Stiff Susan and Start of the Pantry Cupboard

I thought I'd already posted pictures of these two little projects, but on looking back, apparently I haven't. It's a good thing I do this blog - it helps me feel like I'm accomplishing things a bit more. In any case, two other projects are:

The Lazy Susan
The lazy Susan is rather stiff to turn, so as suggested in the title of this post, it may have to be called "stiff Susan" or maybe "Susan working hard". However, it's in and it does turn, so that's a good thing at least.

The Pantry

I've just got the frame up for the pantry and have to make drawer shelves for it, but at least the space is defined now.

 The 2 x 2 frame for the pantry

 Plywood on one side of the wall.

Looking down from the top at a stool sitting in the bottom. There's quite a bit of storage space actually.

So that's it - I'm up to date.

There's a bit of snow drifting down in sparkling flakes and the sun looks a bit more cheery than this picture would suggest. Happy Sunday!  :-)

More Siding and Other Things

All of the siding boards have now been sanded and painted and quite a few more have been put up. Thank you very much to my mother and father and to Deirdre for spending a couple of days working on this!

Just a couple of angle cuts to go and the front will be finished.

Working up the other long side.

Nearly finished - just the slow and time consuming part cutting around the vents and along the top still to go.

The Ladder

 It seems that the ladder ought to look more impressive as it took quite a long time to make. Part of the issue was finding a drill bit to fit the doweling exactly, and then getting the holes drilled correctly. The doweling is 1.5 inch, so one would think that a 1.5 inch drill bit would work quite nicely. The first two bits were too big however, but the third was just right. They all said they were 1.5 inches, so go figure...  ??

It's a fairly simple design though. I cut two 2 x 4's down to make them 2 x 3's, then drilled 1.5 inch holes for the dowel using the drill press. Quite a lot of sanding, gluing and finishing later, I had a ladder. I extended the ladder above the level of the floor so that there is something to hold on to when stepping on and off. After a few trials, this still seems like it was quite a good idea.

Insulation under the floor
Preparation for this was actually quite time consuming. I had to make boxes to cover sensitive parts, as noted in the last post. I also had to cover all of the gas lines with tin to keep them somewhat separate from the foam, and make boxes around any joints in the lines so that they could still be reached and checked for leaks.

 You can see the gas line with its little tin roof running down the center here, and the foam insulation now blown in. It's nice to have this done!

More foam-scape.

Under cupboard light

 This wasn't a big job, but required attaching the light, connecting the wires, and putting a plug on the other end of the wire. I ran wires through the wall in preparation for this light and another that will go on the other side of the sink. The wires go to a plug under the sink and the plug is connected to the wall switch here. The light in the picture is an LED bar light that can direct wire to a regular AC plug.

I also cut, sanded and finished molding boards to go along the bottom of the cupboard. LED lights tend to be rather bright and these boards hide the light fixture and shield the eyes from the direct glare of the light. I don't have the wire stapled out of the way yet though, so it looks a little bit messy hanging down.

Issues with cold and freezing pipes
I made a mistake when I put in the water line from the fresh water tank to the rest of the system. The line runs along the wall, behind the tub, and over to the bathroom sink. This seemed like a good idea at the time, but it turns out that the back corner of the tub is a rather cold place. This is not helped by the fact that the under the floor foam guy missed a spot about one foot square exactly in this corner. In any case, the line froze the first time it went to -20 C and insisted on continuing to do so unless I blew heat around the tub with a heater and fan.

This obviously is not something I want to do all the time, so now I have to move the pipe.

Here's the beginning of the pipe changing process - a large hole in the inside of the bathroom sink cabinet through the two layers between the sink and the tub. Sigh... I guess it gives better ventilation at least.

Here's the pipe on its new path around the warmer side of the tub.

And here's a new T in the line with a valve and a pipe through the floor. This makes it easier to drain water from the lines. It's a bit of a pain taking up space on the floor as it does, but it will still be inside the closet at least.

A Few More Projects...

I have been finding lately that I don't work well with small amounts of time - at least not when it comes to projects that require tools, planning, and materials. The cold doesn't help very much either as it seems to add complications to everything. It generally seems to take half the time for any given project to get set up for it, one third of the time to clean up again, and whatever is left between the two often goes to trying to remember just exactly where I left off last time.

Anyway, now that I've done my wincing and wining about the difficulties of it all, here are some things that have actually been accomplished over the past month or so:

The Fresh Water Tank

I had originally thought I would put the water tank flat on the floor, but decide to stand it on edge instead. I still need to cut plywood to cover the top and front, but the support frame is built and all of the pipes are installed. This tank holds 54 gallons and is good for a backup water supply.

I decided to use a small RV style pump. This one runs on AC power. This picture also shows the pipe going out for a hose connection outside.

 This picture shows the fill pipe coming in from above and the air outlet and overflow pipe going out through the wall in the middle. Sure lots of holes in the wall!

 Yet another hole - this one in the floor for the drain pipe for the tank.

Here's the outside view of the fill spout, air and overflow pipe (it will be cut off shorter), and the hose connection and valve.

Hot Water Heater
The hot water heater has been installed for a while, but the gas lines are in now and it is fully functional.

 Here's a look at the inside. It was jostled around rather roughly in transport and the spark probe was slightly out of position. Tech support at the Precision Temp headquarters was very helpful though and now it's working very well.

Cold weather is an issue for RV style hot water heaters. This one is less affected than any others that I looked at, but it still does get cold inside because of the air intake and exhaust outlet, both of which go trough the floor. It turns itself on briefly when it gets down to a certain temperature. This is great as long as there is gas and electricity. It could be a problem if the power goes out for too long though.

 Here's the view from the front, with the cover on. I haven't had an opportunity to try it for any length of time, but it does put out hot water and seems to react quickly when the water is turned on.

Side view showing the gas lines coming in, and the AC/DC converter to power the heater's electronics.

This is what it looks like under the floor. I made a tin box to go around the air intake and used a larger pipe to provide space around the exhaust pipe. This is so that the space stays open and clear when the foam insulation is blown in.

I had to make several other tin boxes to cover and protect various things under the floor in preparation for the insulation. Here are the flat pieces of tin ready to fold.

...and here's the box with it's bottom lid. This is filled with fiberglass insulation and goes around the trap in the drain under the bathtub. I may have to use a heat tape on the trap as well. It's the place that seems most susceptible to problems from freezing, unfortunately.