It's electric!

Wherein I Don't Really Write Much About the Post Title

Somehow I felt like having the opportunity to use a terrible post title like "it's electric!" was too awesomely awful to pass up. This post could talk some about the electrical bits of the room, but upon reflection, technical talk about 20 and 30 Amp circuits, sub-panels, and consummate dimmer switches is not the way to increase my readership. So I will talk super-briefly about the only sorta interesting thing I have going on up there, electrically speaking.

As anyone who has visited my house can attest, there is a metric embarrassment of electronics wiring that was done by the previous owner. This includes in-ceiling/wall speakers throughout the house, speakers out on the back deck, automated lighting controls, and much more. This "wired-to-the-hilt" mentality carried through to the third floor, as well. There were lots of signal wires, two network cables, two phone lines, several cable TV runs - the whole deal. Although lots more elaborate schemes were dreamt up, I put together a design that will pull it all together in a panel with a cable TV hookup, network jack, telephone jack, speaker terminals, and a feed of audio from the central system in the basement. The room will require an amplifier, and then will run to a pair of wall-mounted speakers that will supply the room with tuneful bliss.

Come back, I promise that's all!
As much as anything, that last paragraph was to remind me what I'm supposed to do with all these wires when it's time to put it all together. Moving right along...

Is it warm in here, or is it just all the insulation?
I'm glad you asked - it is the insulation (or at least it needed to be). With the electrical wires in place, the major barrier between me and drywall was insulation. Since my alleged purpose for the renovation was improved thermal performance, insulation was key. Framing as we did with 2x4's, we were able to use R-13 fiberglass batting insulation. This was definitely not the thickest available, but it was the best compromise between wall space and performance.

In the photo, you can see the front of the room mostly insulated. The straight, evenly spaced studs were very appealing as a practice spot for the novice installer. The insulation is unrolled from its bundle, measured to fit the space, then cut with a razor knife to the right length. It is then wedged into the cavity between the studs, and often will stay there on its own from friction. In cases where it's not a tight fit, or when gravity is fighting you (like in the photo), each run is stapled to the studs. The photo above has a rookie mistake (can you spot it?! Interactive!), and much of the rest of the room was done better once I knew. To make it easier to drywall over, it is recommended that the paper should be stapled to the inside of the studs rather than their face, since it helps them stay visible until the drywall goes up.

The photo on the left shows the back of the room, with a new skylight (!), and lots of insulation, including along the ceiling. A trick that Mike taught me is shown on the left of the photo - when insulation doesn't want to fit the regular way (in this case - cavity was too wide), turn it and make a patchwork to cover the space. Maybe not ideal, and definitely more work, but it picks up the slack from either sloppy or tricky framing.

The most important thing that I learned from all of this insulation nonsense was that wearing the proper gear to do the work was critical. I could get away with wearing shorts on the warm evenings up here, but long sleeves and gloves were very necessary, as well as a respirator and safety glasses. I have only a moderate itchy reaction to fiberglass, but I had enough of it that I learned to take precautions against having much of it, and always showered immediately after I was done working, which seemed to help.

Next Up...
I call some contractors and get some bigtime work done. To be fair, this was always the plan - DIY on things I can do (framing, insulation), and get the experts where it's going to be most visible (drywall, tile), or for systems I have no business tinkering with (HVAC).

Next post will cover HVAC install, beginnings of bathroom tile, and the final framing before drywall.

Plumb Excited for another hlog post!

Plumb Pudding

As exciting as all of this framing was, Mike had to give me some bad news. As it turns out, plumbing and electrical bits all have to go in the walls before we were allowed to hang the drywall. Although I didn't see the need for this sort of extravagance, I was assured it "turns out better with the pipes on the inside" of the walls. I'll take Mike's word for it.

Fortunately, Mike also had the foresight to have us tailor the framing to handle the plumbing needs. In order to supply the sink/vanity area, toilet, and shower, the pipes that extended up from the second floor would need to be split. One branch would head through the interior bathroom wall to the shower head. The other branch would run to the outside wall, and through a wall framed on the inside of insulation (no frozen pipes, thanks!), split to feed the toilet, and then continue over to the vanity area. The waste pipes would run below the supply lines in much the same way. All of these would share a common roof vent, which presented a bit of a challenge. The solution to this was to create a vent line for the sink and toilet that was run through the attic space, and joined up with the shower vent directly under where it would exit through the roof. Very clever plumbing!

