The same crew hanging the board also tapes it. We are using a four man crew, and they are skilled at both tasks. Because they also need to finish the board they hang, it is in their interest to make it as nice as possible and minimize the joints. This resulted in selecting the 54 inch drywall vs using two rows of 48 inch board and a middle strip on the 9 ft walls. When you see a boarded room you can see not only how few joints there are to tape, but also how few screws are needed on the partition walls, as they get the studs glued before hanging. So not only do we get a finish with less visible joint risk we should also get less screw pops too. Seems like a win win for the builder and the subcontractor.
Preboard summary - K35
As we’ve reached the drywall stage of the project, it is a great time to review how far we’ve come since we started the demolition and excavation in early august. We have enjoyed a lot of cooperation from the trades and even the autumn weather. This project was among the most carefully managed I’ve been involved with to date, with lots of staging and orchestration gymnastics to run multiple crews, usually 6 days a week and sometimes even 7. With footing pour on August 9th, and drywall hanging underway September 25th, that is only 11 weeks from an empty hole in the ground to a structure complete enough inside and out to cover it with drywall and start the finishing work.
Of that 11 weeks, or 77 days, we’ve had a bunch of rain storms and blizzards, holiday long weekends, waits for material and equipment, and scheduling conflict among various subtrades. The construction has certainly been a whirlwind of activity each day, and required a lot of management time to keep on track, and on budget.
The green sticker means permanent power
With the garage wiring done and the permanent power service installed, we had our inspection today and this means new meters will be installed. Once connected by Enmax we will have power and lights installed plus the all important furnace connected.
Winged rats strike back
These flying rats are calling out for extermination. With just one open spot in the building they found it and are preparing for a nice evenings roost. I’m going to look for my slingshot.
Exterior progress
Paper and wire progressing nicely at the k35 project.
Spray foam stage
Lots of large cantilever at the k35 project so they’ve received a nice coat of 2 pound spray foam. Next up is insulation of the rest of the house walls and stucco prep. Drywall delivery is early this week so we’ll be making a lot of interior progress soon.
Permanent electrical service underway
Typical procedure in the inner city build of a laned parcel. Get the house up and the sewer installed into the street. Get the gas company to trench and pipe gas to the house from the alley. And then struggle to get the garage built so that a mast and submeter can go on the garage and then a trench and line fed to the main panel in the basement. Once complete, the builder can do two items of considerable importance. Energize the panel for lights and turn on the furnace. After we get to drywall no further work can be done without heat inside. And the heat needs to be consistent and humidity managed all winter, a real challenge to accomplish.
Ground plate is dug in 6 inches deeper than the trench. Lots of digging is done and more to come. But the project is on the cusp of being fully serviced, always a real accomplishment and project milestone.
Where to locate the shower niche
We’ve installed a shower inside a corner with two exterior walls. Not exactly ideal for the shower niche. Only one spot remains and that is below the shower mixing valves. I think this will turn out ok once we get the tile selected and the shower walls prepped.
The niche will be installed below the shower controls. Better here than inside the insulation of an exterior wall.
Construction randoms - protecting finished materials from the onslaught of stucco
Long time without a post. We’ve been out of town for a week and pushing on through the non photogenic stage of prepping for the all important preboard inspection.
A good construction practice is applying the vinyl decking before the stucco so it can wrap up the wall. The stucco is then flashed over top the membrane. This is great but this means active stucco work with sharp object, pipe scaffold, mud, wire and boots possibly destroying your finished deck vinyl. We must go to extreme lengths to manage this problem and covering the deck is the only viable option.
Vinyl decking is all covered with osb material to offer at least some protection for the valuable finished product below.
