More fun with walls. I got to the end of the junk room walk-in closet because I found drafts coming from the space behind the rear wall (the external wall). I cleared out the stuff from the lowest part of the far room (of course that's where the shelves are, and the shelves are covered with stuff) and pulled down the wall. I was expecting to find a few gaps in the brickwork but wasn't expecting to find 12 of them in a space about three feet by five feet. I filled as many as I could before I needed to move- working on my knees reaching under shelves isn't a lot of fun. Anyway, I think I filled six of them. One is a big one where a joist sits in a gap in the brickwork so that will take the shop vac to clear out the crud and a can of building foam. Two of the gaps were in a space barely two inches wide between two wall studs. It was fun filling those. And for good measure I found that my study has more gaps in the brickwork behind one of the wall studs, which means it's almost impossible to get to them. I can see a can of building foam being sprayed into the space as best I can, and hoping for the best.
During the time I was working in the closet (upstairs over the primary work area) the primary work area increased from 50 to 52 degrees. I assume that wasn't just from having some lights left on - they were all CFL or LED bulbs. The only source of heat in there is the chimney stack, so I hope it means I'm continuing to push back against the cold. I can't get behind the rest of the closet wall for a while (specifically until I can figure out where to put the contents of three shelves) so for now I'm going to have to fall back on stuffing fiberglass into the spaces to contain the drafts from any remaining gaps in the brickwork. Now all the gaps I can get at are filled with two exceptions. One is the big one with the beam, which will take building foam and which is currently stuffed with fiberglass. The other is a fairly large gap that's below the floor line so I'm not sure how I'm going to fill that one. It might be another job for reaching up from below and reaching down from above, pressing cement into the gap with my fingers. Or maybe I'll just squirt building foam in there too. For now it's stuffed with fiberglass. The walk-in closet already feels warmer, subjectively speaking, than it did when I first pulled the wall face down. I'm going to need to top up my bucket of cement mix soon.
I don't really have a lot of choice, half of my house is ripped apart so one way or another I have to put it back together again. Believe me, there are days when I wish I'd just put the place on the market and moved somewhere else. But in spite of everything I love this house and really want to see it looking good. I just hope I can finish it before my time is up.
It is kinda frustrating when I think I've got something pinned down and just need to do the work, then realise I've got more work that really needs doing. Especially when it's the kind of work that doesn't necessarily have to be done, but I figure it might as well be done since I've got everything else pulled apart. Like taking down some of the ceilings, I'd really rather not have to do it because it doesn't absolutely, positively, have to be done. But on the other side if it's an old lath-and-plaster ceiling I might as well take it down now while everything else is ripped apart, than leave it until everything else is finished and then find there's a problem and I have to revisit it all. The biggest headache has been the part of the house that was extended because the brickwork was done to a really low standard, and trying to figure out logical sequences to do stuff given that ripping out multiple rooms and closets all at once creates issues of where to keep everything. And this year the weather hasn't helped, staying cold so long only to get very hot very suddenly, and then shift from comfortable working temperatures to cold so fast.
Been having fun with walls again, although this time in confined spaces. Having figured the problem was the wall behind the walk-in closet I decided it was time to just hit it hard and empty the shelves. So far I've emptied two shelves (finding space to store the stuff, given how much else is ripped apart is interesting) and checked the areas behind them. Not surprisingly, there are gaps. Lots of gaps. Some of them are quite big and will need strips of concrete to be cemented into place to fill them. Some are in really awkward places that make it almost impossible to get at them so those ones are stuffed with fiberglass until I can figure out how to get at them better. All that remains is the top shelf. This one is going to be fun because there's also a hanging rail in there, supported by - yes, you guessed it - the top shelf. So I need to move all the clothes from the hanging rail, then all the stuff on the top shelf. Along the way I'm going to need to get my ladder into there. Just to add to the excitement, yesterday I realised that dust was getting around the gap in the wall and forming a fine layer over my desk, which is where my laptop is. So I had an impromptu shopping trip to find some cans of compressed air to get the dust off my laptop, and then had to figure out how to stop the dust. It's tricky trying to work in a corner behind furniture, so in the end I figured I'd tape a couple of garbage bags into the corner. Except that was tricky too, because I needed one hand to hold the bag and two hands to apply the tape. Sadly I don't have three hands and the space constraints were such I couldn't even get my wife to help me. So I ended up using a nail gun to nail the bags into place. So far it seems to work. And having wiped the dust off my desk with a damp cloth, my desk hasn't been this clean in a while. Today's fun is trying to get at the top shelf. WIsh me luck. If any of you hear an almight crash it might just be me.
Just make sure to keep your FitBit on. That way I'll know if you stop moving. Kind of like the High Priest in the Tabernacle days.