To make it as easy as possible to plumb, we had done our best to construct allowing for the plumbing. However, in some cases, it was nearly impossible to do this without having pipe in front of us. So, for most of the supply lines, they were progressively pulled through and drilled through the studs one by one. After this plumbing was all run, nailing plates and stud reinforcing plates were added to keep stray drywall fasteners out of my pipes, and to strengthen the studs that had significant portions removed for plumbing. As can be seen from the photo, the shower base pan was also put into place at this stage, giving a surprising realism to the suggestion that this area could one day be a bathroom. This was identified as a Great Motivational Tactic!

One last plumbing picture will share the detail of the unfinished plumbing - this photo shows the back of the vanity and the waste line/vent line behind it. The lower pipe carries the waste water past the toilet and around to the plumbing stack, the upper pipe runs from the toilet waste pipe to vent through the attic space through the roof.

Bonus feature: If you look close enough in the top of that photo, you can see the bottom of the small skylight that was installed over the shower area. Since it's been a while since the last post, there'll be a bonus close-up photo of the finished product of the skylight! I decided to share another photo that shows a bit more of that skylight in the rough installation phase. My more observant readers will also notice insulation installed throughout the room, as well as the beginnings of electrical work. Depending on how boring I decide explaining the electrical plan for the room is, I may choose not to post anything about the electrical install. So, feast your eyes on this tantalizing bit of it!

Next Up
Exciting thoughts and photos from insulation installation, two more skylights installed, and the beginnings of tile in the bathroom.

Framing isn't just for avoiding criminal convictions!

Framing
Since the mess of ripping down plaster has been covered, I'm happy to move along to more interesting hlogging pastures! The process of framing took a while, with several weekends devoted to wall framing, and the bulk of the ceiling framing accomplished in a single marathon session. I won't cover all of this, but I'll try to get the greatest hits covered on here.

Furring Strips: The Underwire of Framing
Since thermal insulation was one of the major reasons for the renovation, we came up with a plan to maximize the thermal efficiency of the room. The plan was to leave the majority of the plaster up (coincidentally minimizing the additional mess I'd make ripping it down), and allow air to circulate between the roof rafters and the plaster. Eventually, this may include the addition of a powered attic fan to circulate stagnant hot air and reduce the heat trapped in the attic.

On the other side of the existing plaster, we affixed styrofoam panels that were covered with a reflective foil to reflect radiant heat. These would also provide a modest insulating effect, but that's just a bonus. Speaking of bonuses, these panels were super-effective at mocking up walls! These panels were put up in two different ways - the majority were held to the plaster by a couple drywall screws, and framed over, using furring strips as spacers. A few others, particularly those on framing sections made with full 8' boards, the framing was built on the ground, and the insulating boards fixed to the framing before it was hung up. On the vertical surface running along the stairs, furring strips were put up 16" on center with the foamboard between, since the wall couldn't be built out any farther without being in the way of going upstairs. Since the foamboard went up immediately before each section of framing, there aren't really any photos of just the boards hung up. So in place of a nice illustrative photo, I've included this one of a barely-framed wall with the foil/foamboard underneath.

The Bones - Framing Right Along
With the foam board underneath and radiant heat issues managed, framing proceeded in sections. We started at the front of the room with Mike's framing, then moved back section by section. Everything was framed 16" on center to since fiberglass batting insulation was the final layer of the "keep it comfortable" cake. In all, I'd estimate it took about 20 rolls of the pink insulation shown in the photo. This combined with the foam boards should give an effective insulation level of about R-16. It's not as much as I'd like, but it was a compromise between depth of framing I was willing to accept and the need for a better resilience to outside temperatures.

As we moved around the room, the outer corners presented the greatest challenge. These were handled through some clever use of bolts, hope, and clever construction conceived by Mike. The two spots that were intended to be skylights had already been marked off on the wall and cut out, so framing proceeded around them, allowing us to completely circle the room without too much trouble. The photo to the right also nicely illustrates the technique we used to fix the foamboard to the framing, then put the whole piece up all at once.

Once we got around to the corner where the bathroom would be built, we switched over to framing the interior walls with 2x6" boards, since these would have different demands put on them than simple insulation: plumbing!

The added wrinkle of having to plan for plumbing really stretched my mind more than I expected it to. Not only did we have to get the boards dimensionally correct, they had to be pre-cut to allow the large diameter waste pipe to run through them. Since this was roughly a 3" hole, it was cut with a jigsaw on each board, and the walls were stick-built, rather than framed all in large sections. This wasn't a big sacrifice, but you can see from the shim-work at the top of the boards that it was an inexact science to get this wall built. It didn't turn out too badly, and a little bit of shim-work on the face of the boards got the wall structure all in plane and all was well.

