Say Uncle (Day 334)

Remember when you were a kid and someone had you in a half Nelson, telling you to "Say Uncle." Well, we said uncle this week on the dreaded shingles. With about 28 bundles (3000 shingles) left to dip, Nancy and I decided to finish off the master bedroom part of the house with dippers and then hang and spray the remainder of cedar shingles on the upper backside of the house, were no one will ever see them (from the road).

So this week, I've been banging them up, post haste and she's started to dip a couple bundles to complete the bedroom area. Today I'll finish the S & E sides of the second story part of the house, and will just have the big kahuna gable section left (N side). This is the part of the house that rises 27' above ground level (yikes). The upper shingled part of the gable is 48 ft wide and 13 ft high, so it will take about 350 sq. ft of shingles (about 14 bundles). So, it looks like I might have miscalculated on my original shingle purchase, having bought 80 bundles but only needing about 70. No worries, the little tool shed that we'll build out back in a couple of years will have Hardiboard below and shingles above, so that will eat up 200 sq. ft of shingles (8 bundles). As you might recall, the singles were my first GOOD DEAL, having bought them directly from a mill in Forks, WA, about 100 miles west of us.

Last Tuesday we made another foray into the big city (Seattle) in search of a slab of travertine for the 3 bathroom vanities. This should have been easy, but wasn't. I was keen on getting a banded travertine that had some character, but most slabs were looking like Melba toast to me. Went to Dal Tile, Michelangelo's (were we bought the kitchen slabs), Oregon Marble and Tile, Pental, and finally Meta Granite and Marble. By the time we arrive at Meta, we were pretty worn out and had decided that maybe we'd have to use another rock type. Then bingo, we found just what we wanted and it was the cheapest we'd priced all the day. Some times this stuff just works out, if you're persistent.

Our fabricator (Richerts) called in for sizes and prices and actually told me what the rock cost to them! The 2 cm thick (3/4 inch) slabs were $18/sq ft and the 3 cm (1 1/4 inch) slabs were $22/sq ft in polished form. That equates to about $980 for the 3-cm slab, plus the governors tariff (8.4%). The total bill for vanity tops will be about $2400, which breaks down to be $980 for rock, $750 for three sink cutouts, $475 for cutting and polishing 7 edges (21 linear ft), and about $195 in tax. Some where in this breakdown is overhead and a charge for picking up the rock in Seattle. Its a nearly 300 mile round trip that they typically make once a week to pick up a dozen slabs. In terms of fabrication costs, it works out to about $30/sq ft for the slab, whereas the rock is about $22/sq ft. Travertine and marble is soft and easy to work, so these costs may be relatively low compared to "granite" (all igneous and metamorphic rocks).

If you're looking for cheap granite counter tops, you can buy prefabricated ones (25" x 96") that are manufactured in China and India. Home Depot, Lowes, and others sell these, but then you still need to have someone do the cutouts and cut them to size. Nevertheless, this is how you get rectangular granite counter tops for $50/sq ft rather than at the more common installed prices of $100-$150/sq ft.

Hanging Rock (Day 330)

Now I'm not talking about Picnic at Hanging Rock, the novel by Australian author Joan Lindsay and a 1975 movie directed by Peter Weir. The story is of a group of schoolgirls who mysteriously vanish after being drawn toward a mysterious rock formation in Australia in 1900. Geology Rules.

I'm talking about the process of getting drywall up and attached to our ceilings and walls. Nancy and I've done this before (in an amateur way) for our old house in Denver and one house was enough. Professionals that do this have special tools such as stilts, drywall jacks, and scaffolding that make it easier, but its still no picnic.

Evergreen Products of Sequim delivered 16,000 sq. ft of drywall (aka rock; roughly 320 sheets) to the house yesterday (Wed). Two scrawny guys and two big trucks. In 2 hours, they hand packed the rock to various rooms and stood it up according to usage. 5/8" on the ceilings and 1/2" on the walls, all in 12 ft long sheets. Since the walls are 9 ft tall, they supplied 54" wide drywall so you only have one seem along the middle of the walls (2 x 54"= 9'). Rock for the second story rooms (garage loft and second bedroom) were delivered back in June before we put the last windows in place (see blog Day 236). For those keeping track of our declining nickel jar, the drywall job was bid at about $17,500 or roughly $1/sq ft with $1500 of that going to application of light texture and priming all rock with a vapor barrier paint. An alternate way of calculating the square footage cost is that the house is about 2700 sq. ft, the garage and loft are about 1200 sq. ft, and the basement is about 750 sq. ft. This adds up to 4650 sq. ft of drywalled space, or about $3.50 per sq. ft.

