-25T21:41:00.000-06:00

What a weekend. Thursday night I stayed up past midnight working on the plaster repairs in the upstairs bathroom. Friday, I took a vacation day from work and spent over eight hours working on the bathroom. Needless to say, I slept well Friday night.

With all the plaster cracks repaired, I’ve moved on to short ceiling by the window on Saturday. This portion of the room is only 4- by 5-feet and is a little over 7-feet off the floor. The great news is I can reach it without the use of a stool or ladder. The bad news is that I’m working above my head all day. That means all joint compound dust falls down in my direction, making a quality respirator a necessity. It also makes for one sore neck and shoulders at the end of a long day. (To get a better sense of the room, read my Upstairs Bathroom Primer post .)

Yesterday I put on three skim coats of joint compound onto that short ceiling. I’m doing this because the paint in that area was crazed and cracked (see my post, Crazed ceiling paint). Before applying the skim coat, I removed any loose paint with a stiff putty knife, then used my random orbit sander to quickly sand the entire ceiling with 120 grit sandpaper. When finished sanding, I vacuumed the ceiling to remove the dust.

With skim coats, you apply a very thin layer of joint compound with the understanding that there will be another coat coming after the first (and most likely after the second as well). Apply the thin coat neatly so you won’t have a lot of sanding to do between coats, if any. You can use either a 10- or 12-inch taping knife to apply the joint compound (see my Drywall and plaster joint compound tools post).

While the coats of joint compound were drying, I swapped out the older bathroom fan for a more powerful model. This meant some quality time up in the attic removing the old fan, enlarging the hole for the new fan, and mounting the new fan. All in all, it wasn’t too bad. A little over two hours worth of work and the results are every encouraging. Once the power was back on I tested the new fan and it’s much quieter than the old fan. Once the ceiling is painted, I’ll add the bathroom fan’s grille.

Today I finished sanding the joint compound and officially turned the plaster walls and ceiling over to the painter (my wife). Now I’ll have time to finish the new wooden light soffit for above the sink. When I’m finished with that, this project may actually be finished... unless I decide to be a hero and address the storage problems in the bathroom’s deep (over three-feet!) closet. We’ll have to see how motivated I can remain; at this point my motivation tank is damn-near empty.

Where home improvement and woodworking meet

2007-02-20T07:13:00.000-06:00

Last night I went hunting for hardware to attach my forthcoming wooden light soffit to the plaster soffit that’s already in place. I spent over a half hour scouring the hardware aisle (screws, fasteners, etc.) at my local Lowes and I must admit, for a big box store they have an impressive selection of fasteners. From shelf supports to decorative hardware for mirrors and glass doors, they have much more than you’d expect.

The issue I’m facing with my wooden light box is that it’s going to be completely enclosed with four sides and a plywood bottom (which will hold the new light cans). Therefore, I need some type of fastener that I can drive vertically through the plywood bottom and into the plaster soffit. There are three challenges with this plan.

First, simply driving some type of screw is out of the question because the plaster is like concrete and not accommodating to fasteners.

Second, I’d like to be able to remove the wood soffit in the future, just in case. If I didn’t want to remove, I could simply leave the plywood bottom and right side of the box off and attach the box to the soffit with L brackets. Then, with the box attached, I could slide the plywood into the box and nail the right side in place to enclose the box. This would be a nice option because all mounting hardware would be hidden. The shortfall is that if the wood soffit ever needed to come down, I’d have to remove the right side and then the plywood, certainly damaging the paint.

And finally, since I’m using 1/8” plywood for the bottom of the wood soffit, I’ll need to reinforce the plywood from inside the box to assure the hardware used to attach it to the plaster soffit won’t damage the thin plywood. (I’m using 1/8” plywood simply because it was available in my workshop, leftover from a previous project. If I were buying plywood specifically for this project, I would recommend going with at least 1/4" plywood for the rigidity.)

So here’s my plan... I’ll attach two wood boards perpendicularly to the bottom of the existing plaster soffit, one near each end. Fastened to the bottom face of those two boards will be two 10-24 x 9/32 tee nuts, one near the front and one near the back. (If you don’t know what tee nuts are, stay tuned over the next few days... they’re a fastener you need to know about.) I will then drive 10-24 machine screws up through the plywood bottom, through the support board inside the box, and into the tee nut held by the board attached to the plaster soffit. Since the machine screws can easily go in and out of the tee nut, I’ll be able to lower the wooden soffit should a situation ever arise.

To conceal the screw heads on the bottom of the wood light soffit, I’ll use plastic, hinged screw covers.

I realize that without photos or a diagram that this game plan is hard to follow. Please stay tuned over the next few days to see this plan unfold.

Removing old bathroom light box

2007-02-18T20:59:00.000-06:00

Before I start building the wooden light soffit for above the bathroom sink, I need to remove the light box that’s currently in place.

Before doing any work around any electrical device, be sure to turn off the power and test the fixture to assure it’s safe to proceed.

The photo to the right will give you an idea of how deep the existing light box is. With the frosted glass removed, you can see the box is over nine inches deep. Since the bulbs are set at the very top of the box, you can understand why the light produced by the box didn’t do a very good job of spreading light throughout the bathroom. Even though the bathroom is only 5’ x 11’ (see my Upstairs bathroom primer post), much of the light’s effectiveness was blocked by the inside walls of the light box. If the light bulbs were down closer to the rim, the light would have been cast at a much greater angle.

With the chrome trim removed, I discovered that the light box had actually been plastered into place. Lovely. With a stiff putty knife, I removed the skim-coat of plaster from the lip around the edge of the light box. The plaster was only about 1/16” deep. I had to be careful to make sure I didn’t accidentally drive the putty knife into the huge mirror above the sink.

Before the box could be removed, there were four nails driven through the inside of the box and into the wood framing for the existing plaster soffit. The last step before removing the box is disconnecting the electrical from the box. Once these two steps were complete, the box was ready to slide out.

Before pulling the light box out of the plaster soffit, I taped an old cardboard box to the mirror so the box wouldn’t accidentally scratch the mirror during removal. Once the cardboard was in place, I put one of the screws from the chrome trim back in its hole and gently pulled down on the screw with the claw of my hammer. It didn’t take much effort to loosen the box from the plaster.

With the light box removed, I was able to see inside the plaster soffit. Before removing the light, I wasn’t sure if there was any horizontal wood framing to the left of the light box. (Unfortunately, an electronic stud finder isn’t powerful enough to scan through the thick plaster.) The great news is that there is no framing that will get in the way of the new light canisters I’m planning to install. If there had been wood framing in the way, it could have impacted the placement of the new lights. It’s great to know that won’t be an issue.

With no framing to worry about, I can simply cut holes in the plaster so the tall light canisters can extend from the bottom of the short wood light soffit (less than 3” tall) up into the plaster soffit.

Now I can get to work on the wood soffit in the old workshop. It’ll be nice to create wood dust instead of joint compound dust!

Custom wooden light soffit

2007-02-17T14:38:00.000-06:00

Yippee! Looks like Bergie’s going to have a chance to get reacquainted with his workshop! If you didn’t know better by reading this blog, you’d think I enjoyed home improvement over woodworking. Oh, to the contrary!

At this point in the upstairs bathroom project, I’m about 85% finished with the plaster crack repairs. I’m taking a little break from the plaster repair to mock up the light box that I’d like to add to the bottom side of the soffit above the sink.

The image to the right shows the current lighting in the bathroom. That light fixture on the bottom of the plaster soffit houses three bulbs behind the frosted glass; certainly not enough by today’s primping standards (so I’ve been informed).

To improve the lighting in the bathroom, I’d like to add four halogen lights within a shallow, trim-enhanced, wood soffit which would be attached to the bottom of the plaster soffit shown above. Those four lights should provide much better light to the sink area, and the moulding around the visible edges of the wood soffit (the front and right side) should add some nice lines to otherwise “flat” area.

To the right is a photo of the mock-up that I just got approved by the commissioner (my lovely wife). I’m using two pieces of moulding intended for other household trim applications, but I think by combining the two I can achieve a great-looking home for the new lights. I’ll create four sides with the vertical moulding to form a box but leave the smaller moulding off the left and back sides so I can butt those sides right up to the left wall and mirror. I’ll also rabbet the inside of the bottom edge of all four sides so I can add a piece of wood (most likely plywood or MDF (medium-density fiberboard)) to form the bottom of the box, where the holes for the lights will be cut. Below is a recap of the wood moulding I’m planning on using.

Rabbetted stool
The vertical sides of the wood soffit box are rabbetted stool moulding which is intended for use when trimming a window. A “window stool” is the flat horizontal shelf at the bottom of a window. I like the rabbetted stool for this light box for a couple of reasons. First, the 2-3/4” height will ample for the soffit box I want to build. Also, the rounded over edge will make for a nice detail for the bottom of the light box.

Base cap
The base cap moulding has great detail that will add some intriguing depth to the front and right side of the box. This base cap is intended for use as moulding along the top of flat base moulding along a floor. Let’s say you’re using 1” x 4” wood for base moulding at the base of your walls. The base cap – with the fattest part of the moulding on the bottom – adds some nice detail to the flat base moulding. For my box, I’m flipping the base cap around so the fattest part of the moulding will be along the top edge.

Both of the mouldings above are offered by Georgia Pacific and sold at Home Depot (at least in the Midwest).

Here’s some more information about the mouldings:
- Rabbetted stool: item number WM 1194, 11/16” x 2-3/4” pine
- Base cap: item number WM 163, 11/16” x 1-3/8” pine

Since the housing of the lights I’m using are taller than the wooden soffit I intent to build, I’ll still be facing with cutting holes into the plaster soffit that’s currently above the sink. However, that should not be a big issue, because before I thought of this wood soffit idea I thought I was going to have to cut holes for the four lights in the plaster soffit anyway. Now, since the holes in the plaster will be hidden by the wood soffit, I don’t have to worry about how clean the cuts are into the rock-hard plaster. (Previous attempts to cut into the plaster around my house have left rather rough edges.)

