Restore/Repair – Page 12 – Sista Girl with Skills

Page 12 of 12

November 22, 2017December 6, 2017

Open Concept Achieved

My dad (and my General Contractor) is in town for Thanksgiving, so I have two weeks to get things over my skill set done at the house before he leaves for his annual trip to Asia. The goal is to get all the framing done, replace the bad floor joist in the basement, reinstall the floor in the 1st floor bath, so the tub can be returned and install the LVL beam, so the load barring wall separating the kitchen and dining room could be removed.

With the help of Cameron (my Demo King cousin) we were able to get the load barring wall removed. We had a bit of a rough start. My dad miss measured the first LVL beam and cut it 2′ too short. That mistake cost me $100 as I had to buy a new one, but fortunately I discovered a great lumber yard located within 3 miles of the house, Forge Lumber. They stocked the right size and since the distance was short (original LVL and all my lumber needs was delivered by McCabe Lumber located near Kings Island), I pulled a Macguyver and somehow got the beam in my PT Cruiser in a safe enough fashion that allowed me to drive it back to the house. That saved me another $100 bucks by avoiding renting a truck or paying another delivery fee and even more valuable, time, since a delivery would mean waiting another day. I wish I had more pictures (can’t believe I didn’t take a picture of my PT with a 16′ x 14″ beam sticking out the back), but this was a three person job, so all I can present is the finished product.

November 21, 2017

Up on the housetop, click, click, click,

A tree was growing out of one of the chimney stacks. One of the clay stacks was broken and laying on the roof. From the ground I could see that tuck pointing was needed, so I decided to have a roof/chimney company come out and take a look, Shepard Roofing and Home Improvement. I decided to trust that the urgency for repair he shared was legit, so I moved forward with allowing him (and his nephew) do the work. It took 3 days, but the final product looks amazing. Definitely a noticeable difference. He also said that from what he could see the flute looks sounds all the way down, so there is a chance I could have a functional fireplace. That would be awesome, so before next winter I’ll have a chimney sweep company come out the give an official opinion.

November 19, 2017

Doors, Doors, Doors

Fortunately for me the majority of the doors inside the house are in good-great shape, with knobs (all but two) and I will be able to reuse them. I only need to replace two, one bedroom door and the entry closet. Both are damaged beyond repair. However, I am creating a master bathroom water closet, laundry room and walk-in closet that need doors. Trying to find doors that will match the existing doors I thought would be a very hard task, but thanks to Building Value, located on Spring Grove Avenue very close to my house, I’ve been able to find them all, except one (I’ll keep looking for the bedroom door). @NicoleCurtisRehabAddict and @JoannaStevensGaines should be proud to know their use of vintage/salvage stores on their shows inspired me to do the same.

I finally caved in on trying to make them all match, but at least the doors in the same room will and all the upstairs doors have the same color finish. I’ve definitely created more work for myself as vintage/used doors don’t come with door jams, mortises, knobs, and hinges. I really need to find a carpenter as David Daniels, manager of Building Value has told me any good carpenter can reverse a swing and build a jam. Don’t pass up on a sound door because it’s not oriented in the right direction. Fortunately for me I’m only going to need to build one jam in its entirity. Due to the removal of a wall and three doors that were missing and not being reinstalled, I THANKFULLY preserved the jams. One is an exact fit for the laundry room door and the others can be easily trimmed to fit. I just need to reconfigure the hinges and luck up on finding mortise locks, faceplates and knobs, which thanks to Ebay may not be as hard as I thought.

The one door is due to my decision to raise the height of the opening leading upstairs to my master suite. I’ve hit my head 3 times coming down the steps. While I have no play in the width (30″), I could increase the opening up to 110″ from the current 79″. I found this 30″ x 87″ door. It will be the only odd door on the first floor, but having the extra 8″ inches is worth it to me. I may just have to do something funky in my design and really make it stand out (funky = it may be the only painted door).

This decision also freed up the original door to replace the entry closet (once I find a carpenter to reverse the swing).

I just need a 32″x80ish” vertical two panel door for the bedroom, so give me a shout out if you come across one.

New Master Water Closet Door, matches new Master Laundry Door

New Master Laundry Door matches Water Closet door

Original Master bath entry door.

