General Upgrades & Ideas

[Pelado]

One of the nice features of this house was that it already had a fire pit so I didn't have to construct one as I'd done at our last house. Near the firepit, the prior owners had left a supply of stacked firewood as well as a few logs set on end for seating and one larger log - 16" in diameter and three feet long - set on its side for seating.

As my wife and I were walking around the house a few weeks ago, she expressed that she thought the fire pit - constructed of retaining wall bricks - was ugly. She also shared that she thought the same of the fire pit I'd built at the last house. She was also not a fan of the log seating.

I'm planning to build a new, more attractive fire pit with smokeless features at some point in the relatively near future. But I started on the seating issue first. I got out the 18" electric chainsaw that I'd acquired for removing the stump from the front flower bed, situated the big log on end, and started cutting the log into four sections.

Unfortunately, the chainsaw was not working very well and I stopped and re-started each of the cuts several times. Sharpening the chain didn't seem to do much good. Replacing the chain with an aftermarket Oregon chain (thanks, Project Farm!) did a lot of good, allowing me to finish off each cut in a small fraction of the time I'd spent on each cut initially.

Sadly, my poor chainsaw work left each slab in pretty rough condition. I didnt take pictures of all of them, but here are a couple of them after the chainsaw but before the next step:

20240608_171629.jpg
20240608_171634.jpg
I considered a few different methods of smoothing them out, not being particularly worried about achieving absolute flatness. I considered sanding but figured it would take a long time with my random orbital sander and eat through a lot of sandpaper. I picked up a belt sander on special at Harbor Freight but then returned it after I saw a special on a tool that I thought would do the job better without the need for sandpaper - an electric hand planer.

The hand planer took a bit of getting used to, but I got them all pretty smooth and all but one of them pretty flat using the planer. I found and removed a fair amount of rot from the log, which also affected the smoothness.

20240609_053448.jpg

I mixed up a few batches of sawdust and Titebond 2 wood glue and used it to fill in some of the deeper voids in the wood, especially cracks near the ends of each slab. I didn't wait quite long enough for the glue to set before going over each board lightly with the random orbital sander. I vacuumed off any loose debris and then applied a tape dam around the edge of each slab. I didn't secure the tape dams well enough in some spots.

I mixed up a batch of epoxy and then poured it over the boards. I applied the most epoxy to the least flat board, counting on the epoxy to self level and make it a little closer to flat. I didn't count on the excessive amounts of epoxy building up pressure on the tape dam and spilling out, but that's exactly what happened.

20240609_083851.jpg

After an hour, I removed the tape dam. The boards were pretty thirsty, so there wasn't much epoxy remaining on the top of the boards to run off and coat the sides. I used my gloved hands to apply the spilled epoxy onto the ends and sides of each slab. Now I'm just waiting for the epoxy to dry and/or cure before I spray on a couple of layers of polyurethane to protect to epoxy from UV or other damage outside. I also need to fashion some legs for each slab. I'm thinking to use either one wider log on both sides of each slab as the legs or two smaller logs on each side. It may just depend on what's already in my firewood pile.

Here's what they looked like about after removing the tape dams:

20240609_093323.jpg

Just in case it wasn't already obvious, I'm trying to make the slabs into rustic little benches to go around the fire pit.

[Pelado]

Nice job! I hate landscaping type of work, especially when roots and/or rocks are involved.

I started that project around 8 am, thinking I'd be done by noon. I didn't actually finish until about 8 pm.

[Moliere]

Nice job! I hate landscaping type of work, especially when roots and/or rocks are involved.

[Pelado]

One of the nice features of this house was that it already had a fire pit so I didn't have to construct one as I'd done at our last house. Near the firepit, the prior owners had left a supply of stacked firewood as well as a few logs set on end for seating and one larger log - 16" in diameter and three feet long - set on its side for seating.

As my wife and I were walking around the house a few weeks ago, she expressed that she thought the fire pit - constructed of retaining wall bricks - was ugly. She also shared that she thought the same of the fire pit I'd built at the last house. She was also not a fan of the log seating.

