These infernal machines have been keeping us busy for weeks.  Here is a quick run down of our appliances and how they’re keeping us busy.

Dishwasher

First load in our new dishwasher

We just got this about two weeks ago.  It is a sleek Swedish model from Asko.  Stainless steel top to bottom and really quiet.  Usually something like this would be out of our price range, but we got it for $400 with a few scratches and dents.  Got a photo of the first successful load, but as with all our appliances, it started acting up soon after.  The drain pump was going and going when we woke up this morning.  Hoping its something as simple as leveling.  Crossing our fingers its an easy fix.

Fridge

Under Counter Fridge

With only 10′ of width, a fridge will always be an important consideration for how the room feels.  The standard fridge stuck out into the room nearly 1/3 of its total width and more than halfway to the ceiling.  Visually it was a wall and really split the space in half.  To overcome this we decided to go under counter.  Siri found an True under counter fridge (TUC-48).  Its a used commerical model and is 4′ wide and about 34″ high.

Unfortunately, about a month after getting this, it stopped cooling completely.  We made some calls to have someone look at it, but with fees around $120 / hour with no estimate on how long it would take, we decided to do some research first. I’ve been taking a crash course on refrigeration and have learned a bit of the concepts and lingo.

We were lucky in that the house came with a full height fridge in the basement and a college fridge in the shed that both work.  We were able to put all the critical cool stuff like milk into the fridge and all our coldest items in the freezer.

Stove/Oven

This is one of the few original things we’ve got in the house.  Its a pretty standard unit.  We found out back in the first day of demolition that the stovetop worked when a board fell onto the handle and turned it on igniting the drop cloth that was over it.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t until we had the kitchen back together that we found the oven itself was not working.  There isn’t much that can go wrong on a gas oven so I’ve got high hopes that we can find this gremlin.  I’m suspecting something in the glow igniter or wiring.

Media Center

Raspberry Pi – $35 mini computer.

So maybe this one’s not an appliance, but its important to mention (because it’s fun).  We’ve gotten my 40″ Samsung mounted to the wall opposite our couch.  To avoid clutter on the wall we’ve moved all the speakers and computer cables down under the floor to a shelf next to the couch.  This keeps the wall with the TV just that.. a wall and a TV, none of the clutter.  The few wires we do need (Coax, power, HDMI, Monitor w/sound) are all black and bundled up right down into the floor below. We’re experimenting with the speakers by putting them under the couch pointing towards the TV. Sitting above them you have no idea the sound is not coming from the TV as the sound bounces off the wall.

To serve up files we’ve gotten a Raspberry Pi set up as a Media Server running XBMC via Raspbmc.  If you’ve not heard of a Raspberry Pi yet, its a project to create a cheap but powerful computer for education purposes.  The top of the line model only costs $35 and its about the size of a credit card.  Its bare bones though, just a circuit board.  It’s going to take some playing to get it all dialed it, but that’s run… right?  I’ve connect a 2TB USB hard drive to it via a powered USB hub.  This should store plenty of photos, music and movies.  I hope to get the TV’s remote working via CEC so we can control the pi with it.

After celebrating Christmas on the 3rd floor, we started to pack up the house on Regester Street while also working to get as much dirty work done including the 2nd floor sanding / oiling and the 1st floor drywall (didn’t quite get this done). We completed our move on January 10th. The house was stacked with nothing but narrow pathways through each room while 3 humans and a cat were crowded into the 3rd floor.  We’ve been building furniture, unpacking and organizing ever since.

Ikea furniture is always better with a friend. Siri found out the hard way when she smashed her foot trying to do it solo.

We managed to pile enough stuff into the shed and shack to set up our bedroom.  We bought some book cases from Ikea and using leftover furring strips I built a king size bed frame with storage underneath in lieu of a dresser.  Hanging clothes go in a PAX wardrobe by the doorway.  We also got two pre-hung doors at the auction and have been fighting to get them in ever since.  Having them will be a treat as we’ve been without a bedroom door since we’ve moved to Baltimore.

