Author Topic: Home Improvement Projects  (Read 30159 times)

Offline name

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 1570
  • I ate your llama!
    • View Profile
Re: The Homeowners/Home Improvement thread
« Reply #105 on: November 23, 2009, 04:34 PM »
You know, it's amazing what a little paint can do to a house.  Nice remodel there and I'm assuming not to costly. ;)

Speaking of what a little paint can do, I finally got my wife to finish the curtains for the nursery...everything else on that project had been complete for nearly 4 months.  So I got pictures last night....

Tasks:

Painted walls and ceiling
Painted and refurbished crib - was white, dingy, and beat up from six years in basements and three moves
Painted and refurbished dresser - was a yard sale bargain..antique, but with Viva La Raza Mexico carved deep into the drawer fronts.  Puttied, sanded, painted, and put new hardware on the drawers.
Painted changing table - was a freebie...ugly and pink.
Refurbed ugly brass light fixture - my wife's idea...sanded to rough it up, painted, and added these little shades
Slipcovered an old ugly wingback.
Wife made drapes and roman shades.

The only thing new in the room is the rug.  Everything else came at the cost of  paint and a little bit of work.















This sticker is dangerous and inconvenient, but I do love Fig Newtons.

Offline I Am Sith

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2208
  • 1/6 the Sith I used to be...
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #106 on: November 23, 2009, 08:06 PM »
name - absolutely fantastic job!!! :o

Had I not known you did this yourself, I would have believed a professional decorator was responsible for this room.  Excellent work.
The 60mm Sith Lord - All the hate and anger you've come to expect, now in a new conveniently sized package!

Offline I Am Sith

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2208
  • 1/6 the Sith I used to be...
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #107 on: December 10, 2009, 02:28 PM »
Episode III

The service guy came out and did a complete inspection of the unit.  After about an hour, they figured out that the pan where the flame comes out was incorrect.  The manufacturer had installed a pan for a Propane unit instead of Natural Gas.  So, now they have to order a replacement pan and then come out to install it once it arrives.

I seriously hope this is the last issue we have with the unit...  Next episode hopefully airing next week.

So I've been deficient in my updates but really didn't want to post anything again until the unit was either fixed or they gave me a refund...

Visit 4 from the fireplace installers consisted of them coming back on Friday of last week with the replacement burner pan and it still wasn't producing the proper flames.  When that didn't work, the manufacturer then recommended additional gas line replacement.  So visit 5 had them doing addition pipe replacement from the one inch trunk line pipe that they replaced a few weeks ago.  There was about 15 feet of half inch pipe that still led to the unit, so they replaced all of the half inch pipe with one inch pipe on Tuesday and low and behold, it still wasn't producing the proper flame height.  So the manufacturer finally agreed to send out one of their own people to replace the entire valve assembly (gas flow regulator and pilot light assembly).  Visit 6 occurred this morning.

They came in and disassembled the valve assembly from the unit.  As soon as they had the assembly off, they compared all of the parts to the new assembly they were going to install today.  They could see immediately what the problem was.  The opening on the valve from the old assembly was about half the diameter of the one from the new assembly.  Even though the valve was identity stamped with the right diameter number, you could see with the naked eye that it wasn't the right size.  Once they put the new assembly on and fired the unit up we could all see that the flames were about 6-7 inches in height.  They let it run for about 20 minutes and the flames were nice and orange/yellow and the heights were perfect.  Once we have performed the 'burn-off' of all of the residual oils and paints tonight, I need to clean the glass and then I'll be able to take pictures and post them.

So after 6 visits from the installers and finally the manufacturer, the unit is finally looking like it was in their brochures and on-line.  I also received a call from the tile distributor and our order is ready for pick up.  I'm going this weekend to get the tile and will start sealing right away.  I will be putting up the rest of the cement board and running the electrical this weekend as well and will hopefully start the finish tile next week.  I have 15 days until my wife's family is coming over for Christmas so I need to get cracking!
The 60mm Sith Lord - All the hate and anger you've come to expect, now in a new conveniently sized package!

Offline I Am Sith

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2208
  • 1/6 the Sith I used to be...
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #108 on: December 11, 2009, 12:23 AM »
This is the unit with the glass and stones added to the tray:



And to quote one of my favorite stand-ups, 'Now that's a fire!'





Can't wait to get this done now...
The 60mm Sith Lord - All the hate and anger you've come to expect, now in a new conveniently sized package!

Offline JesseVader08

  • Retired Staff Member
  • Jedi Sentinel
  • *
  • Posts: 10862
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #109 on: December 11, 2009, 12:55 AM »
Wow, that is one sexy fireplace.  8)  Your patience was severely tested, but I think it paid off.

« Last Edit: December 11, 2009, 12:56 AM by JesseVader08 »

Offline BrentS

  • Jedi Knight
  • *
  • Posts: 2788
  • I sense much fear in you.
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #110 on: December 11, 2009, 07:14 PM »
Nothing like a sign that say's "Only Non-Combustable materials" sitting on top of a wooden 2 by 4.   ;)  Anyway, looks great!  Looking forward to seeing the finished product!

