Category: Houseblog

On today’s Highlights® for Home Improvement Geeks™, we have the story of Goofus and Gallant and the Undersized Doorway! Read along:

• Gallant starts with detailed plans for his (and her) charming bungalow renovation.
• Goofus buys not one, but two refrigerators that won’t fit through the $#!@#$ kitchen door!
• Gallant strips an entire floor down to bare wood to lay it out the way he and she want it.
• Goofus rips out a door jamb using a prybar and a brand-new reciprocating saw so that the smallest kitchen door opening goes from 27″ to 30.5″—hopefully enough for a new fridge.

In all seriousness, here’s how it went down. As I laid out in my last update, the plan was to remove a little trim from the doorway to widen the opening. The way this normally goes is: use a putty knife or razor blade to cut the paint away from the joint between the stop molding (the strips of wood that the door rests against when it’s closed) and then slip a prybar in to strip the stop molding out.

Had this been a normal house, that’s how it would have gone.

Instead, we have Überhaus. Built way beyond contemporary standards by a highly responsible builder in 1941. In this case, this means the stop molding wasn’t a strip tacked in place but was actually part of the doorjamb. What this meant was we had to rip out the whole doorjamb to gain any width.

To remove a door jamb, here’s what you do:

1. First, remove the casing—the molding around the outside of the doorjamb. To do this, I used a rubber mallet to tap a putty knife into the joint between the molding and adjacent pieces of wood to break the paint seal, then used a prybar to pull the molding away. In some cases, I had to slip a chisel in to widen the gap enough to get the prybar in.
2. In our case, the casing had two parts: some raised trim around the edges (what I like to think of as “crown molding for the doorway”) and three flat boards surrounding the actual door opening. I thus had to start with the raised trim, walk that all the way around (where I could—the door was butted against a wall, so I had to leave some trim until later), then remove the flat boards.
3. Once I did that and caught my breath, I had to repeat the process on the other side of the doorway.
4. Finally, I removed the jamb. Usually the instructions for this read “pry out the jamb and use a reciprocating saw to cut through any stubborn nails.” In my case, I wasn’t able to get leverage to get any of the three pieces of the jamb out, so I cheated. I made a cut about a foot from the top of the left upright piece with the reciprocating saw, pried out the bottom piece, removed the top piece, the top part of the jamb, then the right part of the jamb.

Easy as pie. It only took one whole day.

So what’s next? Well, in our immediate future, we have a 30.5″ hole through which we can fit a fridge. Once we find a reliable carpenter, we’ll have him make a mirror of the arch that leads into the same hallway. Beats having a narrow doorjamb where there’s no need for an actual door.

Incidentally, shout out to JM and A for recommending the Sawzall, which was our reciprocating saw of choice for this operation. Best home improvement tool I ever had. Maybe even better than the crowbar.

Item 1: We have broadband again. The Comcast setup was pretty straightforward, though the tech did wear out a drill battery trying to punch a hole in our wall to install the jack. (We have a house that’s framed with “seasoned wood,” apparently the 1941 equivalent of pressure treated lumber, and the installer said it was definitely on his top 10 lists of most difficult walls to drill through ever. It didn’t help that he decided to go through a stud.)

Item 2: We also have a phone. After Saturday’s adventures with the junction block, I enlisted the help of Charlie, a friendly neighbor who also happens to be an electrician. He showed me a thing or two about troubleshooting, to wit: (1) the wiring to the kitchen jack was shot, (2) I had not connected the outside wires to the right spot on the junction box. We did get one jack working, so I have as a project to re-wire the kitchen jack. It’s all a straight shot above the ceiling, so it will be relatively straightforward. I’m going to take the opportunity to install a little switchblock from Leviton to make the process a little more managable. (For a great discussion of different structured wiring setups, check out HouseInProgress.)

Item 3: We still don’t have a refrigerator. The second one that came proved to have case parts that extended beyond the width of our doorways and couldn’t be removed, contrary to what the salesman had told me when I went, tape in hand, to pick out a fridge that would fit. We “fired” that appliance store and are now proceeding with a new two-part plan. First, I’ll get my crowbar and remove some of the trim from the offending doorway so we get another inch or two of room. Second, I think we’ll try Sears. From what our next door neighbor told me, their installers seem likelier to attempt creative solutions to get appliances into rooms.

Saturday we both woke up sweating about the appliances. The doors throughout our house, a 1941 Cape Cod that we bought from the original owner’s son and that had been occupied by a family member since it was built, are narrow—the door into the living room from the front is about 31 inches, the widest door into the kitchen is 27 inches, and the door into the utility room where the washer and drier would go is only about 26. We dashed to Home Depot to enquire about installing a new door. Fortunately a very patient Irishman in the door and window department informed us that it should be much simpler—all they should have to do to move the fridge inside would be to take the doors off.

That was good news, because we had to quickly dash south to meet Lisa’s parents halfway and pick up our dogs. We got back from that errand at around 3, only to find that the visit from Verizon had failed to get our phone working. He muttered something ominous on the call about some wiring being missing.