The rockers (not to be confused with Led Zeppelin) say it'll take 5 days to do the house, basement, garage, and loft. They start with the lids (ceilings), putting up the 5/8" rock first. These 4' x 12' sheets weigh about 75 pounds each, so they are tough to lift and position. This is where the drywall lift comes in. John, the big guy, says that this device alone has saved him a lot of back aches and allowed him to keep hanging drywall at 45 when he should have quit 10 years ago. Bob, the small guy, does most of the cutting on the ground, whereas John is the fastener. They tack the sheet in with a couple of drywall nails, then use a drywall gun (power screw driver with special bit) to secure the sheet it to the ceiling or wall. They told me they're getting $0.18 per sq. ft, which equates to about $9 per large sheet or about $3000 for the whole hanging job

The finishers, which in a caste system would be several notches higher than the hangers, will take about the same time to make it all smooth. So for now, it looks like we should have a White House on the inside by about the first of Oct. The hardwood flooring should sit inside at ambient temperature and moisture for at least two weeks, preferably longer. Meanwhile, Fredricks Appliances wants to offload our stuff ASAP, which means after the garage drywall is finished and before the driveway gets poured.

We've reoccupied the garage for the shingle dipping ceremonies. Nancy hasn't dipped one in two weeks and is starting to act surely; surely a sign of her addition to dipping.

All of these issues makes moving in by Halloween more of a trick than a treat.

Airtight and insultated (Day 325)

The Wooden Boat Festival was great; Bill Hart and Steve Cooley should have been here. Steve, I know you have an affinity for plastic boats, but there were some pretty wooden ones here, especially some former racing boats that had been restored to Bristol conditions. However, I digress from the business at hand. We're airtight (not uptight) and insulated—hurray!

At the last minute I realized we hadn't plumbed in a water line to the refrigerator for ice making. However, with Pex tubing this is a cinch. I got an outlet box from my plumber, nailed and screwed it to the wall behind the refrigerator alcove, then cut the waterline in the crawl space, below. Put in a T fitting, ran 5 ft of 1/2" Pex through the joists and up through the sill plate. Used the Pex tool and voilà, we had water to the fridge. If city and county building codes (like Colorado) don't allow this type of water piping, someone is trying to protect plumbers and their unions.

Still putting major time in on the exterior of the house. Nancy has been painting the garage doors (two coats, two colors) on days its not too hot, and I'm up on the roof doing some final detailing. I bolted on the remaining Corbels gabled dormers on the upstairs) and have been painting them and the facia in preparation for gutters. The gutters are formed on site (rolled out through a form) from prepainted aluminium, and the downspouts come in 10 ft long sections. I have one estimate from Giraffe Gutters (good name) for $875. This is for 180 ft of gutter, 50 ft of downspouts and some offsets. This works out to about $5 a foot installed, which seems reasonable since I paid about the same in Colorado six years ago. I need another estimate to be sure, but two of the three companies I called haven't responded (people need work now, right?).

The drywall guys are next, so there won't be much to write about for a while. Franks Feltes daughter should be in the house on Wednesday putting paper on the floors to shield the Warmboard from drywall mud. When they finish hanging the rock the rooms next week, they'll finally have their final form, which should be interesting since we've been looking at the skeleton since March.

Chimney going up, insulation going in (Day 322)

So the weekend ended pretty well. Wayne the Mason (Franks former assistant, now the main rock layer) showed up at 7:30! with a helper and up they went to start the chimney facing. They loved the big platform we built, so they mixed up some mortar and put the scratch coat on the wire mesh. By noon they had about 1/4 of the chimney finished and broke for lunch. They worked til 3 pm, and promised to be back bright and early on Saturday (today). So far so good, with an expected completion either today or Monday.

Meanwhile Tracy's insulation guys (Floyd and Brian) showed up at 8 am (early) and off-loaded as much insulation as they could pack in their 16 ft van. They started up stairs with the bedroom and stuffed every little crook and nanny with fiberglass batts. They almost finished up there (except for some 3.5 in sound barrier insulation) and started on the downstairs. They couldn't work the weekend (a funeral, yeah sure) but will be back on Monday and finish it the job on Tuesday. If all goes well, we'll have the insulation inspection and Pex pressure test on that afternoon or Wednesday am, and start the big drywall job. This will take about 4 days to hang and 4 days to tape and finish, so for now the target for a white house is Sept. 28th. Meanwhile, Nancy and I are back to shingles, painting, and prepping the driveway for concrete (after drywall).

Sometimes you have to be an asshole (Day 321)

With reference to our subcontractor problems (previous blog), sometimes you have to be an asshole to get results. So here is the headcount on these jerks:

The mason is a week late. Said he had a family emergency. Turns out he had to go to sin city (Vegas) to straighten out his sisters son who is a druggie and alcoholic. He's back in PT and says he'll start tomorrow. All is well, maybe.

The insulation guy went AWOL. But is was worse than that. I went down to the HS football field and side wiped him. Between coaching plays I approached him with "when are you going to get going on my insulation, blah, blah blah. He let me stew for about 20 minutes (football practice is too important to interrupt I guess), then fessed up that he'd gone out of business over the weekend. At least I got a straight answer. Seems like the bills piled up, and he owed the State money for something, so they revoked his license and his company was toast.

