Jack in Trumann, AR 30 entries to date 12 forum posts to date
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 5/2/2008 4:17:00 PM
Well, Hydro-Temp got my geothermal heat pump turned on today. Of course, we’ll have to get moved in to really see how well it works but my first impression is that it puts out cold air like it is supposed to this time of year in Arkansas and it is extremely quiet. In fact, I was about 10 feet away from the air handler when the technician turned it on and said, “Okay, it’s blowing cold air.” I said, “It’s running now?” To which he replied, “Yep!” It is so very quiet! I couldn’t even hear it! Inside, you certainly can’t hear it. If you hear anything it is the air coming out of the register holes but I didn’t hear much there either and I was trying to. It was running on stage two of three and the tech said that we might hear it a little when it kicks up to stage three. I’ll let you know how it turns out but so far so good. By the way, the guys at Hydro-Temp are really good on customer service; I’m very impressed with their professionalism.
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 5/2/2008 4:05:23 PM
I've been meaning to update my posts about the Wagner sprayer I bought. I did have some trouble with it. It worked great for about 30 gallons of paint/primer, maybe a little more, but then the inlet valve broke. It should be easy to repair but it caught me at a time when I couldn't wait for repair parts so I ended up buying another sprayer instead. Before doing so, I searched online about the inlet valve problem and I found a lot of complaints about the Wagner sprayers and this issue. The valve isn’t covered under warranty and it seems to be designed to fail; at least the one I pulled out of mine is. It is made of a combination of high quality, tooled steel and very flimsy cheap plastic; guess which part broke.
My plan is to fix the Wagner and try to sell it, depending on what they are going for used, but I think I like the replacement model I bought better. It's a Graco Magnum XR5. I’ve already put as much paint/primer through it as I did the Wagner and so far it shows no sign of stopping. I’ve still got about 20 gallons of material to spray inside and then another 30 or 40 to spray in the garage, half primer and half paint basically.
There are pros and cons to both models. I like the hopper on the Wagner because it can use all the material since the inlet valve is gravity fed from above. The Graco uses a siphon hose which is more common to professional sprayers. That system works well too but because of the design of the filter at the end of the hose, it can’t really suck up all of the material; it always leaves some in the bottom the bucket. As it turns out, that isn’t really an issue on a large job such as painting a house unless you figure your paint supply down to the ounce; something that is probably only going to happen by accident. I did have one room where I used every bit of the paint and had to have my wife turn the bucket up on edge so I could get as much as possible out of the bucket. It wasn’t that I figured it that way, I just ran out of paint or barely had enough actually. Besides that, the only other negative I can say about the Graco is that you have to move the hoses between buckets so you may get some paint on your hands; again, that’s not a big issue and if you are careful, you can do it without getting dirty. The Graco is a heck of a lot quieter than the Wagner. The Wagner didn’t bother me when I was using it but it was pretty loud. I didn’t realize just how loud until I got the Graco, it is extremely quiet by comparison and is pretty quiet in general. With the Wagner, you can get about 3+ gallons in the hopper (the manual says to put no more than 2.5 gallons in it) while the Graco sucks it out of a 5 gallon bucket, or smaller if you wish. I found myself just refilling the 5 gallon bucket instead of trying to switch them out.
Actual operation and cleanup steps of the two units are about the same, especially the operation steps. The cleanup on the Graco is easier and quicker for the most part. The only exception is checking/cleaning the two filters, gun filter and outlet filter. The filters on the Wagner require no tools to clean while the two on the Graco do; however it’s still a very simple task. The higher quality, optional guns for the Graco are more like the one you get with the Wagner as far as cleanup goes. On the other hand, I went through three gun filters on the Wagner, counting the one that came with it and the filters are about $5 or $6 each; meanwhile, I’m still on the original filter for the Graco. The Graco filter seems better made and is much easier to clean. Another thing I really like about the Wagner is the built-in two wheel dolly which also has a rack for the hose and the power cord; the Graco has only a rack for the cord and no dolly (the more expensive XR7 model and those above that have the dolly). That is a strike against the Graco but I got around it by using the hose from my Wagner on the Graco which extended my reach from 25 feet to 50 feet. I was then able to setup the Graco in a completely separate room from where I was working which also made it quieter in my work area. Oh, and the Graco supports up to 150 feet of hose whereas the Wagner and other competing brand/models only support 100 feet; that’s probably not overly important to most people but still good to know. By the way, the Graco isn’t heavy so the lack of the dolly isn’t that big of deal until you start thinking about moving the sprayer and a 5 gallon bucket of paint and the spray hose, etc. It’s doable, but it would be easier with a dolly. I’m sure you could retrofit it to a dolly or possibly even buy that feature but of course that would add to the cost; which by the way was about $100 more than the Wagner. Also, I’ve already started thinking about how I’ll put it away when I’m finished painting; what will I do with the hose? The Wagner puts away into a neat little package, much better than the Graco. Of course, I may just sell it since it will be some time before I do more painting; we’ll see.