A trip back out to the box confirmed what he said. When I had checked the network interface the first time, I failed to note the absence of any wiring leading out of the NIB into the house. Yep, there was absolutely nothing connecting the network interface box to the house. I moped for a while, then went inside and “walked the wire” from where the connection in the kitchen dropped into the garage, through the utility room, and into the storage room where an, erm, “antique” phone block was connected to the ceiling. Next to it, a strain relief tube had been passed through next to the window.

Inspiration struck, and I ran to the Home Depot for some Cat-3 outdoor grade wire. I connected it to the NIB, ran it along the house into the strain relief tube, and tried to figure out how to connect it to the old phone block.

And there the story ends for now, because even after trying a couple of variations I can’t get the darned dial tone to go. Oh well. This is probably a good opportunity to look at structured wiring options, and quickly. Our cell phones don’t work so well up on the hill.

Day three in the new house, and I’m down at the Starbucks in Arlington getting some coffee ground and downloading all my email. We still don’t have phone or cable at the house; more on that in a second.

The closing on Friday went very smoothly and we celebrated with lunch at Legal Seafoods. The rest of the afternoon was spent assembling our bed, getting most of the bedroom unpacked, and taking a whirlwind trip to Home Depot and Best Buy. We ended up purchasing a washer and drier and a refrigerator. And I guess what they say about “buy in haste” is true, at least regarding the fridge. But at the time we didn’t have a chance to secondguess ourselves; we had to dash back to Arlington to change and then downtown to the North End and Paolo Diecidue’s new place, Via Valverde (no web presence yet). I’ll write more about that trip later.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: there is absolutely no better home improvement resource than watching someone else document their own trials, tribulations, and triumphs. In this case, it’s HouseInProgress.net. I’ve pointed to JM and A’s (first initials only!) fine work before, but two things popped out of their archives at me recently which made me grateful to be a frequent reader.

The first is their excellent review of air conditioning systems, in which they point out that you can sometimes install a high-tech high velocity system, which is both lower-impact and provides excellent circulation, for less than it would take to do a comparable forced air system. (In fact, all their “review” articles have been outstanding. Check out the “structured wiring” discussion.)

The other was their article about running coax cable through the walls yourself for a low impact (no cables tacked up on the outside of the house!) installation. Cool, practical, and painstakingly illustrated. I’m not sure it’s always possible to find an unused electrical outlet to avoid punching another hole in the wall, though, especially in older homes.

Boston Globe: WAF (Wife Acceptance Factor). Lisa pointed this article to me, I think as explanation for how she thinks about technology purchases. I can certainly say that WAF played a big role in the decision to upgrade my PowerBook. The deciding factor was the ability to do video chats with my inlaws, which I had previously considered a cool bonus but not necessarily a deciding feature.

What does this have to do with hi fi? Well, it certainly explains Lisa’s desire for flat panel TVs, her agreeing with me that we at least need to look at DLP front projectors, and her oo-ing over the new flat panel speaker line from Bowers and Wilkins.

I have become that which I laughed at. I have been taking our dogs to Doggie Day Care for the last few days. (I know, I know. How much more anxious yuppie dogparent can I get?)

It’s a pretty good setup, if a tad pricy. The dogs have other dogs their own size to play with—rare when that size is under 15 pounds. They have an attentive watcher, and a nice back yard to play around in (and get dusty in). They even have individual beds to nap in.

They come home totally wiped out at the end of the day, which is probably the best part. It’s like the Jetta commercial where the guy takes his brother’s kids out and runs them up and down hills and on treadmills to wear them out. Peace and quiet = priceless.

…Saturday’s sting was from a wasp, not a bee. Which explains why, all those years as a kid living next to honeybees and stung periodically, I never had an allergic reaction. So there you go.

In the middle of catching up on home improvement projects, yesterday was pretty damn bad. While trimming a bush next to the house, I was stung by a bee. —I grew up next to honeybees. Who knew I was allergic? Suffice it to say, it was a mild reaction, and after a quick dose of Benadryl and a ride to the ER, I was OK.

Today: finished painting, a little lawn mowing, fixed a transition piece over the sill of the bathroom, stained a few pieces of wood around the house. Except for a little soreness at the sting site, everything’s good.

Another project (nearly) completed. I finished caulking the new baseboards in the guest bathroom. The caulk serves two purposes: it prevents water from running down behind the baseboards in the event of splashes, and it also hides the fact that some of the walls weren’t exactly flat by filling any gaps between the boards and the walls. Everything looks really good now. Except for the transition between the bathroom tile and the hallway floor. I need to lay a transition trim piece over that. Tonight.

I’m speaking of course about the items on my “fix the house” list. Yesterday’s porch repair went pretty easily, if tediously. After verifying the extent of the damage yesterday, I squared off the damaged section to a 33″ x 4″ rectangle using my trusty jig saw, then trimmed a 3/4″ x 6″ x 6′ hardwood board to match the dimensions and nailed it to the floor studs. When I was done, the patch had less give than the rest of the sections of original flooring. I spent the rest of the late afternoon, until about 7 pm, cutting the replacement carpet to shape and getting it snugly into place with my trusty staple gun. It now looks a hell of a lot better than it did. I was even able to fix a loose step or two while I was at it.

