A little step back, a huge step forward

As it turned out, the plumber didn't need to remove TOO much material from around the shower drain, but it did take him the greater part of the day to install the shower pan.

I think he did a pretty nice job:



Despite appearances, that is not just a randomly placed bag of kitty litter. Oh no. That's a very precisely-positioned, high tech stability assurance enhancement. I shit you not.

Around the side, you can kinda see the hole underneath where the plumber removed the concrete (I tried to get a closer shot but, as I may have already mentioned, my camera sucks):



Oh, and full props to the War Department, who helped with mixing the mortar so the pan would have a nice bed of support on which to sit.

Anyway, we have our work cut out for us this weekend as we have to get the wall between the "storage" area (my office) and the laundry room framed in by Monday, at which point the plumber's coming back to move the hot water tank and replace most of the remaining copper pipe.

I love working to deadline! Read more...

Not the sort of thing I really wanted to hear

The War Department is working from home today because our plumber was coming back to move the hot water tank and install the shower pan. We were a little concerned about this visit because the drain for the shower seemed to be a little close to the studs of the bathroom wall; it needs to be 12" on center, and it looked to my (admittedly unpracticed) eye to be closer to about 11". Maybe even 10 and 3/4"...

However, the guy who originally recommended the plumber to us assured us that we needn't worry, that "he's a miracle worker" and would make it right.

So you can imagine my chagrin when I received the following email message from Amy at five after nine this morning:

"I do so love the sound of jackhammers in the morning..."

Yeah. He's busting up the concrete we so carefully poured four weeks ago. Apparently, we were supposed to leave a gap all the way around the pipe for the shower drain, but I either wasn't listening or he forgot to tell us. (Yes, I know; I'm assuming it was my fault, too.)

I'm at work so I can't post picture of the progress, but I should be able to get some interesting shots tonight. Stay tuned.
Read more...

Oh, the pain

You know, I could make this entire post about the bits of me that hurt right now, but it would take up a lot of screen space. Here's a short list: hands, feet, legs, arms, wrists, and back. Oh, jebus, my aching back...

But you didn't come to read another edition of the injury report (I also have a couple of nasty scrapes from where I unloaded the concrete mixer by myself because I'm an idiot), so on with the concrete show!

We started the day by realizing that we were late picking up the mixer, so I rushed off to get it while the War Department lazed about in bed with the cats. (Hey, I write the blog, so you get my version of events! I don't care that she was up and organizing the basement by the time I got back, I like my story better.) While Amy prepped the basement and got the hoses out, I set up the mixer in the side yard by the window:



If you're very quiet, you might be lucky enough to catch a very rare sighting of the War Department in her natural habitat...



Once everything was ready, we mixed up one bag of concrete with a whole bottle of the bonding agent into a thin slurry. (Am I the only one who loves that word? slurry... Seriously, that's a good word.) Then Amy painted the mixture onto all of the rough edges of the concrete while I farted about taking pictures and getting in the way. (That's what she's doing in the shot above.) We let the bonding agent dry a little bit, and then started mixing and pouring concrete. It was pretty much just a straight slog from that point, but here are some of the highlights:

• In the beginning, I brought 21 of the original 32 bags of concrete from the garage to the side yard, partly because I wasn't sure I'd need all 32 bags, partly because it was sort of overcast and I didn't want to move all those bags back into the garage if it started raining, and mostly because after 5 trips with the wheelbarrow, my arms were going to fall off.


• I started by mixing two bags at a time, emptying the concrete into buckets which I then passed through the window to Amy, who dumped them into the holes. She would start smoothing out and leveling the concrete while I mixed up the next batch. After a while, I kinda got the hang of it, and moved up to mixing three bags at a time.


• About halfway through the second hole, the big one on the workshop side of the bathroom wall, we realized that we weren't going to have enough concrete. Amy figured we'd need at least four more bags, and sent me off to Rona to get six more. When I got there, I figured I might as well play it safe and bought eight. We wound up using all of them, with not even a bucketful left over.


• We finished up about quarter-to-five, but by the time I had rinsed out the mixer and got it loaded in the back of the truck (ouch! again!), it was five-to. Amy called the rental place (we had to have the mixer back by 5:00 or pay for an extra day), but even though she said I was on my way and would be there in 10 minutes, the guy told her bluntly that they were closing in five minutes and hung up. Nice. So the mixer cost us $60+ instead of $30+, but you know what? It was worth every penny.


• Amy did all of the smoothing, troweling, and grading. I just ran the mixer, rinsed the concrete off the tools on a semi-regular basis, and did most of the heavy lifting.