Another plus for the Graco is that it came with an operational video, an actual DVD. I was hoping it might show painting tips but it basically shows you how to set the sprayer up and run it and then how to clean it up afterward. I got all of that from the manual but it would be handy for someone who learns easier by seeing.
At the end of the day, I personally like the Graco better and would recommend it over the Wagner. However, the Wagner has its own appeal so I wouldn’t write it off. The biggest problem with the Wagner is that it broke down in the middle of the job and from what I read about it, it is likely to do so every time after about 30 gallons of material; I’m sure that varies depending on the material. I haven’t priced the inlet valve yet but I don’t think it is expensive so for small jobs and infrequent use, the Wagner is probably a good choice but if you don’t like to get shutdown in the middle of a job (who does?), you might want to consider keeping a replacement valve on hand.
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 5/1/2008 4:03:58 PM
I've been trying to get the blog updated for weeks now but I've just been way too busy.
The drywall finishers finally got their part done, at least in the living space; they still have to come back and do the garage but right now I'm using it for a workshop and it is too cluttered to work on. They finished about three weeks ago I guess. In the week following, my wife and I got the rest of the house painted, except for the bonus room. I probably should have gone ahead and painted the bonus room while I was in painting mode but I got sidetracked by tile and HVAC. Basically, I scheduled our HVAC contractors for the final geothermal hookup as a way to deadline myself into getting that part finished and consequently, I forced myself to shelf the paint for a while. I had to get my water heaters installed and some of the water supply plumbing finished before the HVAC guys showed up and that was last week.
I picked up my Marathon water heaters and finished wiring and tiling the closet for the water heater that sits in the middle of the house near the bathrooms. I wasn't sure about what the HVAC guys needed from me as far as hooking the water heater up so I waited until they showed up and had them clarify that right off. I then spent the rest of that day buying and installing pipe fittings but I got it ready to go. I had to take the day off and I figured they would get done in one day but they told me it would take two so I ended up taking another day off to be there when they turned it all on and be available in case they needed anything. Well, they didn't show up the next day so I changed my plans and went to work late. I was aggravated at first that they didn't call but when I got to work, there was a message from them on my work phone. They did come the next work day which was Monday and ended up staying with them. The installer and I both expected Monday would be the big day and I was excited to see the thing in action finally but their fill pump crapped out and so now they have to come back yet again. They are supposed to be onsite tomorrow. In the mean time, I'm installing our second water heater in preparation for them to hook up our desuperheater. I set the tank, ran the pips and finished the wiring last night so I'll be doing the final connections purging the air out of the system tonight. I hope it all goes well tomorrow because I'm tired of missing work for them (I do try to get some work done while I'm there). They should only have a couple of hours of work to finish but we'll see.
In the mean time, I set about 400 sqft of tile over the weekend in the kitchen and breakfast nook area. I've already set the floor tile in both of the main bathrooms and I've got the laundry room ready to tile. I was planning on finishing the floor tile this week but got sidetracked on the water heater instead. I've got another 700 sqft of tile being delivered tomorrow so I've still got a lot of work cut out for me. However, my wife and I have been thinking about cutting the tile area back some so we'll see. Either way, I've still got a lot of tile work to do but everything else is getting there. About half of the house is finish wired with lights, receptacles and switches; and the rest of the house has a lot of can lights which are easier to finish in my opinion so that part is on the way. But basically, all we have left is the finish work and we're well on our way to completing that stuff. Since the drywall guys have gotten out of the way, we're really making progress.
I'm going to do my best to get us moved in by the end of May. I might not make it but it won't be for lack of trying and if I don't make it, we'll be close anyway. I'm going to be focusing on tile work for the next week to two weeks which I'm doing myself. But in the mean time, our cabinets are in progress and we're working on getting our countertops on order. I'm close to have the tile work done to a point where we can order our carpet. Our interior doors and window casings are on order. I might not get much sleep in the coming weeks but I'm going to try to get all of this stuff installed.
