Interior Doors (Day 425)

This weekend, Brian (my right-hand man now) and I took a whack at hanging the interior doors for the house. First chore was to figure out what door went where, but after some shuffling we got them in the right spots. A couple surprises though. One of exterior-type doors (air tight) for the staircase was hinged to open the wrong way (our fault, didn't catch it on the order) as well as the door to the upstairs bathroom. Seems like we went over this list a dozen times with Melissa at Carl's. Anyway, we'll use the exterior door at the top of the staircase, where we were waiting to see if we needed one (yes). For the bathroom door, we can order a frame only and still use the glass door. In addition, we still need a door for the basement utility room and a door for the mudroom coat closet, which I added at the expense of an overly large sauna just before drywall went in, and after our original door order (May). In addition, the master bedroom door came with a flawed door stop on the frame (one piece) so it has to be returned to Carls and reordered.

Anyway, Brian and I hung 6 doors on Saturday (one per hour) and another 4 on Sunday, which included two glass doors (pantry and guest bath). Hanging doors isn't rocket science (thank god), but you have to be careful to get them square and level so they look good and aren't self closers (ghost doors). Typically, we started by tack nailing the hinge jamb to the opening, then leveling it vertically with shims. Then we squared up the door by closing it and checking the reveal (space) between the door and the jambs (header and sides). If this looked good, we shimmed up the other jamb (non-hinge side), and shot a couple of 2" nails to secure it. Then we'd nail the jambs at the hinges with 12 penny (2.5" nails) and replace one of the screws on each hinge with a long square drive (3") screw that goes all the way into the framing, thus securing the door and allowing for some further adjustment (via the long screw). Finally, we'd nail off the non-hinge jamb, set all the nails and putty her up.

After all this was done, we removed the glass doors and stored them in a safe place. We're done with doors for now; still have to hang 6 more when we get all the right parts. After lunch, we knocked out the Hardi backer board for the upstairs bathroom. I had all the material, but wasn't anxious to get down on my hands and knees and screw this stuff down. So, I mixed and spread the cement and Brian did the screwing. More appropriate task for him—he isn't 40 yet and can still get up and down without too much groaning.

We got an unexpected call from our counter-top installer on Sunday am. I thought it was the Church pastor calling, but we got lucky instead. John Richert from Sequim called and said he had a job crater that was scheduled for next week and needed to find something to do for his guys in the shop on Monday. So since all the kitchen and master bath cabinets were set, he came over and measured for the counters. In the old days (like the 20th century), the fabricator would come over with thin strips of wood and a hot glue gun and make templates for the tops. Now days, they use a laser device that sits on the counter or island. After it gets leveled (automatically), the operator takes a stylus out of pivoting arm and pulls it to various points on the cabinet top. (For Tony, this is basically a variety of laser theodolite.) The machine measures all three dimensions (vertical, E, N) for each point, then creates a map of the counter top. Then you drop the sinks in their correct locations and map them out. In about an hour, John had the L-shaped perimeter counter top mapped out, then did the island with a tape measure (its a simple rectangle with 1.5" overhang), and moved into the bathroom. This counter top is a three piece job, so he did it the old way but used firm plastic strips (not wood) and an acetate super glue. Fast, clean, and permanent. He says they'll cut the slabs early this next week, and do the install later in the week. If all goes well, we'll have counters by Friday (Jan. 8th). Woosh.