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1958 Ranch Home, Full of Character - First Home, First Major Project

169K views 519 replies 24 participants last post by  Arlo 
#1 · (Edited)
Charming Central California Ranch Home

I've been lurking the site for quite a while. Recently registered to ask a few electrical code questions, and to try to answer a few myself (with mixed success). I've been enthralled reading Coco's story in BC - now up to page 40 - and decided I might like to start showcasing my own project.

I'm a California native, though not to the small Central Valley community where I now own. I was born in the San Francisco Bay Area, I've lived on a 36' Kris Kraft on the coast, moved around the Wine Country, survived in Reno, came back to the Sierra Nevada foothills, and then moved off to college in the Bay Area about 10 years ago. I had come full circle.

In 2009, I got married to my girlfriend of 5 years for all the wrong reasons and moved to Oregon to be closer to my wife's family. Much too close. I found myself shortly in North Carolina, staying with a friend. I must say that I'm not very fond of the weather in the Southeast, or the food of the South. Go figure.

I enlisted, was rushed off to Texas, then Mississippi, and by chance was stationed back in the Central Valley of California. It feels good to be home, less than 2 hours from every place I mentioned living when I grew up... though all in different directions.

While I was in North Carolina, I fell in love. I've since dragged her all the way back across the country. We both joke that we've driven the 3,000 mile moving trip for each other. It's been a couple of years now for both of us, and we're ready to give marriage another shot. Wish us luck!

One last thing before we start on the house: when I was growing up, always moving between apartments, rental homes, boats, RVs, campers, etc I set the goal of owning my first home by 25. I'm glad to say that I made it, but just barely, by about seven weeks. :cool:
 
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#239 · (Edited)
Been bulk uploading the last 400 images to ImageShack, since the forum limit of 100kb just isn't going to work with a new 14 megapixel camera, as each image is natively 3m (or 30x the 100kb limit).

But it's so. Damn. Slow. I know it doesn't take an hour to upload 87 mb on my connection, as I have over 2mbps upstream. Checking out Flickr now for image hosting... standby.

Update: Just uploaded 100 images to PostImage.org in the time it took ImageShack to upload 30. Plus, ImageShack was only allowing me to select 100 files at a time (which is pretty generous for free), while PostImage is allowing me to upload 295 in the second batch.

Just waiting for the pictures of my present to upload... be back in a bit.
 
#240 ·
Alright... time for a little new-and-improved high def action! ;) Or rather, catching back up to the 21st century action.

Unwrapping my gift, I figured it was pretty obvious what she got me, considering I only asked for one thing...



Exactly what I wanted! Laminated wood levels have always caught my eye because of their beauty. Don't get me wrong, I own several painted aluminum i-beam Stanley levels, a few line levels, and a couple cheapie torpedo levels, but this is a different class of level here, with polished edging and curved bubble windows. I only wish I could see the bubble through the top.



It's as ironic as it is telling that the Made in USA logo is messed up, yet it still made it to market, and an American was still willing to purchase it.
 
#242 ·
This morning I managed to get buff the 2nd coat of polyurethane on the one back, two sides, four tops and four bottoms, as well as buff the 1st underside coat of all 16 shelves. I gotta say... doing the shelves first, and seeing all the screwed up spots that appear in the first coat of polyurethane, really got me down. It's probably the only thing I hate about working with this stuff... the first coat is always a disappointment, no matter how careful you are with it. Sure it becomes lovely again once you slap the second coat on, but it's still a heartbreak seeing all your work come out so crummy every time you sand a first coat carefully.

While I was waiting for the images to upload, I managed to get the third coat on that back, those sides, and a second top coat on all shelves. I'm headed in the direction of getting the tops/bottoms their third coat, then a second underside coat for all of the shelves. Ideally, I'd get a couple more sides/backs done tonight, or the lighting ordered.

We'll see where I finish when everything's on the table, but here's where I stand now:

 
#243 ·
As planned, I managed to get the tops and bottoms their third coat, put the second coat on the underside of the shelves, and the first coat on one back and the remaining eight sides pieces. Sure is starting to feel like progress!

Because it's been dark out for about five hours now and I do all sanding on the back patio, I don't want to even think about buffing tonight. I'll leave that for the next time there's daylight when I have time to work on this project again... Thursday!

Of course, I couldn't go to bed without a 3rd coat shot or two...


 
#244 ·
Progress continues!

Yesterday I buffed out the second coat on both sides of all 16 shelves and buffed down the first coat on the remaining 8 carcass sides, then put the second coat on the sides only. I would have finished the shelves, but we went to a friend's house for dinner and then I caught the Itis on the way back. I didn't take any pictures because it's much of the same... glossy wood.