Oh, and we have all of our appliances in house and ready to install, just waiting on the cabinets. It's going to be a busy month.
Until next time...
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 4/4/2008 9:19:31 AM
I mentioned in one of my previous posts that I had purchased a Wagner Paint Crew Plus Sprayer. I think I might have also mentioned a little about the cleanup. Well, I like the sprayer so far. I've used it several times; in fact I've painted six different rooms/areas with it and I've primed about the same amount of area as well. If you happen to get one of these, I might have a few tips that will help you enjoy your experience with it a little more.
First of all, follow the directions and definitely clean it up after every use. The cleanup portion is probably the only downside to using a sprayer but in fairness you have cleanup to do with manual painting methods as well. It takes a couple of passes through the cleanup procedures to get them down but after you've done it a few times, you'll get quicker at it; just like with any other multi-step procedure. Anyway, during my usage, I developed a shortcut that actually works better than what the manual provides. I'm only going to hit on the main steps, you'll need to read the manual and learn the tedious stuff like the pressure relief steps that you have to perform several times.
The first thing you do once you finish spraying is empty the hopper. Basically, you just pour you paint material back into the bucket it came from. You then rinse the hopper with a water hose or in a utility sink. This is the step I've modified. Rinsing the hopper is probably the most time consuming portion of the cleanup; it's definitely the most manual portion. But the owner's manual has you do this step twice. The first time, it just instructs you to rinse the hopper and refill it with an appropriate cleaning solution (water for latex material and mineral spirits for oil based materials; from this point forward, I’m just going to use water in place of cleaning solution; but you need to remember to use mineral spirits with oil based paints). The problem is, if you do that, you're either going to spend a lot of time rinsing or you're going to end up with colored water in the hopper for the next steps. Why? Because there is an inlet filter at the bottom of the hopper that is full of paint material when you get finished spraying and if you simply try to rinse out the hopper, you will keep getting paint or primer from that valve mixed back in with your cleaning solution.
The manual has you rinse the hopper, fill it with cleaning solution and then use the cleaning solution to flush the spray hose and then the return tube; which is a rubber tube that circulates material back into the hopper when you prime the sprayer. Remember, the water isn’t really clean at this point so the spray hose and the return tube don’t get completely clean either. After you flush the return tube, the manual has you rinse the hopper a second time but this time it also instructs you to clean the inlet filter. When you’re done the second time, you’re completely done. All in all, that process takes between 30 and 40 minutes.
Okay, you got that didn't you? The manufacturer wants you to rinse out the hopper twice! Well, after the first time, I said the heck with that! That filter at the bottom of the hopper is the cause of the dirty water. So, I adjusted the cleaning process so that I lightly rinse the hopper just enough to remove the heavy paint or primer; it doesn't need to be perfect at this point. I remove the inlet filter and clean it thoroughly. Then I finish rinsing the hopper so that it is good and clean and reassemble the filter. At this point, the hopper is as clean as it would be the second time you rinsed it according to the manual. I then fill the hopper with water and I usually have a clean bucket with me and I fill it with water too. Then, I replace the hopper on the sprayer and follow the manufacturer’s instructions. Except, from the time I start cleaning the sprayer, the return tube is removed from the hopper and placed over my waste bucket. After I clean it, I never allow any dirty water or paint material back into the hopper; that is contrary to what the manual says to do. If I'm not mistaken, the manual has you rinse the return tube back into the hopper; I don't do that. At this point, I rinse both the return tube and the spray hose into the waste bucket. If I run out of water before they are both clean, I refill the hopper from my clean water bucket. Once both the return tube and the spray hose are clean, I empty out my hopper (actually I usually allow the sprayer to run all of the water through the hoses so that I don't even have to do that step).
At that point, everything except for the gun is clean. I then proceed to clean the gun and nozzle following the manufacturer's cleanup instructions. I find that my cleanup method is faster, less labor intensive and more thorough than that provided by the manufacturer. I hope this information helps someone save some time. After several prime/paint sequences, you can actually shave off a few hours of work this way.
Enjoy!