The septic guy got over the flu and showed up this morning on time. Finished off the job in a couple hours and hauled off his little blue backhoe, which should make the neighbors happy (it was actually a cute little machine). Invoice is pending.

The electrician came by, unexpected, and wired the exhaust fan for Nancy's 900 cfm (hair sucking) exhaust hood over the Wolf range top. Took an hour ($70) and he'd outta there for a while (cover plates, switches, etc are next, much of which I'll do).

There is good news however. I got two insulation estimates this morning. The old (bankrupt) one was for about $6700 for the entire house. So a guy from Bremerton came up (Richard Gifford contact) and walked through the house. Seemed ok, but found several places where things were complicated. He worked up the estimate and agreed that he could start in two days. $7700 ($1000 more than anticipated). The second insulation company (Tracy's) has done a bunch of Kala Point houses and was recommended by a local builder, Kelly Shields. Tracy (himself) showed up quick as a bunny (they are still hungry for jobs) and went through the same routine. However, his company is much bigger (2 vs 17 employees) and it was a routine job for him. Can start tomorrow (Friday), will take 3 days, and wanted $5950. Sold. We're good for drywall after an inspection on or about Wednesday. So, my guy goes AWOL, I lose a week of construction time, but I save about $750, which will be sucked up faster an a dust bunny in a Hoover, on some other unanticipated job. Cheers, I'm getting a beer.

The Sub-Contractor Blues (Day 320)

One of the most-heard remarks about being your own contractor is the problems you can have with subcontractors showing up or on time. So far this hasn't been a real issue because we were on a slow and flexible schedule. But when you need to make hay, do you think the sun would shine—NO.

We passed our inspection hurdles last week (Wed afternoon), so I called Dan (D&D insulation) and let him know we were ready to go on Thursday am. The key thing here is that we have to get the insulation inspected before the drywall goes on, so that starts to form a little chain of events. No inspections on Fridays.

Meanwhile, Frank the drywaller is hiring additional crew for our job (its been slow to date) and he'd also like to go shoot something to eat this fall (they call it hunting). He needs to schedule delivery of the drywall from Evergreen Products in Sequim. No big deal, but it can't be there when the insulators are working and you can't hang drywall if its not there.

To complicate matters a bit more, Richard Gifford the septic guy seems to have lost his phone. Last week he said he might be out on Sunday (Labor Day weekend) to finish the trench filling and regrading. Then someone might have mentioned the possibility of a long weekend, so that plan went up in smoke (no pun intended). Now its Thursday and two of my 3 current subs are AWOL, and the 3rd is chomping at the bit to get going.

On a positive note, the Ellis boys finished the soffit and are off the job with the exception of hanging the entry door between the garage and mudroom. I want to leave this off until all the big stuff is in the house, like appliances and furniture. I'm back up on the scaffolding hanging shingle nos. 4300-4500 this week on the gabled dormers. Having fun now.

The Wooden Boat Festival is this weekend, so I'm hoping for a little down time and boat gawking. I'll leave my checkbook at home.

Ellis boys to the rescue (Day 318)

Troy and Gary Ellis came by as promised to help on the vexing soffit. I had installed about 100 ft of it, but had another 150 ft to go and it wasn't going to happen very fast. They showed up on Tuesday and worked most of the week, so the job should be finished next week (Tuesday). Gary cuts and Troy fits and nails. The soffit has two forms. 1) is the gable section, which consists of 2 ft tongue and groove cedar that butts directly into the house. This is pretty easy to lay up. The other form (2) runs parallel to the house and slopes upward. First you nail up a 3" wide board, then a 2" section of screen for air movement. This is followed by four tongue and groove boards, the last of which is a real bitch to fit into place. The gap has to be <1/4" wide or the shingles won't cover it. Then there are several places where the two soffit types collide at compound angles. Then add a half dozen corbels, one of which is 27 ft in the air and you have a recipe for disaster (on my part). I haven't seen the bill yet, but they worked 9 weeks on the house with a helper which netted out at about $5k per week. I suspect that's what it will take to finish the soffit, corbels, and a few other finish framing details.

While all this was going on I busied myself with finishing the speaker layout, installing the hood fan (with Levi Ross), putting in the gutter drainage lines (4" pipe), adding blocking for toilet paper holders, wall mounted TVs, and hold bars in the showers. Oh yeah, I also spent 2 hours installing a fire stop in the chimney chase. If I had been about half my size and a contortionist it would have been a lot faster and easier, but I'm neither of those things.

This weekend and Labor Day will be spent cleaning out the house for the insulators and drywallers. The insulation should go in on Tues-Thursday and the drywall starting on Friday. I figure about 4-5 days to lay the drywall, and an equal amount of time to tape and mud it. Frank the Drywaller said we have 16,000 sq. ft of drywall, which equates to 333 sheets of 4'x12' drywall and about a mile (5,300 ft) of taping!