At Home In The Woods

[Pops15]

Here are the options from best to worst.

• 1. Gravel with drain tile and drainage pipe away from house
• 2. Backfill with clay
• 3. Backfill with gravel without drain tile and drainage pipe

Additionally, I could apply a non-permeable membrane over the backfill to shed water away from the house. This membrane could be used with either of the 3 options above.

I don't think there's much question about which solution would do the best job. What I see as the question that needs to be answered is "How good is good enough?" Building a house is filled with decisions regarding money, time, effort, and trouble. If I chose the idealistic option for every issue, this house would cost a million dollars to build and would take forever to finish.

For me, Option 3 is out of the question because like Pops and Eddie mentioned, it will keep the footers wet. My guess is that it would be extremely rare in my area to find a house built by a GC that uses Option 1 around the main floor garage or the main floor of a house without a basement unless the grade of the lot runs toward that part of the house. And I'd be surprised if 1 out of 100 houses in this area have a membrane installed on grade around the house.

The question cannot be reasonably answered without considering the natural grade of the land where the house sits. The house sits along a ridge line. The natural grade steeply slopes away from the house in almost every direction. The house is naturally protected from water.

Obed

You're right. Building a house is full of decisions. Nearly all of those decisions will involve a compromise of some sort. Clay is "good enough" for backfilling around your garage given the lay of the land. If you were talking about a basement at the bottom of the slope then we'd be looking for a better solution.

 

[mikefromnh]

Here are the options from best to worst.

• 1. Gravel with drain tile and drainage pipe away from house
• 2. Backfill with clay
• 3. Backfill with gravel without drain tile and drainage pipe

Obed

Option 1, is the way to go. I have always tied the garage drain into the full basement drain tile.

How hard would it be to dig down to the footers, install a T and run the drain?

This is one of those things that doesn't cost much and is a lot harder to fix later.

 

[tommu56]

Obed
Even a clean gravel filled trench pitched away from the area you cleared out will act as a conduit to get the water away from the stone facing.

Fill the trench with stone 3" below finished grade add filter fabric and put the dirt back on and seed.

I would save your stone and put a course of block down to get you just above grade and start the stone there if you are worried about maintainence look for a precolered block like the pavers or split block or retaing wall blockfor the filler.

tom

 

[WBWI]

Chris,
We installed a Quadra-Fire 7100 Wood Fireplace. Page 4 of the brochure has a good picture of the duct options. In addition to placing a hot air vent in the hallway, we ran a return duct and vent to the other end of the house to encourage circulation of the heated air through the house, very similar to the way HVAC systems work.

We were originally planning to install a Napolean fireplace. We had gotten a quotation from a local fireplace store. However, when it came time to do the framing, we needed the fireplace guy to come out and make sure we framed everything correctly for the fireplace and various options. Unfortunately, the fireplace guy was pretty busy and wouldn't even return our calls. The only other Napolean dealer was an hour away but had gone out of business. So we went with the Quadra-Fire instead.

The Quadra-Fire was a close second to the Napolean for us. The Napolean had one option we really liked but could not get with the Quadra-Fire. The Napolean has the option to put the fireplace fan in the ductwork. This option lets you put the noisy fan in some non-obtrusive location. The Quadra-Fire has the fan in the fireplace so you are forced to have the fan noise in your living room or den. That was the only thing about the Quadra-Fire we didn't really care for.

Obed

Obed, nice to see the progress on your home. Just wanted to say, good choice on the insert. We put the same Quada-Fire unit in our home. It burns clean and really puts out the heat. I think you'll enjoy it! We mainly burn with ours all sealed up but do occassionally enjoy opening the doors and using the screen option. You really notice how much air they pull in with the doors open. It gets quite drafty.

 

[Barton]

I think having bricks below grade is just giving termites a path into the framing of the house. Motor is easy for them to get through, and how they get into homes every day. The concrete footings or brick ledge needs to come above grade.
Eddie

I respectfully disagree with this statement. Concrete cannot be relied upon as a termite barrier. We all know that concrete can and will crack and the slightest crack is all that the termites need to invade. Even homes with concrete slabs have had termite infestations develop in interior walls due to cracks.

Brick veneer cannot be considered a termite or any other bug barrier. It is quite common for brick veneer to start below grade and in some homes the brick is significantly below grade because the builder misjudged the final grade.

The preferred termite barrier is either a chemical barrier using a termiticide or the relatively new termite bait system.

Since we all like pictures, I have attached a few to show my brother's solution to a moisture problem. Shortly after the hardwood floor was installed it started to swell and buckle. The final grade was yet to be done so some rain run off was going towards the house and if I remember correctly it was suspected that below grade moisture was migrating towards the house also. This is not the same situation as Obed's but there are some similarities; tractors, new house, garage, gravel, digging...

