DIY

Life’s good

On Monday we had two toilets and one shower… now we have three toilets, one shower and one bath/shower… who knows what we’ll have tomorrow.

It’s been a hectic week. I’ve been doing what I can, in between helping Tanya move her stuff (and furrfu, does she have stuff. I thought I had stuff. Well, OK, I do have a container and a half or so more stuff than Tanya does, but hey).

Monday morning I fitted kitchen cupboard doors. Found that the idjits inattentive people at Lansdowne Boards had not drilled the corner cupboard doors for hinges. Also decided the bin cupboard needs to swing out on bottom hinges, rather than pull on slides as I originally thought. So I took those down to be drilled.

On Tuesday I plumbed in the MES toilet. And Tamsyn’s bath, which proceeded to leak (the drain).

On Wednesday I cleared “my” stuff (i.e. anything that’s not hers) out of Tamsyn’s room. And re-plumbed the bath with much swearing and contortions and more swearing.

On Wednesday evening Tanya had a bath. After cleaning the protective film off the bottom of the bath, which was a helluva job. But! She had a bath! In our new house! (Hey, you measure progress your way, I’ll measure it mine).

On Thursday (that’s today) I fitted the corner cupboard door and the bin door. The corner door was tricky, but Julian had told me to balance the two halves on a level surface to line things up, and I used a piece of (thin, prolly 3mm) ply as a spacer, worked well.

On Thursday evening Tanya told me my oven is skew. And it is. Never mind I straightened it out with a shim last time I fitted it (before I took it out to fit the dominos). Bugger.

Oh yes, and apparently we have noisy critters in the kitchen. I sleep through this. Tanya doesn’t. I suspect the rock pigeons were observing Genesis 24:2 under the outside roof. I don’t think they know that (1) I have guns and (2) they taste good.

Oh yes, and we put up some curtain rails. Well, one per kid. But each kids’ room has two windows. Half way there :-)

2008-10-30 by wrm House Uncategorized 3

What a weekend

On Friday Tanya and I discussed things and realised that the big part of the move would have to happen this weekend. So on Saturday morning I took two trips with the Rand-Lover, ferried the kids’ beds and a whole lot of random stuff over.

That’s the problem with moving 11km — if it were to, say, Bellville, I’d hire a company to bring in a pantechnicon (I love the etymology of the word), pack everything, and get it there. But because it’s just around the corner, we’re moving everything ourselves. Silly, isn’t it?

After the two trips, I finished installing the dominos & oven, and then cut the post form and installed the sink. Things were coming along nicely when Tanya phoned and said “do you know what time it is?” — we had to shoot through to Bellville for a party (which lasted ’till 3 in the morning, not good for our productivity on Sunday).

Meanwhile Frank installed skirting boards in the living and dining rooms.

Yes, our walls are tough!

On Sunday we hooked my father’s trailer, popped into the hardware store, and got to Fish Hoek at about 11:30, finding Frank hard at work (I think he saw the desperation when I asked him if he’d work on a Sunday). He was almost done stripping the paint off the oregon pine skirting boards that I’d removed from the living room, which he then fitted in our bedroom (to be varnished).

I finished installing the sink in the countertop and the countertop on the base cabinets. Got Tanya to clean off the excess sealant.

We then went and collected the fridge. What a mission. The fridge only just fits inside the trailer, at an angle, and if I were just a little fatter I would have been trapped inside the trailer, behind the fridge, for the drive.

It was getting late, so we dropped Frank off at his place on our way to fetch the washing machine and tumble drier. And what do we spot on the lawn at Frank’s place? A bloody huge open trailer, big enough for all of Tanya’s furniture including the fridge, in one go. What’s this? No, says Frank, that belongs to my uncle, I forgot about it… :-)

So. Sunday evening. This is what our house looked like:

Kitchen

Dining room

Tamsyn’s bedroom

Tanya’s room

Jessica’s bedroom (actually the “tidiest” room in the house)

Living room, from both sides

and our bathroom.

Yea. What can I say? So we lit up a fire and braaied some steaks. With potatoes and half a butternut in foil on the coals, beer and red wine, it’s Hell in Africa (1).

