Concrete and Epoxy

This was a very productive weekend! After speaking with Iowa Paint, I determined that it would be better to let them do the concrete floor overlay in the "main" basement because the cost was low and they could do it in probably 1/4 the time of me, as well as with a 2 part epoxy which is about as good/strong as it gets for coatings.

My always reliable helper... Dad, came over and helped me prep, clean and paint the rest of the brick curb around the basement perimeter. After we did that we vacuumed the basement and
Darren from Iowa Paint came over around 9 to put on the first coat of epoxy. It took him about 3 hours and looked excellent. It got pretty toxic down there so we had to shut off the furnace gas and leave the premises after awhile.

While Darren was working on the floor epoxy, Dad and I worked in the laundry room. I busted up much of the existing slab... in effect, turning it into a gravel rubble. I beat all of this flat and we spread out some bonding compound over the surface with a brush. We cut some 2x4' lengths and tapcon screwed them into the existing slab (that's a special screw to be used for concrete.) After these were in, we used the large tub I bought to begin mixing 80lb. bags of 5000psi Quikrete. We poured the W and E walls and got them trowelled off by mid afternoon. I watched lots of basketball after that.

Today (Sunday) we returned to finish the floor (almost.) Darren also showed up and completed the 2nd coat on the floor which went very quickly. He also left me a kit to do the laundry room floor after it cures for a month. And he left me lots of free supplies and painted the front porch as well. He was a great guy and did a lot for us that he didn't need to do. If you ever need paint, painting, supplies, etc... I will always recommend him (Iowa Paint on S. Gilbert St.) Dad and I pulled the lumber formwork and mixed 9 more bags of Quikrete. We poured in the center piece... between the two we did yesterday as well as the small square in front of the wine/beer cellar. All that is left to do is the wine/beer cellar floor once I pull the old shelves out of there. We got everything trowelled off and later, once the concrete set up a bit more, I cut some edging into the slab joints that I will fill with a high grade caulk. Things are looking good down there and we no longer have that crappy old busted up floor. In addition, i believe this will help keep radon out of the basement.

Contractor work should begin later this week. Then things will really be hopping!

GO HAWKS!

This guy is in our childbirth preparation class!

(it's Marcus Paschal for those of you who don't know... he will probably be playing in the NFL next year.)

St. Patrick's Day?... i'm German

Today I spent the day on a couple of tasks.
First off I acid-etched and rinsed 1/2 of the basement floor so that it can be epoxy coated. It took quite awhile and some scrubbing and then a lot of fan time on the wet pavement. I might be able to do some of the epoxy tomorrow. That will wrap along the floor and up the little brick curb and then the walls will be coated with UGL masonry sealant paint. The left side of the basement here will be a play area with a cool kiddie floor and the right side will be an indoor shop. There are other parts of the basement to be done later.

I also worked on the upstairs bathroom and did some demo. It's always fun to run the Sawzall as it makes you feel really man-like. Anyway, I ripped and cut, did some removals and got everything out into the foyer where i'll load it onto a truck and haul it to the dump. Under the old tub I found a poured concrete pad which i broke into bits and removed. Then I cut out the old plumbing and did some flux/solder caps to plug off the water lines until the plumber can get in and put them where we want. It's nice having everything out of the bathroom and being able to visualize things better. In addition, it lets us save money from having the contractor do the demo. The plumber will move the drain towards the outer wall where the shower floor will be and they will move the water over there as well in addition to stubbing it so that it goes upstairs to the new master bath as well. I've included a concept drawing of the types of showers we're going to put in both of the new bathrooms.

Lastly, I did some wood filler patching on the front door where I installed the new handle-set which can be sanded later. I also explored the laundry room floor and discovered it's significantly thinner than the rest of the basement floor (I think it was previously overlayed and thickened) so i've changed my plan for it. I am going to install some makeshift edge forms around the floor drain with some 2x4s and in one other spot and am going to overlay the floor with a yard of concrete which i'll screed and trowel down so it can get an epoxy coat as well. I plan on doing this next weekend. I'll make sure to get lots of good pictures of that.