Navigating the complex world of encroachment and real property report compliance
Sometimes as a builder you also need to become a negotiator to try and extricate yourself from potentially alarming and usually costly interactions with the local authority. In the recent case, upon successful creation of a utility corridor easement (for over head power lines), the builder justifiably thought he had done the right thing. The power company had come to a fair agreement that allowed us to comply with our approved DP, and build what we needed to do to make a marketable project. When the time came to create a new RPR, we just went ahead as always, the new easement was shown on the map, and all parties were happy. And then it was time to get the City to stamp compliance on the RPR. Instead we were notified of an encroachment advisory stamped on the RPR, as if you can encroach while everything you built was contained within property you own. The slightly overzealous nature of the receiving clerk at the City end certainly wasn’t helpful. We were then advised of a lengthy (yes this is the City) process to have the encroachment reviewed and a likely agreement made to accept the building that we did inside of our lot (the building that is required to do inside the DP).
The happy ending here was I was able to get the direct line of the encroachment desk, and the staff there was agreeable and immediately sent me back the RPR with the encroachment voided. It was a pleasant surprise to have that turnaround within the hour and the docs were shipped off to the surveyor and lawyer. Another lesson learned about the compliance process and how to navigate within the rules of the City. Even better was the avoided fee of two encroachment agreements, that can really add up!
What a relief to have the City void this encroachment into the utility corridor that the power company (City owned entity) created. Saves so much time and cost for the builder to get this granted.
Construction random updates
Significant progress again to report at the K35 semi-detached, currently receiving the vast proportion of my attention and energy. A productive week with good weather again for the outside work, and we also had the long awaited precast window wells installed. This was interesting because I ordered the largest size they make, it requires quite a good sized hold to be dug to contain them.
A lot of juggling of equipment, schedules and materials was done to get the precast in on a comparatively tiny site with lots of other work ongoing. The HVAC crew started and basically finished the first unit, the plumber completed the drainage plumbing, and the framers were back to work on the second basement and lots of back framing work. The stairs arrived for one of the units, and install was well underway this evening. With 3-4 crews involved on one site over the week, much logistics and communication is done to keep everyone happy, with space to work, and with plenty of material.
As the builder, my job at this hectic stage has been reduced to the cleaner of mud off the street, and bringer of materials when shortfalls are identified, with the sporadic rain we’ve had, the mud has been awful, and with so much progress occurring, shortages of material is regular. Aggravating daily hardware store runs are now proving necessary as unexpected materials are needed. Once again, attentive site management (time consuming and inefficient) pushes everyone else forward, leaves no crew with a reason not to work (even if they may be wanting a reason), and greatly increases the pace that the crews can work toward stage completion.
Prepossession touchups
With the sales of the Richmond project moving along we were able to move out the furniture and address a bunch of drywall deficiencies. The house will be looking vastly better and we can conduct a walk through with the clients.
Touchups underway. Unfortunately screw pops and drywall joint issues are unavoidable when building in a place with such temperature and humidity fluctuation.
Garage building
The mild fall conditions have been very nice for the builders so far as we get near the end of September. The crew I usually use to do concrete work gets very busy with a late season push to pour flatwork before the ground gets cold. Immediately after gas line install we had them lined up to do all the sidewalks, patios and garages. A noisy and messy affair but we can try and get the garage built next week.
Pads and patios done. Next up is the garage framing with lumber and trusses booked for next week. Once the garage is framed we can hook up the electrical system to permanent meters from the temporary pole. That will energize the plugs and lights inside the house. For trade convenience
K35 - 1 month update
Lots of progress to report at the k35 semi detached project as we have just passed the one month milestone from the day we poured the footing to early this week. We finished the first full construction month with the shingles on and the basement slabs poured. The plumber is partway through the drainage network, and can now get down into the basement to do the network under the main floor. Decent weather and a good framing crew has enabled all the other associated activity. We are now going to get the garage started and move into Hvac and electrical as we approach the end of September. Overall a really good start to the project.
By mid morning the slabs are both poured. The bulk of the day will be spent by a portion of the crew that sticks around to hand trowel, and later power trowel the finished surface.
The temporary stairs in place have allowed access from the very start of the project where we installed the drainage plumbing, and later the Styrofoam and hydronic rough-in tied to the rebar grid. Getting these in place makes it much easier for the trades to access, and especially the inspector who wont do the inspection unless safe access is available.