I wanted to wash the dishes, so I put the kettle on — lights but no action. I guess the element gave up the ghost. Which means I had to plumb the mixer tap in so that I could wash the dishes.

Tonight, we can move the wardrobes to our bedroom, and get our living room back, yay! (The kids are sleeping at Tanya’s folks’ place for the week, we have enough chaos already :-)

(1) I realised that I need to add to my Land-Rover pages, explaining terms like “Rand-Lover” and “it’s Hell in Africa”. The first is fairly self-explanatory, the funny bit is that I printed the logo on an A4 page and stuck it in the back window, and Pim drove behind me for a week before he suddenly burst out laughing.

We were camping in the bush somewhere between Kariba and Changa, dead quiet, braai fire going, Pim smoking the last of his cigars, and he sighs deeply and says, very gravely, “It’s Hell in Africa”.

2008-10-27 by wrm House 2

Router bits

All the hardware stores carry router bits. Kits with the most astounding selection of everything I don’t need.

I used a jigsaw to cut the holes for the dominos in the kitchen countertop. But the dominos are deeper than the thickness of the counter, so I figured I should route a space into the cabinets below.

OK, I could just jigsaw it out, but that would leave holes visible from the bottom. I only need half a plank’s thickness extra depth (yes, I know, the preceding sentence doesn’t make much sense. Just nod and smile).

So I needed a router bit with a bearing on the shaft, like the one on the right in the picture :

B.P.M. Power Tool Centre in Southfield is the place to go to. They’re cheaper than Builders Warehouse too.

Then I discovered that the router I have on loan is a POS. The “one little thing wrong with it” (inside joke) is that you can’t lock the cutting depth, it works itself loose. So the hole starts off at the right depth and then gets shallower. I removed the springs, with the result that the hole starts off at the right depth and then gets deeper.

I shall have to purchase a decent router.

2008-10-17 by wrm House 1

Taps

(I was in a hurry when I took these photographs so y’all will just hafta live with the autofocus, OK?)

The last five or six times we went to Muizenberg market, I looked for but could not find a prep bowl tap — i.e. a single tap for cold water only, not a mixer.

On Sunday we saw this one and I snagged it, even though it’s not quite what I wanted (R180).

Well, lo and behold, we found the one below at the next table. Exactly what I wanted (Cobra Capstan – R200). So now I have a preb bowl tap spare.

While I much prefer the look of the Cobra Capstan range, I want a continuous mixer at the zink*. This makes it easier to select the temperature when rinsing, for example. Example above cost R180.

Tanya found this shower rose which she quite liked. R375.

And somewhere along the line I found some time to cut the holes for the three dominos. We’re still sort of deciding where to put the electric one, but I think I’ve settled on the layout in the picture.

* While the rest of the (civilised?) world calls ’em “kitchen sinks” or “basins”, in Cape Town we call ’em “zinks”. Much to the chagrin of SWMBO.

2008-10-13 by wrm House 1

Carpet, Novilon, backsplash

We spoke to the carpet dudes in Fish Hoek a while ago, got a quote etc, but we waited as long as possible before (1) choosing the carpets (to match the kitchen cupboards and bookshelves which are still going in) and (2) having the carpets laid (to get as much work done without getting the carpets too dirty).

Belgotex Sensation Kiat for the living room (the one on the right).

Novilon Liberty Yellow Beech for our bathroom.

And while we were at it, Dakota Mist (floor) tiles for the kitchen backsplash.

The quote came to just under R14k (Carpets in Jessica’s room, passage and living room, Novilon in our bathroom, and the supply of one box of tiles). They’re starting on Thursday, which means we have to clear the place so they can work.

2008-10-11 by wrm House 2

What a silly bunt *

When designing bookcases, one should take the thickness of the actual shelf into account. 185mm = good, 177 = bad.

CDs fit better, but I’d need a few thousand CDs to fill the shelves… so… the girls get a fairy shelf each, and I get to redesign these bookcases with fewer shelves.

* Spot The Reference.

