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Rockis Dukakis posted:Wow, you're really not afraid to tear the poo poo out of the place. Have you considered leaving the ceiling open? After you removed the rafters and before you replaced them, the open ceiling looked pretty nice, I thought. It would get really really hot. Also the house might fall down unless you put something back up there.
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| # ? Aug 12, 2011 20:38 |
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| # ? May 25, 2013 06:11 |
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Rockis Dukakis posted:Wow, you're really not afraid to tear the poo poo out of the place. Have you considered leaving the ceiling open? After you removed the rafters and before you replaced them, the open ceiling looked pretty nice, I thought. Partitioning rooms would be a pain in the rear end, since you'd have to drywall up to 20 feet up. Cathedral ceilings are a thing, but mostly when the architecture permits it, and mostly on 2 floor homes. Unless you're going for a loft thing I guess.
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| # ? Aug 13, 2011 01:29 |
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Rockis Dukakis posted:Wow, you're really not afraid to tear the poo poo out of the place. Have you considered leaving the ceiling open? After you removed the rafters and before you replaced them, the open ceiling looked pretty nice, I thought. Tall ceilings (cathedral ceilings) look really cool. . . and are really cool in the winter when all your hot air decides to hang out 15 feet above your head. My parent's cottage has a 25 foot cathedral ceiling and they pretty much have to heat the ceiling first and wait for the air to gradually make it's way down to them. Basically the heat in that place sinks as fast as the Titanic did, which sucks when you've been out all day and the fire has died down.
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| # ? Aug 14, 2011 04:55 |
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Not sure if I'm misunderstanding you, but you have to heat all the air between the ceiling and floor in any space for the air around the floor to get warm. Unless you have some sort of venting system that circulates air from the ceiling to the floor, that is. You can't simply heat some of the air and expect that warm air to mix with the cold air down by the floor. That will never happen as hot air rises to the ceiling and cold air drops to the floor. Very annoying once it's freezing and you have a few hours ahead of you to make the living room habitable. This is also expensive if your ceiling isn't insulated enough. Modern houses around here can have 50cm/20" insulation in the outer ceiling. (Low energy and passive houses that is) If winters aren't that bad or you insulate well, this is indeed cool but not very practical. You lose some space on the upper floor and you have more of a job heating the room during winter. Not to mention the heat you get up top during the summer if you go for a loft type thing. Heat from walls in the ground floor will rise to the upper floor for some impressive sauna moments.
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| # ? Aug 14, 2011 14:24 |
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A less pitched roof might lend itself better to open ceilings but a roof like this would be great with a loft room. You would have to size your rafter ties as floor joists where the loft is though
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| # ? Aug 14, 2011 20:46 |
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I considered putting a loft in for a bit but the actual livable space is not worth the hassle to me. I am going to finish the basement instead and in hopefully 5 or so years build a brand new place. STATUS UPDATE! With walls up the next step is to pull wires and insulate this place.  This house has rough cut 2x4 walls so the R21 Fiberglass option is out. R13 Fiberglass could potentially be the way to go, but I want a way to eliminate air movement in my walls. If only there were some kind of magic material which had double the R value of fiberglass, was a moisture barrier, and I have access too.   Closed Cell spray foam insulation! R7 per inch(4xR7=R28). Very expensive to install($1.05 per board foot our cost) but it will pay for itself in 3 years due to no air movement knocking the heat out of my house. The only problem with this stuff is that you have to make sure you have a VOC Mask or even better, supplied air. It is a 2 part foam that loves moisture, and guess where there is a lot of that : your lungs. If you start spraying this stuff naked your lungs will be candy coated. The spray foam that you see in Holmes on Homes and other DIY shows(spray 1/8 inch and it expands outside the walls) is an open cell foam which has the same R value as fiberglass and allows moisture to pass through, but is roughly half the cost. I want the highest R possible in my thin walls and I feel that closed cell is always the best option. We've done a lot of jobs tearing out improperly installed open cell with huge air voids so I simply don't trust that product. An interesting fact about icynene brand spray foam : It can not stick to itself. If you spray it, cut it with a hot knife and there is an air void(which there can be a lot of) and you spray some more in, the product will not bond with the previously applied foam. Next step : Hang drywall, climb up into the attic, spray the top of the drywall to create a 100% airseal. Then, do some room rearranging, and expand the demo out into the rest of the living room. BRICK BY BRICK BY BRICK
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| # ? Aug 16, 2011 04:16 |
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If you're going to do any sort of electrical work, you'd want to do it now, right? The house being as old as it is, I'd be surprised if it fully met your electrical needs. I could be wrong, though.