Oh, and my little GC2310 performed quite well. :thumbsup:

 

[Obed]

Cabinet Drawer Questions

Hey guys. We got bids from 3 custom cabinet makers. We have crossed off the lowest bidder.

1. Metal vs. wooden drawers

The most expensive cabinet guy ($4000 more than the next guy) uses Z-A-R-G-E-N Integrated Drawer Slide & Side Systems. See the link for some details. These drawers have metal sides and bottoms made of man-made material coated with melamine.

The other cabinet guy uses poplar drawer sides with dovetailed corners.

Which is better? What are the pros and cons of the 2 different drawers?

2. Both cabinet makers have asked for the following payment schedule:

50% down to start the project
40% payment when the cabinets are delivered to the house but not yet installed
10 % payment when the cabinets have been installed

Is this payment schedule normal and reasonable? Should I ask for the payment schedule to be structured differently?

Thanks,

Obed

 

[MarkV]

Traditionally custom cabinets have been wood drawers with the better ones having dovetail joints. That would be my choice and that is not to say that the metal drawers are bad, I prefer the look and feel of traditional. I would also insist on full extension drawer slides. It makes a world of difference when accessing the back of the drawer. You might also consider pull out shelves in your base cabinets. They work like drawers with low sides so you can get that pot at the back of the cabinet without getting on your knees to reach back there.

MarkV

MarkV

 

[brin]

Cabinet Drawer Questions

Hey guys. We got bids from 3 custom cabinet makers. We have crossed off the lowest bidder.

1. Metal vs. wooden drawers

The most expensive cabinet guy ($4000 more than the next guy) uses Z-A-R-G-E-N Integrated Drawer Slide & Side Systems. See the link for some details. These drawers have metal sides and bottoms made of man-made material coated with melamine.

The other cabinet guy uses poplar drawer sides with dovetailed corners.

Which is better? What are the pros and cons of the 2 different drawers?

2. Both cabinet makers have asked for the following payment schedule:

50% down to start the project
40% payment when the cabinets are delivered to the house but not yet installed
10 % payment when the cabinets have been installed

Is this payment schedule normal and reasonable? Should I ask for the payment schedule to be structured differently?

Thanks,

Obed

Obed....We built our house 5 years ago and had all our cabinets and built ins custom made out of Solid Oak..the cabinet shop used these drawer slides and they have and continue to work great ...silent and easy to pull out and push in >Hettich International - Slides - KA3320

We paid cash on delivery..no deposit...I don't like the idea of only 10% being held out until installation...that is worrisome..

 

[firefighter9208]

All of our bottom cabinets are drawers. The only doors we have are under the sink and cooktop. You can pull out the drawer and access anything in it.

I'm not real crazy about the slide you have listed. They look cheap to me. I like the full extension (100#) drawer slides that my cabinet builder used. They are the ones like on a toolbox. 100 LB Drawer Slides | DrawerSlides.com .

Our cabinets are also made out of birch plywood (Russian Plywood). Better know as Baltic Birch. It is extremely strong. The more plys the better. The 1/2" is 9 ply. It comes in 5'x5' sheets. BALTIC BIRCH PLYWOOD, RUSSIAN, FINLAND, CRAFT PLYWOODS

I swear you could stand in our cabinet drawers...

We also have pull out drawers above our refrigerator and built in oven. No more standing in a chair to reach what's above the fridge. The drawers have a front and a side. You pull out the drawer and place items in it from the side. Works great for boxes of cereal, etc..... I can post pictures if you like...

We did pay 50% up front. That's about what the cabinet builder will have in materials. That way if you back out, he won't be out that money.
The remainder was paid after installation.
I would also have something in writing that specified a time frame for the building and installation of the cabinets. It can take 2-4 weeks to build a custom set of cabinets. You don't want him to drag it out....
Chris

 

[woodlandfarms]

We had a flood (broken pipe) and got a new kitchen out of it It is a modern kitchen, maple with maple.

I would go with dovetailed. It is the details someone will look at. But it also costs.

We did not go with cabinet hardware that automatically closes. Regret that now.

Biggest thing for us is the finish. In California, you cannot use (commercially) oil based covers. I have to say that the water based polyeurathane. It sucks and has failed after 2 years. I have heard of a method of baking the finish on. Anyway.. for us the finish has turned out to be a bigger deal than the construction.

Oh,the zargen system is what Ikea uses. We bought an ikea cabinet for a bathroom. Not bad for the price but truly not custom.