Home Improvement II

[BrianR]

Since I cannot find the original anymore, I'm restarting my home improvement thread here. This is basically a thread devoted to the documentation and criticism of my attempts to improve my quarters.

The History:

The back room was the worst of the rooms in the house. It was overrun with mold and shoddy workmanship as well as substandard building materials. There was, as in the rest of the house, a severe lack of electrical outlets, the cable TV and telephone wires were run through holes drilled through the floor, the drywall joints were done with MASKING TAPE and spackling. The electrical wires were cotton-jacketed, aluminum, two-wire cables. You remember, the kind that were outlawed because of their distressing tendancy to burst into flame, smother you with toxic smoke before reducing your home to ashes.

I have set out to right these (and other) wrongs. There are no pictures of the "Before" due to a lack of a digital camera. Therefore I shall commence the narrative from the point of "Demolition Complete".

Demolition Begins:

I began by removing the old pressed paper floor covering. It just was sitting on the floor and came up easily. Into lots of little pieces. Lots and lots of them. I burned them in the backyard because of their weight and the fact that I have lazy trashmen. Note to self: backyard firepit explodes when hot.

Next came the removal of many screws and nails in the walls and floor (?) as well as strangely-shaped shelves and such. Then down came the walls. This exposed the interior of the walls for inspection. First thing I noted was that there was NO INSULATION in the walls. This explains the chilly temperatures in winter as well as the 125-150 gallon/month fuel oil bill. Someone got ripped off back a few years. I also noted that the outside walls were not plywood or OSB as is customary but rather were made of long planks of B grade spruce and/or pine. There were up to 1/2" gaps between the planks covered only with builders felt (tar paper) under the siding. The window had been insulated only with newpaper dated March 12-14, 1943. Unfortunately, none of it was readable as it had been torn into strips first before being stuffed into the cracks. I discovered a button and a kind of wartime baseball card depicting a hand-drawn tank. Value: $0.01. For the metal button. The card had no value, not even to collectors.

After disposing of the walls, I attacked the ceiling. This entailed sawing along the joists and removing long, narrow strips of drywall. And up to six inches of blown cellulose insulation above. I was showered with the stuff and the dust floated throughout my house despite my having hung plastic and wool blankets up to seal off the room. I laid down a plastic tarp to catch the insulation for easier cleanup (read: dump in the woods out back). After the first strip, I added goggles and breathing mask to the list of things to wear the next time.

Eventually, I got all the insulation and drywall down and cleaned out. I tore out the wiring and replaced the outlets with modern three-prong grounded outlets. PLenty of them as I intend for this room to become a computer room holding at least three networked computers plus peripherals.

Then I removed the old doors and opened the cutout so that I could go through without stooping way down to avoid banging my head. The decision was to replace two of the three doors with sliding pocket doors (the kind that slide into the wall, out of sight). This necessitated my removing a few studs as well as reshaping the doorways. When I came to do the basement door, I noted that it was barely 24 inches wide. Far too narrow for me so I was forced to relocate a wall a few inches to accomodate the new doorframe. This will be a standard 32 inch door. Here is a picture of the new, relocated wall.