The Big Addition: Demolition

 

Demolitious!

In the meantime, we hired a general contractor. The real demolition started June 18th at 0702. We came home to find the doors and roof off the garage, and all of the south facing siding gone! By the end of day 2, the garage was gone, and all that was standing was the Mini port, which will be reused as a wood shed. The Mini port was moved on day 3, and roof removal started on day 4. Pretty major changes for one week! 		June 18th. South siding? Gone.... Garage roof? Gone.... June 19th - the morning after - sun was... By about 9:00, all of the garage roof... Then, the other door frame is gone...... ... followed by the center post and... This gives you an idea how heavy this... Buttress wall is there...... ... and now it's not. As well, this is a... End of day 2. Only the Mini port... We're not usually awake this early, so... Piles of junk. Separated, of course,... All quiet at sunrise. Looks strange... The miniport in its new location. Better... At the end of the day, the roof had... The remainder of the garage roof... Friday morning, a gorgeous day. A day...
   

Week 2

Demolition continues on three fronts: ripping siding and roofing off the house, under-house excavation, and shoring up the structure so the south wall can be removed from the wood stove to the west end. When we got home Monday night, we noticed a window lashed to the back deck. Hmmm. We didn't expect this window to be removed. We figured it out when we got inside. The contractors needed to get two 24' 6x6 posts in to shore up the south wall. Ah. Makes sense. By late Tuesday morning, all of the siding was off the west wall through the end of the guest room. For some of you, this Tyvek looks familiar. Yes, we are peeling the siding off that we put on just 5 years back. This might be a good place to talk about wood vs. zero maintenance materials, a short story. Follow the link.

Work continued under the house, excavating for a retaining wall and floor. The sandstone went as far as the concrete, but is now gone. Amazing. At the same time, the crew started work on the last post to support the roof so the exterior wall can be removed. The old sliders were removed and holes cut in the floor. You can see the post go up.

Wednesday was a BIG day. The GC's team work out the removal of the rest of the windows and the construction of a temporary wall. A few of the 6x14 rafters were cut off. Then we went to work. When we got home, all that's left of the outside wall is a few sticks! And the sliders are back! The door to the guest suite is now outside!

On Thursday, preparation for old concrete removal continued. Another roof joist was cut off, and the rest of the exterior wall on the main floor was removed. As well, the post and beam at the garage level were also removed. It's amazing how much weight the center garage 4x4 was carrying. Enough to compress a 1 inch shim at the base to a curve less than 1/2 inch, bending the metal plate in the pad to match (which says nothing about why there is a shim here)!

Here's a "before" image of the... Why is this window lashed to the back... The hole where the window was is now... Ah. There are two posts from the rafters... Siding removal continues. This picture... Under the house, hand excavation with... No man is an island, but this post is.... The sliders are removed.... Cutting a hole in the floor.... Dale, our foreman, on the ground floor.... Bringing the post in...... Wrestling it in place.... Perfect fit!... Final alignment.... Looking up from downstairs as the hole... Plywood over the ex-sliders' space, and... Dale and the crew cut off a 6x14. This... When we got home, the sliders had... Another view; you can see the temporary... View from the back deck.... This used to be the living room. ... Now it's a porch.... An inside view - the cats are not too... This is the living/dining room for the... On Thursday, the exterior wall and... This was the deck behind the garage. Now... House is getting smaller all the time.... With the outside wall gone, a little... Another view of the roof support. The... Yes, that is carpet. A very nice touch... This shim was under the 4x4 carrying the... In this one, you can see the original... Well, it's a good thing this caution...
   

Concrete Removal

Happy July! Concrete demo started Monday 7/2. So why rip up this pad? In the new design, the pad is part of the structure - everything is tied together. This pad? If it's anything like the posts (or lack thereof) ... As with much of the leftovers, it will be reused for drainage by us and some neighbors. Old gutters and beams will be reused; old metal roofing will be reused or recycled. Anyway... Whitlow Concrete showed up to start the demo. it turned out that the pad and the footings were pretty substantial, and it will take a little longer than expected. Monday was a busy day - we had evacuated the upstairs over the weekend, and demo started on the bedroom portion of the remodel. Two of three windows are gone. By the end of the day Tuesday, the concrete pad and the footings were mostly history. Any intact concrete you still see in the latter pictures is strictly to support the structure above. The pour will be done in at least two stages. After the first, the supports will be transferred to the new concrete, then a smidge more concrete demo, then the second pour.

Also on Tuesday, interior demo on the second floor went full steam ahead. The bathroom is gone! Everybody got the day off on the 4th. Thursday and Friday saw continued work on three fronts. Upstairs, we have another temporary wall which will allow work to go on without needing to lock up the cats. Outside, our mountain of dirt and concrete was moved to our neighbor's house and replaced by a small mound of dirt taken out of the garage hole to bring it down to grade level. Under the house, more temporary supports so that the island post (see Week 2 pictures) could be removed. Next week will be big as pier holes are bored and concrete forms go up. Could we be pouring concrete by the end of next week?

Cutting the boundary line in the... This is a little ways out from where the... Cutting up the asphalt... So glad we... The asphalt will be recycled.... The real work. If you zoom in, you can... Progress on the pad...... Clearing out some of the debris ...... That's about half the pad. Not bad.... Josh also took a look at the ongoing... Looking the other way. The back corner... In the dump truck headed for our... End of this task for the day.... While the concrete guys worked out... This will be a debris ramp for removing... This is upstairs bath at 7am on July 3.... Ten hours later, the bathroom is... The ex-shower. This area will be the... Where's my shower? Mr. Mocha is very... While all of this was going on inside,... At this point, about 90% of the floor is... "Ya got your dirt piles, your rock... Another view. By now, most of the... This is about it for this phase of... For the win, can you spot the... The bat cave! Stairs to the master suite... Lining out the location of the... Mostly down to grade level.... Under the house, the island post is...
  

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