I'm planning to build a new, more attractive fire pit with smokeless features at some point in the relatively near future. But I started on the seating issue first. I got out the 18" electric chainsaw that I'd acquired for removing the stump from the front flower bed, situated the big log on end, and started cutting the log into four sections.

Unfortunately, the chainsaw was not working very well and I stopped and re-started each of the cuts several times. Sharpening the chain didn't seem to do much good. Replacing the chain with an aftermarket Oregon chain (thanks, Project Farm!) did a lot of good, allowing me to finish off each cut in a small fraction of the time I'd spent on each cut initially.

Sadly, my poor chainsaw work left each slab in pretty rough condition. I didnt take pictures of all of them, but here are a couple of them after the chainsaw but before the next step:

20240608_171629.jpg
20240608_171634.jpg
I considered a few different methods of smoothing them out, not being particularly worried about achieving absolute flatness. I considered sanding but figured it would take a long time with my random orbital sander and eat through a lot of sandpaper. I picked up a belt sander on special at Harbor Freight but then returned it after I saw a special on a tool that I thought would do the job better without the need for sandpaper - an electric hand planer.

The hand planer took a bit of getting used to, but I got them all pretty smooth and all but one of them pretty flat using the planer. I found and removed a fair amount of rot from the log, which also affected the smoothness.

20240609_053448.jpg

I mixed up a few batches of sawdust and Titebond 2 wood glue and used it to fill in some of the deeper voids in the wood, especially cracks near the ends of each slab. I didn't wait quite long enough for the glue to set before going over each board lightly with the random orbital sander. I vacuumed off any loose debris and then applied a tape dam around the edge of each slab. I didn't secure the tape dams well enough in some spots.

I mixed up a batch of epoxy and then poured it over the boards. I applied the most epoxy to the least flat board, counting on the epoxy to self level and make it a little closer to flat. I didn't count on the excessive amounts of epoxy building up pressure on the tape dam and spilling out, but that's exactly what happened.

20240609_083851.jpg

After an hour, I removed the tape dam. The boards were pretty thirsty, so there wasn't much epoxy remaining on the top of the boards to run off and coat the sides. I used my gloved hands to apply the spilled epoxy onto the ends and sides of each slab. Now I'm just waiting for the epoxy to dry and/or cure before I spray on a couple of layers of polyurethane to protect to epoxy from UV or other damage outside. I also need to fashion some legs for each slab. I'm thinking to use either one wider log on both sides of each slab as the legs or two smaller logs on each side. It may just depend on what's already in my firewood pile.

Here's what they looked like about after removing the tape dams:

20240609_093323.jpg

[Pelado]

The drainage from the west side of our home was not great - there are two downspouts from the gutters but neither were getting the water very far from the foundation. So I dug a trench from the rear downspout location straight out the the edge of the flower bed and then along the edge of the flowerbed for about 10 feet. I then wrapped a 10-foot perforated French drain pipe in landscape fabric and placed it in the trench. I also added a bunch of rocks to the beginning of the trench (also surrounded by landscape fabric) and then placed more rocks on top of the landscape fabric.

Here's a picture from after Id placed the pipe and filled in the trench, but before deciding to add rock all the way across the flower bed:

20240520_134459.jpg And here's how it looks now:

20240523_094000.jpg

The drainage in the front was actually worse, since the roots from the river birch tree had raised the ground next to the draiage spout, making all the runoff run right to the foundation. I dug another trench, this one a bit more arduous because of having to remove a bunch of roots along the way. I tunneled the trench under the fence so as to keep it in the flower beds and not have to dig up any of the lawn.

20240520_134436.jpg

I didn't dig this one as deep or place nearly as much rock, but here's how it looked after placing the 10-foot pipe and before placing mulch and deciding not to use the cinder block paver as one of the rocks:

20240520_193600.jpg
20240520_193613.jpg

The water seems to be dispersing much better now.

