projects on the go
Today was pretty much devoted to pulling panelling, furring strips, plaster, lathe, and bricks from the walls. The exterior walls all had bricks inside. These are not structural but, rather, meant as a heat sink, barrier from wind, fire block, and insulation. We have better quality insulation that acts as a fire block (like Rockwool) available now.
That’s a long title, isn’t it?
The rim joist on the east wall of the original 4-square house has cracked. When? Hard to say. Why? Easy. Too much pressure was put on it many years ago from a support column in the first floor. Raising square-corner butt joint joists were raised up just recently, but the split widened as there was nothing under that portion of it to support it, where the 1st floor support column is.
So today we dug a new area for a new footing. I did the digging and hauling of 20L buckets to the stairs, D from next door hauled the buckets to HFT, and HFT hauled the wheel-barrow to the back. “Are we nearing the end?” I’d hear every now and then. “Almost!” I would shout.
So then what? Fill it with concrete. We mixed one US gallon hot water from the SRV on the water heater, four shovels of cement (blasted 40kg bags! (danged 88 lbs.)), eight shovels of sand, and four shovels of gravel (mixed with sand). Very scientificy, I know – especially as we had to add a little more of this or a little more of that. We got about 3.5″ of concrete. More tomorrow, if the weather holds out.
The after-hours cleanup was also fun.
In mixing concrete for the side patio, we hooked the hose up on west the side of the house. It looks like it was put in in the 1950s. The faucet leaks continually when turned on. Since the main floor kitchen sink is now against an exterior wall, I think we should put in a new frost-free hose bib there. It only makes sense to put it there as it would be more central to the rest of the property (grass, shrubs, potential garden).
The gazebo is gone. We loaded all the pieces up on the trailer along with the forest of weeds that were pulled previously and cleaned up the rest with a leaf blower. All the little stuff was stuffed into Canadian Tire garden bags.
520 12C St N Lethbridge AB prop 20251103_134849 junk trailer tarped.jpg 520 12C St N Lethbridge AB prop 20251103_134900 junk trailer loaded and tarped.jpg
Cleanup didn’t take long. We piled it all on the trailer, along with refuse from 520, to be hauled to the landfill.
It doesn’t look clean, you say? You should have seen it before.
My left knee is sore. Bounding up and down the dirt ‘steps’ to the basement is a chore. One cannot simply walk upstairs to the main floor with a bucket of dirt as there are no real steps.
So FHT and I build some stringers. The first one has cracks in it but seems to be stable.
With the second one, on the other hand, steps actually broke off in my hand. Splits in the wood made it impossible to keep stable steps in place, let alone have them bear weight. HFT suggested we add supports to the side of the stringer rather than abandoning the stringer altogether. (No pic yet. I’ll post later.)
In the mean time, we unloaded the remaining gravel into the sidewalk hole, wrapped up the cement bags, and worked below on another support beam. (Pics later.)
The support beam was a challenge. It simply refused to go into place. It eventually did. We need that beam there to cut out and replace the rotten one along the edge of the house.
Next: dig more dirt out to fit in the stringers. More knee-breaking work.
Two days ago we rented an electric jack hammer and gasoline-powered auger, so I bored a hole what I thought was 2 feet deep. It turns out to only be about 18″ deep. Good enough for a footing, considering it is now about 30″ long! Trying to keep at a reasonable length using a shovel was a challenge as it was all sand and collapsed in. I augured this. (Get it? Auger, augur? Look it up.)
So now I have a 12″ by 30″ by 20″ deep footing. It is long enough to place two teleposts atop it – one permanent, one temporary while the rest of the corner of the building is exhumed.
It will likely take a month of Sundays to cure. I should put a thermal camera on it to see if any reactions are going on within it. In the mean time, before any other digging and removing of slumped soil happens, we wait, as this is where the next beam will be placed.
Our new heat pump arrived. It’s a Senville 48,000 BTU central heat pump, bought with a $440 discount from Amazon.ca. It is to replace the 30+-year-old natural gas furnace.
It will have to sit and wait for a time when we can install it.
Finally getting the necessary bits and pieces together, the vanity (commonly called the bathroom sink) plumbing is finally done, as is the shower plumbing.
I’ll leave water in the P-trap to see if my plumbing skills hold water.
I finally got some more 14-3 wire for the smoke detectors. The last of three is in the entrance, on the first floor. Why there? ‘Cause it’s a separate floor.
The new breaker panel is now wired through the old via the back. I had to get some new cable connectors to fit.