I hope to have the underside of the shelves with the 3rd coat today, get the second back piece done, and have two 24" units fully assembled before bedtime.

Here's where I stand...

 
#245 ·
There's a rather... socially awkward guy at work. He gets ribbed on rather often due to his numerous slip-ups and lack of world experience in work settings.

I started working on a (humorous) Christmas gift to him that is sure to give the guys in the office a chuckle. Lets call it the "Mul Project". It's a solid cherry plaque of 11-7/8" x 15-1/8" x 5/8" that I plan to finish similarly to the bookshelves, but stained Minwax color "Red Chestnut" (as shown in the samples a while back).

It also gives me the opportunity to play with staining a larger piece of cherry, using an oil-based pre-stain conditioner, and masking off areas for adhesion.
 
#246 ·
On with the Mul Project!

For a little backstory, this guy has two very prominent joking points. The first is about a non sequitur tattoo he got on a whim which features a dead tree, glossy jewel tone circular saw blades and sibling initals. The second is about a series of hammy web cam recording outtakes that he unwittingly released into the wild... in which he raises one eyebrow, looks dead into the camera and says "This is how <his name here> gets the ladies" in an attempt at a suave voice.

This plaque is going to be a mix of both running jokes.

So yesterday, I went into town looking for a dog tag engraving machine. I figured for a couple of dollars, it was going to be the quickest and easiest way to get engraved metal on the plaque. All I'd have to do is punch a second hole in the other side of the dog tag. Easy, right? Nope. The Lowe's that I could swear had a machine for that didn't. Woops, guess I went to the wrong location. Home Depot didn't either. Went to Pet's Mart, who charged me $10/tag, but did laser engraving on a matte black finish. Perfect.


(sorry about the blur... still getting used to the new camera)

I came home and grabbed one of the 7" x 36" glue-ups I got from Marleene a while back. I promptly cut it in half and glued it up. I gave the thing 2 hours before I tried to put it in the planer, but before I could even get it to pass through once, the glue joint failed. Luckily not in the machine. So, I planed each half separately, re-ripped the glue line, and back into the clamps it went for the rest of the day.


(image is from before planing)

And here's the old 10" rusty sawblade (Craftsman original) that came my radial arm saw, covered in numerous coats of glossy jewel tone golden yellow.



I just put another coat on it because I left fingerprints in it last night, but otherwise it's practically done.
 
#247 ·
And more progress! Completed everything I wanted to get done (except the second backing, which is drying now...), plus the first unit assembled!

Dry fitting for the second time and discussing the assembly method.



A little closer...



In its place!



Closer...



(Almost) too close...



Feeling like I'm on the top of world right now. :thumbup: Certainly over 100 hours into this project already, not including research and tooling.
 
#248 ·
Project Mul made some headway as well while everything was drying.

Planed 1/128" each side (to remove misalignment ridge along seam). Finish cut to size. Orbital sanded front/back 60-80-120. Routed a Roman ogee on the front. Orbital sanded front/back 180-220. Hand sanded ogee and broke rear edge 120-180-220. Conditioned and stained both sides.



The blade is nearly dry too. During its fourth coat, somebody put a newspaper on (luckily only) one tooth, which caused it to stick. Badly. We're about 6 hours into drying the fifth coat.
 
#253 · (Edited)
Project Mul is moving along nicely. All three coats of poly are on the front, and the third coat is drying on the back. The saw blade still has a slight chemical smell to it when you really stick your nose right up to it, so I'm going to be gentle and assume that it'll cure over the next... days, weeks or months. I'm at the point of selecting the hardware to attach the engraved tags, and have pulled out the tube of construction adhesive to warm up in the house. I had forgotten to remove the old tube of gutter goop, so I had to fight to get the inside of the tube unstuck from the plunger of the caulking frame.

A lesson learned the hard way: when staining, don't think you can stain the backside before the front is dry. When I flipped it over to stain the backside, the front side sucked some of the dye out of the newspaper it was lying on. I quickly flipped it back over and worked most of it off with a paper towel, but some is still in there.

Also, a note on Minwax formulations. The standard formulation, which I purchased in a quart is totally different that what I have been working with thus far. It has a very similar consistency to the Minwax (Oil-based) Wood Conditioner... it's pervasive, gets everywhere, and feels like a thin layer of motor oil when it gets on your fingertips. I can see now why some people just do not like working with it.

