Summer Reno-cation

The plans for replacing the upstairs flooring was supposed to happen next year.  But with COVID-19 going on and maybe COVID-20and 21 on the horizon and the USA being number one in Pandemic with no signs of slowing.  Well.  We might as well keep working on our renovation checklist. Getting this done would mean the last of the big upheaval renos would be checked off.  So why not.  Why not...cuz it's a big upheaval.

I was hoping to have done the subfloor before I took vacation at the start of August.  But that was delayed.  Since Aug 3, we have been on a whirlwind of hammers, screws, plywood, saws and glue.  I initially thought I had booked only 1 week and that'd be plenty for laying down new flooring.  However I hadn't ripped up the old flooring and put down the sub-floor.  And when I checked again I had booked 2 weeks! So I figured that was plenty!

These were one of the 2 toughest weeks I have ever spent.

This was the complete opposite of Bit by Bit.  This was our Summer Reno-cation.  I didn't know how else to do this except complete rip out of the entire upstairs flooring, install subfloor then flooring.   Sounds easy peasy.  3 simple steps to execute.  What is missing are all the little details in between.

1) Rip up old flooring.  Remove all the nails, get rid of all the flooring somewhere.   This part was arguably the easiest.  Hammer and crowbar.  Start ripping it up.  Nothing to it.  Even if you are all thumbs. Then send it to the trash.  And you will save yourself a lot of money that you'd be paying someone else to do work that you could easily do yourself.   So do it.

2) Install sub-floor.  This was a bit more work.  Under the 1-3/4" oak strip flooring there already is a subfloor.  That's those diagonal boards.  However ours squeak and if the boards are old which ours was.  We installed 3/4" plywood on top.  Glued and screwed.  Sounds easy.  Well we needed 14 sheets of plywood.  Try bringing that home in your car in 1 trip.  We worked on each room, getting 4-5 sheets at a time.  Trucking it home on top of my Venza roof rack.  Then I didn't have to worry about moving around 14 sheets.  They aren't light you know?  Each room would take 2-3 full sheets, then it was smaller pieces.

But before you do all of this, you need to make sure the floor is flat.  Doesn't have to be level, but it NEEDS to be FLAT.  Otherwise you will have a big problem installing the new flooring.  The old flooring was less than 3/8" thick.  So it'll bend around any bump.  This new 1/2" engineered flooring was 5" wide.  It wasn't very forgiving.  So I had to address that humpin our master.  That meant pulling up the floor

boards, exposing the joists and shaving it down.  Then putting it all back.   Then laying down the  plywood on top of that.  It wasn't hard, but it wasn't easy.  But it was necessary prep work.  If there is one thing, the better you prep, the less issues you will encounter when you install the new flooring.  I had to do the same work in Kieran's room.  I didn't realize there was a hump there too.   I did this one faster as I'd already done it once before.

Making repeated trips to HomeDepot to get plywood was not a big deal.  It was tiring hauling those 4x8 sheets around and up the stairs though.  And don't forget to get deck or floor screws and PL300 subfloor glue.  Once you do this, your floor will feel solid.

3) Install the flooring.  Before you even get to this step, you need to measure out your square footage that you intend to install flooring on.  Then you need the stair nosing ordered.  And you can't start without installing the stair nosing first.  And you should take a cut off piece of flooring and undercut all the door trim using a multi-tool, so the new floor boards will go under them.  Other wise you will have all these ugly gaps around your doors.  You will also need to borrow a nailer and compressor, without this you won't be able to nail them in.  if you don't have a compressor.  A manual nailer is an option but you need a sledge hammer and a Hulk or Thor to operate it.  So good luck.

When laying out the boards, you will need to keep in mind how the seams line up.  You don't want a pattern emerging.  You want it to look as random as possible.  Ours was not random at all.  Tresa selected each and every board i nailed and/or glued in.   She examined the lines.  Making sure they didn't line up with the prior rows.

If you aren't so choosy.  Take the first board.  Cut it anywhere in the middle and start laying down the next set of boards until you get to the other wall.  Trim to fit.  And you do the same for the next rows.

You will also need to get reversing strips.  You can only nail on the tongue side.  If you need to reverse the direction of the boards you need reversing strips.  It's basically a tongue that you install on the groove side and then nail in.

On the 2nd floor we needed to start at the stairs.  So the stair nosing needs to be cut and installed first.  It's glued and nailed or screwed down.  If you screw it down, you will need plugs to hide the holes.  If you nail then get some wood filler tinted to the colour of the wood.  

When you are not able to use the nailer because it's too close to the wall, then you need to glue it down.  You can also use a brad nailer.  The PL glue is strong so you don't need to put any nails but it's a good idea to put something heavy on the boards you glued down, until the glue has set.

Installing the last board can be tricky.  Just saying.

4) Once you got all this done.  Then all you have left is the trim.

5) and put the doors back.  Might have to undercut the doors.

In these 2 weeks.  We went to the cottage for a few days so that we could sleep in a bed.  Our home has been turned upside down.  Everything that was upstairs that wasn't too big had to be removed and put elsewhere temporarily.  When we were here working on the flooring, our air mattress had a leak and we'd end up on the hard floor by dawn.  It was rough sleeping at night.  All I was missing was a tent.

As I ripped up the flooring and installing the subfloor.  Tresa decided to repaint all the rooms.  White.  And the ceilings too.

We also moved the FLOS light we had into Kieran's room.  Now there's only 1 remaining dome light left in our home.  And I'm dying to replace it.  And it will be chucked!

She also decided she finally wanted to get into the 21st century by replacing the last closet without a Solutions closet organizer.  Hers.

Then my trusty shopvac that'd I had had for over 20yrs started to call it quits.  It was murphy's law too.  I was at HomeDepot getting vac bags for it and saying to Tresa how long I've had it.  Then it died.  So I found an amazing deal on a brand new one on Kijiji and after using it for less than 24hrs.  But it had this smoke smell from the get go, but it worked.  Then we noticed it's suction wasn't as good as when we first started using it.  It went kaput.  I could not believe it.   So I replaced it with the same model from a big box store.  No harm no foul.   And I got back at it.

It took us a long time to do the hallway and office.  We got Kieran's room done in a day!  It was 11pm when we finished but it was 1 day.  We are now on our last room.  And the Reno-cation is over but the flooring install continues and it looks fantastic.  And I didn't even have to under cut the doors.  I was so surprised!  1 less thing to do.  The reno gods were smiling on me.

Upstairs flooring

We finally reached a major milestone today. We are 99.9% complete with the flooring.  I have 1 partial row left to cut and install.  Having the wall there and it being such a skinny piece, it's a bit tricky to install that last row.  You have to install the last full board row and that skinny row at the same time.  Otherwise you'll need to cut it extra skinny to get it in.

I did have to undercut the doors only for the master.  Thankfully it worked out. I still have to install the final trim around the baseboards.  But that is minor work that can wait until I tidy up the garage so that I can work in a saw dust/hazard free zone.

Now we can start the work to get our house back in order.  Last of the major house upheavals is done.  Good for another decade at least.