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| # ? Aug 16, 2011 21:07 |
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Smug Mug posted:If you're going to do any sort of electrical work, you'd want to do it now, right? That's why I pulled all of the wires and put all of the boxes in.
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| # ? Aug 16, 2011 21:08 |
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PyrE posted:That's why I pulled all of the wires and put all of the boxes in. Ah, sorry. Wasn't sure if you just put the existing ones back. Are you planning any hardware work (door handles, hinges, etc.) in the future? I'm really interested to see what you'd go with. Very interesting project, thanks for sharing.
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| # ? Aug 16, 2011 21:19 |
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Speaking of boxes, add Ethernet ports! Just do it now and save yourself the trouble, even if you think you won't use them. Cat6 is cheap. Phones, HTPCs, computers, game consoles, etc, it'll make it all much nicer at the end of the line. Also, as before, awesome job 
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| # ? Aug 16, 2011 22:39 |
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benitocereno posted:Speaking of boxes, add Ethernet ports! Just do it now and save yourself the trouble, even if you think you won't use them. Cat6 is cheap. Phones, HTPCs, computers, game consoles, etc, it'll make it all much nicer at the end of the line. Also, as before, awesome job Just wire the whole house to be wiring friendly, run conduits or raceways that will let you add any sort of man-cave awesomeness you might desire. Also wire the living room for surround sound!
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| # ? Aug 17, 2011 01:48 |
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The Werle posted:Just wire the whole house to be wiring friendly, run conduits or raceways that will let you add any sort of man-cave awesomeness you might desire. Also wire the living room for surround sound! My uncle did this and it has served him well. The last house that he bought and renovated he installed PVC conduits in all of the rooms, and some rooms had multiple ones. What he then did was have a thin cable go from the outlet of every conduit to the basement where they all converged. Whenever he wants to have a cable go from one room to the next he opens the cover on the conduit, ties the cable to it, goes to the basement and pulls the appropriate cord. If you were to look at the cable setup of his house it looks like a tree, with the trunk starting in the basement and them branching out to every room. If he wants Ethernet cable going from his living room to his office he just ties the Ethernet cable to the cord (running through the conduit) in the living room. He then goes to the basement and pulls it from the living room to the basement, then ties it to the office cord (in the basement, then goes to the office and pulls it to there.
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| # ? Aug 17, 2011 02:01 |
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I ran some smurf tube in my walls and ceiling before I put the drywall up and have speaker wire set up for surround sound. It was a good investment.
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| # ? Aug 19, 2011 13:13 |
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Smug Mug posted:Ah, sorry. Wasn't sure if you just put the existing ones back. I don't plan on doing any of that stuff for a bit yet. My major goal is to get this place stripped, insulated, and drywalled before I have to start using the furnace again. The Werle posted:Just wire the whole house to be wiring friendly, run conduits or raceways that will let you add any sort of man-cave awesomeness you might desire. Also wire the living room for surround sound! I've got that hollow blue tubing running to two spots in the room to make future wiring less of a PITA. I plan on doing the surround sound as well. My only problem is I rearrange furniture all of the time... Do they make decent wireless surround speakers yet?