Roof re-do
After truss assembly it was clear we had a problem. The roof peak was offset somehow to the centre of window. It didn’t look terrible but was one of those items that once you’ve seen it, you can’t unsee it. Rather than bungling around attempting to fix it on site I called the supplier. They agreed to replace the affected area and rushed it out in a couple days. The framers pulled off the offending area and reinstalled the repaired new truss pack. Overall a small but significant problem overcome with a lot of cooperation. The rain caused more delay than the wait for the new trusses.
Roof peak is noticeably offset
It all came down as one assembly thanks to the power of the machine
Always sad to see work get undone
And the new trusses are installed and we are back in action with the shingles loaded and roofers hard at work all day
Roof peak is good to shingle now. Old trusses cut up and in the bin. Lots of teamwork on site with pro crews that move quick.
Full house renovation complete!
After a lot of difficult and time consuming effort, we managed to wrap up the renovation project. This was well beyond a lipstick type house flip as shown on HGTV where some photogenic hosts are able to perform renovation miracles with a tiny budget. Somehow those TV couples seem able to hire trades who like to work for free ands shop at suppliers where material costs are a fraction of what you might purchase at your local hardware store.
Some lessons we’ve been able to draw from this project include the following:
While my speciality remains new building, which I prefer over old homes, renovations are possible because the trades we use have a lot of renovation experience, and at some stage of the project it just becomes routine construction, and we can do that. Many of the same managerial and organizational skills of the inner city home builder translate well to renovation.
Renovations are much cheaper and quicker than home building, thus the attraction to this type of work. After the endless marathon of permitting, designing, and struggle to get big projects launched, a renovation is a modest outlay of resources (1/3 to 1/2 of a typical new build budget).
Changing the layout was a powerful and cost effective way to transform the dated living rooms on the old bungalow, and restoring what we could, such as the hardwood floor, made a huge difference for a small expense.
Remaining in control of the deal, by being in control of the realtor/buyer is essential. You just cannot allow yourself to be operating at the whim of a client who hasn’t actually paid you yet. The endless barrage of wants/demands/requests/changes is just not tenable for the budget or schedule of the renovator. As long as you are the owner of the building, you make the decisions that suit your business, and any potential client can choose to buy it when it is complete, or not. Entering into a pre-sale arrangement of a 60 year old house may lead to a false expectation that not only are you changing every single item on the build, you are going to be delivering a new product. The impossible standards of this type of client can quickly sour relations.
Transforming a date and horrible old bungalow into something refreshing and new is quite possible on a budget, provided you have the right knowledge and contacts. Since most people lack the fundamental skills needed, I’d advise they avoid this scale of a build. Too much risk!
Final product is very rewarding for the builder!
From dated and nasty to a really livable, like new, 60 year old home. We’ve extended the life of that bungalow indefinitely and it can house a new family for generations to come.
Hydronic rough-in ready
With a large crew of zip tie helpers we were able to knockout both basements quickly. This is definitely a job where 3-4 people makes it go way easier. Inspection is called and we can likely get this approved and then poured in the next few days. We do need good weather to pour the slabs so hopefully the fall remains nice and dry.
Framing day 12
With the trusses delivered and assembled we again ran out of material. Fortunately a late day delivery got us back in business. Hard for the builders to keep up with the framers when conditions are optimal.
Tall wall building
This is another post commenting on the remarkable productivity of the framers. No technical hurdle appears to slow these guys down. They just proceed with limited discussion or philosophy and productivity ensues. Raising a 25 ft tall wall wasn’t a challenge for the two of them although there was some bludgeoning needed to get it to fit. Enough scrap has been produced to fill a bin and almost all the framing is done with the exception of the roof, planned for delivery after the holiday weekend.
Framing day 7
The framers are continuing to produce at a rate we’ve had a hard time keeping up with for material delivery. The pace will slow with a long weekend approaching and the low likelihood of us moving the roof truss delivery day forward. Regardless we’ve been blessed with stable weather and a great crew.
The machine is the framers secret weapon. Anything to make a tough job easier.