At Home In The Woods

[Diamondpilot]

Here's the range hood duct "chimney" in the garage the wife wanted that I described here. The drywall has been left off of one side in order to enable the H&A guy to finish running the duct to the range hood. The opening will be closed up with drywall after the duct has been installed.

I think I would skip the drywall and make up a wood panel and have your trim guy finish it out. May come in handy down the road for access.

Chris

 

[dstig1]

I don't want to mislead people. We have incurred some debt to build this house. We had intended to take about 4 years to build the house and do it with cash. But three things happened ...
We paid for the majority of the house build with cash but didn't have enough cash to pay for the entire build.

However, it is our goal to become debt free and to stay that way. I really look up to the people who built their houses without debt. We were not that wise. I also greatly respect those who have paid off their mortgages, have been content with what they have, and have stayed debt free afterward. People like that are an inspiration and a great example of what made the U.S. such a prosperous country in years past.

Obed

Relax - debt isn't a moral weakness or a bad thing inherently. Too much debt is the problem with debt, but I'm quite sure you are no where near that level. Being debt free is very nice, but it is darn hard to build a house like you are doing out of cash alone. I know we will be in the same boat when we do it here in a couple years. House building requires a lot of cash in a short time period, and very few have that on hand. Everything in moderation, including moderation

Mark,
Yes we are doing hardwood. We plan to put hardwood floors in the entire house except for baths and laundry room. Any suggestions you have are welcome.

We like to keep the windows in the house open as much of the year as possible. We understand that open windows and the resulting humidity can cause problems with hw floors and require that they are installed with extra gaps between the boards. We won't keep the windows closed when we live in the house so if the hw floors buckle some, so be it.

Thanks,
Obed

To minimize expansion issues, think about what you choose for species and cut. The issue is that wood comes from trees (duh) and trees do not expand and contract the same in all directions. A tree shrinks differently tangentially vs radially, and that is the ratio that is important: T/R shrinkage ratio. The closer this is to 1, the more stable the wood will be. That depends first on the species of wood - ash, birch, walnut, white oak are good maple, cherry, beech, some oaks are real bad (red oak is not great). If you get wood that is quartersawn or riftsawn it will be much more stable than wood that is flatsawn (also called plainsawn), as QS wood is more or less radially cut vs tangentially for plainsawn, and radial shrinkage is always less than tangential. And since you are concerned with the plane of the floor, the cut of the boards in that plane is what matters most as it is a very large dimension so a small percentage change can cause buckling.

The other issue is making sure the moisture content is correct before they lay the floor. The ONLY way to do this is with a moisture meter (well, OK you can use a dessicating oven and an analytical balance too...). Woodworking suppliers will have them, and a good flooring installer will too. Interior finished wood needs to be 6-8% moisture content to remain happy and stable. The other point here is stabilization - you want the wood to stop changing it's moisture content before it is laid. Typically they will stack the flooring in the house for a few weeks to let it equilibrate. Checking it and recording the values periodically is a good check for watching it stabilize. Ask your prospective installers if they check the moisture content and ask to see the meter readings. Like so many things, they can often try to rush the job and do it NOW even though the wood may need another few weeks to equilibrate first.

Moisture is what really makes wood move. If you like open windows and the humidity that comes with them in Tennessee, I would recommend you stay towards the stable species and possibly quarter sawn if possible. A really stable floor is QS white oak. A really unstable floor is flatsawn maple. The larger the area across the boards, the worse the problem will be too.

Wood movement is a somewhat complicated topic for those unfamiliar with it. I hope this wasn't too confusing. Ask questions if I wasn't clear enough.

I think I would skip the drywall and make up a wood panel and have your trim guy finish it out. May come in handy down the road for access.

Chris

Tearing out drywall really isn't that bad - especially small areas like this. Too many people think of it as harder than it is. If you need access, rip out the piece and then patch it up. It isn't that hard or expensive to do. Also this seems like an area where you will rarely, if ever, need access. Removable panels are great for things you need to get to frequently. I doubt this is one of those places as it should be nothing more than a sealed air duct. Plus being a wall between the house and garage, the code guys may require 5/8 type X drywall anyway.

Nice progress!

-Dave

 

[mikefromnh]

I think I would skip the drywall and make up a wood panel and have your trim guy finish it out. May come in handy down the road for access.

Chris

It will likely need to be fire rated -- easy to do with sheet rock, expensive if you want a fire rated access panel.

