Home Improvement

http://www.lowes.com/pd_464310-295-1...3D2&facetInfo=
Somewhat close to what I use, for $30 gives you the cheat stick, and plug tester for piece of mind shit was done right.
The cheat stick you just hold up to a plug/wire and it beeps if it is still hot.

Olebass_sl said:

As far as outlets go pretty easy. Especially if you can locate the final outlet in the chain. Most newer houses have the line coming in at the switch of the room then off to outlets, or to a outlet then daisy chained beyond. Adding new ones is simply picking up where last one ends and running a new wire to next box and so forth. Older houses have the line coming in at the light in the ceiling which makes everything a bit more of a bitch imo.
If it is demo'd anyways most good GC's will do like I did and just buy a halo recessed can, a led conversion kit( $35 for both ) and wire up as many as you need. With the LED you don't have to worry about load because you are only talking 7 watts a unit.
If none of you have seen the new LED conversions for recessed cans, it is basically a LED 7 watt light with a light bulb adapter. You cannot tell it is LED and puts out AWESOME light. IT also is a sealed unit, saving you money from air loss to attic AND does not get hot like a normal recessed does. Well worth the $25-30 per uinit it costs. The ones I put had a 25 year longevity stamp.

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I did see those, and thought it might be worth the added cost just to never worry about bulbs going out. I didn't look long enough to find out if they're dimmable, though. Also not sure what the install cost per light would be. $25-30 for the hardware is fine, but if it costs another $50 per light to install then it jumps out of my budget pretty fast.

This is an older house, built in 1983. I'm not sure when the basement was added. The outlets would basically be replacements since a wall is going to come out.

edit: Would something like this be appropriate for a basement room?http://www.lowes.com/pd_440531-47787...&facetInfo=LED

Heylel_sl said:

I did see those, and thought it might be worth the added cost just to never worry about bulbs going out. I didn't look long enough to find out if they're dimmable, though. Also not sure what the install cost per light would be. $25-30 for the hardware is fine, but if it costs another $50 per light to install then it jumps out of my budget pretty fast.

This is an older house, built in 1983. I'm not sure when the basement was added. The outlets would basically be replacements since a wall is going to come out.

edit: Would something like this be appropriate for a basement room?http://www.lowes.com/pd_440531-47787...&facetInfo=LED

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Oh they are worth it, both in heat cost and lifetime. They are also excellent light. The 7 watt/60 watt eqiv I got actually put out about the same as 70-80 watts and it was a natural light too not like the shit CFL's do.
Wiring is SUPER easy with these , just go from existing past light, to next light, white to white, black to black and ground to ground and continue on.
Use theseHalo 6 in. Insulation Contact Air-Tite New Construction Housing-H7ICAT at The Home Depotif it is gutted out and they have a short version if it is between floors. Always get IC imo, IC allows it to be covered with insulation and not be a fire risk. Those Halos are $9 and $25 for the LED.Commercial Electric 6 in. White Recessed LED Trim-CER6730WH at The Home Depot

Watch slickdeals.net for homedepot using a 5 off 50 online order and pick up in store, OR right now lowes has a 10 off 50 through the 9th on same site.

If you are not gutting the ceiling, useHalo 6 in. Remodel Insulation Contact Recessed Housing-H7RICT at The Home Depot

And yes, the led retro kits are dimmable. Edit, at least the one I posted is. After the remodel I put in 20 of those kits in my parents house due to the can lights being so damn hot with normal bulbs. Took me a little under 2 hours to swap all 20 out.

The ceiling won't be gutted, but the spackle is being smoothed out. I don't believe that will mean opening anything up. What's there right now is just a ceiling fan.

Before I get confused, the housing isn't the full kit, right? Am I better off buying an all-in-one box or just getting parts A and B separately?

I recommend you measure very carefully to see how much clearance you have in your ceiling before buying recessed lights. There are a lot of lights that may not fit. Also, as far as wiring it yourself - Do it, man. Save a shitton of money, and gain satisfaction. The hardest part of it will be running the wires through your closed in ceiling. Honestly, that's the hardest work. Electricity is very logic oriented. Think everything through carefully, and you'll be golden.


