Living Quarters

Last summer I ventured into the attic and tackled a project aimed at more efficiently cooling my condo. I installed air ducts to pull the hottest air down from the ceiling and into the air conditioner unit in the basement. I used vent covers that could be opened in the summer and closed in the winter. It worked pretty well.

Now I’m aiming to do the same thing for the winter. For about $25 in parts, I’m installing a return air vent in the basement to suck in the coldest air and heat it. I did most of the work today – cutting the drywall and assembling the duct piping – and need only to obtain a six inch circular hole saw to complete the project. Hopefully I can do that over the next week or two.

What I really don’t understand is why most homes aren’t built with more efficient return air ducts in the first place. Is it because builders know most home owners won’t open and close the vents twice a year with the changing of the seasons? It blows my mind…

This weekend I took advantage of the beautiful weather and finished the last two steps in the garage project of 2009. I got up into the attic and installed the gable vent on the backside of the garage (see photo) and I finished installing weatherstripping around the garage service door. Now we’re officially ready for winter.

I really liked this vent from Builder’s Edge. I special ordered it at Lowes in the brown finish to closely match the exterior of the building and it looks great. Aside from being off-centered (didn’t feel like cutting structural wood) it could almost pass for being original – which is important given that there are a few members of our condo association who disapprove of any changes to the external of the buildings.

I learned how to cut and install trim this weekend – spending a good chunk of Saturday with a miter saw, hammer and nails. Here is the finished result.

I’m enclosing the word finished in quotation simply because I still would like to put some trim up around the garage and I still need to install a gable vent and create an attic hole covering. Aside from that though, the Gladiator gear arrived a day or two before we left for Puerto Vallarta and I had most of it up before we left. I finished up some last steps Sunday after we returned and snapped these pictures. (Yes, I drilled into the new cabinets to install the under cabinet lighting courtesy of Steelcase.. well Details actually. It was horrifying to drill into brand new cabinets but my measurements were precise..)

The Firebolt.

The Workshop.

Open house.

Drawer 1 of 5 – tool organization.

Drawer 3 of 5 – more organization.

I took Friday off from work and did the prep work in the garage. This involved triple-sweeping out the whole floor and getting rid of every last bit of dust and debris. Next was washing, degreasing, and etching the floor. I donned some rubber boots, gloves, and safety glasses and got to scrubbing the entire floor and hosing it down afterward until “the water flowed clean.” Dry out took overnight.

Saturday morning finally arrived and it was time to paint. It went on pretty easy other than the fact that the paint/epoxy doesn’t have a lot of life.. it thickens and is impossible to apply after about two hours. Work quickly is what I learned.. I just barely finished the garage. I even broke a paint roller halfway through trying to apply the last bit of the first can of paint (it was like mud). All in all though, it turned out beautifully! Here are pictures from this morning.

The floor will take a few more days to dry and then we can park the cars in the garage again. The remaining gladiator pieces are coming on Thursday (bench, gear locker, two cabinets, and a tool drawer). The garage could be back together as soon as next weekend!

Found some time last week to install the Gladiator GearTrack on the walls. I’m really happy with how it turned out. In addition to a wide assortment of hooks, I ordered a ball caddy, clean up caddy, and a storage tub holder (used for recyclables).

This past weekend I mustered up the courage to attack the floor. I rented a walk behind cutter for making grooves and a hammer drill with 3/4″ drill bit for the holes. The channels guide the water to the holes, where the water drains down into the ground. This should make this coming winter much more bearable. Thanks Derek for your help!

Next weekend I hope to apply the epoxy floor coating, order the remaining Gladiator items, and finally check the garage project off as done.

I took the afternoon off and finished putting up the last two Hyloft 3ft x 3ft hanging storage units. This brings the total up to 4 in the garage: 3 on the north side and 1 on the south side. I’m quite pleased with how they turned out and I still have plenty of space left for future use. In these pictures, I have everything up there that I had planned to store on them.

I also snapped a picture of the two bike lifts I installed a little while back. They are the pulley-type that allow you to raise and lower heavier bikes (which the cruisers definitely are..).

The garage is really starting to come together now. I’ve given in to Kellie’s wish that we not take on priming and painting the garage this year. I fear that we won’t ever get back to doing it but alas, it is only a garage and while paint would add that extra splash of style and finish, it is definitely not necessary.