And as mentioned just rip the rock out if needed in the future

 

[Kyle_in_Tex]

Be sure to get a few gallons (if not more) of wall paint to use as touch up paint. Your child will be glad to help out with some custom wall art with crayons.

 

[Obed]

Obed looks great!

hopefully I am not too late...perhaps someone said this before...insist that the corner bead have screws on both sides at bottom, knee level, hip level, and shoulder level...I think the reason is obvious. The crimping tool just doesn't hold it firmly enough.

Rick

I looked at how they installed the corner beads. They didn't use screws; they used staples. I hope that's good enough 'cause the corner beads are all mudded now.

Obed

 

[Obed]

Obed, have you and the wife decided on what you want in the way of hardwood floors yet? There are many options out there to chose from. Give me an idea of what you want and I'll suggest some things to ask as you are shopping a contractor.

You are correct that a wood floor can buckle when exposed to moisture. Generally it takes more moisture than outside humidity on a properly installed floor to cause that problem though. The most common times you would see that is a water leak, plastic ice maker hoses most often, a roof leak or standing water in a basement are ones we see. I would never recommend that a floor be installed with gaps though. We leave our doors and windows open often and live in Georgia so we have similar conditions to you.

MarkV

Mark and anyone else who can assist,

We are considering purchasing #1 grade hardwood floors, which as we understand is one grade below the best grade "select". We plan on using oak as it is economical; we have a lot of floor to cover. We have been considering red oak or white oak. The wife is leaning toward red oak as she thinks the color of red oak floors might look better with the cherry cabinets. How much does using red vs. white oak affect the color of the floor? Can the color of the floor be adjusted to what she might want just by the finish put on the floor?

The flooring installers tell us that we shop for and buy the wood; they just install it. So what should we look for when shopping for wood flooring? How do we determine if the wood supplier is providing quality wood flooring? How important is it to get quarter sawn wood? Is quarter sawn wood so expensive it doesn't justify the extra cost?

Most of the installers are recommending that we install and run the air conditioning before the hw floors are installed. How important is it to do this, especially when we will just open the windows as soon as we move into the house? Also, running the AC is an extra hassle for us because we will have to get an "early on" electrical permit to do so. Normally, the county/state won't turn on the electricity until the house is ready for moving in and the occupancy permit is approved.

Since we will keep the windows open whenever possible, do we need to instruct the hw floor installers to do anything special when they install the floors?

We plan to have hw flooring in the kitchen. Yes, I'm nervous about water leaks but the wife want's hw floors in the kitchen - so that's how it will be. Should we install the hw flooring under the kitchen cabinets or put Advantek subflooring under the cabinets? If we put Advantek under the cabinets, where should the Advantek end and the hardwood flooring start?

Thanks a lot,
Obed

 

[Obed]

The wife covered the entire garage floor with cardboard to keep the drywall mud from landing on it.

 

[Obed]

Today I worked on installing the drain pipes for the gutters in the area between the retaining wall and the basement porch.

I first removed the temporary pipes that run along the top of the ground. Then I removed 4 FEL loads of gravel from this spot and dumped them on the driveway over the culvert where the height of the gravel over the culvert has settled and gotten a little low.

After removing the gravel, I painted lines on the ground to mark where to dig the trenches for the drain pipes.

Running the drain pipes in this area is not entirely straight forward. The septic line for the camper runs between the retaining wall and the camper. You can see in this picture the septic line cleanout sticking up beside the septic tank. If you look closely, you can see the orange line that I painted that runs from the cleanout to the retaining wall and marks where the septic pipe runs. The gutter drain pipes that I am installing need to cross the septic pipe and will have to go underneath the septic pipe.

On of the drain pipes needed to 12 inches in 16 feet (.75 inches/foot) in order to cross below the septic pipe. So I used my level to approximate .75/inches per foot drop. However, I didn't do something right because when I reached the septic pipe, my trench for the drain pipe was too shallow. So I started digging the trench deeper so my drain pipes can cross below the septic pipe. The last picture shows a scrap piece of pipe in the trench that I was using to determine if my trench was deep enough. On Monday I'll finish digging the trench deeper, install and cover the drain pipes.

 

[Obed]

It will likely need to be fire rated -- easy to do with sheet rock, expensive if you want a fire rated access panel.

And as mentioned just rip the rock out if needed in the future

My wife looked up the drywall requirements in the code book. Oddly enough, the drywall between the garage and the kitchen doesn't need to be fire rated according to the code book. The drywall in the garage ceiling needs to be fire rated. However, we installed fire rated drywall between the garage and kitched even though the code book did not require it.