2008-10-10 by wrm House 1

Bookcase

Took me two and a half hours to assemble this bookcase. Each shelf has four dowels and four pins and cams keeping them together. Eish!

The overlap you can see on the left hand picture means I need to trim a little bit off the skirting board (above) to make things fit.

I was completely out of it this morning, and slept in. Definitely a Guronsan C day. I’m not 22 any more.

This is the hidden comparment behind the old kitchen door. It’s only about 130mm deep — any ideas on what we can hide there? Candles and tins of baked beans?

2008-10-09 by wrm House 6

Losing my sense of humour

So last night, it being Tuesday and as such a kid-free evening, Tanya and I started assembling the latest units.

The 2400mm tall Colossal Cupboard (it’s also 900mm deep) had to be assembled upright, in place, because there’s no way to tip it once it’s assembled, it’s only about 100mm short of the ceiling. So the assembly was a bit of a mission, 720mm wide 900mm deep chipboard shelves are *heavy*.

I pinned and dowelled the two sides, slotted in the bottom and the backing board, and then realised that the top had no groove for the backing board. So with Tanya holding things from falling over, I rushed to the garage and chopped eight or ten millimeters off the bottom of the backing board — not the best plan of action but the best I could do under the circumstances.

Eventually got the whole thing assembled and in place and screwed to the skirting and to the piece of skirting I used as a spacer against the wall. Tanya has pictures.

So then I wanted to assemble the bookshelf that goes next to the Colossal Cupboard. And I noticed that the cam & dowel holes in the top didn’t match those in the bottom. The sides are correctly drilled, however — and this means this unit won’t work. And I noticed that neither the top nor the bottom had the slots for the backing board.

So I stripped my moer, commented on the stuff the guy in the workshop was smoking, made nasty remarks about his parents and siblings, and the like. And I checked the other three units.

Yup, groove on the one side, no groove on the other.

Went back to Lansdowne Boards this morning, voiced my extreme displeasure, and after much pondering over CAD drawings and many incredulous looks at the offending shelves (“Oh, look, the holes are *still* wrong!) they realised that yes, indeed, the fellow driving the machine was indeed high on… life… or… err… something.

So we went over to the workshop, waved hands all over the place, and the fellow jigged the stuff up and added the neccessary holes and slots. Got to see how the machine works. Impressive, although it doesn’t go “ping“.

/me renames his blog to “Dealing with Idjits”.

2008-10-08 by wrm House 4

Road trip hiatus

I’ve been quiet because we’ve been on the road. Tanya and I drove up to Gauteng on Wednesday, September 24th, spent two days there, then drove down to Port Elizabeth and from there to Knysna, where we spent the most of last week.

Wednesday : Bellville to Rustenburg. Departed 04:00, got there after 7 the night. Bit of a drive.
Thursday : Rustenburg to Krugersdorp to Centurion to Randburg to Benoni.
Friday : Benoni to Witbank and back to Benoni.
Saturday : Benoni to Standerton to Bloemfontein and down to Port Elizabeth
Sunday : PE to Knysna. Shortest leg of the lot.

And then the next Thursday we drove back home. A total of 4435km, seven tanks of diesel totalling 285 liters for a consumption of 6.4 l/100km (The VW Golf computer reported a consumption of around 5.5 l/100km on Caltex and Total, and 6.5 l/100km on the one tank of BP I put in. It lies by about 0.7 l/100km).

Why? Because I like driving up. (Really! I’d like to drive up twice a year or so if I could.) And because I had to collect stuff which is too heavy to fly down easily, and because there are people up there I like seeing now and then, and because we were on our way to Knysna anyway so what’s a short detour?

Tanya has the notebook, so you’ll have to read more about it on her blog.

When we got back I followed up on our kitchen countertops, they were ready, and I picked them up on Friday.

I fitted the long counter first — this involved power planing off about 5mm on the back corner on one side because of course the kitchen corners are not perfectly square.

I then joined these two bits after edging the 600mm deep one. The holes are cut using a cupboard hinge drill, which fits a standard electric drill, and the slots are routed. I was extremely nervous about going all the way through, so I went 20mm in (I could probably have pushed it to 30mm).