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 4/4/2008 8:09:19 AM
The drywall sub is still taking his sweet time about getting our house finished but he is getting really close. As of last night, he likes the living room, the stairwell, the bonus room upstairs, the coat closet and the powder room; oh, and they still haven't finished the master bedroom. He says he is going to get all those rooms finished this weekend but we have heard that before so we're not celebrating just yet. Even so, he really is close to being ready to spray the knock down in those areas. Some of them just like a little sanding before they are ready; only the master bedroom and the bonus room still have mud work waiting and that is primarily on the corners which they have started. If they do get those rooms finished, the garage is still untouched.
Unless they surprise me and really get in there and work; I seriously doubt they will finish before the weekend is through. However, they might get some other rooms textured. We'll see.
In the mean time, I managed to catch up to them with the painting before they textured the kitchen and family room. Since they got those rooms finished, I have more work to do. I painted the bedroom area hall last night so other than the master bedroom, that whole wing of the house is finished; paint-wise anyway. I'll probably get back on the tile work this weekend. I want to get the tile set so we can get our cabinets started. The floor tile in the master bathroom is set but not grouted and the laundry room and main bath are ready to set.
Here are some pictures of the texture and the painting we've done recently.
Photos
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| Hallway - Before |
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| Hallway - After |
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| Hallway - During... My best side... :-) |
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| Laundry Room - This is one of the first rooms we painted before deciding to texture the rest of the house. Unfortunately, most of the pictures I took of the painted rooms didn't turn out well so this is it. |
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| Family Room - Freshly Textured |
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| Dining Room - You might be able to make out the knock down texture in this picture. It looks better in person. |
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 3/28/2008 5:00:07 PM
<Edit>
My wife informed me after I posted this that the drywall sub didn't get the work done last night like he promised. They only got the texture done on our pantry.
<End of Edit>
Over the past weekend, our drywall company managed to get a full 3rd of the house ready to paint!!! We're very excited. Unfortunately I am currently in New Orleans on business this week and the area wasn't dry enough to prime until late afternoon on Sunday, so I haven't been able to get it all primed yet. I did get three bedrooms along with their closets primed so all that is left is the hallway and the closets in the hallway. That just leaves the master bedroom which they haven't sprayed the texture on yet; they still have to put corner beads on the tray ceiling in that room.
I've been away for three days today and in my absence, they managed to get several rooms on the north 3rd of the house ready to prime as well. I'm going to have my work cut out for me when I return but that is good news for a change.
I used the Wagner Spraytech Paint Crew Plus to prime the last rooms and it sprayed Kilz primer just fine and spraying is much easier than rolling, no doubt about it.
I'm headed home tomorrow and look forward to more painting. By the way, we decided to have knock down texture put on walls and ceilings for the rest of the house and it looks great. However, it does soak up more primer than smooth walls. Something to keep in mind if you are thinking about texturing your walls.
I've got to go but I'll post again soon.
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 3/20/2008 3:07:32 PM
I would have never thought I'd still be working on drywall at this point but that's where I am. The sub has been a little unreliable in that he misses days sometimes and others he doesn't put in a full day. He never puts in more than about seven hours in a single day anyway. But he is getting somewhat close to completing the house at least; he still has to do the garage though. As of today, he is two weeks over his original estimation for completion but he is close and other than missing a few things here and there he’s been doing good work. Two weeks doesn’t sound like much at first but when you consider that the hangers took three weeks (two weeks longer than projected and what it should have taken), then the finisher didn’t start for two weeks after that and I was originally told a week and a half and then that was stretched to three weeks by the guy actually doing the work, we’ve been in the drywall stage for 10 weeks! That’s way too long. I kick myself because I made some lousy choices in drywall subs and now I’m paying for it.
As I mentioned in the last post, I asked the sub to finish out our master bathroom first because I have some intricate tile work to do in there and if he'd do that for me, at least I'd have something to work on while he finished the rest of the house. Well, he finally did what I asked but he just took three weeks to do it. He had most of it finished for about a week but there were two wide-angled corners in the water closet for which he needed a rubber knife to finish and he didn’t have one. His boss, the sub I actually hired has them but they both kept forgetting to get one over to the house. I didn’t find this out until he told me that the bathroom and master closet were ready to be primed and painted. When I went in to prime the water closet, I noticed that those two corners weren’t finished and asked the sub about it. He’d forgotten, again, about the corners and the knife and that is when I found out what he was waiting on. I went ahead and primed the main part of the bathroom and he told me that he’d paint the water closet himself if he ended up delaying me any more on it. Kari and I went forward and painted the rest of the bathroom and the master closet but I talked to the sub about the tool he needed and told him I’d pick one up the next day so he could complete the water closet. I did as I said but when I took it to him at lunch he’d already gotten one from his boss. Go figure. When I talked to him yesterday, he said he was going to spray the knock down pattern on the ceilings in the south half of the house which would give use more rooms to work on while he finishes up. He’s planning on taking off a couple of days to work on another job which has been delayed because of ours so he’s trying to get plenty of work laid out for my wife and I so he’s not holding us up.
