At Home In The Woods

[PAGUY]

I second Dave's reasoning. Grass won't grow there only weeds.

Obed - I used to maintain HVAC units and the evaporator is usually located as part of the blower unit and can be in either attic or basement. It will be where your air filters are located. I found the easiest to service were in the basement. Your gas furnace most likely is a heat pump unit that is heat and cooling. Most heat pumps are electrical and also provide either heat or cooling. I know that Geo-Thermal is expensive but definitely the way to go in the long run. Oh and I thought I should mention the shorter the freon lines have to travel the better the efficiency. You also have to provide a place to drain excess water from humidity at the evaporator.

PAGUY

 

[tony Cecil]

Chris

I also do the same thing but if I could have done the split system in the beginning, it sure would have been nice.....You sound resourceful Tony

 

[Obed]

The weather here has been fabulous. Lows in the upper 50's and highs in the low to mid-80's with low humidity. Today I prepped a spot for the H&A unit pad. I also dug a shallow trench to drain water away from the back of the house.

I started off by putting some gravel and landscaping fabric along the retaining wall to provide a French drain to the end of the retaining wall. Next I dug the shallow trench. The water in this area now has a route to leave the house. Part of this area is always shaded so the clay near the house has not been drying.

The pad for our H&A unit won't be nearly as nice as the one that CurlyDave poured. We're going to buy a pre-made 4'x4' pad. They cost $59. For me that's worth not having to form up and pour the pad myself.

The first thing I did was mark the area with paint. I made some lines 12" outside the perimeter of the pad and also marked lines the size of the pad. I used the backhoe to compress the ground. I also hand tamped it with my tamping bar. Then I made a dirt "form" to hold the gravel. I used a plastic pipe under my level to make my level longer. I filled the area with gravel and hand tamped it and leveled it. The pad drops 1/4" per foot to shed water.

To end the day, I covered the area with plastic to prevent rainwater from getting in the gravel. The uncovered gravel area would hold water like a swimming pool if it rained. My wife will go get the pad in our truck. The company said it weighs about 300 lbs. I plan to unload the pad using the forks that attach to the FEL.

I had a good day today. The weather was very nice. I accomplished one more task needed before we can move into the house. Tomorrow I get to take the day off. I enjoy working on Saturdays much more when I know I can take Sunday off.

 

[Obed]

Exposed aggregate is easy to do and looks really nice. This was a solution to a similar problem on a friend's house. You could also go with stained, pigmented, stamped concrete to make it look nicer. You really are going to hate mowing a spot of poorly growing grass back in that corner. No light = dirt patch.

Dave,
I like the look of the concrete you poured. Something like that could look great at our house. I could image having an outdoor patio table on it. However, from a time standpoint, we just can't swing doing the same for our house. You're right; mowing back there would be a pain. The wife plans on putting some shrubs in that area.

Obed

 

[dstig1]

Obed, thanks.

You could easily have it done by a contractor too. Back in the old days it was harder as you had to time things carefully to not hose up the job. Now, what you do is get a sprayer and a jug of curing inhibitor (cement supplier will have it). Once you pour, tamp, and screed, you just do a very basic float finish. Doesn't need to be perfect as the surface gets washed away later. Then spray the inhibitor on it and wait. The surface will not cure, so you can wait 24 hrs and come back and hose it off. No risk of doing it too early or too late. If you ask me, exposed aggregate is easier than regular flatwork as you don't have to be good at finishing.

You could do shrubs as a temporary fix and then come back later on, of course. Plenty of time to figure out what you want to do then, plus the disturbed ground should be much better settled by then.

 

[Obed]

Painting starts tomorrow (Monday). The painter will first caulk around our exterior doors and windows on the outside of the house against the brick. He will prime the whole house and spray flat white paint on the ceilings.

My wife looked at the work of a finish carpenter she really liked. He is the person who, according to the vinyl sub who reffered him, supposedly couldn't make it as a framer because he was too picky - a good trait for a finish carpenter. His bid was reasonable. We need to firm up the details for his bid regarding his work on our back porch. If those details work out to our satisfaction we'll hire him.

Originally, we were going to have the framer install the porch railing and decking. However, after seeing how the framer did our back porch posts, we might not have him do the decking and the railing. The framer has done a reasonable job framing our house but the decking and railing might be too much "detail" work for our tastes. So we are looking at having the finish carpenter install the decking and railing on the porches. We asked the framer to install the back porch posts at equal intervals so we could have equally sized removable screens between the porches. The posts ended up being "equally spaced" within an inch - meaning the spacing between the posts varies up to an inch. Bummer. Unless we move the posts, we cant have equally sized screens.

 

[dcyrilc]

Painting starts tomorrow (Monday). The painter will first caulk around our exterior doors and windows on the outside of the house against the brick. He will prime the whole house and spray flat white paint on the ceilings.

The saw the work of one the finish carpenters that bid our job and really liked his work. He is the one that was referred to us by the vinyl/gutter sub who supposedly couldn't make it as a framer because he was too picky - a good trait for a finish carpenter. My wife really liked his work and his bid was reasonable. We need to firm up the details for his bid regarding his work on our back porch. If those details work out to our satisfaction we'll hire him.

Originally, we were going to have the framer install the porch railling and deck. However, after seeing how the framer did our back porch posts, we might not have him do the decking and the railing. The framer has done a reasonable job framing but the decking and railing might be to much "detail" work for our tastes. So we are looking at having the finish carpenter install the decking and railing on the porches. We asked the framer to install the back porch posts at equal intervals so we could have equally sized removable screens between the porches. The posts ended up being "equally spaced" within an inch - meaning the spacing between the posts varies up to an inch. Bummer. Unless we move the posts, we cant have equally sided screens.

Obed,

Can't help here, but thanks for posting that. I have always been very particular about my measurements on things which I do. My father, who passed away 12-1/2 years ago, always felt that if it was within an inch it was close enough.:laughing: Your post brought back some good memories of the debates we used to have about measuring things.:thumbsup::laughing::thumbsup:

 

[Obed]

I suspect we will move the posts on the back porch so that all the screens can be the same size. Having the removable screens the same size will make it easier to put them in each time; otherwise we would have to put numbers on the screens to make sure we knew which screen goes where.

 

[HiddenHollow]

A heat pump is just a split system cooling unit with a reversing valve and controls. The reversing valve changes the evap coil to a condenser coil and vise versa. When this happens the air blowen across the coil is heated instead of cooled and the cooling actually takes place outdoors at the compressor unit. Heat pumps work great where you live because you don't get extended cold snaps. You will not have to use your gas heat very often.

 

[firefighter9208]

Obed,

All your interior trim work needs to be done before that painter starts. Crown, baseboards, and interior doors need to be hung. Unless your going with stained doors and trim.

When the painter sprays the ceiling he will also spray a coat on the crown as a primer coat. Then come back and hand paint the trim.

Chris