Perfect fit.

I tried matching the back of the counter to the (not so straight) wall, using a down-cutting jigsaw blade. My recommendation is, don’t bother. My result is slightly less in line with the plaster than the original straight cut was. Down-cutting jigsaw blades don’t work so well. Or maybe it’s my jigsaw.

While waiting for the glue to dry, I went around sorting out door handles and locks. Just about all the handles had stripped out screws, some lock mechanisms were missing etc. I bought two new locks for Jessica and Tamsyn’s rooms, and I had one lying around for Tanya’s room — the bathroom and toilet don’t need keys, sliders will do. Basically I filled the holes, pilot drilled new holes, and used the nicest screws I could find — brass, which is better than the chipboard screws they sell with locksets these days, but not as nice as the oval countersunk screws one used to get.

The holes for the bottom hinge on Tanya’s room’s door were completely stripped out, so I grabbed the 10mm dowel kit and modified a few dowels by chopping the one pointy end off.

Holes drilled out and dowels glued in. All fixed up.

On Monday I got the five cupboard and bookshelf units I ordered from Lansdowne Boards. This time I paid extra to have them individually wrapped — this will go far towards avoiding the confusion I had last time, although I’ve already identified two 2000×500 panels with edging all around which were nicely wrapped with the 2400 tall cupboard, but which don’t appear on my packing list).

Chipboard is heavy. I had help loading up, but to unload I had to unpack on top of the Land-Rover and carry it down bit-by-bit. Kept everything together, of course :-)

2008-10-06 by wrm Farting around House 0

Big update

As mentioned in the previous post, I found a tiler, Glynn Maree, he advertises on Gumtree. I’m very happy with his work.

The border tiles were cheap, and we quite liked them at the time. But Tanya took one look at this, and said that they didn’t look right. So I quickly removed them before the cement hardened. The problem of course is that we now have a strip the width of this specific border tile (80mm) and we need to find something else that fits.

At the time I built the bath surround, I didn’t know what kind of tiles we’d be using, so the gap I left down the middle of the surround (to be able to connect the plumbing) was determined randomly by the board size. Last week, Glynn tiled to a point, and this morning I cut the hole bigger at the bottom and filled the top in. Glynn will stick two tiles to the loose plank, and I’ll fit magnetic catches to keep it in.

I’ve been building this unit out of my favourite material, shutterboard. Tanya and I carried it from the garage to the house (it’s heavy) and wrestled it into position. So what is it, you ask? Well, it’s part of my one built-in cupboard, the one with drawers and shelves that I’m still designing. It’s also a space to store towels, all neatly rolled up.

This is the view from the living room. A bit of cretestone and paint and it will blend right in.

On a totally unrelated topic. I’m around the house on Saturday morning, and my cell phone rings. It’s Tanya, she’s stuck in the toilet.

Now, there’s a story here. When we got the house, the toilet door had no mechanism, and I don’t know what they did to it to damage the door like they did…

I fitted a mechanism, cut a plank sort-of to size, nailed it into place…

… and liberally applied (automotive) body putty (bondo in the USA).

I still have to drill the hole for the square rod… but this explains why Tanya couldn’t get out. I had to unscrew the handle on the outside and use a pair of pliers to open the lock.

Bloody good thing this didn’t happen to me one morning while working alone at the house. Especially since I don’t generally carry my cellphone with me when working.

And yet another unrelated topic — I’m still looking for a wok, so I went to Taste of Asia in Plumstead. Found a mortar & pestle, and umeboshi. The umeboshi is quite expensive, the package above costs about the same as a flat (24 cans) of beer. Havn’t tried it yet.

I also made Cheezy-Lime White Chili with tofu, mostly for Jessica, but I ended up eating most of it. Gooood. Not that I’d call it a chili, it’s more of a (mild) curry. I’ll make it again.

I bet the car’s a writeoff.

Evidence that it hailed in Fish Hoek this morning. Just a bit, but man oh man was it loud on the tin roof of the garage.

2008-09-15 by wrm House 1

DIY