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| # ? Aug 20, 2011 15:15 |
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PyrE posted:I've got that hollow blue tubing running to two spots in the room to make future wiring less of a PITA. I plan on doing the surround sound as well. My only problem is I rearrange furniture all of the time... Do they make decent wireless surround speakers yet? Just put speaker jacks and raceways in each of your walls adjacent to the electric outlets. This is preferable than a future using too many wireless devices with excess RF interference.
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| # ? Aug 23, 2011 13:08 |
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Neutrino posted:Just put speaker jacks and raceways in each of your walls adjacent to the electric outlets. This is preferable than a future using too many wireless devices with excess RF interference. Good idea. Definitely going to have to do this. I hung drywall, finished it, textured it, and painted it. So, I now have one bedroom nearly done, with only the flooring and trim left to do. Picture Time :      Moved a bunch of stuff around and started knocking down the plaster in the living room as well. Will post a couple of pictures once I make some more progress.
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| # ? Aug 30, 2011 02:58 |
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You put drywall up horizontally? Never seen that before. Why did you do this? I set them up vertically so all sides are on studs or sills (is it called that in English? The top and bottom horizontal boards studs are attached to). In Europe it's common to have a stud every 60 cm (23.6") so drywall comes in 120 cm width. This means I only need to fill the gaps every 120 cm.
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| # ? Aug 30, 2011 08:55 |
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Iskariot posted:You put drywall up horizontally? Never seen that before. Why did you do this? It's done to avoid butt seams - where the untapered edges of drywall come together, the goal is often that you can get one 10' or 12' piece across a whole wall without having to have any seams. It's also supposed to make hanging easier as you can rest the next piece on the drywall below it.
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| # ? Aug 30, 2011 12:54 |
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I see. I don't really see how it makes the process easier but I'm not an expert. If I have a wall that's less than 240cm wide, I get by with one 240cm seam. Two if it's 360cm, three if 480 and so on. By comparison you get one 240 cm seam if it's 240 wide. Two plus 120 if it's 360, and an equal three if 480. It's not that I think it's bonkers but I find it somewhat worrying that your seams seem to by unsupported horizontally, unless you added boards in the wall where horizontal seams meet? I had a single place where a seam was unsupported behind the drywall and it cracked the moment I bumped into it. Luckily before I was finished so I tore down a small piece and put a small plank behind it. Didn't even fasten it to the beams, just the two drywall pieces. That made the two pieces flex in unison and the problem was gone. Putting up vertically doesn't really need any help in support as each piece rests on the floor. Could be it helps with lighting issues. A seam will really stand out on a wall where the finish isn't perfect and it crosses the direction of the light. I usually fuss on seams that run across the ceiling or walls that sunlight will follow. Seams that run along light will not have this problem.
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| # ? Aug 30, 2011 13:34 |
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e: nevermind I'm just a jerk
Hypnolobster fucked around with this message at Aug 30, 2011 around 14:19 |
| # ? Aug 30, 2011 14:12 |
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It's a bit stronger if you put the drywall perpendicular to the studs (horizontal), because drywall has tiny reinforcing fibers that run parallel to the long edge.
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| # ? Aug 31, 2011 01:36 |
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It's much easier to pull a long run of drywall mud at slightly higher than waist level than it is to climb up and off a cart every 4 feet. Every corner has drywall nailers and there are studs roughly every 16 inches. It's the best and easiest way to put drywall on.
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| # ? Aug 31, 2011 01:53 |
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I never knew. A case of TMYK, I guess. There are no fibers as such in regular drywall we get here. There's reinforced pieces with a fiberglass layer but it's expensive and seldom used for regular houses. Must be a culture thing. I have never seen drywall put up that way here but it could be done with what's called ceiling drywall. They have folds on all four sides. Regular "wall" drywall only has folds on the long sides. Anyway, now I know. Thanks for explaining.
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| # ? Aug 31, 2011 08:31 |
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I didn't see if you mentioned but what foam insulation product and sprayer are you using? I interpreted your comment about Icynene to imply that you're using something else.
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| # ? Sep 1, 2011 02:48 |
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Since this was such a small application I used our touch n seal cpds machine with closed cell insulation.