Once the wooden soffit is built, I’ll attach it to the bottom of the plaster soffit with L brackets.

Off to Home Depot for the rest of the moulding! Yippee!

Progress tonight, 20% off paint tomorrow

2007-02-16T22:23:00.000-06:00

Tonight I put in another three hours of quality time into the upstairs bathroom project. I’m happy to report that the ceiling in the shower nook is almost completely repaired and ready for primer. More on that in the near future.

Tomorrow there’s a bag sale at Ace Hardware. Anything you can fit into a paper bag is 20% off. While we’re not ready for paint, we’re going to take advantage of the savings opportunity and buy our latex paint for the bathroom walls and ceiling. We’ll also probably stock up on Kilz latex primer, since we’ll put that down on the plaster (and joint compound repairs) prior to putting down the final paint color.

Now, it’s time to start flipping through the paint chip samples that we’ve be accruing over the past couple months. Seems like every time we’ve gone to Ace Hardware, Home Depot, or Lowes recently, that we come home with another three or four shades of gray (the color we're painting the walls).

Let the official shade of gray debate begin!

Who do you love?

2007-02-14T19:41:00.000-06:00

A great Bo Diddley blues song went a little something like this...

I walk 47 miles of barbed wire,
I use a cobra-snake for a necktie,
I got a brand new house on the roadside,
Made from rattlesnake hide,
I got a brand new chimney made on top,
Made out of a human skull,
Now come on take a walk with me, Arlene,
And tell me, who do you love?

Who do you love?...

Not exactly the most romantic of Valentine’s Day songs, but it does have a nice little home improvement twist to it. Or not.

On this day, I hope you’re well aware of who you love. If you’re lucky, you’re blessed enough to not only know who you love, but what you love. For me, it’s my wife and our classic Cape Cod home. As much as I shake my head and swear under my breath at this home, I love it more than any other dwelling I’ve ever known.

So, on this Valentine’s Day, what do you love?

Preparing plaster cracks for joint compound

2007-02-12T21:25:00.000-06:00

Since I’ve already discussed joint compound and the tools used to apply it, I’m now going to cover how I prepared the cracks in the plaster walls prior to applying joint compound.

If the cracks are large and contain small pieces of loose plaster, you’ll need to remove the old chunks of plaster prior to applying the new joint compound. When I say chunks, I’m merely referring to small pieces about the size of a grain of rice or a single piece of Rice Krispies cereal.

To clean out the plaster crack use the sharp end of a can opener. Since the pointed end is made to withstand opening a tin can, it’s durable enough to dig into plaster. Simply drag the point along the crack to loosen the old plaster and enlarge the crack slightly for the new joint compound. Inevitably you’ll come across cracks where the old plaster chunks, or any loose plaster dust, will not want to come out of the crack. For the new joint compound to work well, you need to remove the loose material. To do so, I use a plastic drinking straw to blow air directly into the crack. Now, keep in mind that when you blow into the crack that there’s a great chance of the debris coming right back into your face... or better yet, your eyes. Consider yourself warned.

Once you have the cracks cleaned you need to determine if you should use any type of drywall joint tape, wall repair fabric, or corner bead to strengthen the repaired crack. Below I cover the three that I used to repair my upstairs bathroom plaster cracks: joint tape, self-adhesive joint fabric, and paper-faced metal corner bead.

Before diving into the explanations below, you may want to read my Drywall and plaster joint compound tools post for a primer on the tools involved with applying joint compound.

Paper joint tape
This is the old standard for covering drywall joints. Simply put down a thin layer of joint compound over the seam with a 4-inch joint knife, place the paper joint tape over the length of the seam, then drag the joint knife over the entire length of the tape to remove any bubbles. After the first coat has dried (which will depend on which type of joint compound you choose), apply another layer of joint compound over the tape with a six-inch taping knife to taper the compound out over the edge of the first coat. When the second coat is dry, gently sand the area smooth. Wipe the dust away and then add another thin coat of joint compound with a 10-inch taping knife.

Best case scenario: you’re finished and ready for priming and painting.

Worst case scenario: more sanding and another layer of joint compound. Just remember, the more joint compound you put on the more sanding you can look forward to. Thin coats work best, and make sure to keep the blade clean of dried pieces of joint compound when applying the second and third layers of mud or you’ll leave scratches in the wet joint compound as you draw the knife along the seam.

Self-adhesive joint fabric
As the name implies, this drywall mesh is easy to apply to the wall because its backing is sticky. Simply cut to length, apply to the wall over the seam (or crack in my case), then add a layer of joint compound with a 4-inch joint knife. Follow the instructions above for the second and third coat. Since this type of joint tape is a little thicker than the paper joint tape, you’ll need to decide when and where to use it. I used it to patch plaster cracks only in areas where there’s no concern over the thickness of the joint (this isn’t a concern when applying to new drywall, because drywall edges are tapered to accept tape and mud). If a crack is mid-wall, I’d recommend the thinner paper joint tape, if any at all. Remember, your repair will need to be discreet so when the wall is painted it won’t stand out.

Paper faced metal corner bead
To add joint compound to corners (both inside and outside corners), drywallers have traditionally used metal corner bead. It’s thin, easy to cut to length, is pre-bent at a 90-degree angle to fit perfectly into corners, and features a slight recess molded into the corner to accept extra joint compound (to assure the metal won’t show through the joint compound in the corner).

More modern alternatives include plastic corner bead, which is easier to cut and isn’t as prone to cutting your hands as its metal counterpart. Another modern alternative, and the choice I went with, is a corner bead that’s a hybrid of paper joint tape and metal corner bead (see the photos to the right). This product is beneficial because the paper is super thin, yet the metal corner is very durable. I used this product to patch cracks in the corners of my plaster walls and at the point where the walls meet the ceiling.
Now that I’ve covered the tools, joint compound, and crack preparation, next time I’ll show you some of the variety of cracks I repaired in my plaster walls.

Great progress this weekend

2007-02-11T20:41:00.000-06:00

This weekend I experienced some extremely encouraging progress in our upstairs bathroom remodeling project.

First, I finished repairing the cracks in the plaster walls. I’ll cover the techniques I used to patch the various cracks in the coming days. It’s a relief to know that the dirtiest part of this project – sanding the joint compound – is in my rearview mirror. I might need to do a little joint compound work in the shower stall, but it should be as time-consuming as the walls. You can also read my previous posts, Patching plaster cracks with joint compound and Drywall and plaster joint compound tools to see what I’ve covered on the joint compound work up to this point.

The most encouraging portion of the weekend’s work was the fact that it only took me about and hour-and-a-half to remove the cracked paint from the arched ceiling of the shower nook. After finishing the joint compound work, I decided to take a pass at the cracked paint. Low and behold, it came of so “easy” that just a little elbow grease later and I was finished removing the paint from the plaster ceiling. Once again, the fact that I have solid, smooth plaster probably made the paint removal go much faster than if I was working with less rigid drywall. I’ll share photos and the technique I used to remove the paint later this week.

In other bathroom news, I picked up a new, more powerful fan for the bathroom that will need to be installed prior to painting the ceiling. Since I’ll have to remove the old bathroom fan from the attic, I’m hoping I have a week or so before I’m ready for this task. The temperatures are in the teens here lately, and I really don’t want to spend too much time up in that icebox.

I’m also considering new lighting solutions for above the bathroom sink. There’s currently a recessed light housing with three bulbs and frosted glass. Needless to say, it doesn’t provide a great deal of light. We’ve already purchased some halogen bullet lights, but I’m not certain how I’m going to install them. I really don’t want to cut individual holes in the ultra-hard plaster soffit above the sink for the four new lights. Thus, I might build a new wood soffit to house the new lights and attach it to the bottom of the current soffit. It’d be nice to actually use my woodworking tools for once! At this point I’m thinking a simple rectangular frame with some molding on the edges to give it some depth. Once I figure out what I’m going to do and get it approved by the commissioner (my lovely wife), I’ll share what I come up with.

Now, time to relax and work out the kink in my shoulder from all that damn sanding.

Time out for a prank

2007-02-09T12:31:00.000-06:00

This week has been extremely un-productive in terms of working on the old Cape Cod. Between family commitments and the day-to-day rigors of working a full day, coming home to more work on the old house just hasn’t been in the cards.

What was in the cards this week was a good old fashion prank on a co-worker. If you watch The Office on NBC, this prank will hit home with you. On the show, Jim occasionally puts a co-worker’s office product inside a Jell-O mold. If memory serves me, his first stunt was suspending co-worker Dwight’s stapler in Jell-O.

This stressful was the perfect time for a little comic relief. One of my co-workers is a big fan of The Office, so she’s been the brunt of my antics. Shortly before the holidays when she was out of the office for a few days, I filled her favorite water glass with lime Jell-O. She retaliated with a weak attempt to fill my Eclipse gum BigEPak (a small plastic cylinder that holds 60 pieces of gum) with Jell-O. I say weak because the gum started breaking down inside the Jell-O, making the Jell-O more like goop. What a rookie. And, since she ruined 30-plus pieces of gum, the ball was back in my court.

My opportunity presented itself about a month ago when a different co-worker’s computer mouse failed. After a new mouse was delivered, I swooped in and took the old useless mouse. That’s right; I would exact my revenge with a tool of modern day society that no office cube-dweller can live without: their mouse.

My wife actually did the hard work, which was finding a container that was perfect for placing the mouse in, upside down, so once the Jell-O had set, it could easily be flipped out of the container.