I spec’ed out the two remaining tools I need to rent to groove and drain the garage floor and now that I have a hitch on the TT, I just need a free day to head over to Home Depot and pick them up. Then I’ll epoxy the garage floor and it’ll pretty much be done!

Just a quick update before bed: on Saturday I rented an Attic Cat insulation blower from Lowes and picked up a few more bags of insulation. I ended up blowing two bags into the garage attic and the remaining three bags into the condo attic. It was actually pretty fun and I’m satisfied knowing that will pay dividends not only for the garage but for the condo as well.

On Sunday I found a leak in the basement. The piping behind the shower sprung a small leak sometime recently and the laundry room floor and under the shower were covered in water. I was able to find the leak without too much difficulty after ruling out the dehumidifier and the shower drain. I cut open the drywall and hired out a plumber to weld/solder in a new section of pipe. Here’s the new pipe.

Here’s the piece that was removed… notice the water deposits.. making me think this has been a slow leak for a while that widened after the shower was used on Saturday.

That’s all patched up now and I had the contractor who is mudding our garage today and tomorrow patch up a few spots in the house too. After the mudding is done in the garage, I’ll:
-mount up all the accessories that need studs (to create the holes)
-remove accessories and prime and paint
-cut floor, install drains?, apply floor covering
-reinstall accessories

It’s hard to believe the garage project is getting close to completion!

Today saw a great deal of work done on one of my summer projects: the garage renovation. I and three others tackled drywall and finished the 24′ x 24′ x 8′ area in seven to eight hours. A drywall lift rented from Home Depot for $30 made a huge difference and allowed us to break up the work so that we could be attaching one piece of drywall while also measuring for the next piece. We broke for lunch and had yesterdog delivered (by the wives) and went out for ice cream when finished. All in all, a very successful day and I’m very grateful for the help from Mike, Eric, and Phil. Jason also deserves a thanks for spending a few hours with me on Wednesday picking up the drywall. Here are some pictures from the day.

A little over a week ago I posted a picture of some duct piping I creatively put together to attack a problem with hot air in the condo. That solution was obviously temporary – and given that I had today off from work and the weather was supposed to be mild (in the upper 60s), I took the opportunity to start putting the permanent solution in place. Up into the attic I went…

As you can see, it was pretty warm in the attic despite only being 67ish outside. The sun beating on the shingles for several hours this morning is the culprit.

I started with the vent into the A frame of the cathedral ceiling. Used a 14×6 opening for this one. I had to pull back a lot of insulation to get at the drywall.

This is a shot of the transition out of the wall cavity I’m using as a pipe. This is directly above the return air duct vent below the thermostat. You can see the top side of the can light in the hallway by my left foot. The transition piece is a 14 or 12 by 3.5 that’s made for this purpose. This was the hardest part of the whole day: I had to cut through 3 2x4s laid on top of each other to get into the cavity from the top… finally borrowing a reciprocating saw to make it easier.. otherwise I’d probably still be up there drilling holes. After about three hours, I’d gotten it trimmed and perfectly sized.

I used six inch piping throughout.. a y-pipe here allows me to put one vent in the A frame of the living room and another into the master bedroom (which gets really warm on summer afternoons as it’s on the west side of the condo).

I did quite a bit of eyeballing on this project… not typical for me but it worked out well. Here you can see the two pieces that will eventually connect.

By this point, I’m sweating like there is no tomorrow. It’s climbed to 70 outside and about 105 inside.. enough to max out the thermostat.

Here’s the cut and placement of the pipe for the master bedroom. Used a 12×6 here.

Here’s a shot from above the master bedroom showing the entire system. I had to break from the project to head to a 4th of July party so I left the duct taping and clamping for tomorrow. I also need to insulate the pipes to prevent the hot attic air from warming the air in the pipes on the way to the air handler.

After returning from the festivities earlier than expected, I finished the drywall and vent work on the visible side. Here is the A frame vent. Almost looks like it has always been there.

Here is the master bedroom vent. A little close to the door for my liking but there is a few inches of clearance between the edge of the vent and the wall. Both vents have levers for opening and closing so this should allow a lot of flexibility for efficient cooling.

Tomorrow I’ll finish up and in addition to a little work in the attic, I need to open up the bottom of the wall cavity and seal off the existing vent (below the thermostat) so that the suction is from the two new vents in the ceiling. After tomorrow, bring on the hot weather!