Final inspection is done!

We had our plumbing inspection on Tuesday. While we have a couple of things to correct, the inspector gave us a pass so we could get the final building inspection done on Wednesday. When it was time for the building inspection, we had five items to correct--the worst was the back porch stair height. Linnea and #1 son lowered the step heights to an equal amount and did a fair amount of digging. I came home after work and changed out some breakers for the correct size and added a weather cover for the porch outlets. I also had to correct a ground problem in the master bath--I forgot to bridge the grounds on some of the outlets.

We are installing the rest of the flooring and ceiling and wall textures, painting and planning to move in soon!

Big catch up note

Okay, I last posted a note on 7 August. Tonight is almost two weeks later--zoinks!

We have been going full throttle to get ready for the final inspections. In the last two weeks we have: installed two full bathrooms, a kitchen, finished all the electrical in but one room, built a glass block wall, installed tile in two bathrooms, plumbed in the water heater, installed the porch railings, the porch stairs, the balcony railings, the window screens (had a lovely 52 degree night on Friday), installed a sub-panel for electric as we have 10 more spaces than our 40 space panel (electrical breakers take one to two spaces each), and I am sure more than that. Whew--just typing it wears me out. We also have two sickies in the house right now--Linnea and number one son have a cough/running nose/ear infection going. Son is getting better but Linnea may take a trip to the base emergency room tonight to get some medicine to help her get better.

Looking over the photos from the last weeks, I see that we also spent the first nights at the house--how could I forget? We took last week off on leave and camped overnight from Tuesday to Saturday. Coming back to the apartment in military housing was a let down after being at Thistle House for five nights. Even in it's chaos, it's an easy to live in house. Plus, all the food is there now and the larder is bare here. There is no connection to the internet at Thistle House yet, and I told the kids we are not moving a single computer until every dust speck is gone and all messy work is done. That motivated them as that means the Xbox stays at the apartment too.

So, here is a montage of photos from the last few weeks; comments are welcome.



Basement mechanical room; well pressure tank, water filter, water heater with pressure relief tank--not pictured are the electrical panels and PEX manifold.



The Leaning Tower of PVC Babel. This puppy took about two hours to figure out and build. I had to label all the parts--three bowl sink, one garbage disposal, two dishwashers and one air admittance valve. When it was installed, the right sink drain line was 1 1/2 inches below where it was supposed to be--two hours later it was right. Works great.



Here's the kitchen sink without the Leaning Tower of PVC Babel. Did I mention that we got this sink (Kohler) from the Habitat for Humanity ReStore? It's a real bargain--we spent $40 on a sink that would have cost us $2,000. All we had to do was clean it up and remove the old fixtures. Sweat equity in action.



Re-installing the KitchenAid fridge doors after moving it upstairs. I am really getting bald.



The essentials are getting in place--and if anyone knows where my green Nalgene water bottle is, I need it for physical training tomorrow morning.




Laundry/bath sink--Kohler fixtures are great--install easily and well. I have one problem with a sink missing a washer and they are FedEx-ing it to us. That's three sink faucets, three showers and one bath faucet. Great stuff--two thumbs up and five stars.



A nice photo taken by son #1 (I think). Shows the laundry/bath and nice use of the mirror. Linnea developed this mirror fetish while we were stationed in England, and we came back with something like 15 wall mirrors. Apparently everyone in England is getting rid of theirs and we had to take them--probably something to do with reparations after the Revolution.



The cat is at the house full time now, although he isn't earning his tuna at this time. He is turning into quite the fly and moth catcher though. Number 2 son isn't too bad at flies either, but he doesn't eat them. There is a standing 10 cent bounty on every fly, payable at the ten fly count in Thistle House.



Here it is; the end of the 'Blue Room'. I have an entire future blog series on the trials and tribulations of having a port-a-potty for a year. It's a joy almost indescribable to have indoor plumbing. Now all we need to do is install the bathroom door.



Same toilet in the laundry/bath, showing the glass block shower wall just getting started.



Dinner interruption on Saturday night. Fresh from the garden, our own veg. Disclaimer: the onion is from the store.



Glass block wall, post dinner. Linnea and son #1 are hard at it, installing it. I was doing electric in the upstairs bedrooms.



We are doing a 'Tuscan' theme in the laundry/bath, and when I say 'we' I mean Linnea and Daughter. I just haul boxes of tile.



Finishing up the glass block--rubbing off the stray mortar.


That's it for now--more later. Probably another week before a good post, as the Air Force (and DoD) has blocked access to Blogspot from Air Force networks. Being a military IT guy, I totally agree in principle but it sure impacts my slack time at lunch doing updates. Oh, well.

Passed the rough inspection

Well, we passed the rough inspection! Troy was happy with just about everything, but we will have to add a receptacle above the second sink in the master bath. That and a few little nit-noids and we were done. Yeah!

On Tuesday the 25,000 pounds of drywall showed up--okay, but it seems like that much. Tony the building supply guy did a more detailed take-off to get a better idea of how much we needed, and with all the supplies it added about $1,300 to that budget category. Good thing we don't need any money. So, we took the rest of the week off and started putting up ceiling board. That's 1/2" gypsum drywall with fibers in it to resist sagging. The crew from Building Specialties boomed the load into each floor and carted it around to each room. Boy is that convenient, but boy is it in the way of putting it up.

As a bonus, here are the pictures of the two upstairs shower floors Linnea is putting together. The tile is in ours, it's bargain tiles from Lowes. The river rock is for the kid's shower and it's an artistic experiment that Linnea and our daughter are doing. They are going to set the rocks in the concrete with their flat side up to give a smooth floor, yet show off the rocks. I think it will be cool.

