Our Painting's Time has Come

Last week we received a letter we'd been dreading for awhile. Our village has a Property Standards department, and every few years they take a "neighborhood walk" and cite homes that are in violation of miscellaneous dangers such as missing downspouts, rotted wood, missing handrails, garages in need of repair, missing address numbers, and improper parking surfaces (e.g. your lawn).

Well, what did they find when they came around to Humphrey House? A Violation waiting to happen! Yes, our poor, hapless paint has seen much better days. While I don't have any closeup photos of our currently dire straits, there are many posts from the past with photos that give you an idea. We've known all along that painting was going to be inevitable - Jen even created some super neat color scheme ideas when we first moved in. But now its official:

"Scrape/paint the wood members on the home, fascia, soffit, trim, and front entrance. Reinspection: August"

Gulp. So now its back to the color drawing board. In fact we ordered a book specifically focused on bungalow exterior colors. This looks like an involved project with a quick timeline, and we may have to call in some professionals. Maybe we can even find some stucco-friendly and eco-friendly exterior paints for Humphrey House's facelift.

What, THIS failed inspection?

Last week we had our final electrical inspection for our upstairs renovation, which the inspector promptly informed us that we failed before setting foot upstairs. Why? Well, while we had grown quite comfortable with the messy hole in our hallway ceiling and light fixture from repairing the upstairs floors, it seems newcomers to HumphreyHouse just don't have that same affinity.

But after convincing him that this was all part of another project (Kitchen reconfiguration), he reluctantly went upstairs. Where he failed us anyway. Lessons learned:

• If you run low-voltage wire (speaker, phone, cable), be sure it is "routed" cleanly and anchored every 3 feet.


• There are rules for closet lighting. Basically use a globe-style florescent, not a regular incandesent bulb. Incidently, laundry rooms don't have this requirement.


• Have supporting documentation from previous inspections at and to produce evidence if requested.

Take two of the electrical inspection will be Thursday, along with our final plumbing inspection and even the HVAC / Building inspection. Here's hoping for an occupancy permit!

Stop the press - before they catch on fire!

So we're passing a big hurdle in the way of renovating our bungalow attic. The last month or two have dragged on as we did a lot of the finish framing, and the insulation. My god, the insulation. No wonder contractors bidded it out so high. Dirty, time consuming work that never seemed to end. At least it was cooler as winter approached.

But significantly, we're about ready to have a drywall crew come in and cover up the walls at long last. We just needed to have the inspectors come by once more, for an insulation inspection. This is to verify that we actually did put the right levels in the building before closing up the walls. Initially, he liked what he saw - R19 in the kneewalls, and R38(!) in the ceilings. So we passed. Almost.

The insulation also includes a firestopping inspection, which requires a ASTM-rated caulkto be applied around openings between floors (conduit , plumbing, speaker wire, etc.) I know Mark's getting excited, but this is a special type of caulk that, when exposed to high
temperatures or direct fire, releases water vapor and forms a solid char and retards the spread
of fire. Otherwise, a fire on the floor below can get sucked up through the wall cavity like its a chimney. Plus, I got to caulk more over the weekend!

So anyway, today we got the official approval for the firestopping, and we're almost ready to move on. A few final pre-drywall punchlist items this weekend, and we'll be having 65 sheets of drywall dropped off before Monday.

Plumbing, Take 2

Well, I now feel like I could act as a plumbing consultant (at least for OP village code) to ensure that everything comes into compliance. Educational experts always say that the best way to learn is through failure. Well, that's what happened to us, along with a whole lot of extra work. Good thing we had the extra time from a holiday weekend.

We started off by demolishing (yet another) wall in our kitchen to expose the cast iron pipe. The old vertical stack needed to be replaced since we were cutting out a section of it below. That was a bear of a job, but a special chain pipe cutter that John brought made the job easier. Unfortunately, in order to remove the old stack, we also had to replace the 1st floor bath toilet drain which was molded into the old cast iron pipe. Of course, in order to fully reach that, we had to drop one of our HVAC supply ducts in the basement. Then we were finally able to start chiseling out the old drain, which was embedded in the 3-4 inches of concrete "subflooring" under our first floor bathroom. It's hard to convey just how hard this whole process was in words, and, sadly I did not take any photos before the cast iron was removed. But the whole process took the better part of Saturday, if that gives you any idea. By the time the pipe was out, we had just enough time to run the new PVC pipe from the basement upstairs, and reconnect our toilet.

As you can see, things started to get messy and complicated in the basement utility room with all the PVC pipes from upstairs connecting in to the stack.

After failing our inspection last week, we learned we could purchase a copy of local building code amendments for "a nominal fee". Turns out that it is only $5.00! Well worth the investment, and something I wish we'd known of earlier. It will definitely come in handy as it contains the amendments for ALL building codes, not just plumbing.

