I LOVE your book and the content on your website. What a great resource! Brit A. in Sequin, TX

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Started Electrical

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 6/10/2008 11:03:27 AM

Been a while since I've posted with pictures, so I have included some with this entry.  I started nailing boxes and drilling holes about a week ago and along with a few friends and my dad and father-in-law were able to pull about 95% of our wire in this past Saturday.  May not seem like much, but there is at least 6,000 feet of wire in the house and shop at this point.  We really accomplished a lot of work in one Saturday.  My friend and I will wire in the panels and make up all the boxes this week and hopefully I can get a rough-in inspection the first part of next week. 

The plumbing is ready to inspect and I have hired the insulation contractor and am really close to settling on a drywall subcontractor.  Things keep moving along, but I will admit that the plumbing took longer than I expected.  I have most of the blame on this one because of other commitments I made.  The exterior doors showed up yesterday and we had quite a windstorm last night and you guessed it, I was out at the house at 1:00 this morning making sure my doors hadn't tipped over in the garage.  I don't think any general contractor would have done that?  Maybe.  Here are some pictures to enjoy.  More pictures and posts to come.

Photos

Busy, Busy, Busy

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 5/28/2008 10:59:37 PM

I know, I know.  I have been a bad owner-builder-reporter.  We have been very busy in the last month with the plumbing and the electrical work.  These were the two things I was taking on to save money.  The roofers finished the roof for the shop and house last Thursday.  It has rained hard twice since they finished and all is well.  They did a nice job. 

My dad came over two weeks ago and I took the week off and we finished about 60% of the plumbing.  Since he left, I have almost finished the rest by myself with one more Saturday to go.  I have also started the electrical work in the last week.  The shop is ready for wire and all the can lights and fixture boxes are up in the house.  The next task is to mount all the switch and outlet boxes and start drilling holes.  We are planning on having a wiring party in the next week. 

The HVAC guys are in and they are about 25% done with the rough-in and told me they will be done on Friday.  I met with two insulation contractors today and need to pull the trigger on someone soon so they can do some piecework around the other subs.  We have ordered our exterior doors, they should be in next week and I will install them.  We will probably order all of our cabinets next week because I hope to be drywalling in four weeks from now.  The siding sub is slated to start June 15th and is giving me a great price and does nice work.  All these details and no pictures.  I took some tonight, but the inside pictures didn't turn out too well because of the low light.  Stay tuned, I promise to TRY to be more diligent with my reporting, but no promises.  I will post some pics, though.

House Up, Shop's Next

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 4/30/2008 12:46:14 PM

The framing crew we hired has been very busy and they have kept the schedule they promised.  The sheeting was completed yesterday on the roof for the house and they are now nailing fascia boards.  The rest of the week will be spent finishing odds and ends inside the house.  They will start framing the shop on Monday and should only take them two days.  My windows were held up at the plant because of a "water" problem.  Both my lumber rep and myself don't believe that excuse, but I won't see any windows until Friday.  I will be getting my shear-nailing inspection today from the county inspector, so hopefully all the nails and staples are where they're supposed to be. 

The next step for us is to hire the roofer and get some roofing on both the house and shop.  I roofed my way through college, so I may tackle the shop myself.  I have done lots of roofing since college off and on, but I am about 25 pounds over my optimal roofing weight.  We'll see how the bids come back.  After the roof is on, my dad and I will begin the rough plumbing and electrical.  I am going to take a week off of work and we should be able to get the plumbing roughed in.  The exterior electrical will also get roughed during this time so I can get my siding crew going.  Still getting some bids on that, but we're close to making a decision. 

We met with our cabinet rep last Friday on-site to get some hard measurements to finalize our bid price.  We made some minor changes in the bathrooms and added some additional cabinets in the breakfast nook.  This will definitely raise our price, but I figured we'd make some changes with the cabinets and padded my numbers. 

Here are some pictures of the framing process:

Photos

Posted by Dave in Richmond, CA on 4/30/2008 Dave's Forum Posts: 7 Average Forum Rating: 3.50 Randomly Selected Image 4/30/2008	Looks real nice! keep the photos coming. as always hard numbers on budgets are very interesting t see too if you can share them. Sincereley, Dave
Posted by L in Ritzville, WA on 4/30/2008 L's Forum Posts: 0 Randomly Selected Image 4/30/2008	Looks like things are rolling along...very exciting!  Figure 50

Houston, We Have Walls!

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 4/22/2008 11:11:52 PM

The framers are making good time and have the subfloor system down and just erected all of the exterior and most of the interior walls today.  Trusses are to be delivered on either Thursday or Friday, depending on how quickly the framers can get the garage and shop walls framed. 

