Day 256 - driving for drywall

Monday Dec 19th, 2005

Everyone is driving for the drywall. The plan is to be ready to start drywalling on Thursday, so the punch list of things to complete for then is steadily shrinking.

One thing that wasn't on the punch list but was on the annoyance list - was the wrong chimney cap is replaced. The fireplace people came and straightened out the pipe supports and installed the correct cap.

This is Chris tacking up furring strips. They will need to fastened in properly for the air test and also for the the insulation. The insulation guy should be ready to roll with the insulation on Wednesday.





electrician and plumber discussing some topic in the laundry room.

Andre - got the heat going
Nick - wiring basement, moved boxes that were at the wrong height above the desk
Plumber finishing up rough drywall
Buchan, Lawton, and Peron - scheduled for air test
Called in request for electrical inspection on main floor
Things to do: Go over central vac locations, review partitions with sound insulation
Call Thorston to schedule attic insulation.

Looking ahead this week

Things to do so drywall can start on Thursday:
1. Vapour Barrier inspection - Charles will call on Monday morning.
2. Complete strapping installation.
3. Complete framing around fireplace.
4. Complete framing around shower in master bath, includes wood jamb for edge of door and shower base.
5. Complete shower base for Tawny washing area in the laundry room.
6. Complete central vac rough-in.
6. Complete electrical work: A few things left to do: move the pantry light from a wall where the fixture won't fit to above the door where it should have been, lower the box for a closet light that was installed before the closet ceiling was dropped to 8', and move a 120V wire that was run through the same hole in the floor as the networking -- a major no-no.
7. Complete plumbing rough-in. I thought this was supposed to have been done a week and a half ago.

Supplies:
We ordered the trim supplies last week. They should be delivered towards the end of this week.
Flooring supplier has missed what seems like his 4th or 5th appointment to take measurements. We are concerned about getting the materials in time and therefore causing a delay. However, Mike called us on Friday to say that all the products we want are stock items with his suppliers and there should be no problems getting it in for us.

Day 255 - The week in review

Drive up - Sunday December 18th, 2005

As noted in Saturday's blog entry, we received 25cm between Thursday and Friday evening. This meant we had a lot of snow in the driveway. Since we need to have easy access for the various trades on Monday, Charles brought his snowblower over in the morning before church and we cleared out the driveway in fairly short order.

This photo also shows some of my handiwork from yesterday. Due to the wind conditions, a fair bit of snow blew in the two south facing doors. The crew stapled some poly up over the doors but the wind blew it off, so I fastened some strips of wood over the poly to hold it down. Even with the strapping on the edges of the garage doors, the plastic was flapping a lot. I fastened some strapping across the middle of the door to take some of the pressure off the plastic.

I haven't had a photo of Tawny for a while now, so here she is doing what we call her "soldier sit". She does this very upright sit posture when she is showing how good she is so she can get a treat -- very cute. You can see that Tawny has what is called "snow nose". A dog's nose should be black (or else it is considered a flaw by judges in dog shows), but dog's who sniff a lot - like Labs - stick their nose in the snow and the cold causes frostbite at the cellular level, causing the pink tones.

In the heading I promised "the week in review". So here is a review of the blog entry from Monday, Dec 12th:

Day 249 - Things for this week
Taking cover off to straighten chimney
Chimney guy didn't call back, so I faxed him a photo of the crooked chimney with a note that it was unacceptable. He called back 2 days later and left a message to call - I called back on Thursday morning and just got his voice mail. No response yet.

Heating guy there to finish hvac.
I actually think this was done.

Started on poly and strapping
Poly completed on Saturday, thanks to Dave. Started tacking strapping into place.

Charles will call for an inspection of the vapour barrier.

Drilled hole for electric supply for island - twice.
Well, that was last week actually.

Drywall guy was there to measure for quote
We received a quote last week from one company, and received another from the guy we would prefer to use on Wednesday. Unfortunately, the quote from the preferred guy was 23% higher than the first company. I negotiated a reduction in his price to match the first company.

Get heat on boiler for air-side by end of week
Didn't happen. The heating plumber had trouble getting things going - the water wasn't flowing through the coil in the air exchanger for some reason. As it was about 5pm, he said he would come back on Friday and get it going. Unfortunately, the weather made driving difficult in the morning and he never came out at all. So we still don't have heat.

We did have a propane tank heater in the basement but it ran out sometime on Friday night. The temperature in the basement on Saturday was 46F which was no problem for frost on the water pipes. I brought in the propane tank from our barbecue today and hooked it up to the heater but didn't fire it up as it was still 47F in basement.

Day 254 - A catch-up day

Saturday December 17th, 2005

Today was a bit of a catch-up day. Due to weather conditions (we had about 20cm of snow overnight on Thursday and another 5cm or so on Friday) and other things, the crew didn't quite get the poly (vapour barrier) installed and sealed - with red tape at joints and acoustic sealant at the perimeter. Because of that, Dave went above & beyond the call of duty by coming in on Saturday to finish the poly taping and "black death" (acoustic sealant).

While Dave was finishing the poly, I cleaned up the house. There were lots of little pieces of poly all over the floor plus various sawdust, bits of wire, and other construction debris. This was a critical thing to do as the poly is quite slippery and is a hazard. After I picked up the big stuff, and swept up most of the other stuff, I fired up my shop vac and vacuumed the rest of the little bits.

