Drying Out

-

It's been a few weeks since my last post. Eric has been leading up the project while I was out of town. The goal has been to get the plumber in here to start the drain work, but we had lots of basement jobs to do first:
- more excavating of dirt to make room for new floor (2" gravel, insulation, 4" concrete) without raising the finished floor height

- filling in cracks limestone foundation with mortar

- painting below grade foundation with DRY LOK (we'll also cover with 6 mil plastic later)

Hopefully we'll be ready for the gravel delivery soon. I'm not sure why, but the plumber wants the gravel in before he puts in the drains. Maybe he doesn't like working in the mud?
The photo is of my friend Chris sloppin' on the waterproofing. He gave me a day's labor in exchange for a couch we were no longer using.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chevy HHR water leak passenger floor, HVAC fan dead

-
Image
After watching a number of youtube videos, I discovered there's a commonly worn out cover under the windshield cowl.  The rubber piece covering this hole (called the fan access) was completely damaged and sunk into the hole.  Water was just pouring in from windshield, then under the hood, then into this hole right into the passenger side behind the glove box. access hole under windshield cowl replacement cover with silicone seal installed cover, hopefully no more leaks here A terrible side effect of having water pour into the access hole is damaged HVAC fan and its resistor.  The 'resistor' enables the fan to have different speeds.  So, it looked like in the end, the water started leaking in, damaging the resistor and the fan would only run on high setting (no resistor).  Then after time, more water would cause the DC motor to fail (rusted brushes, bearings, etc.).  The last symptom was a soaking wet passenger floor carpet.   I replaced both the
Read more

Paver Patio Part Deux

-
Image
 This project is taking almost a month.  I dug out the top layer of dirt, down about 6 inches.  I wanted to dig only 3 inches, but it became obvious while digging I needed to go deeper to get to some solid ground.   Once I had all the dirt out, I figured out I needed about 2.5 (cubic) yards of aggregate to fill back in 3 inches.   I had Chicagoland Materials deliver the aggregate and torpedo sand by dump truck to the alley.  I poured the first layer of aggregate into the patio area and used a Wagner compactor rented from Sunbelt Rentals to firm up the base.   The weekly rental price for the compactor was half the price of what Home Depot wanted.  I used gas pipes to lay down and flatten the 2nd layer of aggregate and the top level of sand above that.   Once the sand layer was down, I put down the Gator Base panels.  Much more about laying the pavers in  I'm going to go on a diatribe here about the Gator Base panels..  Alliance, the company that makes the panels, claims you don&#
Read more

1st phase new front porch

-
Image
returning cement mixer to home depot, had to walk it from our house finishing the concrete 'platform', where the steps will start about to start mixing concrete, platform form in place ancient water level, tube has windshield fluid in it measuring for square with building, Pythagorean theorem! Roldolfo triumph, old concrete pier excavation old concrete pier in ground, where the new one goes, delayed project 4 hours dumping old concrete at Ravenswood transfer station Eric's fine deck drawing (1 of many) the stairs before demo stairs after complete demolition sidewalk and stairs during demo brick under porch, hasn't seen light of day in a LONG time
Read more