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A crew came today to remove the original heating lines from the basement. Since these were insulated with asbestos, they needed to perform the necessary asbestos mitigation procedures. It was a fairly straightforward procedure though. There were only two runs that needed to be removed and they were already encapsulated with poly when the construction began.
They simply needed to fully encapsulate any exposed areas and then cut the runs at a couple of places to remove them from the basement. They did set up a shower for precautionary purposes and used inhalators and Tyvek suits to minimize their own exposure. They expected that it would only take a few hours to perform the removal. When I got home in the afternoon, the lines were removed and it looked like everything went well.
The electrician also came today and he continued the wiring of the basement. There’s still another day or two of work, I surmise. With the old heating lines removed, the framing can be finished. A soffit will need to be framed along the center beam in the basement. There will also be a soffit in the bedroom and one of the basement windows needs to be framed out. They will also need to repair the rim joist before the insulation can be foamed into the walls.
It rained last night and on and off most of the day today. The good news is that there are no signs of water intrusion in the basement.
The crew finished waterproofing the areas of the wall that have shown some water intrusion. The goal is to prevent the entry of water through the wall and force it to drain down the wall to the drain tile. Hopefully with the downspouts connected and good surface drainage, we won’t have any problems.
The electrical work also continued. The contractor spent a lot of time connecting the new wiring with the original wiring of the upstairs. He also needed to reconfigure some of the wiring that went into the circuit box and rewire some of the upstairs outlets.
Todd from McDonald Remodeling sent us the estimate for the carpentry work to be done repairing our rim joists. We await the estimate for the stucco repair. Not really much choice. It’s got to be done before the foam insulation is installed.
Hua Mei has been doing a lot of drawing lately and likes to draw with markers. Today she was drawing with a Sharpie that she grabbed from my desk. I went to cook dinner and when I returned to see what she was up to, she had the brilliant idea of painting her finger nails with a black Sharpie. Whoops. Karen quickly checked on the Internet for suggestions on how to get permanent marker off. She was able to remove all traces just using sunscreen, no toxic chemicals at all. Hooray. I think that Hua Mei was relieved to get her fingers cleaned and she’s sworn off of Sharpies. Just in case, I’ve removed them to a safe place.
The crew completed the basement slab by patching the hole from where the old boiler and water heater were. Hua Mei and Xia Mei left their mark in it.
The washer and dryer were connected and we now can do laundry in the basement. They put poly around the laundry room to isolate it from the rest of the basement to allow us to continue to do laundry through the remainder of the construction process.
Work on the ducting for the exhaust fan, heat exchanger and combustion air continued.
Exterior wall dampers for all the ducting were also installed.
Waterproofing of the wall was begun today also.
The electrician came to continue the wiring of the basement. He needed to do some rewiring of the circuit box and rewired a couple of outlets upstairs.
We also found out that there are a couple of places where the rim joist has been compromised by water damage. Chris will be giving us an estimate on the work that will be needed to be done. That was not what we wanted to hear.
Almost all of the framing was finished today.
They will need to frame the soffits but that can’t happen until the old heating lines and asbestos is removed. They also have begun the installation of the ducting for the heat recovery ventilator and the bathroom exhaust fan.
The electrician was here today and he began wiring up some of the electrical lines in the basement. He also rewired the calbe line to the upstairs.
Today was an eventful day. Last night we noticed that there was water leaking into the basement from the rain we had all day. In the late afternoon when I first went down to the basement, the area was dry. It wasn’t until later that it happened. Some of the delay is because it would take some time for the water to percolate through the soil. Also with the frost line a few feet below the surface, the rain water would seep into the soil, hit the frost line and then have nowhere to go but back up against the foundation wall. Karen noticed that the downspout was not connected so this would also contribute to the problem.
Anyway, it was timely to discover the issue. This morning we had a meeting with Chris from McDonald Remodeling and the electrician they are using. Chris will have his crew waterproof the walls where it looks like there might be a moisture issue. If water does get into the wall, we want it to flow down the cores into the drain tile. The waterproofing should serve as a barrier to do this. It looks like we’ll be having some landscaping done this year. These are the two corners that show evidence of water infiltration.
They are the northeast and northwest corners of the house. They’ll be waterproofing in these two corners and possibly other areas.
The electrical walkthrough went well. They will also be wiring up the cable and phone lines in the basement. We didn’t have many changes from the original plans and so it should be pretty straight forward. They’ll be doing that later this week.
One complication though is that the bathroom sconces Karen ordered for the bathroom won’t fit with the medicine cabinet that she also ordered, now that we see the framed wall and all the plumbing lines. She’ll be ordering new lights.
The crew framed out the door opening for the laundry room. They also started to put in the insulation in the laundry room. The plumber came today and he connected the water lines in the laundry room. They connected the gas to the clothes dryer and water to the clothes washer and the laundry tub. It won’t be long before we can do laundry again.
They also framed the linen closet and the bedroom closet.
The plumber also moved the water heater and connected the lift station. The old slab and soil could then be removed. They connected the drain tile in the open area and will be pouring the slab tomorrow.
More bad news: It looks like over the years there has been some moisture penetration into the rim joist. We know that the rim joist is rotted by where the new egress window we’ll be installed. They will check the integrity of the rim joist in other possible trouble spots along the perimeter. Ugh. Oh, well, so much for furniture.
The framing work for the walls continued today. The framing for the interior bathroom wall and door was finished, as well as the east wall of the office space. The framing for the north wall of the living area while the framing for the east wall was constructed but not yet installed along the basement wall. They also built the framing for the for the partition wall that separates the laundry room from the living area.
Finally they also built the last two steps for the basement stairs.
The crew also removed the old slab where the original boiler was.
The gas line for the clothes dryer was also connected. The other gas line will be connected to the gas stove in the kitchen above.
Since we have a 90+ percent efficient boiler, we qualify for the 2009 tax credit for energy efficiency. We also would have qualified for the tax credit for the insulation along the foundation wall and floor. We should be eligible for the maximum $1,500 amount. So, in addition to the energy savings we’ll be enjoying from the new boiler, we’ll also get a nice bonus next April. This is a good year to do energy efficiency retrofits on your house.
Today the framing for the south wall of the bedroom was completed. All the framing in that room is now done. The egress window may soon be installed.
The heating contractor also worked today. They connected the new boiler to the gas line and connected the boiler to both the upstairs radiators and the infloor heating system. They also finished connecting and sealing the exhaust venting to the outside through the foundation wall.
They also connected all the new heating lines to the radiators and filled the lines. The house is now being heated using the new boiler. A building inspector will come into to look at the system later this week.
They also disconnected the old boiler and removed it.
A plumber will come in to move the water heater. The remaining slab and soil will be removed. Poly will then be laid into the open section, the drain tile along the perimeter will be connected with the rest of the drainage system and the floor insulation will also be installed. The heating contractor had connected some infloor heating tubes so these just need to be laid over the insulation and then the new patch of slab can be poured. The asbestos crew will probably come in this week to remove the old heating lines.
It was laundry day today. Karen went to the laundromat where she did a number of loads to take care of the couple of weeks of laundry we had.
I took the kids to Edinborough Park for the morning expecting Karen to be gone most of the day. She was fairly expedient though. The advantage of a laundromat is that she could use multiple machines at once and so it didn’t take nearly as long as when she tried to do laundry at her parents a couple of weeks ago.
With luck we might have our washer and dryer reinstalled in the basement in the next week or two.