[Pelado]

Either the builder or the first owner of our home planted a couple of river birch trees in the flower bed right next to the house (not a great spot for them). It looks like whoever planted them didn't even dig holes for them, they just plopped them down on either end of the flower bed and then placed large rocks around the trees to secure them. The tree next to the porch was removed prior to our moving in, the other we'll probably have to remove ourselves.

The tree that was removed was not extracted in its entirety - a stump remained. My wife instructed our son to remove it a little while after we moved in about a year and a half ago. He used the maul on it a bit, producing a few woodchips, but not really making much of a difference. My wife guessed that his maul-swinging motivation was likely more about showing off to his girlfriend who was spectating than about stump removal.

This spring, I started working on it. In lieu of a stump grinder, I used several other tools. What seemed to be most effective were the shovel, chainsaw, reciprocating saw with pruning blade, maul, and the breaker bar. The breaker bar was also instrumental in providing leverage for me to more the huge rocks so I could get easier access to the stump and so I could dig down a bit to lower the huge rocks and make the new hydrangeas and flowers more visible from the front of the house.

I'd already been working on the stump for a while before getting out the maul, but I was able to forcibly remove large chips and chunks with it, with the bonus of using the chips as mulch in the flower bed.

I switched over to Makita tools a while ago since the batteries on my old DeWalt tools were not holding much of a charge anymore. But I had not yet acquired a Makita reciprocating saw. Lucky, I found one of the small form-factor versions at a local pawn shop for a reasonable price. Once I acquired some pruning blades for it, the reciprocating saw was pretty effective at cutting through the roots.

The chainsaw made quick work of cutting into the center of the stump (while trying to avoid the chain-dulling earth.

Here are some snapshots at various stages of progress:

20240418_142036.jpg
20240422_195356.jpg
And here's how ot looks now:

20240520_193759.jpg

[USUC]

I may be asking a few questions here over the next few months as I toy with the idea of buying my late parent's house. It's a 50 year old rambler and hasn't been updated it quite some time. The main floor mainly needs cosmetic upgrades. The basement is half finished but needs some work.

My dad had a suspended ceiling with tiles put in 30 years ago. He didn't want access to the ceiling blocked off. I don't mind the tiles, although they updating, but I think aesthetically drywalled and textured ceilings look better. Anyone here have experience with drop ceilings? Do they make tiles/panels these days that don't look like an office building?

[MartyFunkhouser]

I have the same problem as falafel. Stud finders never work for me. I recognize that it is 100% user error though.

I look forward to all the responses to this softball that I have just lobbed.

Never read or watched.

I have a stud finder, multiple sized levels, a laser level, cordless drill/driver, tape measures, and 2 cases of various screws, nails, hooks, wires, anchors, etc. I live for this kind of thing.

Dude, I'd like to invite you to my home. It is no mansion in Alpine, but I like it. I can provide a lot for you to live for at my home.

[Jeff Lebowski]

My guess is that falafel isn't following the prescribed calibration method (must be done EVERY TIME immediately before using):

• Tell significant other "I'm gonna test the stud finder."
• Use on self until it beeps.
• Say to SO: "I guess it's working!"

[Lost Student]

I have orange peel walls, and my $20 Zircon stud finder, purchased at Home Depot, works just fine. I think this is a user issue.

My guess is that falafel isn't following the prescribed calibration method (must be done EVERY TIME immediately before using):

• Tell significant other "I'm gonna test the stud finder."
• Use on self until it beeps.
• Say to SO: "I guess it's working!"

[Moliere]

I have one like this (but a model that is a lot older) I love it and never have an issue finding a stud.

https://www.leevalley.com/en-us/shop...r?item=88N8721

[falafel]

I have orange peel walls, and my $20 Zircon stud finder, purchased at Home Depot, works just fine. I think this is a user issue.

My zircon has been a piece of trash since 2010.

[Bo Diddley]

Shots fired!

[Donuthole]

I have orange peel walls, and my $20 Zircon stud finder, purchased at Home Depot, works just fine. I think this is a user issue.

[falafel]

And good news. You can get it at Harbor Freight!

A good $7 cheaper than HD.