1910 house, the work begins

[Hoosier Foursquare]

Wow, the place is looking great! Love what you did to the floors. Ours had some bad staining as well but those are chocked up as being what we lovingly refer to as "character marks". I tried to remove some of the spots but wasn't able to. Some lightened, others laughed at me.

Vandals........Suck......

[Improbcat]

Quick update because we're still working away. Pics are out of date as I can't seem to keep up with all the changes.

Hallway before & after:


The color is a *very* light mint, it is only visible as not-white because the trim is pure white.

Remember all or wallpaper stripping and repair work?


We finally got primer & paint on the walls:


Her bathroom before & after, Vanity still to be installed in these pics:

The color is all her choice, I take no credit or blame.

We also got a new roof! They stripped two layers of shingles, plywooded & put down architectural shingles in two days, and built a dormer for the upstairs bathroom in another two days. Great work on the part of C&J Construction of RI!



Since they were only doing the shell of the dormer per our contract, the upstairs bathroom now looks like this:



Now I'll be able to add a shower to the clawfoot tub, but I also have to find a window smaller than 30"H x 33"W to fit in the dormer.

One of the projects I am looking forward to in the bathroom is here over the bumpout for the staircase. I want to build a recessed shelf or shelves into this space to take advantage of the dead space in the wall. That'll be after we move in though, as this whole bathroom is a project in and of itself.

[Improbcat]

Sorry for the lack of updates, we had a final big push to get the place livable(we moved in this weekend) and most of our friends couldn't help with the final work as they'd already given us almost two months worth of their free time. I'm still far behind on pictures, but here is one project that ought to amuse. Before we could repaint, we needed to peel our kitchen cabinets. Yes, peel.









The paint was so thick that in most places if you nicked it the top 3-4 layers would come off in a sheet. It made our lives easier and helped restore some of the detailing to the edges. Just wait until you see the finished cabinets, subtly is not something we are known for.

Another fun thing was my housewarming gift to my girlfriend. She is an editor for a Young-Adult publishing company and works from home. One thing we required from whatever home we bought was office space for her. The foyer in our house is large enough to work well for this purpose(and we'd rarely use the front door anyway as the driveway and mailbox are on the side street). We are both big fans of the 1940's/50's noir detective stories & movies. So I did some discreet antiquing and put together a period office for her.




There is a wooden swivel chair as well, but I couldn't get it out of storage in time. The lettering is on the door to the porch, I frosted the glass and ordered gold-leaf look vinyl precut in a period looking font. She was thrilled and is really looking forward to working in there.

[cadrad]

I had my electrician say the same thing when I had the house inspected about the knob and tube, which is in the original undisturbed condition all through the house. my house has really high quality knob and tube (oddly so, very overkill for the period, but I have a lot of odd overkill things like that, like a poured cement foundation and steel I beams carrying the floor joists), and some of it was exposed when we were doing plumbing repairs. It is still in good shape and the rubber coating is not deteriorated. All of the rooms were equipped with at least two outlets, even in rooms with overhead fixtures, and all of the closets have overhead light, most with the original push button switches. A few of the out of the way outlets still have edison style plug ins( the kind where you can screw in a light bulb) The living room has 6 outlets( actually 9, but some were added later and are grounded), and the dining room 4, which, again appear original. I have 150 amp service, but the house had 100 amp originally(!? for 1916 ?!) according to the electrician who did the replacement. I have a scary looking fuse box in that it has like 5 supplementary panels all willy nilly around it, because whenever they wanted more power, the ran a new panel and new wiring, which my electrician says is good...all of the fused circuits have those tamper resistant threads in them that don't allow for more than 15 amp fuses.

[MrGrady]

How'd you make out with the electric? I may have missed it somewhere in there...

My house was about 60% K&T still, and I ended up taking on the replacement myself. It was all in great shape except for the wires that ran along steam pipes (it crumbled in my hands!), and basically everything in the basement was pretty brittle.

In the end, the first floor lights are all still K&T. I snaked and pulled new wires to all of the other outlets and spliced to the first floor lighting via junction boxes or right at the push button switches. It's way cleaner, grounded, and there are no worries about overloading the wiring... which technically shouldn't happen with K&T if you're using 15 amp breakers.

All the electricians I spoke with said the same thing though... K&T is ok if it hasn't been tampered with or you're not overloading it. Everything I pulled out of the walls or attic looked like it did in 1901. Like I said previously, the exposed stuff was the issue.

Keep up the good work! Your place look great.

[Improbcat]

We haven't done anything with the electric yet. one reason is the K&T turned out to be in good condition so we aren't as panicked as we were. The other reason is that of the five electricians we have contacted or been told would contact us not one has come through. Only one got as far as coming to look, then never responded again. So all electrical beyond what I can do myself is on indefinite hold until we find an electrician who actually responds to customers.

I have been swapping out old plugs for new. Because while having a 3-prong plug on a non-grounded circuit isn't optimal, it is safer than the old cracked & painted 10amp bakalite ones on a 15amp circuit.

[Texas_Ranger]

If you put in a GFI, it's perfectly legal (just put up stickers "No equipment ground!").

[MrGrady]

We haven't done anything with the electric yet. one reason is the K&T turned out to be in good condition so we aren't as panicked as we were. The other reason is that of the five electricians we have contacted or been told would contact us not one has come through. Only one got as far as coming to look, then never responded again. So all electrical beyond what I can do myself is on indefinite hold until we find an electrician who actually responds to customers.

I have been swapping out old plugs for new. Because while having a 3-prong plug on a non-grounded circuit isn't optimal, it is safer than the old cracked & painted 10amp bakalite ones on a 15amp circuit.

I hear ya... I get extremely angry trying to give people my money sometimes.

[Improbcat]

Just got a cancellation letter from USAA due to the Knob & Tube. Still can't find an electrician who will answer my calls.

We moved in two weeks ago, work on the house has stalled while we get unpacked and settled in. No room to work on the place until the boxes are out of the way.

[csnyder]

Ugh - sorry to hear about the insurance issue. I've heard that some parts of the country are worse than others with this - thankfully, here in Michigan, I haven't had to deal with that.

From the way our electricians were complaining (good-naturedly) while they were working, I gather that they prefer to do new construction, rather than crawling around in 100-year-old attics. Can't say that I blame them, but it's certainly not acceptable for them to not return your phone calls.

We moved just under two months ago, and there are still stacks of boxes (some threatening to become permanent fixtures). Best wishes on unpacking and settling in!