Yet more framing... with ducts!

I actually started this post, like, two days ago, but then I did some more framing, and now everything I was thinking of writing on Tuesday is wildly inaccurate, and I have to start again. Yeah, I probably could have posted earlier in the week, but the post would have been something like:

"Ugh.
(picture)
Bleargh?
(picture)
Nice jaeorb?
(pictures)..."

Aren’t you glad I waited?

By the way, if you’re a fan of the crappy-ass pictures I take with my crappy-ass camera, well, I have Good News and Bad News: the Good News is that this post contains a buttload of the aforementioned crappy-ass pictures; the Bad News is that this might be the last post I’ll be able to complain about my crappy-ass camera. Because, really, if I can’t complain about my crappy-ass camera, I think we all lose a little something, if you know what I mean.

And if you don’t, well, never mind. Just click the link thingy and we’ll get started.

I’ve been in something of a hurry to finish the framing so we can get the electricians in and get an estimate from the guy who was supposed to be doing the ductwork (more on him in a minute). After three consecutive nights of framing, framing, and more framing, I’m happy to report that I’m almost done.

Before we get into the pictures of the new stuff, however, I thought I’d take a quick trip down memory lane and revisit what the place used to look like, back in the rose-coloured days of May:



Ah… so spacious, so “open-plan”. And we just couldn’t wait to wall it all off.

Here’s a shot from roughly the same spot (okay, fine, it's about four feet to the right and from a different angle) now:



It’s a veritable forest! It might be just a bunch of crappy spruce (honestly, I can’t believe how bad this latest batch of two-by-fours is – they’re all warped or full of knots or even cracked right down the middle), but they’re vertical and sturdy enough. Besides, they’ll all be covered up by drywall eventually anyway, so … well … so it’s kind of a wasted effort making them look nice, isn’t it? (And yes, there are a couple of braces missing from that wall - it was 20 past 10 when the battery in the drill ran out and I realized I'd forgotten to plug in the charger, so I called it a night. Heh, one of those braces only has one screw in it, actually, and it's not even driven in all the way yet...)

Let’s do some more!

Here are a couple of shots from the Dread Wall of Pink:





You’ll notice that I’ve even finished the bracing for that wall, and down into the corner. This is so that we aren’t wasting time when the electricians want to install electrical outlets in that wall.

Furthermore, I’ve started constructing the bulkhead along the support beam where the majority of the electrical wires will go:



(That block underneath is just for support while I get everything cut and screwed into place. I’ll take it off before the drywall goes on.) You can see how the bulkhead extends on the other side of the office and into the laundry room:



And of course, all this cutting and trimming and banging around has changed the scope and shape of my carefully sorted piles of wood, too. I now have only two piles; useful bits:



And firewood:



On to the ducts!

So, as I mentioned, we had a guy lined up (informally) to come in and rework the furnace ducts to supply heat to the office, and take out some of the more questionable bits like, say, this one:





That line comes off the main trunk of the furnace, comes down on the other side of the support beam, goes up again into the joists, and then splits off. One branch goes toward the register in the kitchen (which works), and the other goes into two dead ends. It also has arguably the worst taping job I’ve ever seen.

At any rate, none of the work we need done is all that complicated, as all we want to do is extend the cold air return to vent the office, lengthen two runs so that they supply heat to the office, and redo that appalling line to the kitchen so that it a) doesn’t have more kinks than a leather fetishist in Vegas, and b) supplies heat to the laundry room and kitchen instead of the kitchen and a pair of dead ends. The problem is that we’re not totally sure that what we want to do is to Code, or how big the cold air return has to be, or whether what we want to do is even advisable. (I’d be happy to just go ahead and do it, and bully for the inspector if he even notices, but the War Department is concerned about “efficiency” and “circulation” and “carbon monoxide poisoning”. Pft.)

Not that any of our concerns seem to matter, because we can’t get anyone to even come out and give us an estimate! The guy we were going to hire can’t even show up to look at the job until December, and the guy he recommended to us hasn’t called back. The people who installed our furnace won’t speak to us until at least JANUARY, and the people I called at random in the phone book haven’t bothered to call back to set up an appointment – they apparently don’t need the work anymore than anyone else.

So, ironically enough, the person we might have to consult is: the inspector. I think we’ll be writing up an email and including some of the pictures to explain the situation, and ask him if what we plan to do is acceptable. Of course, as Amy has already pointed out, the inspector won’t care very much if we’re getting enough to heat to certain areas (they’re not all that concerned with your comfort, just your adherence to the Code), but he will be able to tell us if our plan isn’t likely to pass his inspection.

Anyway, this post is long enough, I think, and I’m sure I’ve posted enough crappy-ass pictures for one day. If all goes well, the next picture I post will be the last one I’m forced to take with my crappy-ass camera. The subject matter of said picture?

The new camera, of course.