The rest of the bathroom walls went up without much drama. By this time, I had gotten the solid-surface shower pan ordered and shipped in, so we used that to help size the bathroom enclosure and got through the work nicely! The only thing I'd change about the way we did this section would be to only use 2x4" boards to frame the doorway - neither Mike nor I realized that the 2x6" would complicate our lives since the pre-hung door was too shallow for the wall we had built. It's nothing that a little trim won't hide, but I think we both had a forehead smacking moment when we realized it.

Like a Moth to a Frame
Once the bathroom framing was finished-ish, the only major framing work to be done was to hang the ceiling framing. This was not particularly well documented work, since we were ready to end the framing-phase, and not too many photos were taken. It's sort of a shame, since it involved a water level (exotic!), and a lot of standing around scratching our heads why our water level didn't agree with our eyes (...more likely the other way around). However, the ceiling boards went up rather successfully, and that's all you'll get out of me on those.

Coming up next post... the basics of plumbing with copper and PVC, and the first skylight is installed! Very exciting stuff, and is that a light at the end of the tunnel?!

...

(It turned out it was not a light at the end of the tunnel. It was just afternoon sunlight coming in for the first time through the skylight. There is much work to go!)

Demolition Man

What was up... Must come down.
In order to get going on the project, the first step was clearly to do some demolition work. There were bits of plaster that were coming down from the ceiling, and damage around the windows on either side of the room. First, a study of those windows. Mike identified the need to fix up these windows and generously volunteered to do this repair. The photo on the left is during demolition phase, which included removing loose plaster, and removing the old counterweights from the original windows. Closing up these voids and sealing up around the windows would help with air infiltration when all was buttoned up, and this falls in the category of "doing things the right way." In order to not give Mike nearly enough credit for his careful work, I've quickly posted another photo with the work completed that will seem like it took no time at all. He meticulously repaired and patched this and I'm sure it will last for generations! The photo on the right shows it all closed up and finished. He was even careful enough to get a nice surface finish, despite the 11" or so of wall we would build out from it, and 2 layers of insulation that would eventually cover it. If anyone ever has the bad taste to re-do our work, they'll be delighted by our forethought!

You will no doubt also notice the plaster missing from the ceiling area. This is what we in the hlogging business call a "segue." Mike got a start on the plaster removal one day while I was at work. He showed me his method for bringing down the plaster and lath underneath, making sure that I took careful note of the finer points. Once he was sure I was fully aware of the method, he informed me that this was to be my first big responsibility!

The process of bringing down plaster is deceptively simple. The original plan was to shove the slim end of a pry-bar under a tiny bit of plaster, and take tiny chunks of plaster in hand, then throw them into the bag before they could hit the floor and create lots of plaster dust. This plan was rubbish. The need to go back and pry off the lath underneath roughly doubled the work involved, so the improved plan was to start by pulling off lath, and pull the chunks of plaster down as they came (more easily this way than the previous anyway!)

With this new method, I began to make satisfying progress and cut through the work much quickly. It was extraordinarily messy work, and incredibly unpleasant. The main reason why this should be so laced with suffering is what was on the other side of the wood lath: about 115 years of coal dust. Sure, most of that was deposited there in the first 25 years or so, but the Industrial Revolution's vestiges made themselves known with each piece of ceiling I brought down. This put a fine black dust all over, well... my entire house. Fortunately, I had the realization how hilarious it would be to laugh at my misfortune. See if you can see why I might complain about this work from looking at the next photo. This picture is not quite in strict chronology, but it documented the last day that I suffered through coal dust. You can see the area where my safety glasses covered, as well as my respirator. It's important to note, of course, that I'm not wearing a black long-sleeve shirt for the photo. That was the end result of a night upstairs working on plaster removal. Basically - a pretty awful task. You can see how happy I was to know I was done with it.

Next Up...
I gloss over a bit more prep work (e.g. caulking windows and such), and we start talking about framing!

Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance!

Getting Things Started

Before jumping in with both feet, Mike and I decided to get plans together for the room. Lots of measurements were taken, and I took advantage of a being tired of my extraordinarily busy social life to put together plans of the existing shell. We used this as a basis to draw up ideas and sketch some layouts.

These were invaluable since we could print off as many of these as we wanted, and they were pre-dimensioned and to scale. We could also use this to draw in the different plans - electrical, plumbing, framing, electrical again, plumbing once more... and so on. I drew these up using Microsoft Visio, which was fairly easy to learn quickly, and is pre-loaded with lots of useful shapes including windows, plumbing fixtures, etc. That way, I could get layouts prototyped quickly on the computer, as well as print off the base image to draw on.