I am still working on getting my temporary power approved and activated.  I failed my first inspection and corrected the two problems tonight, so maybe the inspector can come back out tomorrow and hopefully approve it.  The framers definitely would like to get rid of the generator because they can't hear their music very well.  Here are some pictures of the progress.

Photos

Framing Tomorrow

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 4/16/2008 10:05:21 PM

Now I know why there are so many blogs that seem to only get updated once or twice per month.  We have been very busy over the last two weeks.  The backfill was completed and the slab areas for the shop and garage were prepared for the flat work contractor.  I had a hard time finding a good one that was available right now.  The slabs were poured on Monday and Tuesday and turned out pretty good.  I thought I was done with concrete for a while, until my truss rep called me today at 3:00 and told me a very critical footing was left off of our plans and must be installed or the home would suffer settling and severe drywall cracks.  So, not wanting to waste time and energy on who missed this footing, I was off to the Building Department to figure out a solution.  I was very surprised to find them easy to work with and we found a very reasonable solution.  I went out tonight and installed a 32"x32"X19" footing in the required spot.  The inconvenience wasn't too bad, but I was able to get my temporary power hookup wired like I wanted.  Oh well, I could have found out about this on Monday and been crawling on my knees under the subfloor to fix it.  Attached are some pictures to let you see what we've been up to.

Photos

Foundation Done...

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 4/9/2008 9:57:23 PM

Well, I don't have any pictures, but the foundation is complete for the house and the shop.  I am very pleased with the job of the foundation contractor.  The next thing to happen is the framer will start next Thursday, so it's up to me to get the garage and shop floors poured by then.  We will backfill the foundation this weekend and then start on the slabs.  The contractor I wanted for the slabs is too busy to get to them in time, so I am checking references on my back-up subs.  Sound familiar?

I am very excited for the framer to start because I lucked out and got a good one.  It doesn't hurt that he is going to cost about $4,500 less than the original framer.  This one should be faster and I will get more for my money. 

The well pump was put in yesterday and I was pleased to find out that this contractor held his price he gave me back in September 07.  You might say that he just padded his numbers, but he was within $30 of two other bids at the time so I am happy.  Hopefully, I will have some final grade pictures from this weekend and by the end of next week, some lumber may be in the frames.  

Foundation Almost Done

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 4/3/2008 11:04:11 PM

The foundation is almost complete with the pouring of the stem walls happening tomorrow.  The foundation contractor has been nice to work with and when items have come up, he's called me on my cell to ask how we want it done.  He has had some good suggestions also. 

Next week we will let the foundation cure and then get the brother-in-law back out to backfill the lot and foundation.  I have also hired the well pump contractor and they will be starting on Monday or Tuesday with the installation.  This means that I need to get my electrical permits on Monday and run some conduit for him.  I am learning quite a bit about planning and timing. 

Attached are some pictures showing the foundations of the home and the shop.  The house is a 2,589 sq. ft. ramble with a 931 sq. ft. three-car garage and the shop is 1,200 sq. ft.

By the way, I think we have found our new framer and his price is very nice.  All he does is framing and he can get in and out in about two weeks.  This was a nice surprise.

Photos

Excavation Goes Well

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 3/31/2008 11:20:59 PM

The first task of excavating the lot for the foundation of the shop and house went very well.  I have to admit that my brother-in-law is a pro on the dozer.  He must have moved at least a couple of hundred yards of dirt besides the excavation for the foundations.  He'll be back in two weeks to backfill and get the lot as close to finish grade as we can at this point.  I met with the foundation contractor today, and he will begin forming up tomorrow for the footings.  He thinks he'll be done and off the site by Friday of this week or Monday of next.  He seems very motivated and comes highly recommended. 

My original framer I had chosen to frame the house is very busy right now, so we are interviewing and checking up on our two back-up framers.  Hopefully, we'll be impressed with one of the two and they'll be able to get going on the project. 

I have attached a before and after picture of the excavation.

Photos

Before

After

Ready for the first day

Posted to Quail-Bluff-Pasco by Brent in Pasco, WA on 3/28/2008 11:00:20 PM

As I sit here on the computer thinking about all of the aspects of our project, my brother-in-law is navigating our snowy mountain pass in hopes of getting here in time to help prep our lot with the bulldozer I've rented.  Hope he gets here, because he is the only one who knows how to run a bulldozer!  Tomorrow will be the first day of our great adventure and of course the weatherman is calling for snow in an area of Washington that boasts over 300 days of sunshine per year.  I will hopefully have some before and after pictures to post after tomorrow's excavation.