We are starting to see some real progress though, for all my complaining. He’s almost finished with the mud in the house and we’ve managed to paint three rooms (out of about 18 or so) and I’ve even laid floor tile in the master bath. I also have backer board down in the laundry room and plan on laying the CBU in the main house bath soon. I have the tile for the house bath so I’ll probably get around to setting that this weekend, assuming I don’t get caught up painting instead. I just got the Kerdi in for the master bath shower today and I ordered the rest of our tile which we’ll use throughout the laundry, utility, kitchen, dining and foyer areas of the house. I have pictures of the master bath floor but I haven’t been able to grout that floor yet so it’s not finished. I had to special order the grout because nobody had the color we wanted in stock, same goes for the other bathroom. That at least is one good thing about the other tile we’ll be using in the house, it’s a dark brown slate color and the grout for it is readily available at Home Depot.
Also, I finished the wiring in the master closet and about half of the master bath so we have permanent lights, receptacles and switches in that area. And the insulation company will be at the house tomorrow to blow cellulose in the attic. Plus, I called the cabinet guy to give him a status update of where we are and he put us on his schedule behind two other projects so we’re about three weeks out from having cabinets, maybe four. Our appliances are all on order and scheduled for an April delivery. I should have all of the flooring (that I’m doing) done by then and probably most if not all of the painting so carpet will go down around that time too. We’ve definitely got some momentum going right now. I hope it stays that way because I really am ready to finish this project. It’s been long and a lot of work but I’ve enjoyed most of it. I’m especially having fun with the tile right now.
Speaking of tile, I thought I was going to save some money on that trade by borrowing a friend’s tile saw. He offered it, I didn’t ask, but I typically avoid borrowing stuff from people, especially expensive items because I’m always afraid that it might break while I have it and I would feel obligated to fix it. But I let him loan me his saw because it was so much better than the one I had planned on buying. It’s about a $400 saw compared to the $80 one I was going to buy. I used it on about half of the master bath floor and then it quit cutting. At first I thought I’d worn the blade out so I bought a replacement for $50; that’s almost as much as the saw I was going to buy; so that didn’t sit too well. The new blade cut great, but after I cut one tile, I noticed that the motor seemed like it was dragging. Sure enough, the belt had started slipping and the belt burned up! When I took the cover off, the belt was almost worn all the way through at one spot. Well, I spent a couple of hours trying to find a belt for the saw with no luck and I was losing productivity. So, I weighed my options and decided that I’d fix his saw later but I was held up without one so I went to Home Depot and bought one of their Husky brand saws. It cost $300 which was a lot more than I wanted to spend but I had determined that it was actually the best one for my needs since it has mitering and plunge features (both of which I need for my project) that surpassed the capabilities of my friend’s saw and it also has laser sighting to boot. The laser feature alone has really increased my productivity with the tile cuts. I need to clarify that my friend’s saw is an industrial quality saw the likes of which professionals use and the one I bought is not; but it is great for my project. And the Husky cuts great! It has a smallish motor but it runs at 7000 RPMs and really cuts through the tiles with quick clean cuts. Also, it does a great job at keeping the tile and the blade wet; that’s another area where it surpasses the borrowed saw. In case you can’t tell, I’m pretty pleased with the saw. Besides the features I listed above, it also came with a stand which is nice. The only complaint I have with it so far is that the laser vibrates out of adjustment pretty much after every cut. It wasn’t nearly that bad when I first started using the saw but since the blade has been worn down somewhat now and there is more vibration during the cuts, I have to adjust the laser between cuts. On the upside, the laser adjusts very quickly and easily. Anyway, I like the saw and considering I’m saving a minimum of $8,000 by doing my own tile work, I think the $300 investment is going to be worth it. By the way, I finally found a replacement belt for my friend’s saw today; that was an ordeal. I think I’ll get his going and return it before I break anything else.