More Work

Well, another weekend and more work for me. After a Friday night out with some friends, I got to work early Saturday and through the day on Sunday. It feels like I didn't get much accomplished but i'm very tired so I must have done something. I just finished some painting so it's blog time then a shower before passing out.

Saturday I worked on the Ronalds house and did a quick install of the new doorbell. Didn't put the new button on but it still works with the old one for the time being. Mostly I just wanted to get this out of the way so it's done and it took only 5 minutes. It has a very pleasant sound yet still makes Oscar go bonkers when he hears it. After finishing the doorbell I worked in the basement doing the oil stain remover in the NW corner which is where I will start the acid etching and floor epoxy once I sweep this up (it's dry and ready to go now.) Consequently, the entire house smells like a big orange because the stuff is citrus based so it's a big added plus!! I worked on replumbing the hose bibs in the laundry room, did some plumbing on the utility sink and redid the duct work on the hot water heater as well. I also finished removing all of the crappy white vinyl pebble-texture tile from the future baby's room which took forever. The smell of old cat urine at 900 degrees as I heat gunned the tiles off was stellar. As a side note, I got Oscar a new bed (Woolrich!) that he's laying in in the picture below. He loves it. After finishing all of this, i went home to our current house and cleaned up all of the ice damaged limbs in the back yard from the ice storm a bit back (see old post.) They are all at the curb for the City crews to pick up Thursday.

Today I bought Dad breakfast at Hamburg Inn and we went to Lowe's for a quick lumber run. We hit Caribou Coffee on the way home and then got to work making a laundry utility bench. By lunch time we'd completed it. We were able to use my birthday present - a DeWalt miter saw which was sweet. We got it all assembled and jig-sawed out the opening for the utility sink which I then plumbed up. The faucet is slow, however so I need to investigate the hose washers as I think they might be squished and squelching the flow rates. I have to do some fine-tuning, additional screwing and painting on the bench but it's mainly done now and functional so I have a work/cleanup area to work from. It was a fun project.

This afternoon I came home and got the first coat of "Just Ducky" Crayola-inspired yellow on 3/4 walls of the baby's room. Tomorrow I will second coat those 3 and then finish the final wall. After that we can hang the nice pictures Carrie's Mom did for us and things will be looking peachy. Dad and Kathie brought over the baby crib that Dad completed last week and I included some pictures here. We have to get the mattress for it at Target yet, but you can see how wonderful it is. We are so grateful and thankful for this wonderful gift... we absolutely love it. Dad has been nothing but generous with us, helping to make things for the baby/house and we thank him for everything. We owe him a lot of free meals and beer (at the minimum.)

More with next weekend's update...

Snap into It!

So last weekend was the big one... Sue and Dave were in town to close on the house Thursday adn then Friday I took the day off and we went to town. For three straight days I worked on the house with a ton of help from Sue and Dave. We went into the house and right off started tearing up the old carpeting. It was nasty! I don't know what kind of dust, dog-hair, cat-pee, infestation came out of it, but it gave me a whopping bad allergy attack and was pretty disgusting. Getting all of that out on the porch by Saturday was nice.

In a stroke of genius I remembered by old buddy Harold Mullinix who I called to bring over his truck. He did and backed it right up to the deck where we were able to dump everything over into it - old carpeting, old tiles, old everything. It was great. Sunday morning he came and got the truck and hauled it away to the dump. I talked to my neighbor (don't know his name yet) who was an older gentleman that reminds me of my grandpa Pilger. He said that he remembers when the carpet was put in!

Also on Friday (and again yesterday) I met with the general contractor and electrical contractors to get some estimates for a lot of things. Now we are just awaiting the damage to see what it will be. Things are rolling along. I'm sure i'll be painting, redoing the basement floor, etc... before too long.

We'll keep posting updates.