All in all, it was a hell of a lot of work for one day. But we finished! We now have a basement floor - with no cat tracks! Imagine!

Here are a series of shots showing our work. The first of each pair shows the concrete after pouring, the second after letting it cure overnight (still not quite ready to walk on):










Look! No more hole to the outside!



Okay, so that's probably more pictures of concrete than you really wanted to see, but we're pretty proud of the job we did.

So on Sunday, we cleaned up most of the dirt and mud on the rest of the floor and tidied up the work bench. Amy patched most of the holes in the slab (and the giant hole left by the old water service in the side of the house) with hydraulic cement while I fixed the plumbing under the kitchen sink. Yes, I fixed the plumbing. (Yes, I left a bowl under the drain just in case I didn't fix it right and we haven't run the dishwasher yet, which will REALLY test it, but I'm pretty sure it's good.)

All in all, it was arguably the most work we've managed in a weekend so far. 40 fricking bags of concrete. Oh, my aching back.

Yes, we both took our Vitamin I and plenty of Vitamin Beer. Probably shouldn't have ground one up and dissolved it in the other, but what are ya gonna do? Read more...

It's concrete day!

All right, enough of the simpering about keys and kitty litter. It's picture time!

A warning to users on dial-up: ha ha!

First up, the plumbing inspection. Our poor beleaguered plumber booked the inspector for 2:45 on Thursday afternoon, and came over a little early to get everything set up. When the inspector arrived, and they filled up the system with water to test the seals, they found a leak in one of the connections between the crappy old cast iron pipe and the new PVC. The inspector, bless his cold, cold heart, said he had another job to inspect, but would come back in an hour or so to give the plumber a chance to fix things up.

Well, the plumber scurried around the basement for the better part of an hour, getting absolutely soaked and covered in mud (the contents of the pipes were under pressure for the test, and when he attempted to let the pressure off... well, let's just say it didn't release as smoothly as he planned). Fortunately, he was considerate enough to do the mud and water spraying outside, so the basement didn't get trashed again.

When the inspector came back, they went to conduct the test again, and the bladder they were using to plug one end of the drain wouldn't work. I don't know what was wrong with it (I was getting the play-by-play third hand as I was at work), but it wouldn't inflate properly to close off the drain. So he's running around trying to get it to work (getting more soaked in the process) and the inspector is RIGHT THERE... ah, it must have been a glorious scene.

Eventually, however, they managed to plug the drain, fill the system, and check for leaks. All good - we passed the rough plumbing inspection! W00ts! Of course, we also had to pay the piper - er, plumber - for all his hard work. The War Department handed over a cheque that was five bucks south of $4000. Um, ouch. Still, the guy worked his butt off, and we're pretty sure he STILL cut us a bit of a deal as far as the number of hours he actually put in.

At any rate, with the plumbing inspection completed, we have the green light to start covering up those damn holes in the floor. Which means... concrete!

We picked up 20 bags on Thursday night and stashed them in the garage for safekeeping. After work on Friday, I picked up a half-a-yard of washed sand. We used the sand to cushion and embed the pipes, and then covered them up with some of the better quality dirt and the rest of the sand. Did I mention that all of the sand and dirt had to be passed in through the window in buckets?

Here's the result:




(Ha ha, cats can't get out the hole!)

After we were finished that, I went back to Rona and picked up another 12 bags of concrete. Of course, my back and arms started to stiffen up on the drive, so loading 12 bags really, really hurt. When all was done:



That is 32 bags of Sakrete Concrete Mix, and we're hoping it will be enough. We had to get it in two trips, because we didn't want to find out that the truck couldn't handle 1760 pounds of crap while coming back on the highway at 90kph. Oh, and by the way: picking up and putting down 32 bags of concrete means more than two "Vitamin I". I'm just saying.

All in all, it was a hell of a lot of work for a Friday night. It's worth it though: no more enormous piles of dirt in the basement:



The plan for today: pick up the concrete mixer (what? you think we're mixing 32 bags of concrete in a wheelbarrow? HA!) at 10, clean and prep the holes, and start laying concrete. Oh, joy. If I don't post pictures tonight, I'm probably stuck in the foundation.

Fortunately, Amy's done a fair amount of concrete work in her time, so once again, she'll be in charge while I do all the heavy lifting.

One last picture before I go get started:



Ah, my favorite hole. Want to know the best part? We can't fill it in yet! We have to make it BIGGER!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Ahem.

Sorry about that. Anyway, we need to dig down some more on the right side there to expose the drain tile - that's where it connects to the pipe that runs through the front yard and out to the city storm drain. We have to expose it so we can install a clean out. Joy.

I'm going to need more coffee today. I can feel it already. Read more...