Ready?

Tomorrow we are going to call Troy the Inspector (Inspector Troy?--sounds like a mystery) and schedule our Rough Inspection. It has only taken, umm, way too many months to get this far. Once upon a time we planned, on paper even, to be in Thistle House for Christmas. Anyway, we are over budget and past due for this inspection. I finished the last electrical circuits today with the three-way light switches. I hope I wired those right. It makes sense on paper, or actually on a 2x4, but I have NEVER done one before. Anyway, we need to get to bed so we can call the inspector bright and early.

Passed plumbing, onto framing/electric/HVAC

Barry the plumbing inspector for Miami county was pleased with our setup and gave us the coveted 'Green Tag'. The waste/vent PVC only needed to hold 5 pounds of pressure for fifteen minutes, but we have had it hold overnight almost completely (it leaks around the pressure gauge). The PEX has been holding tight since Saturday. I just realized last night that we can connect the well pressure tank to the cold water side as soon as we have power--even though the other lines will be off, we can have the outside spigots working as soon as we pass the next inspection. Our county requires a pass on the plumbing before the rough framing/electric/HVAC inspection. I am going to call Travis the electrician to help out with finishing it up--especially getting the power to the HVAC. We are nearly there!

Don't try this at home

Okay, so if anyone from OSHA is reading this, please know that (1) I am the homeowner-builder and (2) there are NO paid participants in the following set of pictures. Legal disclosure aside, this is what I was doing yesterday afternoon. We were putting up the trim, soffit and siding on the most challenging part of the East face of the silo, and the East gable wall.


It's a bit difficult to see, but I am on a 7' ladder on top of 20' of scaffolding--so that's about a double gainer with a twist and 2.4 seconds of screaming all the way down to the rock and dirt below. So far, the only casualty has been some miscellanous nails and the occasional pencil. All have survived, although my temper at times is frayed. Or maybe it's 'fraid?


This week we are trying to get the East gable and silo finished, as well as the electric and plumbing. We had a nice talk with Troy the building inspector and he told us we are well on our way to being ready for the rough inspection. Despite what their paperwork says, he said we don't need to have the siding done for the rough inspection--if we had asked that earlier it would have changed our schedule. Oh well, back to the slave mines of Endor.

No pictures, but lots of pipes

We spent a cold Saturday at the house yesterday, along with Kenny and Craig the plumbers. They got something like fifty percent of the waste and vent lines in. I only had to go to Lowes once--and that was mostly for me as I needed more electrical parts. While they worked on the pipes, I worked on the wiring. We are nearly ready for the rough inspections. We are going to ask Duane our overseeing contractor to come by and tell us what we need before calling the inspector. I may call the inspector too, as we have very helpful inspectors in our county and they are willing to advise if you are willing to listen.

Weather you like it or not...

Looking for thunderstorms today and maybe tomorrow--whether we like the weather or not.

The next five days are dedicated to getting a lot done on the house--I am taking leave (that's vacation for everyone outside the military) Mon - Wed next week. I plan on taking one to two days off each week to finish up the house until we are done. There's about 12 weeks of time left until our construction loan "matures" and we exhaust our money set aside for the interest on that loan. If we aren't done by June 15, we will start making double payments (mortgage and rent where we live now) August 1. Ack!

So, time to kick it in gear and finish. I will call the building inspector Monday to get a pre-inspection walk through. I want to see what we need to finish before he's ready to sign us off for our rough inspections. Then we can insulate and close up the walls! Then all we have to do is install everything, like flooring, fixtures, paint, move and be here around my birthday in early June.

Linnea and I have talked about Nehemiah, the prophet who God called to rebuild the walls around Jerusalem after the city had been sacked and burned. He had an impossible task with unfriendly neighbors and scared builders. We have had all of those situations on this project! We feel like the next 12 weeks will be our miracle, after all, God worked out that the walls around Jerusalem were rebuilt in a month. We have two and a half, and our friends have all said that they will help us in droves once the insulation is in.

Thaw brings ketchup!

Here's a quick summary of what's been going on since January.

In late January we were frozen out as the temp dropped into the single digits, and the propane heater we borrowed had to go home. So, until the thaw at the end of February, we basically did nothing. We did have family time and get some sleep, plus rebuild the family computer.

Now that the thaw has happened, we are playing catchup (hence the title). Wiring is underway, as we are nearly done with the PEX supply tubing. It's looking speghetti like in the house and it's more difficult to sneak between studs; we have to start using the doorways.

We are getting ready for the next inspection; it's a biggie as it covers rough framing, rough electrical, rough HVAC (heat and A/C) and rough plumbing. We have to finish siding the house, finish all the rough framing (things like partition walls) and have all the electrical wire run. We also have to pressure test the plumbing and get ready to tie it to the pressure tank from the well.

This next week we are hoping to finish the wire and my son and I can buckle down and get the siding up in a big way. I have to finish the north side of the house (just started, as you can see in the picture) and then the east side needs to get done. I have reached my maximum height on the scaffolding, as any higher I get freaked out about the distance X 32M/second² = terminal velocity. I plan on renting a boom trailer so I can use that to reach the tall stuff. Linnea pointed out last night that she is totally fine on a tall ladder. I read in this month's Fine Homebuilding that Warner Ladders did a survey and more people are scared of falling from a 25' ladder than speaking to a crowd or asking for a raise. Linnea said her only concern on a tall ladder is dropping something onto someone's head.