New Master Closet Door, exact style and color of master bath door, which will be located in very close proximity.

Door For Sale (28″x60″). Door from closet being converted to laundry room, too small.

November 11, 2017November 11, 2017

Logs Gone Bye Bye

As promised Randy Wipert of Woodwright’s Portable Saw Mill and White Dove Originals Hardwood Furniture and Artistic Designs, came out to my house and picked up the walnut tree logs that were left at my request. It will be about 8 weeks before he will have them cut into slabs and another 3 months before they are dried enough to turn into something. Perhaps by spring I’ll have some wood to create my dining room table, which I’m hopeful Randy will help me make.

Several months ago I lucked up on these cast iron table legs. I had just started my home search and thought immediately how cool it would be to make my own table. The curves on the legs scream for a round or curved table top. Making a table from the wood that came from my yard would be so cool. I really hope this one vision for this project comes to fruition.

October 27, 2017October 29, 2017

Time to Save the Stained Glass

20170729_161120 Today, in preparation for #DemoDay (the real one) I had Architectural Art Glass Studio, located in Pleasant Ridge, come out to my house to remove the stained glass from the entry foyer. It has some cracks and is in need of repair. Unfortunately I missed the actual removel as I had to run to Harbor Freight and pick up a generator (finally broke down and got one to keep batteries charged on grinder and reciprocal saw). I got back in time for the cutting of the plywood that now fills the hole. Amazing how much light that window provided.

October 25, 2017October 25, 2017

YouTube, a DIYers Resource

shared previously, my house had been ransacked. Stripped of plumbing, electric, most metal of value. What was left, fortunately, were almost all of the doors. The french doors seperating the dining room from living room; upper half of dutch door separating kitchen from hall to bedrooms; and a swinging door separating the kitchen from dining room were taken. No big deal with two as the wall is coming down that housed them. The french door would have been nice, but no great loss given how small the area is (relatively speaking). Of the remaining doors only 2 are damaged beyond repair and I’ll need to replace.

With the rest, I plan to clean them up and reuse them. The biggest issue with them are the hinges. They are rusted, some so severe the doors don’t open or close, so I Googled how to remove rust from metal and found some great YouTube videos that recommended soaking the object in vinegar, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlcL_vHODkc&t=151s, or vinegar with salt added, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6x5BNcHyiiI&t=87s. I decided to give both a shot. Here are a couple of the hinges. Prior to putting them in the solution I used my Dremel tool to remove the surface rust.

These hinges are from the door to attic and they soaked for 3 days and as you can see from the video they now move freely. Upon taking them out of the vinegar and salt solution I did scrub each with a steel brush. I sprayed the hinges with WD40. The kitchen entry hinges are still soaking. They at least move now, but not as freely as in the video, so I put them back in the solution.

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These door plates and knob were not as rusty as the hinges, so I opted to soak them in vinegar only and they only soaked approx 24 hours.

October 20, 2017

By Gosh It Works and Surprise, Surprise, Surpise

I live on #HGTV and #DIYNetwork. #RehabAddict is one of my favorite shows and I feel like @NicoleCurtis and I could be sisters from another mother. It blows my mind the contractors that come in my house and talk about short cuts or throwing out some of the coolest features of this house just because they are old. You can’t recapture the craftsmanship that was done back in the day. Case in point my light fixtures. The house was pretty much ransacked and stripped of any metal deemed valuable. However about a dozen of the light fixtures were still in place (or the base in the case of the dining room chandelier and door entry light). All were covered in cobwebs, soot, and layers of paint (which is probably why they were left behind).

Nicole always shares how she removes paint off her home’s hardware by cooking them in a crockpot of water. Also, with the new season of #SalvageDawgs (another favorite show) @RobertKulp has a commercial that talks about the same topic. He takes Nicole’s tip one step further by transferring the hot item into cold water. The sudden change in temp causes the paint to just crack off. I tried this today. To my surprise, surprise, surprise the process revealed the most beautiful gold finish. By no means is gold going to become a main fixture color in my house, but these six fixtures will be prominently displayed for all to see (assuming I can get them rewired). Check out these before and afters.