Sheetrock Cleanup

Last Saturday (7/19), we spent the whole day loading sheetrock scraps into a trash trailer to be hauled away. I'll bet they've never seen a trailer so neatly packed as to fill every cubic centimeter of space! It was all fit together like a 3D puzzle so that I could pay only for a 15 yard trailer instead of springing for the 20 or 30. But in the end, all the trash is gone. It's nice to be able to see my front yard again!

This Saturday (7/26), we spent the day cleaning all the sheetrock dust and mud from the floors. We only got through about half the house in a full day, so that's turned into a real job! Each room was done in three passes. First, we swept up all the loose dust and debris. Then, we used shovels to scrape up hunks of mud and stuff that came up easily. Finally, we mopped up the rest.

The stuff dissolves easily in water. You just have to scrub a little bit. Some final spots required a scraper or a wet rag to get up. We had to stay away from the edges of the rooms with the water since we don't want to wet the sheetrock. So we left the edges to get later with a scraper or some other tool. The slowest part of this job is constantly rinsing the mop and changing out the mop water. Like I mentioned, we only did about half the house on Saturday. This evening, we'll start on the rest.

It's great to see clean floors again!

Spraying Texture Today

This morning, we went to the house to open it up for the guys spraying the texture on the walls and ceiling. I'm getting a very light orange peel done everywhere. Yes, I've heard people say that perfectly smooth walls are coming into style. But if there is any defect in a wall at all, it will stand out like a sore thumb on a flat painted surface. My walls have been done really well, but I just don't want to risk it. I think the light orange peel will look fine.

We also brought over the plywood doors we made. These will go up in place of my real front doors until I'm finally ready to hang them. I was going to hang them now, but multiple people recommended against it. We hung one side, and we'll do the other one this evening when we lock up.

I need to call around for information on a paint sprayer. That will make it easier to paint the primer all over the house...

There was a heavy rain for a while this morning. It's coming from the outskirts of Hurricane Dolly, which is making landfall in Texas today.

Prepping for Post-Sheetrock Work

You mean after all this, I still need to decide on colors for EVERYTHING in the house?! Wow! Another marathon of decisions are ahead.

The sheetrock finishing guys are moving right along. They tell me I could have texture on the walls by this Tuesday! Afterward, I'll be ready to paint walls, lay down tile, and all the other finishing stuff that comes afterward.

I've talked to two custom cabinet makers. One is coming to measure within the next 2 days, and the other lives over an hour away, in Hammond. He's looking at my plans and tentative cabinet layout before working up a ballpark figure for me. I've also contacted the interior trim & finishing guy that I want to use. I met him at the house today. His price for all the base and crown moulding, installing cabinets and doors, and all the trim like towel and toilet paper holders, etc., is $4795. That doesn't include moulding material. If I choose to do some of the work myself (like the cabinets, etc.), he'll take off for that portion. I know that this guy does good work with a lot of attention to detail.

As for colors, I'm starting to get input and advice from a few people. I have a few vague ideas about wall colors myself, but nothing definite. My pastor's wife is talented in this area. They're coming by tomorrow for her to take a look at my place and give me some ideas!

It's amazing to look at the house today and remember back to when it was a vacant lot. So much change! I'm heading into the home stretch now, even though I'm sure the remaining work will go the slowest. I enjoy painting, so I'm looking forward to that. I've never put down tile, but I've seen it done and read about it. My knees may not enjoy that work too much, but I'd like to save money and do that myself.

Garage Insulation Blown. Taping Sheetrock.

There's a lot more sheetrock scrap than I predicted. There are at least 4 piles of the stuff all around the yard. I'm planning to have a trash trailer or a dumpster brought to the site so we can load it up and they can haul it away. We've usually just brought trash to the dump ourselves. But there's enough of it here to make it worth the $175 - $285 for a container.



They have worked 2 half days at taping all the sheetrock. Today they start working whole days because their other job is finished up. Woody, the guy who seems to be the supervisor working with them, tells me that the end of today should be the half-way point in their work. So far, it looks good.






We finished blowing the insulation into the garage walls and attic at 10PM on Monday night. That ended a 4-day marathon of work on that project. I hope I never have to do that again!

Blowing in the attic was far easier than the walls. Just point and shoot! The walls took so much time attaching the netting and then having to hold the hose just-so. And there was so much starting and stopping for each stud bay.

I took yesterday evening off from working at the house. Except for closing up the place and meeting a friend of mine to talk about doing the finishing of the garage door arches, I didn't work over there.

Rear Garage Insulation

While the guys were hanging the sheetrock in the house, my dad and I got to work insulating the rear garage with blow-in fiber material from Home Depot.

Yes, that's me! See, I really am capable of physical labor!