The results are to the right. I made certain I was nearby when my co-worker arrived at the office that morning. She said she didn’t know what to do. After all, you can’t exactly call the IT help desk and say you need a new mouse because yours is buried in Jell-O! Since I’m not completely mean-spirited, and because I really didn’t want her to call the help desk, I left her “good” mouse nearby so she would see it. I also put it on a plate so the Jell-O wouldn’t “melt” on her mouse pad.

Well, now that the fun and games portion of this week is over, I’ll be back to work in the upstairs bathroom tomorrow. More progress reports on the plaster crack repairs then.

Stainless steel compound mud pan

2007-02-04T15:31:00.000-06:00

This morning I swung by Lowes and picked up a new stainless steel mud pan to replace my failing plastic mud pan.

If you enlarge the photo to the right, you’ll see the failing plastic in the bottom of the plastic mud pan. I alluded to this yesterday (Plastic joint compound mud pan) but it was only accentuated this afternoon when I noticed a small flake of yellow plastic embedded in the hardened joint compound that I put down yesterday. This only validated my decision to go to with the better stainless steel mud pan.

The new mud pan is shown to the right. One little piece of clarification to my Drywall and plaster joint compound tools post from a couple of days ago. When preaching the virtues of spending the extra money on a stainless steel mud pan from the get-go, I guessed that I probably saved $10 by purchasing the plastic mud pan instead of the better stainless steel mud pan. Well, much to my delight, the stainless steel mud pan that I purchased today was only $8.88, while the plastic mud pan was around $4.50. Trust me, spend the extra $4.00 on the stainless steel mud pan (skip the trip to Starbucks on the way home if you’re concerned about the four bucks!).

Working with the stainless steel mud pan is great. Since the joint compound doesn’t adhere to the sides (which happens moderately on the plastic mud pan), it’s easy to mix and then pull the mud from the pan to the taping knives. And the best part, clean-up is extremely easy. I was using a hand brush to clean the plastic mud pan because as the joint compound hardened it became more difficult to remove it from the inside of the pan. With the stainless steel pan, some warm water and a couple of passes with your hand is all you’ll need to clean out the inside of the mud pan. (Naturally, remove all the excess mud with a joint knife and throw it in the garbage before washing the mud pan in the sink.)

The only concern I have with this new mud pan is that the top edges are sharp, and since I hold the pan from both the bottom or from the top with my thumb pointed down into the pan, I’ll have to be careful not to cut myself. (I know I probably just jinxed myself.)

This project should really hit its stride now that I’m saving so much time cleaning up. Yeah, right!

Plastic joint compound mud pan

2007-02-03T19:51:00.000-06:00

If I didn’t state clearly enough in my Drywall and plaster joint compound tools post to never buy a plastic joint compound mud pan, let me state it again now with absolute resolve.

I spent a large portion of today repairing cracks in the plaster walls of our upstairs bathroom. I would guess that there have been at least 30 batches of joint compound mixed in my plastic mud pan on this project alone (plenty of cracks, and three layers of mud on each). With all the scrapping from the metal 4" joint knife on the inside of the tub while mixing, applying the mud to the walls, and during clean-up, the plastic is going to naturally start showing signs of wear.

Today I noticed on a couple of occasions that when I was dragging joint compound across a repair area that small flakes of the yellow plastic mud pan were on the wall. Needless to say, when you’re trying to leave a nice, clean application of joint compound, any fragment in the mud is going to be pulled along the edge of the taping knife and leave a streak in the mud. While the flakes of plastic from the mud pan are small, they’re a total menace.

So again, don’t skimp when it comes to shopping for your joint compound tools. Tomorrow I need to go out and buy a new stainless steel mud pan, so I really didn’t save anything in the end.

Drywall and plaster joint compound tools

2007-02-02T19:57:00.000-06:00

Below is an overview of the tools I use to apply joint compound to either drywall joints or plaster walls. While the type of joint compound you use will differ depending on your situation (read my post Patching plaster cracks with joint compound), the tools basically remain the same.

Mud pan
A mud pan is where I mix my joint compound when making small batches, like the plaster wall crack repair in my upstairs bathroom. The narrow design is easy to hold in one hand as you gather mud with one of the various joint compound applicators shown below. As you can see to the right, a few years ago I went the cheap route and bought a plastic mud pan. I probably saved about $10, but I now regret it. Spend the extra money and get a stainless steel mud pan, it’ll last forever.

My plastic mud pan has been used so much it’s developed some small hair-line cracks which I’ve repaired with thin strips of styrene plastic (.020" thickness, found at model railroad hobby shops) glued onto the crack from the outside of the pan. Again, spend the money upfront and buy the better one. Never skimp on tools, you’ll only regret it later.

UPDATE: Read my February 4, 2007 post, Stainless steel compound mud pan, to see the right type of mud pan to buy.

4" joint knife
This is the tool you must have when applying joint compound. It’s used to mix the joint compound in the mud pan and to put the first layer of joint compound onto the drywall or plaster.

6" taping knife
Once the first layer of joint compound has dried, move to a 6" taping knife. The difference in the width will help taper the joint compound out over the wall. Most taping knives have blue spring steel blades that are sturdy, yet have some flex when you’re pulling the mud along a seam.

10" taping knife
Hopefully, the final step will be a third coat of joint compound with a 10" blade.

Inside corner tool
To apply joint compound to an inside corner, use the aptly-named inside corner tool. (There’s also a similar tool meant for outside corners, but I don’t have a need for that application.) The blade of the inside corner tool are set at the perfect angle and make drawing mud down a corner extremely easy.

I’ll show more specific examples of how to use joint compound tools as I progress with patching the cracks in the upstairs bathroom.

Don’t forget this critical home improvement project

2007-01-31T21:04:00.000-06:00

It’s easy to fall into a funk this time of the year. If you’re knee-deep in home improvement projects like me, you find yourself not only consumed with the worries surrounding that project, but also a myriad of other headaches that come due after the first month of the new year ends. Tax documents start rolling in, bills from the holidays come due, and it seems like every Tom, Dick, and Harry is starting a new campaign to try to get more of your money. (Noticed the bulge in your mailbox since the first of the year? It’s direct mail drop season!)

So, with all of those annoyances distracting you, it’s easy to forget one of the year’s most important home improvement tasks. If you do this job right, you’re sure to experience an improved quality of life around the homestead.

What task is it? Valentines Day shopping. That’s right, it’s only two weeks from today, and if you pull this one off, all your hard work around the house will certainly be rewarded (and your mishaps forgiven). But why is shopping for a Valentine’s Day gift a home improvement task, you ask? Read slowly: home improvement. Any gift should make things around the home improve, right?

If you’ve been at this for a while, you can attest to the fact that it’s harder and hard to complete this task in a unique manner each year. Thus, just like the typical posts in Old Home Blog, I’m going to share my experience in hope that it helps lead to another successful project completion for you.

Here are my picks for four sites that make Valentine’s Day shopping easy, and most important, gift-giving rewarding.

Pajamas
That’s right, good old fashioned PJ’s. PajamaGram.com has a wide selection, from classic pajamas and Valentine’s Day inspired designs, to more risqué designs. Best part: each order includes a personalized card and comes wrapped in a hat box. We’re talking 10 minutes and done here, fellas.

Sweets
Tired of chocolates? Your significant other might be too. Try cookies from David’s Cookies. They have cookies and desserts that’ll make a box of chocolates look like the most unoriginal gift ever.

Flowers
I know, it’s so traditional, but I also understand that some just have to have them. If that’s the case shoot over to 1-800-Flowers.com and check out not only their flowers, but also their other Valentine’s Day gift ideas.

For serious relationships only
OK, if those first three picks almost put you to sleep, this should wake you up. Bare Necessities has a wide selection of lingerie and sleepwear Valentine’s gift ideas that should please all. For you ladies out there, they even have a selection of gifts for men.

Alright, I’ve done about all I can do for you. Now it’s up to you. Do something about it right now before you’re one of those chumps paying $30 for rush shipping two days prior to Valentine’s Day. Oh, and if you get the old frying pan to the head for forgetting again, especially after reading this, don’t blame me.

Back to serious home improvement business tomorrow.

Patching plaster cracks with joint compound

2007-01-30T21:13:00.000-06:00

The upstairs bathroom remodeling project presents plenty of challenges. The most time-consuming project will be repairing the cracks in the plaster walls. There were plenty of cracks hidden behind the wallpaper, and since we’re going to paint the walls, each and every one of them needs to be fixed... and fixed right. The plaster walls are smooth, and any attempt to cut a corner will be amplified once the final paint is applied to the walls.

Over the next few days I’m going to show you the tools, materials, and techniques I use to repair cracks in plaster walls. There’s plenty to learn from this room, because the cracks appear everywhere: hairline cracks mid-wall; cracks where the ceiling meets the walls; cracks where the walls meet; and on, and on.

Joint compound of choice
When patching cracks in the plaster walls of my old home, I prefer a product that is durable and is going to stand up to the subtle movements and drastic changes in temperate and humidity. That product is Sheetrock-brand Durabond Setting-Type Joint Compound. Use in conjunction with (paper) joint tape or fiberglass mesh tape (depending on the type of joint, I’ll show each in future installments) and you’ll end up with a rock hard repair that’s not going to crack again for the foreseeable future.

I could write my own description of USG’s Sheetrock brand Durabond Setting-Type Joint Compound, but why not just use the word’s from their Web site? They state:

SHEETROCK® Brand DURABOND® Setting-Type Joint Compounds are chemically-setting powder compounds for drywall interiors and exteriors that permit same-day joint finishing and, usually, next-day decoration. They provide a hard, plaster-like surface when dry and are virtually unaffected by humidity. (They are difficult to sand after drying; must be smoothed before complete setting.) Also ideal for heavy fills. They provide low shrinkage and superior bond, which make them excellent for laminating gypsum panels to gypsum panels, to sound-deadening boards, and to above-grade concrete surfaces. In addition, SHEETROCK Brand DURABOND Setting-Type Joint Compounds can be used for filling, smoothing, and finishing interior concrete ceilings and above-grade concrete; for taping and finishing SHEETROCK Brand HUMITEK™ Gypsum Panels; and for taping and finishing SHEETROCK® Brand Water-Resistant Gypsum Panels under tile in bathroom wall areas. Other uses include finishing joints in exterior gypsum ceiling boards and presetting joints of veneer plaster finish systems.