In the basement we finished up a few things.   After 3 weeks without laundry I soldered up the valves for the washer and dryer, hooked up the gas and ran a dryer vent hose to the window.  We also stapled up the PEX for the radiant heat under the living room.  This freed up enough room for the next big step, a permanent beam to hold up the joists who’s ends had been eaten by bugs or rotted away by moisture in the bricks.  To do this I added a 12′ long 4×6 treated beam held up by 4 built up 2×4 posts resting on treated 2×4 pads. This structure serves double duty as the back posts of my work benches.  These benches are 24″ deep and 36″ high and run 12′ down to the front wall and around another 8′ to the water heater.  I’ve topped them with 3/4″ particle board and 3/16″ hard board so they’re easy to clean.  A 21″ deep bottom shelf lets us store things underneath without having having it sit on the potentially wet basement floor.  Another bench of similar design was built on the opposite corner and right now it is a mountain of tools.

While I was working in the basement, I also moved the lights over from the middle of the room to above the sink / dryer and benches.  These were a pain from day one and in total I think I’ve broken a half dozen CFL bulbs with my head.  Having them on the side, I was able to store leftover lumber in the ceiling, seriously tidying up the room.

Until just last weekend we were moving boxes out of the 1st floor enough to be able to finish the ceiling drywall in order to paint it. Once it was painted we needed to do a final sanding of the floors. The living room floor is exactly the same boards as the 2nd and 3rd floors, but the kitchen is much lighter. It was hard to notice this until seeing both next to each other.

Living Room < – > Kitchen

The final cleaning and oiling of the floors had to be done over two stages due to the oven, fridge, couch and cabinets that we were unwilling to move back out side. We moved everything we could to the living room (front) of the house so Siri could do the kitchen.  This morning the floor was ready to have things on it so we moved everything from the living room to the kitchen and she is working on that today.

The reason all of this is coming together now is that we will be hosting our house warming party this Saturday and a visit by Siri’s parents next week.

This past week we finally got around to crimping our PEX fittings.  We had put this off until we were pretty well done everything else in the hopes that we could rent a  PEX crimping tool for a night to finish it up.  Unfortunately, no where we could find rents PEX tools so now I’m the proud owner of a $60 tool I used for about 2 hours.

All hooked up. The wire nuts on the gray board are currently standing in for our Arduino controlled relay board.

Here is where the bathroom plumbing ties into the core plumbing.  We tested this by running the exhaust through a dryer vent out the window and opening the door on the other side of the basement.  Runs nice and quiet even with the pumps running.  Will likely need to run for a few hours due to the thermal inertia of the house, but once warm, it should only need to kick on every few hours to keep the place comfy.

This photo shows plumbing under the bathroom. The big toilet drain and vent which also serves as the sink drain. The blue PEX is for the sink and toilet. Big red PEX is for the heating system.

Iris had dibs on 1st flush. She couldn’t get enough. Need to put it through its paces, right?

Getting a toilet it was a big deal.  We’ve been having to walk back to the other house each time we needed to go… or use a bucket.

Shower plumbing should be ready to go too, but first Siri needs to get done the tile which should arrive tomorrow.

We’re working on drywall now.  It took a whole lot of hard work to get to this point.   Had to finish and test everything first before we covered it up.  After putting up new walls, this included repairing the bricks, the roof, replacing the plumbing and electric.  Lots of work for sure.  Its a shame it will all be hidden away.  Here is a peek at the work that got us here.

After fixing the bricks and roof, we still had to add nailers for the drywall.  This took a while but with that help of my brother and dad, we got it done.  Very tedious work.

After we got everything up, it was time for spray foam.  We paid a company to do this part.  It took them half a day and they needed a large box truck to carry their machine.  While they were at it, we also had them do the closet / former bathroom / future office / deck entryway.

Spray foam (yellow) in all its glory

More detail in the corner. Walls are only about 1″ thick, but they act as a vapor barrier and are likely way more effective than cramming in styrofoam sheets which is what is likely behind the drywall that we left in place.