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| # ? Sep 2, 2011 01:35 |
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Thanks. The touch n seal looks like a nice machine. Did you have any problems with the drywall laying flat on the walls? We have lath and plaster and I hear that's something you have to worry about.
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| # ? Sep 3, 2011 18:19 |
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You're such a pimp. I am absolutely in awe of people like you who are capable and knowledgeable to pull this type of thing off.
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| # ? Sep 3, 2011 19:54 |
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laod posted:Thanks. The touch n seal looks like a nice machine. I tore the lath and plaster off so it was attached to the studs. There is one corner with a little bit of a bend in it because of the old studs being crowned so badly. I can see how there would be a lot of issues if you were just attaching directly over the plaster. I can assure you sir, I am far from a pimp. I'm just "lucky" enough to have been born into a family of carpenters.
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| # ? Sep 3, 2011 21:06 |
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PyrE posted:I tore the lath and plaster off so it was attached to the studs. There is one corner with a little bit of a bend in it because of the old studs being crowned so badly. I can see how there would be a lot of issues if you were just attaching directly over the plaster. I could have been a whole lot clearer. Sorry about that. I meant did the drywall lay flat across the studs? A friend mentioned having trouble with some joists not being particularly planar when he redid a ceiling so I was wondering if that happened with walls too. Apparently in his case the builders were a little sloppy with the joists since the surface that had to end up flat was the plaster. I shudder to think about having to eventually get in to my walls and ceilings since someone just hung drywall over the plaster. I guess it'll really just be more to haul to the dump than anything else.
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| # ? Sep 3, 2011 21:56 |
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laod posted:I shudder to think about having to eventually get in to my walls and ceilings since someone just hung drywall over the plaster. I guess it'll really just be more to haul to the dump than anything else. I helped my uncle redo the place he renovated before he moved into his current place (and reno'd that as well). L+P with a sheet of cheap wood paneling over top. . . then drywall over that and to top it off, 4 coats of paint and then some wallpaper. I think the guy that lived there before he did was OCD or something. I swear that house must have lost a hundred square feet just from all the crap he put over the original walls. Breaking that stuff was a bitch and there were so many layers it was like trying to get into a flak jacket with a fork. The wall outlets were never moved after he took them out for the original wood paneling that went on first thing after the L+P, they looked like they were all recessed outlets. My current nightmare is trying to gain access to the chimney in my house which is in a wall that has a closet built in front of it with a solid ply backing in it. That room is not going to look pretty when I finally get to it. They say old houses have character. Character is just another word for expenses!
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| # ? Sep 4, 2011 05:27 |
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Blistex posted:I swear that house must have lost a hundred square feet just from all the crap he put over the original walls. Breaking that stuff was a bitch and there were so many layers it was like trying to get into a flak jacket with a fork. Carpet over 4 layers of vinyl tile, one layer of newspaper (wtf? but it was pretty cool seeing papers from the 50s  ) between 2 more layers of vinyl, plywood over horribly destroyed hardwood floor over very thin plywood for the subfloor, then the joists.The designs in the 40s and 60s were seriously old lady-y. All that only to find the original wide-plank hardwood floor that must have been beautiful in the 20s.  All gone, all ripped up, now it has 3/4 plywood and I will put laminate hardwood over it. None of this Jenga business! quote:They say old houses have character. Character is just another word for expenses!
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| # ? Sep 5, 2011 02:45 |
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daggerdragon posted:Expenses and "how the hell has this house not burned down yet?" I know you're joking, but in the case of my folks' old row house, we learned the trick is "nobody touch/rewire anything, moving things only makes the insulation fall off." Rubber insulation from the '30s is a real bitch.
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| # ? Sep 5, 2011 03:11 |
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daggerdragon posted:
When I'm finished with my current project I'm going to post pictures of the hallway roof that rested on horizontal 2x2". Yep. Regulations state we can get 400 kg of snow per square meter where I live.