I’m something of a book worm and I’m an aggressive DIYer so I did a lot of research before starting my tile work and since. I actually set about 300 sqft of tile in our current house about eight years ago but nothing like what I’m doing on this job. When it’s all said and done, I’ll have set about 2,000 sqft of tile in this new house. The last job I did was a fairly straight forward, rectangular, two room job. With this new house, there are a lot of odd angles for which to account, multiple rooms (about half of the house) and I’ll be tiling bathtubs and showers which I’ve never done. Consequently, a lot of my research has been focused on building a waterproof shower. That is where the Kerdi comes in. If you’re not familiar with this product and you are building a new home, I’d recommend you check it out. You can find all sorts of information online via both Schluter’s website and on tile centric message boards. I’ve found some of the most useful info on the John Bridge tile forums where amateurs and professionals alike hang out and try to help each other with tiling issues. And if you spend much time in the forums, you can also learn what not to do via the many horror stories of mostly bathroom projects gone awry! Judging by the posts on the tile forums, I would guess that most professional tile setters are already using and recommending Kerdi and I’d be leery of any that aren’t personally. Anyway, Kerdi is an amazing product by all accounts and I look forward to using it in my home. It does add some additional cost to a shower project but it is completely waterproof unlike the older traditional methods of shower building. Check it out and judge for yourself.
I almost forgot, I also bought a Wagner Paint Crew Plus paint sprayer. We’ve got a lot of house to paint and I wanted something that would do it as fast and neat as possible without going completely industrial. Well, I bought the sprayer at Lowes for $200 and I’ve got to say that I am impressed. I painted our master bathroom in about 15 minutes and the master closet in less than 7 minutes! It took me longer to put the thing together than it did to paint those two rooms. I was a little concerned that I might not be able to use it well but it turned out pretty darn good. It does take about 20 – 30 minutes to clean the sprayer after you’re finished with it but that’s not bad when you consider how much painting you can get done with it in a short time. Actually, it might not take quite that long once I get used to the steps and don't have to take time to read the directions at each point along the way. The bathroom was the worst because it’s about half tile and half sheetrock, so we had to tape off the areas that we didn’t want to get paint on which took some prep time. It actually took longer to do that than to paint the room but the prep work was neither hard nor overly time consuming. I’m not sure I’d bother with it for smaller rooms unless they were going to share a paint color with other rooms that you can do at the same time but for larger rooms such as bedrooms and the public areas of your house, it is a great tool. Also, rooms other than bathrooms are a lot easier to prep (for new construction anyway); you only need to cover up doors and windows unless you’ve got something special such as flooring already in the room which you need to cover. If you do get one of these or something similar to do your own painting, practice with it on spare sheetrock or in a small, out of the way room until you get the hang of it. I found it very easy to use but you can get runs pretty quickly if you aren’t careful. Anyway, it beats rolling the paint on for sure!
Well, I think that’s about it for now. I’ve still got a lot of work to do before I can put up my work boots but at least the little bit of aesthetic progress we’ve made so far has lifted mine and my wife’s spirits this month.
Photos
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| Here's a picture of the tile saw I bought. I've read a lot of decent reviews from professional tile setters about this saw. Even though it's not an industrial saw, it seems the pros like it. |
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| Light switch in master bath. The picture doesn't do the paint color justice but it is a darkish, gray/green. Should look great with the tile and white trim. |
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| Isn't it amazing how much joy you can derive from something as simple as getting your exhaust fan finished out? You can also see the ceiling texture in this photo. |
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| Here's our paint sprayer. You load the materials into the removable bucket at the top. It'll hold 2.5 gallons of paint at a time. |
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| Here's my tile when it was about half done in the master bath. |
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| This isn't the half of it but you can get an idea of the angles I'm dealing with from this photo. There are many such angles throughout the house, mostly where I decided to install tile. How stupid does that make me? |
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 2/19/2008 4:16:40 PM
Well, I have to say that the excitement I had while adding my last post has completely burned out. The drywall hangers took three weeks, in other words FOREVER, to get the rock on the walls. It should have been a week job at the most and they completely drug their feet. In the last post, I was excited thinking I was going to be painting by now but nope, didn't happen. The sub that hung the drywall was originally supposed to mud it too but after talking to him and seeing how long it took him to hang it and how sloppy they were, I told him that I was going to get someone else to do it.