I actually did put it on yesterday. I kinda forget about it a lot of the time, it stays clipped to the jeans I'm wearing at the time, and when I'm working on the house I'm usually wearing a pair of scabby sweatpants or similar. On a housey note, last night the study wasn't drafty, for the first time in quite a while. It was still cold this morning - 52 degrees - but that's after a night of temperatures hovering around freezing. It still wasn't drafty this morning, just cold. And losing the draft is half the battle. So far today I've cleared the hanging rail and the top shelf. Now it's time for lunch and then I plan to attack the last of the wall. I will need to get Mr Angle Grinder fired up because I know I'm going to need at least two concrete strips cut. I just hope I can find a concrete block that's a suitable donor. Otherwise I'm going to have to drive to town, and I really don't want to make a 30 mile round trip to pay $1.20 for a concrete block.
So I just reviewed a report submitted by the neighbouring claim holder(s) to my client's property and am seriously considering filing a formal complaint. I don't know why the government reviewers accepted that report, but it shoddy and sloppy, considering the author is a licenced professional geoscientist. Stuff like that really gets me annoyed. While I spend the time trying to do the things the right way and then you see garbage like that it's pretty frustrating. But, I've left it up to my client to decide on proceeding on the complaint.
My wife had adopted the most-of-a-concrete-block as a ledge for a couple of her plants. She didn't want to give up her block so I asked her to buy me another concrete block while she was out grocery shopping (the hardware store isn't all that far from the grocery store, which was handy). While she was out I set about clearing the last shelf, removing the shelf, pulling down the wall and fixing the gaps. All in all that small section of wall is the worst I've seen in the house so far. In a piece of wall maybe four feet wide and eight feet high I filled something like 30 gaps. Two were large enough to need a slice of concrete block cemented into them. One was partly behind a wall stud so I couldn't cement a strip of concrete into it, so I just had to keep adding cement until the hold was filled. All in I've used another 10lb of cement in the last 24 hours. It is noticeably quieter in the closet now. Not that noise levels in the closet are of great concern but obviously the noise in the adjacent rooms is. And now it seems the drafts in the closet are all but gone. Tomorrow's job is to clean out a couple of larger gaps and fill them with building foam (including one where a floor joist goes into the outside wall), then spray foam into an awkward corner of the study where there are a couple of small gaps behind a wall stud that I don't see any other way of getting at. And then, hopefully, I can put the shelves back into the closet and enjoy not having a dozen breezy breaks in the wall.
The temperature outside dropped below 20 overnight and even now is only slightly warmer. The study didn't go any lower than 50. Still colder than I'd like but not as bad as I feared it might be. Even at 50 degrees it isn't drafty in there the way it used to be - the cold seems to be due to the last couple of gaps that need filling with foam. Last night I ran the space heater in there and it went from 54 to 60 in just a few minutes, and then when I turned the heater off it still felt comfortable in there. Previously it took an age to get to 60 degrees and once the heater was turned off it almost immediately felt cold. So here's hoping my handiwork is on course to save me another bunch of cash this winter.
No foam yet, as I cleared away the debris from one of the places I planned to spray the foam I found another couple of gaps in the wall. So I got busy filling them in, and now it's just a question of waiting for the cement to dry before I start spraying foam too near the wet cement. Along the way I got sick of having two wall studs barely 4" apart. One of them was loose at the bottom and nailed to the concrete in one place so I pried it off the wall. It turned out there was another big nail holding it to the ceiling joist but I was able to pry that off as well. So now that wall stud is gone and I can get at the area more easily, and for good measure I found another gap behind it. Then since I've got everything ripped apart I might as well put some insulation panels in place.
Foam applied. Sadly much of it oozed out so I ended up packing a larger space than I hoped with cement. The other large space was more cooperative and for now has little more than a pinch of fiberglass. For the sake of completeness I took the chance to add some insulation to a couple of pipes in the unheated area where it's routinely dropping to the high 40s. The gap in the closet between the wall and ceiling is now stuffed with fiberglass. I spotted another couple of gaps in what has to be about the most inaccessible place imaginable. For now they are covered in fiberglass. Hopefully I'll be able to fill them with either cement or, at a push, sealant. The study now just takes a few minutes to heat form feeling chilly to feeling at least moderately comfortable. The drafts are all but gone. There's an issue around the window that I don't know if I can fix without more major work, but at least I can work without feeling like I'm about to freeze in there.
Gah. 48 degrees in the study this morning. But I think I've figured where the last of the drafts is coming from. It's the room the other side of the closet I've been working on. I'm not sure how because I thought I got them all filled, but at least I know what to be working on next. At least after FedEx finally shows up and delivers the parcel that is due to day but was last seen hundreds of miles away early this morning. Their online tracking "service" really is useless.