Up til I stained Project Mul, I've been working with a Minwax 250-VOC gallon because California law prohibits the sale of the regular formulation in the gallon size (also OH, IN, IL, and most of the Northeast US). The label says that this product is thicker because of added resins and my experience is that the added thickness makes it easier to work with. However, if you don't wipe it off within 20 minutes (label calls for 5-15 minutes), it'll get so tacky that it'll rip apart cheapo brand paper towels trying to wipe it off. It doesn't drip, spreads very evenly, and levels well enough. But, I can see that I wouldn't want to stain an entire floor with it the way pros do (pour a pool, spread it around, buff it off) because it'd probably be tacky by the time you got a room spread around and you'd go through countless buffing pads trying to get it back up.

Quarts match quarts. Gallons match gallons. Trying to match colors across regular quarts and 250-VOC gallons is not going to work. Do not mix them together, or you'll get a horrible mess because they use different bases.

Regular Minwax Wood Finish can be top coated in 6 hours, while 250-VOC takes 8 hours.

The product labels and website often disagree. Label says 5-15 minutes, then wipe, and done in one coat. Website says a couple seconds to no more than 5 minutes, and it takes two coats. Just make a standard and stick to it for consistency.

Lastly, a note on coverage. The 250-VOC can says it covers 500 sq ft. I just stained ~275 sq ft of red oak plywood and used about 1/8 of the can. Same thing with the Minwax Water-based Oil-modified Polyurethane in Semi-Gloss... says a can coats 500 sq ft. I've done 3 coats each on about 250 sq ft (total 750 sq ft), and I've used less than half of the can. I tried putting it on thicker, but it ends up just glopping and needing more sanding; it just doesn't level right if you put it on too thick. Thinning with 10-25% mineral spirits may help, but I haven't tried it.
 
#254 · (Edited)
More progress on the bookcase. Taught the wife to stain (and carefully watcher her) the second set of backings. Got one layer of poly on them last night, then buffed this morning and put on the second coat. Buffing and third coat goes on at 12:20pm.



Also located and drilled for the electrical on the two existing units. I figure there's no way I could measure accurately enough to do the electrical cut-outs before assembly. So, I fabricated one of the spacers I'd designed (okay, so I really just wire nailed two pieces of scrap together for the correct thickness), then placed each of the cabinets in its proper place. I then marked their location on the base, pulled them down, stuck two red pens in opposite corners (ie, top-left and bottom-right) of the electrical box, put the cabinet back in place, and moved the pens to mark the back side of the carcass while holding it from falling on my head.

Once I took the cabinets back down, I just drilled directly between the two red dots I'd created with a 1/2" spade bit, put the cabinet back in place, and marked a red dot through the center of the hole. Dead on center of each receptacle. Once everything's leveled, aligned and shimmed, I'll carefully cut each opening for the box extender.

Oh yeah, box extenders. Forgot to talk about them. They look like so.



There's a video on Amazon if you'd like to see how they work, but essentially they provide up to 1-1/2" of extra box depth, especially good for recessed or buried boxes (due to addition of drywall, paneling, etc after electrical box installation). They're approved for use with both metal and plastic boxes, and cover completely under a standard size receptacle cover or switch plate. There's 2-, 3-, and 4- gang models also, but you can use multiple 1-gang pieces and trim the wings off where they meet also. I picked up 3 from the Big Orange yesterday ($2.97/ea) to play with, and ordered another 10 from Amazon ($9.38/5pk with Prime).

I'm also considering putting two or three receptacles in the toe kick, but have to check on code compliance first.
 
#255 ·
Looking back at Page 7, I realized that I never updated on the neighbor paintball situation. The renter neighbors that liked to play rap loudly all night until the sun came up, and then resume at noon the next day.

I watched the Sherrif's Department evict them a little over a month ago. That was a pretty sweet day. I made sure to "check the mail" at the mailboxes outside their house several times that day. Man, they either had friends over to help them move out or a straight ton of them lived in there.

It's already been re-rented out and, you guessed it, another bunch of people moved right back in. They're not nearly as noisy, but dang, they sure cram a lot of people in that house.
 
#256 ·
Making a little progress...

Found (somewhat) suitable hardware to mount the engraving on the plaque in the pile of hardware Colleen gave me. There's handles, pulls and feet for days in here.







I wish I had something with a a rounded head and a flat back, but I was in a rush and it was Christmas Eve, so there weren't many choices in hardware stores that were open...

Got them mounted, then had to run off to work

 
#257 ·
After work, I added another coat of paint (ugh, now a full can of spray paint on that heavy blade) and glued 'er down with construction adhesive and a fair bit of twisting.