Offline I Am Sith

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2208
  • 1/6 the Sith I used to be...
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #111 on: December 29, 2009, 11:52 PM »
It's been a while since I updated the fireplace progress.  I finished the sheet-rock before Christmas:



I had also run electical outlets and an on/off switch to the fireplace so that we could have power up on the shelf.  My wife thought it would be funny to get a picture of me crawling around under the fireplace attaching the conduit:



We then started the slate work yesterday.  It's going a lot slower than anticipated, but I guess that's to be expected when this is the first tile job you're doing, you're working with 16x24 sheets of slate, and your 4 and 5 year old kids want you to play with them instead of working on the fireplace.  So with that being said, we've only been able to finish the hearth to this point:



The 60mm Sith Lord - All the hate and anger you've come to expect, now in a new conveniently sized package!

Offline I Am Sith

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2208
  • 1/6 the Sith I used to be...
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #112 on: January 1, 2010, 11:17 PM »
Finished the first three rows of the lower half of the fireplace as well as the shelf and the first two rows of the upper half of the fireplace.





We are hoping to have all of the slate work done tomorrow.  Then it's on to cleaning/rinsing off all of the tiles and sealing them.

The 60mm Sith Lord - All the hate and anger you've come to expect, now in a new conveniently sized package!

Offline Chris M

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2368
  • Time to nut up or shut up.
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #113 on: January 2, 2010, 06:54 PM »
Your slate work looks great.  Good work.

I'd love to slate up our bathroom, but I'd rather hunt instead...so I did this weekend instead of working around the house.
"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote."  Ben franklin


Embrace the suck.

Offline BrentS

  • Jedi Knight
  • *
  • Posts: 2788
  • I sense much fear in you.
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #114 on: January 2, 2010, 08:30 PM »
Almost done!  Keep up the good work!

Offline BillCable

  • Jedi General
  • *
  • Posts: 9883
  • CreatureCantina.com SUCKS!!
    • View Profile
    • CreatureCantina.com
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #115 on: January 2, 2010, 09:52 PM »
So - where the hell do I go to find curtains?  Walmart - crap.  Home Depot - crap.  Lowes - every damn panel was 84" long.  I'm looking for small ones to finish up a bathroom.  I can't use 84" long curtains in the bathroom!   >:(

I remember when Boscov's (or was it Bon Ton... forget) was closing down they had an entire room full of them.  I haven't found anything close to that since.  Just garbage.  I don't want to shop online because I like to check them out in person.  Any ideas?
Bill Cable - Steeler Fan & Star Wars Collector
  http://CreatureCantina.com       
"Cable is incapable of contributing anything positive to this world" - cstoj

Offline Rob

  • Staff Member
  • Jedi Elder
  • *
  • Posts: 25281
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #116 on: January 2, 2010, 10:48 PM »
So - where the hell do I go to find curtains?  Walmart - crap.  Home Depot - crap.  Lowes - every damn panel was 84" long.  I'm looking for small ones to finish up a bathroom.  I can't use 84" long curtains in the bathroom!   >:(

I remember when Boscov's (or was it Bon Ton... forget) was closing down they had an entire room full of them.  I haven't found anything close to that since.  Just garbage.  I don't want to shop online because I like to check them out in person.  Any ideas?

I don't know if this is an option for you and your family... but Marin always makes ours.  We get fabric usually at Crate and Barrel or Ikea.

Offline I Am Sith

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2208
  • 1/6 the Sith I used to be...
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #117 on: January 2, 2010, 11:25 PM »
We bought our curtains at Crate and Barrel.  I agree with you, the chains like WM and HD usually have a bunch of junk.
The 60mm Sith Lord - All the hate and anger you've come to expect, now in a new conveniently sized package!

Offline Phrubruh

  • Jedi General
  • *
  • Posts: 7847
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #118 on: January 2, 2010, 11:28 PM »
My wife tells me a good fabric store is hard to find. They seem to be closing left and right. However, her and her mom seem to know the location of every fabric store within 100 miles so it is usually covered. Sometimes when they can't find what they want they go online for fabric.
This message brought to you by Wookiee Cookiees - "MMM... Chewie!"
Visit The Endor Express - The Ultimate Guide to Disney's Star Tours

Offline I Am Sith

  • Jedi Apprentice
  • *
  • Posts: 2208
  • 1/6 the Sith I used to be...
    • View Profile
Re: Home Improvement Projects
« Reply #119 on: January 6, 2010, 08:59 PM »
The fireplace is finally done.  We sealed it a few days ago and put the faceplate on the front of the unit.  I'm really happy with how it turned out considering that this was the first time I ever did tile work.  Now it's on to replacing the carpeting with hardwood...

The 60mm Sith Lord - All the hate and anger you've come to expect, now in a new conveniently sized package!