On the 3rd floor, we tried our best, without replacing the whole roof, to meet the minimum recommended R value for a roof in our area of R-38.

1. Inside Air film: R- .61
2. 1/2″ Drywall: R- .45
3. 2″ Pink Foam: R- 10
4. 1″ Air Gap: R- 1
5. 4″ Spray Foam: R- 25
6. 1/2″ Plywood: R- .62
7. 1/2″ Fiber Board: R- .1.32
8. Rolled Roofing: R- .44
9. Exterior Air Film: R. -.17

The total R value for our roof is between R-33.36  and R-38.16.  This depends on the thickness of the foam between the joists.

When they sprayed it, they were careful to not make it stick up higher than the joists so it would be easy to install drywall.  They were a bit too conservative in my view sometimes leaving over an inch of cup between joists.  Luckily, even the sealed air gap itself has a value of R-1.

Pretty good on paper.  Pretty effective in the real world.  With just the work lights on, the top floor can get HOT enough that we needed to open windows.  Condensation shouldn’t be an issue inside the ceilings, but it does occur on the windows and maybe even in the walls.

The guest room doesnt have the 2″ pink sheets as we decided that ceiling height for this small area was more important than R value.  There will be some interesting  transition from the stair way to the 3rd floor ceiling here, but we’ve got it figured out.  I’m not too worried.  For over 100 years people lived in this house and I can’t imagine it had more than R-10 and it had visible air leaks (I mean I could see the harbor looking through them).

Iris helping me to lift one of these heeaaavvvyyy sheets while dad does something likely more significant in the background.

After all the insulation was up, we added the drywall.  On the 3rd floor there was lots of cutting as nothing at all is square or level.  We shimmed with wood and still found some spots that would push in.  We did some experimenting and figured out that we could punch a hole in the drywall and spray in some Great Stuff foam which would act as a shim after the sheet was already up.

Walls are up, still need to finish the small pieces above where the drop ceiling used to be.  Dad took care of all that little stuff while I worked on finishing things downstairs.  Strangely the old man seems to enjoy this stuff.

The previous owners only did drywall up to the drop ceiling so we had to do the rest up to the top.  Dad is intent on blending it in with spackle.

Starting to Spackle.  Also, we seem to have developed a black spot in the middle of all our pictures.  Construction and digital cameras don’t mix.

So its coming down to the wire.  We likely have another week of sanding and spackling on the 2nd and 3rd floors before they’re done.  After that we sand / oil the floors.  Hopefully that will be the end of the dust and we can start painting and moving in boxes!

All but two of these are already antiquated; how long until they too are useless?

I call wall plates like these memorial plaques.  They are used to remember technologies of the past and are helpful in estimating the date of the most recent renovation  (RJ-11 phone jacks: pre-2005, S-video: 1990-1995, Composite HD: 2000-2007, Ethernet 1998-2008, etc).  For this reason, I’m trying to convince myself that I don’t need to plan anything at all.  How much longer will I need even a cable TV  connection with everything streaming over the Internet and WIFI these days?

Fortunately, we’re putting the TV right over an old and unused air duct to the basement.  I can run wires through this to the basement where I can set up a media server, DVD player, game console.  No need for wall plates at all plus it keeps any hidden on a shelf in the basement.

Its not that simple though.  I need sensors for our heated floors.  Since I’ve never done this (DIY thermostat or hydronic heat) before, I’ll only have a few days to figure out if they’ll work before I need to cover them up for good.  There are also other projects that might not be done for a while that will require wired sensors or power. One is the temperature controlled glass tile back-lighting in the shower. I’ll need to wire up my temperature sensor on the pipes before I cover them up or I lose my chance.  Central 12v power distribution for gadgets? Speaker wires?… Speakers themselves? (a smart house should have a voice.)  Microphones (a smart house needs to hear your commands.)  I’ll think this over long and hard before we put of the last of the drywall.

*There is one non-electrical thing I can think of needing still: a filtered water line to the bedroom.  This would be great for a glass of water while in bed, or even better, a bedside coffee maker.