I have the strangest thing going on. I'm installing some new projectors for a church, and I can not get the stupid things working. It called for shielded CAT6 cable, and I got exactly what the specs call for. It's all in conduit, and it tests perfectly, but it won't drive the projectors. So I test every twisted pair, and they're all good, the terminators are all perfect, it's just incompatible with that cable. So I try a straight run with that cable - shorter run, no possibility of kinks. Doesn't work. I try good, unshielded CAT6 cable, no go. I pull out a 10 year old piece, with the cheapest possible ends, and it works perfectly.

What in the actual fuck is going on here? Why would some cable be incompatible?

Yeah, I have no idea how much clearance I have. I may have to settle for track lights or something like that. Anything has got to be better than the shitty ceiling fan I've got right now.

What is the easiest and least damaging way to figure out how much room I have in the ceiling? Just drill a pilot hole?

Correct you want the 2nd unit which is a remodel kit. The first one is meant to be nailed to the joists, the second one you just cut out the hole, tilt the unit and the clips will spring and hold onto the drywall.
You will need to see which way your ceiling joists are running. Adding lights to that same 14.5 inches from one side to the other will be easy, just snake a wire. IF you want them elsewhere you will have to make holes every joist/16 inches inches to drill a hole for the wire to run through to get to the light. The hole doesn't have to be massive, a 2x2 inch hole should suffice and can be repaired easily enough.

It is cheaper in this case to buy the remodel can and then the retro kit separately. To install the retro kit, just simply screw in the light bulb adapter, plug it into the led light and hook the springs on the latch and push up. Literally a 4-5 minute max affair( do this after light is installed and wired up.)

There are other options, too. I did something like this in my beams (not LED, though):

2 Recessed LED Downlight - Low Profile Design | PilotLights.net

They're super easy to install, though they are small. So you need to put a few more of them in to cover the room adequately. They're fairly inexpensive, the install incredibly quickly and easily, and they are nearly flush to the ceiling.

Well damn. The estimate from the contractor I spoke with last week came in a little higher than I was expecting. I'm a little disappointed, but I have a second bid tomorrow morning so we'll see what they say.

For reference (and I know without seeing the space this is mostly meaningless):

1. Installation of sheetrock, tape, mud and sand. Complete repaint w/ doors primed and painted - $2800
2. Tile bathroom floor (labor only) - $400
3. Remove center wall and fix damages - $1200
4. Remodel fireplace - $1100
5. Custom shelves on both sides of fireplace - $1200
6. Install 10 can lights - $900 (labor only) or $1200 (with materials)
7. Install & paint new base molding - $450

Total $8,050

That estimate doesn't include carpet or labor on its installation.

The sheetrock work sounds a little high to me, and having the molding be a separate line item is annoying. All told it is about a thousand higher than I was hoping.

what exactly does "remodel fireplace" entail?

It's a giant brick fireplace right now, so what we discussed was covering up the brick with sheetrock (either framing it or directly to the brick) and building a new hearth on top of the existing brick.

I had thought the shelves on either side would be included, but he had them on there as a separate line item.

This isn't my house, it's just an image I found online. However, it's an example of what I mean by remodeling the fireplace.

http://ana-white.com/sites/default/f...1372452107.jpg

How many sq ft of drywall do you have and painting?
Also see that's the shit I was talking about few pages back. $900 to run 10 can lights. It is a day max for 1 person.

It's about 1-2' at the bottom around the walls of the bathroom, closet, a very small, square hallway, and two basement rooms that without the wall would be roughly 18x24 square. The large room would only need about 1/3 of it repaired, and then the drywall on the other side of all in the garage. After that everything needs repainted.

The attached image is the floor plan that was drawn up by the cleaners. I've highlighted the sections in red that need sheetrock repair up to about 1' off the floor. Also, everything will need new baseboards.

The wall between the den and storage area is the one that I want to remove. There is a steel support beam that runs the length of the house horizontally along the top of the wall, so I don't believe it to be load bearing. The den and storage area would become one large carpeted room, with the bathroom being tile. The stairs, formerly carpet, will just get painted.

Probably be almost as easy for them to just redo the bottom 4 foot. Existing tape seam to cut out and less patching. That does sound about right then for the drywall and paint. Although painting is fairly simple, could always do that yourself if you like.
Looking at it, he used the lights to make up gravy money, everything else just seems like it is priced pretty normal, so that is his profit.
I price out molding separate as well, but I include what kind so if a homeowner wants to go from a 3.5 base to 4 1/4 or 4 3/4 or 5 1/4 so forth I can just adjust material cost.