I had originally told the guy I'd probably let him do the mud work but afterward I saw another job that he did and I was less than impressed. The truth is it scared me. I'm building a very upscale house for my town and this guy did substandard mud work. So, I started calling other subs in the area to get someone else on the job and completely struck out all around; I couldn't find anybody to do it. I thought I was going to have to stick with the original guy until at the last moment I finally found someone with a good reputation to take the job. I felt like a load had been lifted and I felt a lot better. I talked with the guy and he pointed out several rough areas in the rock that would have to be fixed but he said they'd take care of it and it wouldn't be a problem to make the place look good. Man that made me and my wife feel so much better. The only downside was he told me it'd be another week before he could start; but, he said it would only take a week and a half to two weeks to finish. I was looking at probably four weeks with the other guy anyway so that was still a time savings and he’s a better quality finisher to boot so I was okay with the delay.
Then the other shoe dropped. The new guy was four days late getting started on my house and instead of working the job himself, he hired it out to another sub. By all accounts the guy he hired is a quality finisher but he is known to be slow and in fact, he told my wife we were looking at three weeks. Now, I'm back where I started time wise and the only good thing to come of all of this is that I expect we'll get a quality finish out of it. That is definitely worth more time to me but I can't help but be disappointed. Oh, and it's going to cost me $2,900 more than the original guy too; but that is okay with me because the original guy under quoted the job considerably. He probably would have been asking for more money before it was all said and done if I had allowed him to proceed.
I was in a hurry, trying to get as much done before the end of February as possible because that is when my loan expires but from day one, I've had problems with subs dragging the job out so I don't know why I expected any better from these drywall finishers. At their current rate of productivity, it's likely to take them more than the three weeks we were last quoted too. I mean we're talking about one guy working alone, so far anyway, on about 4,200 sqft of floor space and he seems to be working somewhere else part of the day and then hitting my job in the afternoons. Consequently, he's only been putting in about four or five hours a day since he started and he's only worked on the job three days so far. I would complain about that but at this point, it isn't going to accomplish anything. I'm going to have to get an extension, no question about that now and since this is the only drywall finisher I could get to even take the job, I don't have a lot of options.
If you can't tell from my tone, I'm a little down right now. I was hoping to be in the house before the end of March and just a few weeks ago, I didn't think that would be too hard to accomplish. Now, I'm thinking we may be lucky to move in by the end of April and it’s all thanks to slowpoke subs. I've still got tile to put down after the mudding and sanding is done and a lot of painting to do as well. I'll probably hire out the finish carpentry. Early on, I had planned on doing that part myself but we're too far gone on the project now. I'll do the tile and the painting for sure and I'll be doing the finish electrical and plumbing too but that is about it. Right now, I'm just spinning my wheels waiting anxiously for these guys to get out of my way. I did request that they finish the master bath first so that I could go ahead with the tile work in there. Maybe I'll feel better once I have something to do besides wait...
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Posted to Arkansas-First-Timer by Jack in Trumann, AR
on 1/24/2008 4:21:37 PM
Finally! We did it! Whoopee! We finally covered up the studs and have actual rooms in the house! We are so excited. It has taken much longer than we anticipated but we finally have drywall hung in the house! I was there at lunch today and the downstairs portion of the house is almost completely hung; it should be finished by the time I get home today. All they like is the bonus room upstairs and finishing the garage (waiting on Hardy siding for the garage). I don't have any pictures uploaded that shows the drywall going in but I do have pictures of it being loaded into the house and you can see the insulation in the walls in these photos as well.
This is a major milestone for us. It means we are getting close. We should be painting within the next two weeks and I'll be laying tile shortly thereafter. The power company cut us over to permanent power last week and I had to wire up a couple of receptacles for the subs to use inside the house. I also installed the garage door lights and have tested them. My garage doors are going in tomorrow and after they are in place, I can start leaving those lights on; I didn't want them on at night showing everyone what we had in the garage. This weekend, while the drywall subs are working in the house, I may wire up my security lights and the lights and receptacles in the attic. I can't do a lot inside the house without getting in their way so I'll piddle around for now; I need the break anyway.
It's very exciting to finally feel like we are getting close. There are still a hundred little things that have to be done but we are getting there. We've been shooting for the end of February as a completion date but more and more it looks like it will probably be the end of March. That still works out nicely for us though.
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