Tonight’s project: either clean up the library (where months of processed bills wait for me to file them) or finish the trim in the guest bathroom. Both, maybe, if I’m lucky.

I finished cleaning out the rotted wood on the porch today. When all was said and done, the only damage was confined to a 33″ x 4″ strip along one edge. It strikes me as safer and easier to square-cut the hole and drop a replacement board in than to pull up the remaining 4 foot by 5 foot by 1″ board—especially now that I realize it’s (a) got the railings nailed into it and (b) is tongue-and-groove mated to the adjacent piece of decking.

So it’s off to get my jigsaw to cut the board out and then some nails and I should be done.

So: this weekend was the weekend of mulch. More specifically, “Pacific Fertile Garden Mulch,” also known (after the sniff test) as an approximately 50-50 mixture of compost and steer manure. More specifically yet, 15 cubic yards of this stuff. In our driveway, delivered Friday afternoon.

Lisa had called a landscape contractor after we realized the state the beds in the front yard were in. They recommended 20 cubic yards of mulch and 30 of topsoil. We decided they were out of line, so we cut back the request for mulch by 5 cubic yards and eliminated the topsoil. Good decision, in retrospect, but not nearly enough.

I knew we were in trouble when by Friday night at 6 (after two hours of work) I had shifted hardly any of the pile and only succeeded in covering a few beds. The next day I mowed the lawn, helped Lisa prime and sand some more paint on the exterior of the old part of the house, then we moved about a third of the remaining pile. I was so sore by 5 pm that I could hardly stand. So we called in reinforcements.

Today our very special friends Ed and Gina gamely showed up with a shovel and a rake and helped us move the rest of the pile. All of it. It ended up in the beds under the trees where the pine needles had built up for twenty years, the beds around the fence, the back beds, a bed against the house, my clothes, Ed’s clothes, Gina’s clothes, Lisa’s clothes, our wheelbarrow, our neighbor’s wheelbarrow, and most of all my driveway, where Lisa was able to wash most of the remaining dust into the gutter.

I don’t hurt too much yet, but it’s only a matter of time.

Ah well. As Lisa said, “Never again will we order 15 cubic yards of anything.”

To paraphrase William Burroughs: “Warning to young couples with Select Comfort beds: watch out for the family dog!” To be more specific, watch out for dogs that like to sleep under the bed and like to chew things.

Last night I went to adjust the pressure in my side of the mattress, using the wired remote. The partly-wired remote. One of our dogs managed to chew through the really tough insulation on the remote and short out the controls.He also made a real mess of our front room carpet, dangers of having pets! We called area rug service to help us with that mess, but for the remote I found another solution.

Tonight I managed to fix it, using a multi-gauge wire stripper, a large set of diagonal pliers (a.k.a. “dikes”), and electrician’s tape (and a little bit of help from my friend who works for Electricianinperth.com.au). Here’s how:

1. Unplug the pump from its electrical connection.
2. Cleanly cut the control wire at the chewed part, using the dikes.
3. Using the wire stripper (or the dikes if necessary), strip the thick insulation from both sides of the cut control wire, revealing the five small (22-gauge) wires inside.
4. Strip all the small wires using the multi-gauge stripper.
5. Matching colors, twist the cut ends of the bare control wires around each other (white to white, red to red, and so on), and wrap each with a small twist of electrician’s tape.
6. Once the five wires are reconnected, wrap the whole shebang with electrician’s tape.
7. Douse liberally with bitter apple spray or the anti-chew remedy of your choice…

Once I plugged the pump back in and checked the control, it worked on the first try. It’s great, I won’t be needing to call on Contractors Today! I guess those wild summers as an electrician at CEBAF (now Jefferson Labs) weren’t spent in vain.

Lisa and I spent Saturday and Sunday on our front porch. Alas, not in rockers. More like off our rockers.

Saturday began with the ceremonial Removal of the Cruddy Outdoor Carpet, that green plastic thing that used to cover our porch. No more! Now the two-inch gap in the flooring in front of the old front door and the six inch wide strip of dry rot along the far end of the porch are out in the open! Oy.

We chose to go ahead and paint the walls and old front door first, rather than continue to look at primer spots. We began by painting the porch walls and door, and amazingly, the paint that Lisa and her mom got from Lowe’s actually matched the old paint on the walls. When we were done, I couldn’t tell the patched and repainted parts from the untouched parts around them.

We also cleaned a ton of trim and upper wall that had been allowed, in the shade of the overgrown front trees, to mildew. And I nailed in a patch to replace the missing wood in front of the doorjamb. We also bought a replacement carpet (much as I would love to just paint the exposed flooring, I don’t think sheet plywood is anyone’s idea of House Beautiful), though we didn’t get to install it.

In fact, besides some lawnwork and weeding, we didn’t get to do anything else at all. As we collapsed exhausted on our sofas late Sunday afternoon, accompanied by dogs who were ecstatic that we were finally paying them some attention, I think I muttered something about taking a two day vacation to make up for the lost weekend. But I can’t be sure, as I was already asleep.