To meet varying job requirements, a full line of SHEETROCK Brand DURABOND Setting-Type Joint Compounds has been developed to provide a choice in setting times. The suffix number identifying each SHEETROCK Brand Joint Compound indicates an approximate setting time. DURABOND 20 sets in about 20-30 minutes; DURABOND 45 in 30-80 minutes; DURABOND 90 in 85-130 minutes; DURABOND 210 in 180-240 minutes; and Durabond 300 in 240-360 minutes.

For me, the benefits of Durabond setting-type joint compound is that it’s easy to mix with water; it resists shrinking; and it resists humidity changes, which is especially important in a bathroom of a Midwestern.

The downside is sanding. Durabond setting-type joint compound is much harder than your traditional drywall joint compound, and thus, it’s harder to sand. You want to apply it in thin, smooth-as-possible coats to make sure you don’t leave yourself with a lot of unnecessary sanding in the end. Why not just use the pre-mixed, easy-to-work-with drywall joint compound? Because it’s not as strong and the chance of cracks re-appearing is much greater. Spend a little more time and effort doing it right the first time, and you’ll hopefully never worry about the cracks again.

When choosing the setting time (Durabond 20, Durabond 45, or Durabond 90 are most common), keep in mind that the higher the number the more challenging the sanding. Therefore, I typically use Durabond 45 for my first layer, and then switch to Durabond 20 for subsequent layers. I like to think this makes the finish sanding easier.

The other downside with using Durabond 20 is the quick setting time. While 20 minutes might seem like a long time, the clock starts ticking when the water first hits the product. After you’ve gotten the hang of mixing the product, the setting time shouldn’t be a problem. But in the beginning you will most likely struggle with getting the right mixture of water and the dry compound. You could easily kill five minutes mixing and then, if you have a long seam to repair, getting the entire mix of joint compound (or “mud”) on before it starts to harden can cause you to rush and make mistakes. Trust me, with the Durabond 20 you can literally see when the final grains of sand are moving through the proverbial hour glass. At that point it’s best to walk away from that batch. If you try to use mud that is starting to harden, you’ll likely end up with a result that will require additional sanding in the end.

One more thing on mixing: The consistency you’re looking for is similar to peanut butter. After some practice you’ll be able to tell if you have too much water in your mix. If there’s a glossy appearance to the mud, there’s probably too much water. If you try to put on mud that’s too watery, you’ll notice right away because you’ll see bubbles in the mud after you drag it into place with your drywall taping knife.

Next time I’ll cover the tools I use to apply the joint compound.

Visit USG.com and search for “durabond setting-type joint compound” for more details (including data/submittal sheets) on the Durabond line of setting-type joint compound.

Gutter ice dams

2007-01-29T17:34:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in my last post, ice dams have formed in all the gutters on the north side of our Cape Cod. Seems the recent snow, thaw, snow, freeze, snow pattern has lead to some trouble for our six-month-old gutters. Those gutters are currently filled to the rim with ice, and from the research I’ve done, there’s little I can do about it. Some tricks, but the focus is primarily on prevention, not what do to once you already have ice dams

One trick I’ve found involves filling an old tube sock (or panty hose) with snow melt pellets (not rock salt) and placing it perpendicular to the gutter to break the ice into manageable chunks. I’m going to give that technique a shot on one of the short, easy to reach sections right above the back door.

More to come.

Shower leak repaired!

2007-01-27T08:55:00.000-06:00

Yesterday was the first day we put the downstairs tile shower stall to use after the old grout was repaired. I happy – and relieved – to report that the shower no longer leaks in the basement!

I thought I could now get back to work on the upstairs bathroom project. However, we’ve had some recent snowfall in the area and I noticed some potential ice dams in the gutters on the north side of our Cape Cod.

Today I’ll get out and investigate the problem areas and see if it needs attention. If not, it’s plaster repair time.

Rotary tool grout removal kit

2007-01-23T12:23:00.000-06:00

So there I am at my local hardware store last night buying another bit for my Dremel rotary tool (actually, for a work project, not the cape cod this time). As I stood and waited for an employee to open the glass case containing all their Dremel attachments and bits, I was perusing the other goodies behind the glass. Turns out, Dremel isn’t the only company that sells an attachment for a high-speed rotary tool. (See my post, Dremel Grout Removal Attachment.)

I also discovered that a company named Milescraft Inc. makes a Grout Removal Combo Kit (item number 1004). I found the same kit offered by my local hardware store at Amazon.com, and barrowed their description of the product:

"The Milescraft Grout Removal Combo kit has two rotary tool attachments to help solve your grout removal needs. The Angle Plunge is a versatile attachment that adjusts in 15 degree increments from 60 to 45 degree. The Corner Grout Remover has an extended nosepiece that allows the bit to get into tight corners. Both tools will easily attach to corded rotary tools."

See the Milescraft 1004 Rotary Tool Grout Removal Attachment Combo Kit at Amazon.com.

Just thought I’d pass this along, as this attachment seems to offer a little more functionality than the attachment offered by Dremel.

Tile floor grout repair

2007-01-22T21:39:00.000-06:00

After letting the wall grout cure for about 24 hours, I went to work on the grout line around the base of the walls. I’m using the same premixed grout (Premixed Ceramic Tile Adhesive and Grout, made by Tile Perfect) that I used for the walls, but in gray instead of white.

There were a couple of tricky parts about adding the grout to the grout line on the floor. Since the grout line is at the base of the wall, it’s a little more difficult to work the grout into the line between the vertical wall tile and the horizontal floor tile. I used the same technique mentioned in yesterday’s Tile wall grout repair, by putting the grout down with a putty knife and then bringing the rubber grout float across the grout line at a 45-degree angle.

The other tricky part was I had to replace the one floor tile that had popped out when I was removing the grout. (See that tile resting on the plastic putty knife in the image above.) The tricky part is that each floor tile is only about 3/4-of-an-inch square, meaning it was impossible to get the new grout down on the floor where the missing tile would be set.

To get around this problem, I used a product that I find comes in very handy for a variety of old home projects: styrene plastic. Styrene is very easy to work with and comes in a variety of dimensional shapes and thicknesses. Any model train hobby shop worth their salt sells styrene from Evergreen Scale Models, including 6-by-12 inch sheets. I keep styrene on hand for situations where you need to make a small, sturdy piece of plastic to get adhesives, putty, grout, etc., into tight spots where putty knives won’t fit. The photo above also shows the small piece of styrene I cut down to use as a miniature putty knife to install the grout. Styrene is easy to cut; all you do is scribe it with a sharp knife then bend it a little until it snaps along the seam.

Once the grout was down in the corner, I set the lone tile into place then carefully filed the grout lines around it. (I only used the grout flout on the grout lines running away from the corner, not over this individual loose tile. It was too easy to shift this lone tile with the grout flout.) If you enlarge the image to the right, you’ll notice that I went up the vertical grout line in the corner a little bit, simply to assure that no more water penetrates that corner (at least that’s my hope).

I’ll let this grout cure for 48 or more before I let the family back at it. Hopefully, this will solve the leak into the basement and I can get back to work on the upstairs bathroom rehab. Frankly, in hindsight I wish I had the time to put the lone loose tile down and let it set overnight before I added the grout around the parameter. However, I’m running out of days until family from out of town visit this old house, and I need to get this project put to bed. Plus, I must get back to work on the upstairs bathroom. Hopefully I’ll be addressing that again soon.

Tile wall grout repair

2007-01-21T14:05:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I used two-part marine epoxy to seal the problem areas under the grout line where the walls meet the floor. With the epoxy cured, I can now apply grout to the areas where I had removed the failing grout, both along the floor and on the walls.

I used white grout for the walls, and gray for the grout line along with floor. I started with the white for the walls, and will let that cure overnight before I add the grout to the floor seams.

The grout I used is a premixed ceramic tile adhesive and grout (made by Tile Perfect) and worked it into place with a gum rubber grout float. First I used a plastic putty knife to take the premixed grout from its container to the grout lines on the walls. (The plastic putty knife won’t scratch the tiles, like a metal putty knife could.) Once a generous amount of grout is along the grout line, I took the rubber grout float and pulled it along the seams at a 45-degree angle (the float itself should also be held at a 45-degree angle to the surface of the tile) to work the grout in between the tiles.

Once the grout is in place, I removed the excess grout with a sponge, being careful to remove all grout from the face of the tiles so a haze isn’t left behind. It’s helpful to have a good-sized bucket of water on hand. The larger the bucket of clean water the better, because you’ll want to wring out the sponge frequently.

If you enlarge the photo to the right, you’ll see the bright white grout in the vertical grout line in the corner. It extends down to the floor, but come up a little short of the floor grout line. I’ll add the gray grout up to meet the white wall grout. You can also see the white marine epoxy along the floor joint, and under the corner below where the missing floor tile (which will be re-installed with the gray floor grout).

Again, I’ll let this grout cure overnight before applying the grout to the floor. There’s only one area were the floor and wall grout meet – the trouble spot in the front corner of the shower – so I want to give the white wall grout time to cure a little before the gray floor grout comes into contact with it.

Overall, the manufacture suggests that the grout cure for 48 to 72 hours before regular (shower) use. Tomorrow, grey floor grout. Then hopefully I can get back to work on the upstairs bathroom.

