Dinklocker Happenings

This post is a long time in coming. Unfortunately, work got a bit busy and I was swamped - making it tough to keep the blog, or the pictures updated.

Check out the gallery - I posted a bunch of pics this afternoon. The order of the pics is still a little funky, but you should get a decent idea of what has happened for the last week or so.

The webcam is currently down - once the walls started to go up I had a tough time finding a good spot to put the camera (and the computer that goes with it) such that it would have access to electricity, the Internet, and be sheltered from weather. It may come back if I figure something out, but until then, you will have to rely on my less than stellar track record of posting pictures to the gallery in a timely fashion.

Let’s see - progress: First and second floor walls are up, trusses are set, roof decked, and the roofers were supposed to be at the house today putting on the roof. All of the windows are in the first floor - and last I heard from Amanda, my eyes and ears on location (not to mention my wife and the mother of our beautiful daughter), the guys even got the new window installed in the dining room. The new linen closet and the bedroom closet are already framed upstairs.

Today was also the day that the work crossed over from the addition into the existing house. The guys put down carpet protector - which is essentially rolls of sticky, thick saran wrap - then dove right into cutting holes in walls - including removing the existing linen closet. So the dust infusion begins!

The contractor has done a great job - everything has been on time, they are slightly under budget right now, and there has never been a day when they have been unexpected no-shows. Always very professional and willing to explain things to me and provide updates of what has gotten done and what will be getting done next. We are more than halfway done, and they just now had to start work inside. Great experience so far! BTW, our contractor is DLH Inc. and the acting foreman is Jason (son of the founder and current VP of Operations).

We are also very pleased with our architect, Sam Beadel of Place Architects. Sam did a great job on our relatively small job. She provided lots of ideas along the way to help us consider other options, and she made sure that this addition would blend in with the house, rather than just looking like a box that got tacked onto the back.

Door Update: We finally got the price for the fancy door. The door in the bid was $750 - reasonable for what it was and matches the windows. The fancy door came to $1900. Well, I was willing to go to $1000, maybe even $1100, but not that much. So in the end, we decided to stick with the more basic, fiberglass door with a full window. So I guess the door saga is now over. If this is the biggest saga that we encounter in this adventure I will be thrilled!

Here is how the timeline went today:

7:30 AM - Subfloor installed with wall bottom plates.

11:00 AM - All first floor walls installed - ready for top plates, door header, and one window header.

Yes - that was 3.5 hours from a subfloor to a fully framed, plywood sheeted, almost ready for second floor joists family room. Oh, and that was with 2 guys, just installing the SIPS by hand. They did not use a crane or a forklift at all.

Next steps are the second floor subfloor, then second floor SIPS, then roof trusses. If everything continues as planned, we will go from foundation to under roof for a two story, 16′x16′ addition in about 6 or 7 working days.

Unfortunately, now the family room looks smaller than I imagined it. It will be fine, it just looks a little bit smaller than how I had pictured it in my head. Too late now!

BTW - We still do not have a price for the fancier door. The guy at the dealer went on vacation, should be back next week. Hopefully, early next week we will find out that the fancy door does not cost more than the rest of the addition and we can finalize that one decision.

The footers have been formed, the rebar set, and the concrete poured. What began as cutting off a chunk of the deck and digging an 18′x18′x3′ deep hole is now working its way upward. Progress is great, but things do move slowly at this stage. Concrete takes a couple of days to set and the work to setup the next set of forms is easy - so it seems like things are moving slowly. I would much rather that everyone take their time at this stage, though, since a mistake on the foundation can make for dramatic problem later! It also does not help that there is a concrete strike going on - making it that much tougher to actually get concrete delivered. Luckily, our contractor was able to find a small company that is still delivering, and our scheduled meshed almost perfectly so that the whole project is still on time.

Here you can see the Insulated Concrete Forms (ICF) in place, re-bar hung, ready for the concrete to form the foundation walls. These are cool - basically ICF is like a hollow, Styrofoam Lego piece, with metal guides to hang the rebar on. Makes placing the rebar easier, and since the ICF forms are left after the concrete cures, the concrete walls have some additional insulation and waterproofing. Pretty cool overall.

I also started to post some pictures, so feel free to check out all of them here.

BTW, I am using the new Windows Live Writer to author my blog entries. I like it so far, and it is head and shoulders better than any of the online authoring tools offered by some of the major blogging tools (like WordPress or Moveable Type). In the essence of full disclosure, I do work for Microsoft, so feel free to take my opinion with as large a grain of salt as you would like!

Well, the location of the web cam is not ideal, but it is better than nothing. I may move it around if I can find a better place for it. In the meantime, you can checkout what is going on in the backyard here:

Link to Dinklocker Construction Cam

Minor progress update - the footing forms are in and passed city inspection this morning! Concrete pours at 7:30 AM on Monday morning!

Pictures are coming, but we have had digital camera issues and are borrowing one from a neighbor, and I just have not had time to pull the latest pictures off.

There is one universal truth about doing any work to your house - there will always be lots of decisions to be made. Some of these decisions are easy, others are quite a bit tougher. Some are driven by money (since very few people have more money than they could dream of spending), and others are driven by fashion (flooring, furniture, lighting, window coverings, etc.). Often there are MANY different products to choose from, in a wide variety of price ranges, with a wide variety of options available.

I never realized how many different doors there were until I had to choose one. You decide to go with a fiberglass door because it matches the windows that already took months to choose. Then you think, “Wow, it sure would be nice to have a between the glass blind in that door.” So, you go to the door manufacturer ’s local showroom to take a look and get some pricing information. OK, the first problem is that the fiberglass door does not have the option of adding blinds in between the glass. The next problem is that the next line of doors up the ladder does offer blinds in between the glass, but they are clad with metal on the outside. Well, the white painted metal outside does match fairly well with the windows, so that should work. Unfortunately, though, these doors are wood - so now we have to choose a finish for the inside of the door. It was also at least a bit concerning that I knew more about the product lines than the salesperson did, and I had only spent about 45 minutes reading through the website.

So, all I need now is a price so that I can compare the fiberglass door, for which I already have a price, to the fancier wooden door with the blinds in between the glass. The salesperson says, “Sorry, I can’t give you a price. You will have to call your contractor, who will call his sales rep here, who can give the price to your contractor, then your contractor can give it to you.” Wow - I am standing right there in the showroom, but I have to go through this convoluted system just to get a price. I know there are good reasons for this practice, but that only takes the edge off of the frustration that I am feeling. I went to the showroom to make things easier, only to discover that my idea of easier and their idea of easier were vastly different.

We have not gotten a price for the fancier door yet, so we have not decided. However, what is starting to worry me at least a little is that there are more decisions like this to come - exterior lighting is currently the bane of my existence, while interior paint colors and furniture loom in the not too distant future.

This is all fun, in a painful sort of way - the only problem is that if something isn’t quite right when this thing is all finished, I will only have two people to blame for most of the decisions - my wife and myself.

The two story addition to our house starts construction on Tuesday! Finally!

We are all VERY excited to get things started! Pictures will be posted as things progress. I the meantime, you can check out the family at http://dinklocker.com/gallery

More to come…