So on Monday, we moved on upstairs and rerouted all of our "improper" venting in the attic. We did this early in the morning (8am!), which fortunately turned out to be relatively cool up in the attic while it was raining. By the time the showers passes, it was noon, and we had completed everything except pushing the pipe through the roof (finished later that afternoon).

Then it was down to the basement, where we were able to devise a monstrous maze of piping. (photo coming soon) Why so complicated? In order to make sure every little nit-picky thing that we could be failed for was taken care of so there was no chance of failing the inspection again.

And guess what, when the inspector came at 10:30 this morning, he was very pleased to see everything was so well done and completed correctly. So, now we can continue with flooring and framing!

The Finish Line (level 1)

After a few months of detours, lost paths, and pit stops we have finally reached our first real milestone. Something is finally done. Actually, an entire level of our house!

The basement has reached the final stage (sans decorating), and we even have the official approval inspection from the city building inspector! Wee!!! There was a slight problem when the electrical inspector noticed that there was no grounding wire jumping over the water meter, but realizing that we're doing the work ourselves, he gave us a stiff lecture and an approval. We have it fixed now though [picture]

Sara helped Jen again by putting on an extra coat of paint. Jay had to come back from thanksgiving early to finish off various trim details, but the extra work over the weekend has paid off. The place looks sharp, except where the floor level varied so much that there are gaping crevices under the trim. Not the levelest floor in America, but we'll take it! Just caulk it! (I'm kidding, mark :)

We've got our movers coming in today to bring back our furniture that has been forgotten since we left our condo in July.

View final pictures (pre-furniture)

Rough Inspection #2

Insulation inspection this morning. Although the inspector was an hour late, he was very apologetic and was at Humphrey House all of 5 minutes. "Looks good. You just need to put some insulation up in the joist bays along the outside walls." So, PASS!

Now Menards is dropping off 60 sheets of drywall later today. Hopefully we'll have walls by Monday!

Rough Inspection #1

The last inspection we had was in mid-March, when the inspector and the structural engineer for the village came out to ensure that our new post footings were dug to the proper depth of 18". During that visit they freaked out when they noticed other things that were not being done properly at the time. Such as glass block windows installed without a header (even though we just put inside an existing opening).

We barely ended up passing, but ever since we have been very concerned that any other inspection would be very scrutinizing and they would be looking for every little detail to fail us. So before the rough inspections, Jay took Jen through on a mock role-play pointing out and asking questions about every possible thing that they might have a problem with so she would be thoroughly prepared.

The first inspector to show up was the electrical guy. Fortunately, he is on the board of directors at Jen's former employer so they immediately had a good rapport. He took his time going through the place, but was encouraging in general and had offered some advice. His main concern was the high placement of outlets along the outside wall (due to concrete). He said if there was a problem he would call Jay later that day. And, the phone never rang. So, PASS.

The second inspector was the same guy who came out before on the footing inspection. Jen was tense, but this guy clearly had a much busier schedule in the middle of building season. His arrival and departure both included cell phone conversations. His total time present looking at everything from post installation to window headers to wall framing and everything took about three minutes. His only comments were "You'll have to have me back for an insulation inspection before you drywall" Okay. And, "You're not going to use any of these rooms as a bedroom, right?" No. Of course not! PASS.

Now we breath a collective sigh of relief. 72 hours of last minute cramming to desperately earn a passing grade... reminded us a little of college. And now, we can begin preparing for the final examination.

Today's deadline

We worked like mad the last five days... spending Independance Day weekend putting the finishing touches on our place in preparation for the building inpection today (Wednesday). Of course we had great help as usual from our family - Jen's dad Ken, Scott, and Jay's grandpa all came by to help us get things finalized.

Now everything will go under the magnifying glass as Jen leads the inspectors through our basement to check out the HVAC, framing, and electrical roughing. Keep your fingers crossed until 1:30... Will we clear this hurdle?

Stop! it's the Zoning Police

Well that didn't take long.

The village's Zoning Administrator promptly called at 8:30 this morning right after he got to work to let us know the plans we submitted were incomplete. Apparently since we we want to change the outside shell of the building by constructing a dormer, we need to submit before and after drawings of both the North and West elevations! ARgle bargle.

It won't be too difficult, but it will be tedious. Especially to get all the measurements. Woo hoo! Should be a fun weekend!

Actually, we've recruited friends to help demo the basement ceiling (lath and plaster) since we're going to need to sister all the joists in there to give the floors more support and a better solid feeling. So Scott, Sara, and Mike are coming over tomorrow to wreck things.

In the meantime, we had two (2) inspectors over today. One was the insurance inspector, who basically just needed to take a picture of the electrical panel and the furnace. Odd, but it was over quick.

Then came Rick, the village construction inspector for a pre-construction inspection. He gave some good pointers for remodeling the basement and reinforcing the main structural beam in the basement, as well as tips for the dormer addition. Perhaps best of all was his encouragement to add the kitchen remodel into the scope of work now rather than later. I'll ask the village about that when I resubmit the blueprints (with elevations) next week.