Tile grout repair preparation

2007-01-20T17:18:00.000-06:00

With the old, failing grout removed from my downstairs shower stall, I can now proceed with what will hopefully be the repair that will stop the leak of water into my basement.

After removing the failing grout, my assumption is the leak is coming from the front corner of the shower stall, where the walls meet the floor. In that area I ended up not only removing the grout that was failing, but also was able to stick a small screwdriver into the corner about an inch-and-a-half. That’s concerning. (I cleaned removed as much as possible, then vacuumed the old debris.)

Since I know grout absorbs water, I didn’t want to just use grout to fix this problem. Therefore, I turner to a product that I’ve used for a couple of other watertight repairs around my old house: two-part marine epoxy.

PLEASE NOTE: This is only a short-term solution (maybe a couple of years) for a much bigger problem. Having done some research around the Internet, I’ve determined the pan under my shower stall is most likely failing and the only long-term fix for that is gutting the shower stall and installing a new shower pan. If you recall, I’m supposed to be working on the remodel of our upstairs bathroom right now. I only started working on these leaks out of necessity, because we had to start using the downstairs bathroom shower after I officially closed the upstairs bathroom during its construction. Thus, with the upstairs bathroom already torn up, I’m not in a position to tackle the proper repair for the downstairs bathroom. Hence this band-aid repair.

My mission here was to use the marine epoxy as a watertight base for the grout. By doing so, I hope to seal any leak that’s going to the basement. Before applying the two-part epoxy, I masked off the tiles in the area so I wouldn’t add to my clean-up headaches after the epoxy is down. If you do get it on any of the tiles, it’s best to let it dry and then carefully scrape it off with a sharp razor blade.

Now to the epoxy itself. I discovered this epoxy at my local Ace Hardware when I was looking for an alternative to caulk for our upstairs shower (where the tile from the shower stall meets the cast-iron tub). The caulk from the previous owner failed shortly after we moved in. I re-caulked; and that failed a few months later. I was officially finished with caulk. I discovered two-part marine epoxy (made by Power Poxy) and have never had another problem with the upstairs shower over tub. Over two-and-a-half years later and it’s still holding firm. (The only minor gripe is that it goes down brilliant white, but ultimately yellows a little.)

Since I wanted absolute control over where this epoxy was applied, I purchased a glue applicator at my local Ace Hardware (item number 254151, as shown in the photo above). After mixing the epoxy, I carefully moved it to the syringe with my stir stick (a popsicle stick).

With the epoxy in my applicator, I was able to carefully move along the grout line in the areas where the repairs were noticeably deep. It was the deeper areas of missing grout that I was concerned with, including the one in the corner. I did not apply this to the entire grout line along the floor, only the deep areas.

In the corner, I inserted the applicator’s tip in as deep as I could and injected epoxy until it started coming back over the tip of the applicator. It’s my hope that, when cured, this marine epoxy will serve as a solid, watertight base for the grout I’m going to install.

The photo above also illustrates how small this shower stall is. Enlarge the image and you’ll see that I’m working on one wall and my back is almost touching the other wall (while kneeling).

The photo to the right shows how the epoxy looked after it was in place. Notice that I kept the epoxy below the level of the floor tile so there would be adequate room for grout. Once the tile that came out is put back in place, I’ll have plenty of room for grout both under the tile, and along its sides.

I’ll let this dry overnight and then install the new grout tomorrow.

Old grout removed

2007-01-20T10:48:00.001-06:00

Thanks to my Dremel rotary tool and their 1/16" Carbide Grout Removal Bit (see at Amazon.com), I now have the failing grout in my downstairs tile shower stall removed and ready for repair.

The photo to the right shows where the grout removal bit had been used – the horizontal line – versus the vertical grout line which was hit with only a putty knife and grout saw. As you can see, the rotary tool bit does a great job of cleaning out the old grout and leaves a clean area that’s ready for new grout (after the dust was vacuumed out).

This photo shows the corner that I believe as the cause of the leak into the basement. This photo was taken before I took the Dremel power rotary tool to it. At the time this photo was taken, I had only used a putty knife to clean the grout line. You can see where the far corner tile popped up out of the floor. This was actually good news because it proved that this area was the trouble spot because the back of the tile was wet. (Enlarge the image and you’ll clearly see that there was obviously a problem around the parameter of the that missing tile.)

Having that one tile out also meant I had a little more room to dig into the back corner to remove old grout. This photo shows the grout lines after I used the grout removal bit to clean out the vertical corner grout, the area along the floor, and to the vertical wall grout to the far right.

After all the failing grout was removed, I vacuumed the area and then started thinking about how I wanted to tackle the grout replacement. More on that next time.

Dremel Grout Removal Attachment

2007-01-18T17:26:00.000-06:00

I’ve got a little update concerning the Dremel attachments I discussed in my post, Another handy Dremel rotary tool attachment.

Naturally, as soon as I got home from the hardware store with the 1/16" Carbide Grout Removal Bit (see at Amazon.com), I put it to use right away (freehand, sans attachments). Turns out, if you read the instructions that come along with the bit, you’ll discover that Dremel also makes an attachment to go along with their grout removal bit. [Insert derogatory “won’t stop for directions” joke here, if you’d like.]

The Dremel Grout Removal Kit (see it at Amazon.com) can be used with the grout removal bit to control the depth of your cut and to keep your bit centered between the tiles. While I haven’t used it, it appears as though the sightline for this attachment would be better than the attachments I mentioned in my post mentioned above. Those two attachments position the tool at a 90-degree angle to the work surface, where this Grout Removal Attachment places the tool at roughly 45-degrees to the work surface. This is a great improvement as you’d easily be able to see the bit as you move down the grout line.

Another handy Dremel rotary tool attachment

2007-01-16T22:07:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned yesterday, I’ve been using my Dremel high-speed rotary tool with their 1/16" Carbide Grout Removal Bit to remove the old grout in my downstairs shower stall. This process takes a steady hand, so if you want added stability, you should consider the Dremel Tile Cutting Kit (item number 566) or Multipurpose Cutting Kit (item number 565). While the bits aren’t the ones you’ll need to remove grout, the attachment for the head is very handy. It screws onto the end of a Dremel rotary tool and let’s you set the depth of the bit you’re using.

While I own this attachment from previous work around my old house (the Multipurpose Cutting Kit, shown above), I didn’t use it when I was removing the old grout in my shower stall. I tried it first without the attachment and everything went well, so I didn’t go back and install it. If I had wanted to control how deeply I went into the old grout or simply wanted more stability that the large base provides, I would have certainly put it into action. Just something to consider if you want more control over this sometime unwieldy tool.

Tomorrow we start to patch the grout that’s been removed!

Shower tile grout removal

2007-01-15T21:10:00.000-06:00

My initial assessment of the grout problem in the downstairs bathroom shower was a little over optimistic. With a halogen task light in the shower stall I was able to see the complete situation. It looks as though there’s a combination of original 1939 grout that is failing, as well as a few repair spots that now failed as well.

The older grout has simply cracked over the course of time, and is now to the point where it’s coming out in chunks anywhere from 1/8- to 3/8-of-an-inch long. That’s the situation in the area in the far front corner of the shower, where I presume the leak to the basement is originating.

To remove the loose grout, I used a few different tools and techniques. First, there’s the grout saw, which is pretty self-explanatory. Simply put the carbide-tipped saw blade in the grout line between the tiles and used it like a regular saw. If the grout line is recessed between the tiles, you’ll be fine. However, if the grout line is close to the face of your tiles, you might want to only pull the saw towards you. If you go in a back and forth motion, the blade might come out of the grout line and mar the face of your tile.

The other tool I used to remove grout was my Dremel rotary tool with their 1/16" Carbide Grout Removal Bit (item number 569). Click the image to the right to see a larger version.

You need to be careful when using a power rotary tool around delicate surfaces like tile. Be certain to hold the rotary tool with both hands and work slowly. If at all possible, steady your hand(s) against the wall or floor. If you’re not careful, you could easily move from the grout line into the edge of your tile or, worse yet, jump out of the grout line and harm the face of your tile.

The last tool I used to remove the cracked grout was a stiff putty knife. It comes in handy because it’s narrow, yet its stiff blade can be used with a considerable amount of force.

The putty knife was also used to remove the grout repairs that have taken place before my time in this house. Those old repairs, which are now failing, come in two varieties. The first type isn’t a big surprise: caulk. Caulk is the easiest way to repair missing tile grout, but it is not a long-term solution. It will fail, I can promise you that.

The second old repair looks like some type of adhesive-based patch, possibly epoxy. It was pretty easy to remove with the putty knife.

While removing old grout in the far front corner with the rotary tool, one of the small floor tiles popped out. In hindsight, I’m happy it did, because the bottom of the tile was damp, strengthening my suspicions that the leak into the basement is coming from that corner.

With all the loose grout removed, I now need to determine what path I’m going to take to fix the problem areas. Since some are on the walls and others are along the base of the wall and floor, I might need a couple of different solutions. More to come soon.

Old home blues: shower leak is back

2007-01-14T10:01:00.000-06:00

One step forward, two old home leaps backwards.

Just when I thought I could focus all of my attention on the upstairs bathroom again – the project that I’m actually supposed to be working on – another leak appeared under the downstairs shower.

The situation is the same as before: I was in the basement using the utility tub when I glanced over and noticed water on the floor under the shower location. I guess the hot water faucet repair wasn’t the only situation I’m dealing with in that shower.

Upon discovering the new leak, I went into the shower stall with a flashlight to look around. With the better light in hand, it was easy to spot trouble spots that the shower light itself wasn’t illuminating. Most notably, there is grout missing where the tile on the shower wall and the tile on the shower floor meet. (With the better light – either a flash light or camera flash – you can also see shower scum and the overall nastiness of that grout area that isn’t visible to the naked eye with just the shower light. Pretty gross; I can’t believe I’m actually sharing this with the world.)