I took these photos after the clean up. This photo is looking at great room from from entrance.

This photo is looking at front entrance from great room. I was standing in front of the scaffolding that you can see in the previous photo.

You can see the arch more clearly in this photo. The arch is actually exactly the same radius arc as the center window in the great room.

This is the office, and you can see what it looks like with the strapping in place. It is just tacked up for now, but will be nailed in securely next week.

You can see the empty spools of wire of wire here. There are 15 spools, each was 150m or almost 500ft. There are a few other spools of wire that are in use but not yet finished. Just counting the empty spools, that means there is over 2.25 km (1.42 miles) of wire in the house.

Day 251 - Glass in doors

Wednesday December 14th, 2005

We have glass in our doors! Yippeee!!

One of Steve's guys came today and picked up the sealed units, the old door, and also installed the glass in our front doors. What a difference this makes in terms of the light in the house.

Day 249 - Things for this week

Taking cover off to straighten chimney
Heating guy there to finish hvac.
Started on poly and strapping
Drilled hole for electric supply for island - twice.
Drywall guy was there to measure for quote
Get heat on boiler for air-side by end of week

Day 248 - The end of a pane-ful experience (almost)

Sunday December 11th, 2005

If you've been following this blog, you know that the windows were received with grills in the transoms and not in the main casements. Unfortunately, because the grills in the casements wouldn't line up with the ones in the transoms, the transom sealed units needed to be replaced also.

The replacement sealed units (with the grills) arrived, and Steve came out and replaced some of the sealed units. Steve also changed the door from the garage to the laundry room. Steve wasn't able to change the windows in the front doors because the battery in his cordless drill died.

The "(almost)" in the heading refers to the transom in the dining room. Part of the grill in the replacement transom came with a crooked piece, a manufacturing defect. So this sealed unit will have to be replaced again! What a pane! (haha)

We appreciate John and Steve sorting out the windows, so we received what we had ordered.

The windows look pretty good, don't they?

Day 246 - Didn't quite make it

The title refers to the electrical inspection. We had expected to have it today, but we didn't quite make it. It is now scheduled for Monday. The networking and alarm prewire will happen on Sunday. The insulator will come and start doing the batts for the cathedral ceiling on Monday. The poly and strapping will start after the electrical inspection, with the plan to have the blower door test this week, and then start drywalling.

In Day 244's post I mentioned the chimney is not straight. Here is a photo of it - you don't need to zoom in to see that it is not straight. Unfortunately, it will take more than just changing the chimney cap as the chimney is strapped in crooked all the way up. I've called the chimney guy but he hasn't responded. It will be very challenging for them to fix it if they delay too long.

For the sake of something different, I took a photo of the the house fom Howie Rd. It nestles into the tree line nicely with no lights on.

Thiis is a photo of the baffles under the roof. These baffles are part of the R2000 spec, and their purpose is to prevent wind from riffling through the insulation and cooling it off. After all, insulation works on the principle of trapped air so if the air is moving it makes sense that you will benefit if you can prevent this. Here is a CMHC quote:

Windwashing occurs where wind blows through insulation disturbing the trapped warm airpockets replacing them with cold exterior air on a constant basis. The effect of this is to seriously degrade the effective resistance value of the insulation. Therefore wind washingmust be minimized as part of the insulation process.

The replacement sealed unit windows have arrived. They are scheduled to be installed on Sunday. We are glad about that as the previous install date we had was after Christmas.

Day 244 - pot lights

Saga of the pot lights

We have a lot of pot lights in our house, Candice Olson would be proud! We have pot lights in the dining room, in the hallway (or the "gallery" as it is called on some plans!), in the kitchen, in the bathroom (shower light), a few in the master bedroom, and of course in the great room.

This story is about the pot lights in the great room.

The great room is planned to have 6 pot lights in total - 4 in the "corners" of the room, and two to accent the front corners of the fireplace. Unfortunately, one of the pot lights on the fireplace is in the wrong place, which means it will need to moved over a little bit, which then forces the 2 adjacent pots to be moved.

In other news, the electrical work will be completed tomorrow, and an inspection for the electrical and the framing (roof trusses) is requested for Friday. As soon as the inspectors come, then the crew will start installing the vapour barrier and the strapping for the drywall.

The plumber will also come out on Friday and complete the roughin. I need to get the fitting for the "utility tub" in the laundry room so it can be plumbed in. Also, the HVAC guys will come and complete their ventilation installation.

The fireplace installation is complete, but they put the wrong cap on the chimney, Charles says it is crooked. Since it's been getting dark when I was on my way out there I didn't see it so will have to call them tomorrow about that.

I am waiting for the networking and security installation people to confirm the installation date.

Insulators are booked for Monday. Then we will need an inspection for that (Tuesday) and an air test (Tuesday).

Drywall could start Wednesday, but we are still waiting for their quotes. I guess it will be hard for that to be completed by Friday. Charles said, with a wry grin, that he thought that was "a bit of a stretch".

The aluminum soffit and fascia installation will start next Friday. Once that gets started, the garage doors can be installed. I sincerely hope we can get the garage doors installed before Christmas.

Day 243 - cheap lights

Electrician Dave said that he wouldn't want to install our permanent exterior lights until the exterior is completed. Since only the hanging light will be able to be installed (once the soffit is completed), I purchased some cheap lights for the other locations. Only $5.95 each.