I've got one example of a very early proposed layout. At a certain point, of course, it was important to start building and see what shape the room wanted to take. This is a strange concept: the shape the room wants to take. I learned it from Mike, and was at first very dubious. The idea of the room telling me the next step to take really seemed foreign, but it was shocking how true it is - once a basic framework was up, it seemed very obvious how one idea or another was logical. I think of this as rapid prototyping - you can't decide whether or not a ceiling height feels low until you're standing under it, so these plans evolved rapidly as we started to build. So, for historical curiosity, check out an early idea I sketched out:



However, the one item that was key for planning was the plumbing for the bathroom. In the plans above, the shower was very much unworkable - it would have projected into the room a lot more than the drawing indicates. Similarly, the toilet was going to be in a strange place with some window visibility. We didn't realize much of this until after we started prototyping-building Taking some of these thoughts into account, Mike drew up proposed plumbing plans by hand that were more detailed and based on code. I know I have other and more close to current drawings, but these are the ones I have handy for now. When I get electronic copies of the other ones, I'll do a catch-up post to share them out.

Next Up!
The first photos of construction!

Design Help Needed!

Which of these lights is better for putting on either side of a bathroom vanity? Decor for the bathroom is fairly modern/simple... Comment and let me know!

Choice 1 - Black with Chrome Accents, Frosted Inner Glass, Clear outer



Choice 2 - Brushed Aluminum with White Shade

The Reason for the Treason

Now that my loyal and expansive readership is well-versed in the house's character, charm, and idiosyncrasies, it's time to kick off a series of posts detailing the first major project (lots of painting excluded).

Third Floor Beginnings
In December 2007, I started to consider the prospect of touching up the third floor and making it a bit more livable. A friend was considering moving in from out of town in a few months and was interested in a room to rent, and I was starting to think that I was wasting 1/3rd of my house. At the same time, my friend Mike was interested in working on a project like this, and had both expertise and talent. We agreed that he would be the project leader, and we would collaborate on the design and build that laid ahead. Before anyone could call it home, it would be necessary to remedy the arctic tundra that formed up there each winter. After herding the caribou and plowing the snowdrifts off the floor, some photos were taken.

Looking toward the front of the house, we have a reasonable size window obscured by a window air conditioner, the only climate control available on the floor. Take note of the angles of the ceiling/walls here - these presented lots of challenges over the course of the project. The plaster around this area was all in pretty great shape, and the woodwork was pretty good as well, although plenty dirty. Wires were all run on top of the baseboards with simple plastic covering over top. Lighting was plentiful and fluorescent.

Standing in the area of the above photograph and looking back and to the right shows a bit of a different story. The fencing surrounds the stairs to the second floor. Plaster is falling down on the back wall slope, and was patched with spray foam insulation installed by Elliott (best tenant ever). More wiring surface mounted in plastic channels. There's a fairly nice window at the top of the stairs, a tiny bit of natural light. The floors look pretty decent in this picture, and with a little work could look great. The green is the chimney, which previous owners/tenants painted. Yeah, it's strange... who knows?


I saved The Bathroom for last, since other than thermal insulation, it was most at fault for spurring on the renovation. The photo is taken from the same spot, looking now toward the back left of the room. Other than a distinct lack of privacy, or even completed walls, the key feature here is that everything is built up on a 2x6" riser, bringing a low ceiling even closer to the head of anyone who had to visit the loo. It's hard to believe that this is significantly worse than it looks in photos, but it was a constant risk of head injury to be in the bathroom area here. Once we started the delicate surgery to disassemble the room, the limits were further visible.

I couldn't quite find a photo that illustrated these limitations cleanly, but notice how each of the important fixtures (toilet, tub, and sink) were positioned exactly in the wrong places. The sink was in the back left corner, which meant that any attempt to lean in for a tooth-brushing required wearing a helmet. The toilet had excellent visibility into the neighbor's house, and vice versa. The bathtub wasn't quite as bad, but was set up to be a shower that was as head-threatening as the rest of the room. All in all, the most redeeming feature of this work was that someone other than me had hauled the lumber and plywood up to this point. This was all disassembled in short order.

To be fair to the previous laborers, the reason for elevating the bathroom was a valid one. The floor joists for this room run from one side of the house to the other exactly perpendicular to what's shown on this platform. This meant that they did not have the option of pulling up some of the floor and running plumbing below to get it back to the main plumbing stack. Their solution was laid bare when the plywood was taken off of the platform: both their supply lines and waste lines ran under here, as well as electrical feeds. We didn't know how we would accomplish this without raising things up, but we knew there had to be a way. Cleverness would be needed.

After disassembling the last vestiges of the bathroom, we knew the first order of business would be to put up framing to hold the insulation that would make the room livable, but in order to get started on that project, we would have to know a rough plan for the room, and attack any elements of the room that would get in our way.

Next up - planning a new space!