Since the crumbling grout is in the far front corner of the shower, I presume that water doesn’t always get to that location during each and every shower. If this is indeed the cause of the latest leak into the basement, this would explain why there isn’t water dripping into the basement after each and every shower. Looks like a trip to the local hardware store, and possibly the local tile store.

Of all the time I’ve devoted to the upstairs bathroom remodel, I’d be willing to guess that 30% of it has gone to addressing issues that have popped up in the downstairs bathroom. While I know these problems need to be addressed (especially since some family members are coming in from out of town next weekend), it’s frustrating that all of my time can’t be going to the primary project; the upstairs bathroom.

Old homes; you love them for how they look, but cuss them for what they do to you.

Crazed ceiling paint

2007-01-13T13:55:00.000-06:00

Now that I’m thoroughly entrenched back in the upstairs bathroom remodeling project, I’ve noticed another issue that’s going to need to be resolved: crazed paint on the ceiling.

As I mentioned in my December 27, 2006 post, Upstairs bathroom: primer, the bathroom fan in our upstairs bathroom hasn’t been used faithfully by all family members over the past three or so years. Frankly, even if the entire family used the fan dutifully, I’m not sure the $19.99 Home Depot-special bathroom fan would be powerful enough to get all the steam out of the bathroom during hot showers.

The result can be seen to the right. If you click on the image you’ll see the ceiling paint within the shower nook. The ceiling within the shower nook is only 6-feet, 8-inches high, while the primary portion of the bathroom is 7-feet, 8-inches high. The bathroom fan is located outside of the shower nook, on the higher ceiling. With a cheap bathroom fan that didn’t draw enough air out of the shower area, the steam stayed in the room and started “crazing” the paint. (You can see the blueprints of the bathroom, including the shower nook, in the “Upstairs bathroom: primer” post shown above.)

This next photo shows an area of the ceiling outside of the shower nook. If you enlarge the image you’ll notice that I tried a quick test repair. I first took a putty knife to remove the loose paint, and then used sandpaper to see if I could get the area smooth. As you’ll notice in the photo, not all paint comes off, so if it’s painted it won’t look good.

At this point I’m note sure how I’m going to tackle this problem. My initial assumption is that I’m going to need to remove all the old paint off those areas and take it down to the plaster. If I don’t, the areas that would be sanded would be recessed, while areas that were in fine shape and not sanded would be at a different thickness. In other words, you’d be able to tell where I had sanded. I would use spackling, but I’m not certain that’s the right solution... my gut says no.

Do I sand the entire ceiling areas down to the plaster? (Those areas would include the shower nook and lower ceiling marked “arched lower ceiling” on the blueprints, which isn’t arched, simply flat.) If so, do I just drop the hammer with my random orbit sander? Or, is there a paint stripper that will quickly remove the paint but not harm the plaster? Off to the Internet to do some research on this problem.

Oh, the joys of an old home. I know there’s great plaster under that old paint, but how do I get to it? If you know, please click the comment button below and share!

Back to the upstairs bathroom

2007-01-12T19:27:00.000-06:00

With the shower faucet leak fixed in the downstairs bathroom, I can once again focus my attention on the upstairs bathroom remodeling project.

I've been prepping the various cracks in the plaster ceiling and walls for repair. If you've never repaired plaster cracks, it's a little different than repairing drywall, as the joint compound that is used is a little more significant. You can't use premixed joint compound (that comes in a five-gallon bucket) for fear that it's not strong enough for cracks caused by the home settling. (At least that's my take on it... I'm sure others would tell you that using premixed joint compound in conjunction with drywall tape or fiberglass mesh is good enough, but it's not what I learned from my father-in-law... a stickler for doing things right the first time.)

I'll share more on my plaster repair in the next few days.

Compression faucet repair

2007-01-10T21:39:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned last time, I’m going to show you step-by-step the process of fixing the compression faucet in the shower of my downstairs bathroom. If everything is in good order, this type of home maintenance project isn’t too bad. For me, the job was made more difficult by the fact that the valve assembly hex nut had been rounded off, so I had to use something other than a socket wrench to get the assembly out of the wall.

Before you get started with this project, turn the water off to the faucet being repaired. If you’re lucky, there’s a shut off valve for the faucet being repaired. If you’re me (read: not lucky), you have to shut off the water to the entire house... a real crowd pleaser.

With the water off, we’re ready to get started.

Step 1: Remove the screw cover on the face of the faucet handle. If you enlarge the image to the right, you’ll notice there’s tread around the edge of this round cover. If you’re lucky, you can gently use a pair of pliers to remove the screw cover. Be careful not to mar the cover by digging the teeth of the pliers into the cover’s edge. If the cover doesn’t easily screw off, try applying some CLR or Lime Away to break up any calcium or lime deposits caused by your water. Do not apply more pressure with the pliers and use more force, you’ll only be sorry with the result. Be patient if you need to wait for the CLR to loosen the cover.

Step 2: With the cover off, remove the screw that holds the handle in place.

Step 3: Remove the shower faucet handle. I used the soft handle of my adjustable wrench (shown in step four’s photo) to gently bang on the back edges of the handle to remove it. Since you have limited room between the shower wall and the back of the handle, hitting the back of the handle too hard shouldn’t be a concern. Just be ready to catch the handle if it comes off all the way with one of the blows with your wrench. If the handle doesn’t want to come off, you might need to apply some CLR and let it loosen any calcium/lime deposits for a little while.

Step 4: With the handle removed, use an adjustable wrench to remove the nut that holds the primary valve assembly cover in place.

Step 5: Remove the nut and cover to expose the compression faucet’s valve steam assembly.

The photo to the right shows the calcium/lime deposits around the valve stem. You can also see the rounded-over hex nut on the back end of the valve assembly. That’s assuming you can see though all the crud. Just look for the bright brass areas. I’m sort of embarrassed to show a photo like this, but I thought I’d keep the valve as I found it so you can see what you might encounter. Cleaning up the valve assembly – or the wall for that matter – wouldn’t give you the full extent of what’s involved here.

Step 6: If the hex nut on the back end of your valve assembly is the good shape, you can use a shower valve socket wrench to loosen the valve assembly. I got the shower valve socket wrench at Ace Hardware, and it fits both 1-1/32” and 1-3/32” hex nuts, depending on which end you use. A screwdriver through the opposite end of the socket serves as a handle. Why not just use an adjustable wrench to loosen the valve assembly’s hex nut? It all depends on how far the assembly is recessed into the shower wall. My upstairs shower’s valve assembly is recessed into the wall about a quarter of an inch, completely eliminating the opportunity to use an adjustable wrench. Even if your valve assembly is sticking out enough from the wall, I’d recommend using the shower valve socket wrench so you don’t risk scratching the shower walls with your adjustable wrench.

Step 7: Warning: this step is only recommending in dire situations where the assembly can’t be removed by a socket wrench. Since my valve assembly hex nut was rounded over, I was forced to use a set of Channel Lock adjustable pliers to remove the assembly. I don’t recommend this tool on anything you want to keep pristine, because the teeth of this tool do a great job of digging in for great traction (especially in the soft brass of a valve assembly).

Step 8: Remove the compression faucet valve stem assembly from the wall. The photo to the right is how mine looked right after I removed it.

I know the leak from my compression faucet is coming from the area where the valve stem assembly meets the pipe in the wall (due to a worn out gasket), I’m going to make the extra effort to replace all the washers within the assembly since I have it out of the wall.

Step 9: Remove the screw on the very end of the valve stem assembly and remove the rubber compression washer. As you can see in the photo, this compression washer definitely needs to be replaced. If this washer started leaking water, the result would be a dripping showerhead, as the water would get around this washer and head up to the showerhead.

Step 10: With the compression washer removed, check to make sure the end of the valve stem assembly is in good shape. Mine was a little out of round, but the lip is easily bent back into place.

Step 11: At this point you’ll probably have to go to your local hardware store to pick up a new washer (I got mine at my local Ace Hardware). My piece of advice: these washers are cheap so buy a lot of them so you can save a trip to the hardware store on future faucet repairs.

Step 12: Install your new washer on the end of the valve stem assembly and reinsert the screw.

Step 13: On the opposite end of the valve assembly, remove the first nut (shown to the right). You’ll probably have to use one wrench on the large hex nut and another wrench to remove the smaller nut. This would be a great time to pinch some skin between the wrenches. Try to avoid that.

Step 14: With the smaller nut removed, you can pull the valve stem out the other end. Twisting it back and forth along with way will help. Take a flashlight and look in the end you just removed the stem from. There’s an O-ring within the assembly housing that needs to be replaced. I used a flat-bladed screwdriver to carefully dig out the old O-ring.

Step 15: When you’re at the hardware store, also buy a stash of O-rings for the valve stem. Mine are of the fabric variety, and fit around the valve stem very snuggly. With the O-ring on the stem, work it up into the assembly housing.

Step 16: I added plumber’s grease around the threads on the end of the valve stem. Once the assembly is back in the wall and joined with the head that’s tucked inside the pipe in the wall (see the photo below), this grease will ease the turning of the handle.

This shot shows the way the valve stem adjoins with the head inside the wall. When the faucet is turned off, the compression washer on the very end of the valve stem assembly presses up against the very end of the head, cutting off the flow of water. When you turn the faucet on, the water starts flowing around the compression washer.

Step 17: As I mentioned earlier, the area that’s leaking with my shower’s compression faucet was where the valve stem assembly meets the pipe coming from the wall. If you enlarge the photo to the right, you can see the gasket for packing the valve against the wall pipe was clearly warn. Remove all of the old packing material from around the rim.

Step 18: I used modern TFE String (a stranded, 3/32” thick material made of Teflon), cut to length to fit perfectly around the valve stem’s rim.