This material is like the lint you clean from the filter in your clothes dryer mixed with random pieces of newspaper and plastic scraps. You break it up from the bag into a hopper, and it blows though the hose. It's dry, so it doesn't stick in the walls on its own. You need netting installed across the front of the studs to hold it in.

Like everything else, this has taken much longer to complete than first anticipated. As I write this, we're not done yet. If you buy enough material from Home Depot, they let you rent the machine for free. They say they don't want you to keep it longer than 3 days, but that didn't sound like a hard-and-fast rule. Just a request. I picked it up Friday afternoon, so this afternoon would make 3 days. I'll bring it back tomorrow if we can finish tonight.

The stuff is dry and fluffy, so it gets everywhere. In the picture above, you can see it coating my arms and clothes. The gear on my head is keeping it from my eyes, nose and mouth. The material is treated with a chemical. I presume it's to make it fire retardant. But if you have any open cut, blister, or sore, it burns like crazy on contact.

So far, we've completed all except the right-hand wall. Blowing in the attic should go mch quicker than the walls since we don't have to stop to hang netting and I don't have to hold the hose over my head. I'll be in the attic blowing down in between the rafters.

The stuff seems really good at sound insulation. I hope it's good at keeping some of the heat out. I know I'm not cooling the inside of the garage, but it would be nice for it not to be 100 degrees in there.

On the Sheetrock Front...

The hanging is done, and the next crew is starting the next stage today. I know they start with taping, and I guess the next step is called floating? In any case, I'm told they're going to start after lunch.

Photos of Sheetrock in Progress

Random Thoughts

Regarding Contracts...

I spent time and money up front to have a lawyer draw up contracts and lien waivers to use when subbing out the work. I'm glad I did this because I now have them in case I need them. But I haven't used them much. I've had a few subs sign lien waivers when I paid them, but I haven't had anyone sign one of my contracts up front.

I've gotten two or three people to sign lien waivers, and each one looked at me like I was from another planet. The roofer looked shocked, hurt, and offended. Looking back on it, I'm glad I got him to sign it because he seemed a bit cagey. But the plumber is a fine upstanding guy who has worked in the area all his life. There's no real need to have him sign them.

I think if you hire someone who is new to the area or someone you have no prior knowledge of, the formality of the contract and lien waiver is a good idea. If you either knew of the contractor through some prior experience, or even if you know they've been well established in the area for years, then it's not as necessary. That's just my amateur opinion. If I got burned once, I'd probably turn that opinion around. But for now, that's the way I see it.


Regarding contractor clean-up vs. doing it yourself...

On a semi-related topic, the contract template I have talks about the subcontractor having to clean up after themselves. It's great if they do, such as in the case of the insulation with all the sticky overspray, but I personally enjoy going over and picking up inside the house and around the yard. And sometimes, you don't notice some detail about the work that's been done until you bend over to pick up that piece of debris.

Sheetrock, Day 1

The guys showed up around 9:30 this morning. Their first task was to count and sort through all the sheets that were stacked. They found that many of them were cracked and busted. Basically, they said it looked like the beat up stock from the back of the yard. I called to have the supplier come out to look at it. They did, and the replacement stock should be there tomorrow morning.

In the meantime, they were able to get the top half of several rooms completed: the office, the front bedroom, the bathroom, and several closets. They finished up around 3:30 today because the lead guy was tired from an early morning and a day of traveling.

It was nice for me not to work at the house this evening. It was a relaxing one at home!

Tomorrow, I expect that they'll get more done since they're already setup and in motion. I'm assuming they'll be able to work a bit longer also. Photos to come soon!

Sheetrock Delivered

Delivery people rarely follow through with the phone call they promise before they show up. I woke up this morning to see on my phone that I missed a phone call. It was the driver with the sheetrock. He hadn't left the yard yet, and he was calling for directions (not necessarily to let me know he was coming). I told him the place was locked and I'd be over there in 15 mins. They beat us there. So had they not needed directions, it would have been more of a rush on my part to go over & let them in.

All I can say is: I now have a LOT of sheetrock!

There are three big stacks in the living room, two in the kitchen, and one in the garage. The green rock is next to one of the bathrooms. The truck they used has a boom arm on it. The arm lifts sheets off the truck and extends out to the front door. So the guys just take them off the arm and onto a dolly with wheels. Then they take them to the stacks in the house.

It'll be interesting to see where they start hanging the stuff and how they maneuver around the stacks.

One thing I noticed is that some sheets were scraped and gouged by the time they were put on the truck and handled by the crane arm. I assume they either don't use the gouged pieces or they can mud over the scars later on.