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| # ? Sep 5, 2011 08:31 |
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You're all insane. My mother has a 2-story A frame log cabin that is completely open on the back side, and she solves that whole hot-air-going-to-the-ceiling problem with a very rare and obscure device.... a ceiling fan. Seriously, put a ceiling fan up there and crank it up when you want the place to actually feel warm all the way through. Managing air circulation in an open space is fairly easy.
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| # ? Sep 7, 2011 23:45 |
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Pile of Kittens posted:You're all insane. My mother has a 2-story A frame log cabin that is completely open on the back side, and she solves that whole hot-air-going-to-the-ceiling problem with a very rare and obscure device.... a ceiling fan. Seriously, put a ceiling fan up there and crank it up when you want the place to actually feel warm all the way through. Managing air circulation in an open space is fairly easy. Depending on the size of the cathedral ceiling and the pitch of your roof, the fan might be hanging at the end of a 6 foot pole and thus looking really out of place. In a 12-12 pitch roof/ceiling you have to be about the diameter of the fan down from the ceiling (plus a foot) for it to fit properly. I've seen some that look good, and I've seen one or two in A-Frames that wobble like crazy no matter how balanced they are because they're at the end of such a long pole. My parents have two ceiling fans at the top of theirs but in a huge open room with a 25-30 foot ceiling even them going full speed doesn't heat the place up very well. You still have to heat all the air in the room before it gets comfortable. It's like having a bathtub full of cold water and you have to keep adding hot water and circulating it before it's comfortable. Moving the air will get it mixing, but the two temperatures will obviously meet in the middle and require additional time to get to the appropriate temperature. If your heaters/furnace/fireplace isn't putting out enough heat sometimes it never really gets there, even in a really well insulated house.
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| # ? Sep 8, 2011 02:50 |
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daggerdragon posted:I have pictures of tearing up the second floor in my house. Haha, holy poo poo you've just described the upstairs flooring in my house exactly, except my newspaper was from the 40s! In my case though it was just carpet, layers of vinyl, newspaper, more vinyl, then immaculate, perfectly preserved wide plank pine. I went no further than that. A few swipes of a sander and it looked like it was freshly cut...and it was a hundred years old. Stained that poo poo and it rocks.
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| # ? Sep 10, 2011 13:54 |
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Astroman posted:Haha, holy poo poo you've just described the upstairs flooring in my house exactly, except my newspaper was from the 40s! Pretty much any house that's pre-war (WWII) is going to have wood floors under whatever it has now. My house is 83 years old and upstairs is laminate (installed in the last 10 years by the previous owners). I'm going to take a peek next summer, and I'd bet a few  that it's got hardwood under it.
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| # ? Sep 11, 2011 01:56 |
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Iskariot posted:You put drywall up horizontally? Never seen that before. Why did you do this? A lot of people have spoken to this already but in addition to being stronger and easier to install, it is also required by code in many cases. It's dimensionally stronger in its length, you end up with fewer popped seams (one seam along an 8' high stud vs. offset 4' seams on diff. studs). It varies region-to-region, but in residential construction, horizontal is the norm in Canada. If you're installing on furring against a CMU wall, direction is mostly irrelevant.
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| # ? Sep 13, 2011 17:55 |
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Sorry for being slow on updates, but I haven't made a ton of progress until today. With no ceiling the house has been 50 degrees when I wake up, so I have been inspired to get this thing done before I freeze to death. What I did today was extend the wall which will make the second bedroom larger, knock down the rest of the ceiling in the living room, and knock out the wall separating the kitchen and living room.      
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| # ? Sep 18, 2011 05:00 |
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| # ? May 25, 2013 06:11 |
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Hehe, I feel your pain, man. My living room looks a lot like the pictures above but I have most of the insulation done. Just a couple more hours of framework now, one billion hours billed by the electrician and I can put up the diffusion barrier and start hanging up drywall. It's cold as poo poo.
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| # ? Sep 19, 2011 09:52 |
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