Step 19: Put the valve stem assembly back into the wall. If you enlarge the photo to the right you’ll see the gasket made from the TFE String. Compare that to the photo in step five and you can clearly see why this faucet used to leak.

Step 20: Replace the shower faucet handle parts shown to the right, and you’re done. Turn the water back on and cross your fingers! For me, the leak was gone and I was back in business.

There’s nothing like the satisfaction of tackling a home project that was once foreign to you and solving the problem... without resorting to the yellow pages! Now, back to reality that is the torn up bathroom upstairs. So much for a victory parade.

No more shower faucet leaks!

2007-01-08T17:14:00.000-06:00

Great news! The leak in the downstairs bathroom has officially been fixed.

I went down to the basement first thing this morning to make sure all of the boards around the drain pan were dry before the troops hit the shower this morning. (See photos of the leaking shower from the basement.) Everything was dry, so the true test was upon us: was it indeed the hot water faucet in the shower causing the leak?

As I mentioned in yesterday’s Shower faucet leak: nothing’s easy post, I’ve fixed the leak in the hot water compression faucet. With that fixed, I wanted to confirm it was the water from that faucet going into the wall, then down to the basement. If it wasn’t, it meant the shower tiles were not watertight. That, my friends, would be really bad.

I’m happy to report that after all showers were complete, I went back down to the basement and there were no signs of water. That’s one headache solved. Now I can get back to work on the upstairs bathroom, which is why we’re using the downstairs shower in the first place!

Tomorrow I’ll try to post the step by step process of fixing a leak in a compression faucet. Until then, may your water flow where you intend it to.

Shower faucet leak: nothing’s easy

2007-01-07T19:38:00.000-06:00

As I’ve mentioned, the downstairs bathroom shower has been leaking into the basement. With the upstairs bathroom out of commission because of the remodeling, the downstairs shower is our primary shower so I need to get the leak fixed immediately.

The water dripping into the basement appeared to be coming from the hot water faucet of the downstairs shower. As most home improvement projects go around here, the shower faucet repair didn’t come easy. I’ve had experience rebuilding this type of shower faucet because the upstairs shower faucets were leaking last year. Since I’ve rebuilt these faucets before, this should have been a quick fix. However, I couldn’t get the compression faucet assembly out of the wall because someone before to me had rounded over the corners of the nut on the compression faucet. If the nut were in good shape, the shower faucet socket wrench shown to the right would easily remove the compression faucet assembly. With the nut rounded off, I couldn’t get the socket or wrench to grab.

This problem meant I had to make a trip to the hardware store to buy a set of Channel Lock adjustable pliers to remove the compression faucet assembly. Using an aggressive set of pliers like that on a brass faucet assembly is a big no-no because the teeth of the pliers dig in to the soft brass of the faucet assembly. However, I had little choice since someone else had already rendered the assembly nut useless to socket wrenches. Regardless of how hard I tried, every tool I tried to grip the nut with would slip off because of the rounded corners.

The good news is that I overcame this obstacle and now have the shower repaired. Next time I’ll go step-by-step through the process of fixing the shower’s compression faucet.

Roofer came, now the shower faucet leak

2007-01-05T12:33:00.000-06:00

The roofer came yesterday to check out the leak that was occurring around our chimney up in the attic. As I’ve mentioned before, we had our house re-roofed in the spring of 2006. Prior to the new roof, there were signs of previous leaks, but we thought we had addressed those by having the chimney tuck-pointed and a new concrete crown put on (also in the spring of 2006).

Before I go any farther, I was to reassert my feelings toward the company that put our roof on. I was very impressed with the company in every aspect. From the sales guy, to the crew chief, to all the guys on the crew, I think they did a great job from top to bottom. The crew chief deserves extra accolades. He actually came out one other time since the new roof was completed to see if he could determine where the leak in our dinning room ceiling was coming from. This was above and beyond the call of duty, since we hired them to put a new roof on the primary portion of the house, not the flat roof above the dinning room (which was fixed two years ago by a different company).

My respect for that crew chief – Paul – only grew after he came yesterday. He got up on the roof and checked the flashing around the chimney. He said everything looked fine and surmised that the stone chimney was absorbing water, then leaking. Sounds a little far fetched to me, but he had a great point: the two times it leaked recently was after we had experienced a couple days of steady, driving rain. Well, he’s the pro, not me, so I’ll believe him until I have a reason not to.

This is when the respect level grew: Paul went out and obtained sealer for the stone chimney and sprayed it to our chimney. Was this Paul’s responsibility? Hardly. And while I’m not 100% confident that the stones are the problem or that the sealer is the long term solution, I do have to respect Paul for going above and beyond to keep a customer – a past customer at that – happy. Kudos to Paul.

Tomorrow’s project: fix the leaky shower faucet in the downstairs bathroom and try to make more progress in the upstairs bathroom.

New leak: shower faucet

2007-01-04T12:26:00.000-06:00

Another day, another leak.

Since our upstairs bathroom is under repair and unavailable for showering, we’ve been using the shower in our downstairs bathroom. As the blueprint to the right proves, it’s a little less spacious than the upstairs shower (see the blueprint of the upstairs bathroom). The size of the downstairs shower isn’t the problem. The problem would be the water dripping from the bottom of the shower’s drain into the basement.

The image to the right shows the bottom of the shower drain from the basement. By the looks of the drain bottom, it appears as though this isn’t the first lead this shower has experienced.

At first I thought the drain itself was leaking. But after some initial exploration, I think the source of water is actually the hot water faucet in the shower. I think it’s leaking, coming down the inside of the wall, and then escaping near the bottom of the drain.

Well, I guess I know what I’ll be doing this weekend! Look for more on this in the next few days.

In happier news, the roofer actually came today to examine the leak around the chimney (read Roofer on the way?). He actually called first thing in the morning and left a message that he’d be stopping by. When I came home for lunch his ladder was up against the back of the house, so he’d definitely been here. I told you I liked this company, so I hope this all gets resolved in a positive manner soon. More on that progress later.

Roofer on the way?

2007-01-02T21:03:00.000-06:00

As you might recall, on December 22, 2006, our roof was leaking around the chimney (read my Getty started post). That same day I called the company that installed the new roof last spring and my contact said he’d be out after the rain stopped. The rain stopped days ago, but it wasn’t until today, January 2, that he called and promised (again) that he’d be to our house this Thursday, January 4.

So, here’s the tally thus far for those keeping score:

Two phone calls on our part; one after we first noticed the leak in late November and another on December 22

One call from him today after his hiatus

Three promises from him to come and take a look at the problem

Due to the lingering holiday spirit, I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt. If he doesn’t show up on Thursday, I’ll have to see if I want to use this platform to drag him through the mud. I certainly hope it doesn’t come to that, because (A) I’m not that kind of person and (B) I was really impressed with their roofing company up to this point.

With that being said, the leaks around the chimney on a brand new roof are a little disheartening. When that job was complete, I thought we would be safe from worrying about that roof for a couple of decades. In reality, we’re frustrated eight short months later, especially since there wasn’t a leak around the chimney leading into the project.

More to come, I’m certain.

Patching wall imperfections with spackling

2007-01-01T19:09:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in my Upstairs bathroom: removing the wallpaper post, I inadvertently took small divots out of the plaster wall with the blade of my putty knife when I was removing the wallpaper. The repair for this little mishap is rather easy: spackling

Spackling is great for use on either drywall or plaster walls and I’ve used it many times to patch wall imperfections. Whether it’s a small depression left by an old picture hook location, or just a dent accidentally made in the wall, spackling is a quick, easy way to fix the problem. Granted, this assumes you’re working on walls that will ultimately be smooth – that is, non-textured – and repainted. If you put a divot into a wall that’s painted blue, you’re still going to end up with a patched area that’s white that needs to be sanded and repainted. Not out of the realm of possibility, it just takes a little more care to blend the patch job with the rest of the wall when you’re done. Thankfully, that’s not my dilemma here.

The spackling I prefer is DAP’s DryDex Spackling, which goes on pink and dries white. Once it’s white, you know it’s dry enough to sand. The primary limitation of spackling is that you can only patch shallow holes. Supposedly, deep repairs can be fixed with multiple layers. I tried it once and ended up with cracks in the spackling. I think it can be done; you’d just have to build up thin layers. If memory serves me, I wasn’t that patient, and thus, I failed.

Before I go any farther, I’d be remise if I didn’t tell you that spackling is not a long-term solution for fixing cracks in walls caused by a home’s natural settling. If you’re selling your house next week and need a quick fix, knock yourself out. But if you’re sticking around for a while and don’t ever want to see that crack again, spackling most likely won’t fix your problem. You see, as your house moves from season to season, it literally moves from season to season. Humidity can cause your house to move in unexpected manners. If you use spackling, those subtle movements will undoubtedly cause cracks sooner or later. To fix those types of cracks, you’ll need more serious repair techniques involving reinforced joint compound, which I’ll be covering in the next few days.

Back to my project at hand. Since I’m dealing with shallow divots created by my putting knife, this DryDex Spackling will work well. Most of the trouble spots I’m fixing are no deeper than a 1/16th of an inch deep. See the photo to the right.

I recently changed my technique for applying spackling after a few prior repair jobs left too much spackling on the patched area.

To start, I spread a generous coat of spackling across the area surrounding the blemish with a plastic putty knife. I like plastic putty knives for this application because they’re flexible and make it easy to press the spackling into place.

Right after the spackling is down, I take a rigid 4" drywalling joint knife and drag it across the entire repair area. Move from one side to the other and make one pass, if at all possible, with the blade held at a 45-degree angle. The rigid blade – which does not flex – will remove the majority of the excess spackling from the area and will greatly reduce the amount of sanding needed later.