I left a voicemail with my sheetrock guy letting him know the material is on-site and that he'll need to call me to get in the house when they're ready to start... We'll see if they are another group that forgets to call first! :)

Late Night at the House

I worked with my mom & dad's help until 10:30 tonight! That's a record. My friend Ken was over earlier in the evening. He marked on the floor where each outlet was so the sheetrock guys can keep better track of them (and I can make sure I don't lose one without realizing it). Then he helped me run a couple of speaker wires.

Afterward, my dad and I finished straightening out bowed studs. If a stud is even at the top and bottom plates but it bows in into the room at the center, it could affect how the sheetrock job will come out. (Yes it's probably overkill, but I'm a perfectionist!). So we cut a diagonal slot into the stud on the side where it's bowed into a room. Then a screw is applied on the edge to close the gap that's been made. This usually makes it straight. In most cases, we also screwed a piece of 2x4 over the cut to strengthen the area.

Then it was back to running speaker wire. I tell ya, no matter how much you think to do, and how much you accomplish, it always seems there's something else lurking out there: another wire you could run, or something else you could accomplish in the attic before the sheetrocking happens, etc.

My mom helped outside with the pile of sand I have left over from the brick-laying. I'm keeping as much of it as practical because I'll need to lay more bricks for steps, and I may also put pavers down in the backyard. She filled buckets with it and we moved them to the back garage. She filled around 7 buckets and it's probably less than half the pile! I'm not sure how much sand is practical to store in buckets. I know I'll use some of that to fill in low spots in the yard. But I wanted to clear that pile enough so it's not in the way when they deliver the sheetrock tomorrow.

Post-Insulation, Pre-Sheetrock

The insulation is done. The sheetrock is scheduled to be delivered on Tuesday, with the hanging work starting on Wednesday. In the meantime, we've spent a lot of time cleaning the foam overspray out of the attic. The sand-like residue is everywhere! We scraped and swept everywhere on the flat deck up there. We also did a lot of scraping on the beams and supports, but there is more work to do if I want to get it completely clean.

We've also begun finding wall studs that are bowed and correcting them. This will make for walls that are more straight and level. I've also got to finish running speaker wire to a few rooms, and mark on the floor where all the outlets and switches are so that I can make sure none get accidentally covered by sheetrock.

My brick layer came back to hang the new address number. This time it's level and un-chipped. It looks good!

Walking in a Winter Wonderland

The insulation guys finished up day three today of what should be a 4-day job. It's coming out great. I have learned a few things along the way about the spray foam insulation. First, there is a misty overspray that comes from their work. Foam particles land EVERYWHERE and then expand, like tiny styrofoam spheres. The stuff coats everything. It's not a problem because the guys were really good about covering everything with plastic(windows, doors, tools, equipment, etc.). The other thing is that the foam expells fumes after it's applied. My vision was hazy after spending much of the first day on-site. Venting the house is important.



I used a company called Energy and Comfort Solutions. The crew is Spanish-speaking. They know only a little English. That has caused at least one minor problem. I asked them if they could save a particular room until last because there were still some things I was considering installing in the walls. They said yes, but they did that room first! It turns out it wasn't that important, but still...



This company offers a caulking package where they caulk seems everywhere (between two studs, between the sill plate and the slab, around window & door headers, etc.). It's another thing to help with air-tightness. They've done a good job with that.



I also have to thank the management of the company. I have a bathroom with bedrooms on either side, and I'm concerned about noise from the bathroom spilling into the bedrooms. I purposely designed it so that the plumbing for the shower is NOT in the wall that borders a bedroom, but I still wanted to add something in the walls to absorb some sound. I had not planned to put spray foam there because it's more expensive than other materials. I called them to ask what other material they thought was second-best at absorbing sound. He offered to just have them spray the walls while they were there at no cost! I hadn't had sheetrock installed on one side of the walls, so I had to rush over to staple some tyvek material on one side of each wall to provide backing where they can spray. They are going to do this tomorrow. Afterward, I'll peel off the Tyvek and the foam ought to stay in place.



Here are a few pictures from Day 2. This doesn't show all they finished today:

First Attic Insulation Photos

The pictures above are from the first day of insulation work. They're done with about 3/4 of the attic. The last photo is just to show the outside now that the trim work is done.

Thar be Foam in These Here Rafters!

Okay, so I'm not sure how to translate that declaration into pirate-speak (or is that gold-prospector-speak?). But the message is an exciting one: they're beginning to spray in the foam insulation today!

I got word late yesterday that they could start the process today. I'm still working on some of the bowed studs in the exterior walls, but it's gonna take them all of today and some of tomorrow to finish the roofline (the roof rafters). By the time they start spraying downstairs, I'll have all the studs evened out.

They arrived at about 8:40 this morning. The prep work took a while, and they started spraying at around 10:30. I left for lunch and to get some work done for my employer. I'm headed back out there now, and I hope to get some good pictures.