I make my bookshelves out of popular, even when painted( see pictures few pages back ) and Sanderply hardwood for anything wider than 12". That is expensive, so that seems right, but not sure what material he will use.
As for the fireplace, you can tapcon 2x4 flat to the brick and drywall it, or you can glue drywall to the brick if it is cleaned well. Either way unless it is far more than just putting drywall on the brick that is way to damn high. Liquid nail only costs a few bucks a tube.

People over charge a fuckton for mantles. I make mine usually out of a piece of crown, with a dental mold, and a base with cap over 1x8s. $80 material max and I can cut/nail and paint one in about 2 hours.

I am confused about the center wall. Is this a home load bearing wall in the basement? What is his plan for load support?

Ok you posted that while I was typing. Is he repainting all of that or just the affected walls?
Unless there is some weird shit in that wall you want removed, and it isn't load bearing like you think, $1200 is a ass raping on it.
Demo is a few hours max. The repair is about 6 hours labor. I assume he will repaint that entire ceiling but even then 450 sq ft ceiling is only $110 by my price.
That wall removal $400 max in my case of doing it.

I have not seen it in person or a picture however, so there must be some unknowns, or he eats better than me( likely )

Taking a couple pics so you can maybe see what I'm looking at.

Yeah, repainting everything pretty much. As for the wall, there shouldn't really be anything about it that is complicated. My dad seems to think he and I can probably just do the demolition ourselves.

Android photos, sorry.

This is the old fireplaces. We want to cover it up and paint it some accent color. As much of the brick that we can disguise, all the better. Maybe some tile or something like that along the bottom. All that bullshit along the top is from moving everything out of the room. It looks awful.

Back side of the wall we want removed.

Front side of the same wall. They tore the baseboards off but left the sheetrock intact. This room mainly had carpet damage. The dip above the television is a pair of I beams that run the full length of the house and into the concrete foundation on the far side of the room (and also all the way across the garage behind this camera position). I know for a fact it is there because we had to go around it when wiring the house for ethernet after I bought it.


The ceiling in that room will also need to be redone to match the other room. Right now one is smooth and the other is spackle. It might just be easier to rip the old sheetrock out than try to smooth it. I honestly don't know.

Ok. You got a plug that is chained there from one side to the other. Not a big issue unless the power is coming from that switch, which it probably is.
That will have to be relocated and a new line somehow fed to a plug to start the chain with the others.

Appears you have a HVAC trunk line on the ceiling there. That makes the repairs pretty easy. That texture is super easy to match. I would knock it down some and match it in the other room. Saves on coating and finishing.


That fireplace is probably the 2nd most ugly thing I ever seen, and I've seen many. What the hell is going on with the sides of it. Is that 6x6 timbers or railroad boards or some crap?
I would rip that out. Scratch coat the lower part of the brick mantel down with concrete and tile, with a border tile around the fireplace.
I would build a mantel similar to what I suggested earlier, and personally 2x4 flat ways above the mantel and run the cable/power up there and drywall and mount the TV on the wall.

Make sure the mantel is at least 18 inches above the firebox, and comes out at least 10 inches from the brick( 2x4 and drywall will be 2 inches of that ) to force the heat away from TV.

Fairly sure it is more cedar since it is hollow. There is cedar all over this house. The whole living room is covered in it (I mean covered, as in all 4 walls and the ceiling double layered like stripes). In that one room, the effect actually works and looks kinda rustic. In every other room it is just awful. I had an entire bedroom I had to tear out when I bought the place, and hip high cedar in the kitchen. At this point I'm down to just what is in the upstairs hallway.

It was probably fine in the mid 80s when it was built, but then some previous owner tried to reinsulate it and just failed miserably. That's why I want it covered up so badly. What you're suggesting is pretty close to what we had in mind, but it's also outside my expertise. Paying someone a thousand bucks for the remodel is acceptable if it turns out well.

As for the ceiling texture, my preference would be to have it smooth in both rooms since the texture is sorta dated. If I had to match it in the other room, that'd be fine but the savings would need to be relatively significant.

Ultimately I'm going to be limited by insurance. With a 10k max, and roughly 3k in clean up costs already spoken for due to the cleaners sent by State Farm, I've got a fairly slim budget.