One particular repair job from the past that haunts me is in our downstairs bathroom. There’s a spackling repair job right above the toilet that really stands out (to me, anyway) on the mocha-colored wall. Every time I’m standing there doing my business, I see the repair area as a small bump gently rising up from the rest of the wall. Even though the area is smaller than a U.S. quarter, the nearby lights above the sink cast light across the repair just right and accentuate the problem. In hindsight, I can tell I put on too much spackling then didn’t sand it down enough. To my defense, it’s hard to see how smooth you have a spackling repair until it’s too late. After all, I was sanding the white spackling that had been put onto a white plaster wall.

Once the spackling in the repaired area has dried, use 220 grit sandpaper or higher and sand the area smooth. Since most of the excess spackling was removed at the time of application, not much sanding is needed, so don’t be too aggressive.

I can’t believe I just used so many words to describe such an easy task. Trust me; it’s easy like Sunday morning.

As I mentioned above, I’ll be showing you how I repair the structural cracks in my upstairs bathroom’s plaster walls in the next few days. Trust me, there are plenty of cracks to fix, and it seems each is unique. Should be plenty of fun ahead of me!

Upstairs bathroom: removing the wallpaper

2006-12-29T19:53:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, rehabbing the upstairs bathroom is the latest project we’re working on. Since I’ve already started, I’m going to take this opportunity to catch you up on what’s been done so far.

As luck would have it, when we purchased our home the only room that had wallpaper was the upstairs bathroom. While every single room in our home needed some level of repair and/or updating, only one room needed to have wallpaper removed.

What a project. The blessing in disguise was the fact that our walls are plaster. That meant I could be a little more aggressive with a sharp putty knife while removing the wallpaper. The bathroom is only 5 feet by 11 feet, so it’s not a large a room. (See my post Upstairs bathroom: primer for dimensions and a photo of the blueprints.) Plus, the bathroom’s walls have tile on the bottom half, so the total amount of wallpaper to remove isn’t too great (in terms of square footage). With all that said, it was still a headache.

The wallpaper could best be described as foil-based (or foil-faced). That meant that solvents designed to loosen wallpaper wouldn’t penetrate the foil. The photo to the right shows the results of simply using the solvent. It just didn’t work.

Removing the paper turned into a three step project. First, get as much of the paper – both the foil face and paper backing – off with the putty knife. That left behind remnants of the paper backing over much of the walls. The photo to the right shows the backing paper left behind before I had my technique down.

This photo shows how much of the foil and backing paper I got off with the putty knife once I had my technique down. One sharp putty knife and a lot of steady, downward pressure. (I’ll discuss the aftermath of this technique, and the resulting addition to my to-do list, below.)

The second step was removing the paper backing that was left behind. I used a mixture of 60 percent vinegar, 40 percent water, sprayed onto the walls with a spray bottle. After letting that mixture soak in for a five or so minutes, I’d hit it one more time with the solution and then use the sharp putty knife to easily remove the paper.

The final step was to go back with the same vinegar/water solution one more time. I sprayed small areas of the wall then used a damp sponge in a circular motion to remove whatever wallpaper paste was left on the wall. I had a bucket of clean water nearby to clean the sponge frequently. This took a lot of elbow grease and some areas took a second pass to get all the paste off.

Those plaster walls are dreadful when you need to cut a hole in them and you’ll hear more about that when I install new light fixtures above the sink. Plaster is like having concrete on your walls. But with the wallpaper removed, you can truly appreciate those virgin plaster walls (virgin meaning they’ve never had paint on them, unlike our other plaster walls throughout the house). Extremely smooth and very durable. The only problem: cracks.

Before I launch into repairing the various cracks in those plaster walls, I’m going to show you how I repaired the divots I made in the plaster with the sharp putty knife while removing the wallpaper. It’s a delicate balance removing wallpaper. You want to use enough pressure on the putty knife to keep the edge under the paper so you can remove as much as possible with each pass. However, that same pressure often works against you when the edge of the putty knife digs into the wall. I’ll show you images of the damage left behind, and how to repair it in my next installment.

Front elevation

2006-12-28T08:55:00.000-06:00

Front elevation? I thought you we supposed to be working on your bathroom!

I know, I know... I just thought that since I’m sharing the experience of rehabbing my home, you should at least know what the outside of it looks likes. I’m not procrastinating; really, I’m not!

Here’s the front elevation blueprint...

Here’s a photo from September 7, 2002, shortly before we closed...

And here’s a photo from yesterday, December 27, 2006...

The most notable changes thus far:

You can see the cool front path! Notice in photo one they weren’t visible. That took an afternoon of scrapping the overgrown grass from the top of the stones to reveal the path. Neighbors thought I installed the path and simply marveled at the fact that those stones were there all along.

We took down the tree to the right of the front bay window and upstairs dormer.
Remove all the overgrown landscaping in front of the bay window and added more manageable plants.

Mother Nature took down the pine tree off the right corner of the garage. Made us sick to our stomachs then; makes me sick now. It hurts to lose a great tree.

The vines on the right side of the house still exist; they’ve simply dropped their leaves for this season. They’re attractive in the summer, but you MUST stay on top of pruning them or they’ll take over the entire side of the house.

New roof. No, we didn’t replace the cedar shingle roof with a new cedar shingle roof. But as you’ll note in the photo to the right that was taken during construction of the new roof in the spring of 2006, the new composite roof closely resembles the traditional cedar roof. The decision to use composite over natural wasn’t solely based on cost. Since we had to re-deck the entire roof, the cost of the composite roof was only a couple of thousand less then the cedar roof. The biggest deciding factor was long-term maintenance. Since a cedar roof is supposed to be cleaned and treated every five years, we were swayed to sell our traditional souls to the more maintenance-free composite roof.

Lesson learned: If you have pine trees that start showing big areas of dead needles, and if those needles have little black dots on them, call an arborist, stat!

Upstairs bathroom: primer

2006-12-27T11:30:00.000-06:00

Before I dive head first into the myriad of tasks I need to complete to give our upstairs bathroom a facelift, I’d like to give you an idea of the space we’re working with.

Room size:

5 feet wide (not including deep closet or the shower and toilet nooks) by 11 feet long.

Pre-construction photos:

First, here is a photo of the upstairs bathroom on the original blueprints (north is up)...

Next, here’s the detail of the shower and toilet nooks on the west wall...

Here’s the east wall on the day we moved in...

And here’s the west wall on the day we moved in...

Isn't that wallpaper the tops? I can't believe we're taking it down!

Details:

Nothing has changed between the time we moved in and now. I simply say “on the day we moved in” above because the changes to the room have been minor and nothing we’ve deliberately done; assuming you consider cracks in the plaster as a minor change. The cracks have slowly appeared along the wall and ceiling joints within the shower nook as well as along the plaster seems on the ceiling. (They used narrow, 16-inch-wide, sheets of plaster board on the ceiling of the bathroom. At every joint you can now see a crack, side-to-side down the bathroom ceiling. More on the repair of those cracks later.)

There are also larger, more concerning cracks at certain intersections of walls, and walls to the ceiling. I’m certain these cracks – which were found behind the wallpaper – had been there for years. The cracks along the ceiling were – in my opinion – the direct result of a certain beloved family member refusing to use the shower fan while in the shower, thus creating a tropical environment in that small room during hot showers.

Let me digress for a moment. Shortly after we moved in, a shower fan was added to the room and wired with the light in the shower. The thinking at the time was that if you were going to shower, you’d have to have the shower light on. And if the shower light were to be on, so too would the newly-installed bathroom fan. It was perfect, exit one small detail: I guess some people can do without significant light while showering.

And the excuse from the violating family member: “the fan is too loud.” Now, who purchased said loud fan? That same family member, who essentially purchased the cheapest fan possible. I totally agree, it is extremely loud, but it also serves a very important purpose.

Lesson learned: you get what you pay for. Buy a cheap bathroom fan and it’s going to sound like a jet taking off. I’ll be resolving this problem with a new fan later.

1939 Blueprints

2006-12-25T13:37:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I took the time to photograph the blueprints of my Cape Cod home. Yes, despite the fact that the house is almost 70 years old, we have a copy of the original blueprints. Hopefully the images will help illustrate each room's dimensions as I'm working on it.

Speaking of working, I'm taking the week off between Christmas and New Years to work on our upstairs bathroom. More to come on that!

Have a safe and merry Christmas!

Getting started

2006-12-22T11:02:00.000-06:00

Welcome to the Old Home Blog. I'm going to take you along with me as I continue to restore, maintain, and cherish, my 1939 Cape Cod home. It's full of charm; and challenges. For example, it's raining today, three days before Christmas, and there are two different leaks coming into the house. One in the attic and one in the dining room.

The attic leak is around the chimney and is a complete mystery. The chimney was tuck-pointed in spring and a new roof was put on in late spring. The roofer is supposedly coming back after the rain stops to take a look at it. He said that about three weeks ago too.

The leak in the dining room has been there since the day we moved in. We re-sealed the flat "sunning porch" that's directly above that leak to the tune of about $2,000. Didn't solve the problem. So persistent was that leak that I ended up cutting out a portion of the dinning room ceiling to see exactly where it was coming from. Better to cut it myself than come home from work to see the entire ceiling on my dinning room table. The image to the right shows the leak prior to cutting into the plaster ceiling. Still haven't determined where that leak is coming from. I'm certain you'll be hearing more about my battles with that leak in the future.

So here's my first piece of advice for you: if you ever consider buying a house with a flat roof, turn and run. Either that or (A) be prepared to coupe with leaks or (B) be prepared to reconstruct the roof so it's no longer flat. If money were no object, that's what we'd do. Have a contractor come in and extend the roof line from the front of the house to the back, covering this retched sunning porch. Sunny porch... it's on the north east corner of the house! The sun almost never hits it! Just another thing to make me shake my head.

Before I dig too deeplying into the projects I'm currently working on, maybe I'll take you through the projects I've already tackled. Look for those soon!

Happy holidays!