It's harder than it looks to imitate wood carving on fresh paint with a Sharpie... especially when the marker tip fouls every half inch...
 
#259 · (Edited)
And here's the overhead LED lighting I'm deciding between. Big Orange ran out of 5" (600 lumen), so those are definitely out of the question, leaving the 3" (345 lumen) and the 4" (400 lumen).



Note that the actual LED portion of the light is actually smaller on the 4" model (plus brighter), so they're a lot more harsh. However, the baffle is also deeper, so I may be able to easily hide the light source more easily. We'll see.



I noticed that my local Lowe's just got 6" Halo LED kits in this week, but those are far too large. I did manage to find 4" and 5" non-IC cans that I could use with a new construction IC box box, but that would only get me flush to the top side of the drywall (and not the ½" drywall + 1-2" air gap + ¾" plywood from there to the underside of the bookshelf top). Plus then I'd have to pay for the can ($14ish), the IC can ($8, was $15) and the LED retrofit bulb ($40ish)... and that costs more than the Big Orange kits (3" $50, 4" $55, 5" $60)
 
#260 · (Edited)
And the bookcase progress is coming along nicely. Now that I have the overhead LED lighting units, in-ceiling (attic) electrical, and in-cabinet electrical supplies purchased and on hand, I feel like I've made good forward progress.



And now about the center unit... after putting the 24" units in place and measuring, it came out much different than I expected... the gap was about 3" wider than anticipated. :eek: Lovely.

As it turns out, I left the back about 2½" wider when I rough cut, so I was able to get almost all of it back. I did have to take 1/8" off the shelf width and top/bottom width due to re-ripping the sides 1/8" previously. I have just barely enough shelf front material to make it (will have about eight ½" pieces left over, I estimate). And I'll get the last ½" by pulling all four units ¼" to the center and scribing a little extra against the wavy walls.

Seeing that 3" sure did give me a fright at first though!
 
#262 ·
More or less a gag gift, and to let me practice on this solid Brazilian cherry and Red Chestnut stain before I tried to make real things out of it. Got 28 pieces that size for about $15, so I figured it'd be a good idea to iron the wrinkles out of my process before I did it for real. Paid off too... found a couple things I did wrong that would have screwed up my cabinet doors (and my day).

Hung it on the wall in the shop for a day and a half. The guys got a kick out of it. Also posted it on Facebook and tagged him in it. When he picked it up, I'm told he was rather happy to have been made it.
 
#263 · (Edited)
Some progress today. Got a little frustrated toward the end, but that's how it goes some days. Spent a good portion of the morning going back and forth between the 3" and 4" LED cans. I really do with the 3" can were baffled deeper on the recess, and it would have been a very easy choice. Went with the 4" ones for that reason. On a dimmer, I don't expect they'll be as harsh as in the store, and completely out of sight unless sitting in one particular chair. *cross fingers*

Pulled out a scrap piece left over from a center unit shelf and tried the 4-1/8" hole cutter on it. Came out fairly smooth, but not as smooth a a jigsaw on a hole cutting jig. The can popped in easily, and then I sprang the retrofit feet with hardly any effort.



The bulb and ballast fit in pretty easily too. I took off the airtight gasket here.



I didn't have to touch anything from above to install. Obviously I'll have to go up into the attic to wire them, though, since I haven't pulled wiring from the junction yet or wired in the switch.

 
#264 ·
Got all the biscuits cut for the center unit shelves. Another 20 biscuits (40 cuts) knocked out.



Just finished gluing them all up. I think that's pretty close to my least favorite part of the whole process... smearing glue, the mad rush to get everything aligned and clamped, scrubbing excess glue off, waiting to take off clamps, etc. Funny that it used to be my favorite part of the process.

I had numbered each joint on both sides for the fronts. Somehow when I was gluing, the stacks got jumbled up, and I didn't notice until I had glued half the pieces together. There goes all the grain matching I spent an hour on earlier. *sigh* And now probably a lot more sanding.
 
#265 ·
Determined the finalized spacing, which of course took far too long. Then I cut all the lighting can holes in the bookcases and drywall.



I'm so excited that I can wait to install the light cans. But I know that I can't do that until I screw the carcasses into the studs, and I can't do that until I have the center unit completed. Ugh.

Hopefully I can get the junction box installed and all the wiring ready tomorrow. I'd also like to be able to start staining, but I know that I probably can't until I let shelves finish curing (late tomorrow night). Ugh!
 
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