Obed

 

[dstig1]

Mark and anyone else who can assist,

We are considering purchasing #1 grade hardwood floors, which as we understand is one grade below the best grade "select". We plan on using oak as it is economical; we have a lot of floor to cover. We have been considering red oak or white oak. The wife is leaning toward red oak as she thinks the color of red oak floors might look better with the cherry cabinets. How much does using red vs. white oak affect the color of the floor? Can the color of the floor be adjusted to what she might want just by the finish put on the floor?

The flooring installers tell us that we shop for and buy the wood; they just install it. So what should we look for when shopping for wood flooring? How do we determine if the wood supplier is providing quality wood flooring? How important is it to get quarter sawn wood? Is quarter sawn wood so expensive it doesn't justify the extra cost?

Most of the installers are recommending that we install and run the air conditioning before the hw floors are installed. How important is it to do this, especially when we will just open the windows as soon as we move into the house? Also, running the AC is an extra hassle for us because we will have to get an "early on" electrical permit to do so. Normally, the county/state won't turn on the electricity until the house is ready for moving in and the occupancy permit is approved.

Since we will keep the windows open whenever possible, do we need to instruct the hw floor installers to do anything special when they install the floors?

We plan to have hw flooring in the kitchen. Yes, I'm nervous about water leaks but the wife want's hw floors in the kitchen - so that's how it will be. Should we install the hw flooring under the kitchen cabinets or put Advantek subflooring under the cabinets? If we put Advantek under the cabinets, where should the Advantek end and the hardwood flooring start?

Thanks a lot,
Obed

For shopping for wood floor, you need to ask some key questions:
Is it kiln dried? To what %MC (moisture content)? (You want 6-8% for wood in conditioned space. Take nothing that is not kiln dried.)
Is it solid wood? How thick?
What are the board lengths in the bundle typically? Minimum length?
Where do they get it from? (Helps to know if it comes from a region, and if it all comes from the same region as that affect color a lot.)

Good sources for oak:
Clary Wood Products
Lumber Liquidators: Hardwood Floors for Less!

And seeing as you are not far from prime White Oak forests, try these guys:
Frank Miller Lumber - Leaders in Quartersawn Lumber for for high-end cabinetry, furniture, architectural millwork, paneling, and flooring

Red and white oak are really very different. Grain patterns and colors are different. Also - White is much more stable than red. See my previous posting where I detailed all of this. I am personally against staining wood as a moral issue. If you like wood, then pick the wood that you like, don't color it weirdly. I know not everyone agrees with that. There is some adjustment that can be done with different finishes. Water based PU's tend to be cold (bluish) where solvent based ones tend to be warmer (yellowish). There are whole worlds of pigments, tinting, dyeing and toning that can be done. But if you lay down some color in the finish, as it wears you will see the thin spots.

If you want to put all of the issues to bed about the wood you get, buy a moisture meter. Consider it $200 as part of the flooring cost. Then resell it on CL or ebay when you have time. Nothing will tell you where the raw materials are vs where they need to be like a moisture meter. Get the moisture meter and forget about the AC for now. They want you to run the AC to make sure the wood is dry and acclimated. But you really never know until you test the wood.

A couple options for moisture meters:
Mini-Ligno E/D Moisture Meter - Rockler Woodworking Tools
Moisture Meters - Woodcraft.com

See my previous posting on QS wood. It is much more stable than flatsawn. If you are covering very wide areas, it may be a very wise move. But it also looks different than flatsawn as it is cut differently. This may be a plus or minus to you and your wife.

Flooring under cabinets is one of those Ford/Chevy arguments. I think you should lay down flooring first and cover it wall to wall as it make the next steps a lot easier and avoids slight mistakes with the flooring causing trouble in cabinet/trim install. HW in the kitchen means you need to be diligent about mopping up any water leaks/spills ASAP. As long as you are cool with that, you will be OK for the most part, but if a dishwasher or sink springs a leak, you will have big problems no matter what.

As far as your expansion issue, you will want to make sure the installers allow sufficient expansion space at the edges of each room. This may be more than normal for them. It can be calculated once you know what species/cut you are using, and the width of the room.

There are other woods that may be cheaper. Have you looked at Ash? It is very stable and typically very cheap. Flatsawn it is not much different looking than oak, but the grain patterns are a bit more "wild". You can always find places that will mill flooring to your spec. The flooring guys will know places that do this locally. I'd ask the local flooring guys what is the cheapest stuff they have. Let them throw some options at you.

If you want more info ask. If I'm boring the crap out of you, I can stop.

-Dave