I mentioned in part 2 of this project that I found a lot of floor rot surrounding the toilet in the bathroom when I removed the contractor grade tile and the 2 layers of linoleum underneath it.




The linoleum is still in the room in that picture, but the rot is already evident.  The tears.  You can't see my face because I'm hiding the tears.

Time for some repair. Another opportunity to use my sweet new circular saw.  Wood runs in fear.  So do the dogs.

Up first; cut a huge hole in the floor into the basement.  When you cut a whole into your house that opens up one floor to another, it’s a bit… disconcerting.  There is suppose to be a floor there.  Not a hole.  It really messes with your perception of how a house works.



Now that I have the floor open, I need to put in a new sister joist against that back wall so that I have something solid to anchor the new subfloor to.



I picked up a 2x6 and some 3/4” plywood from Home Depot and cut them to fit.



Lets.. umm.. let's not talk about those random screws, there.  Look, the angles of approach were pretty limited and the smell isn't pleasant.  Moving on.
With the new sister joist in place, I ripped the plywood that I had cut to size in half, and then used my dremel tool to cut a half-circle in each one of the halves.  After that, I simply put the halves in place and screwed them home.



There are some things I didn’t do correctly, here.  It would have been smarter to raise the toilet flange at this point.  However, that sucker is solid and it isn’t budging.  I would’ve had to replace the whole drain line to do it correctly, and I didn’t have the time, patience, or desire to do so.  Instead, I’ll use a spacer when I go to install the toilet. 

But I’m happy with the end result, and now I can carry on to the next step… hardwood installation!

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I’m sleepy and I have to work this weekend, but I’ve been busy this week, and want to share at least one thing with you before bed.  About 8 months ago, the chain connecting the handle of the toilet to the flapper at the bottom of the tank broke off at the flapper.  Here’s a diagram to illustrate what I’m talking about.

 

 

My “solution” at the time was to use this.

 

It held the chain remnant to the flapper and allowed everything to keep working.  But it rusted away, and then fell off the chain.  Time to fix this properly.

 

Dani and I try to be environmentally conscious whenever we can be.  I’ll admit it’s not as often as we should be.  I picked this up at Home Depot for about 20 bucks.

 

 

The instructions did a pretty good job of explaining how to install this, so I’ll skip re-doing that here. 

 

Here’s the tank before removing the old flushing mechanism.  Note the dangling chain. 

 

 

After removing all the old pieces and dropping them in the sink, I started installing the new stuff.

 

 

 

The new one has this j-tube that is supposed to keep gunk (like the gunk that is visible in the picture) from forming at the bottom of the tank.  We’ll see.

 

After installing the new hardware, I put the new button on.

 

 

My tank wall was too thick for the included plastic washer-nut.. if I used it, there wasn’t enough space to attach the internal button mechanism.  I ended up using one of the thick rubber gaskets from the old innards to act as a spacer and I’m depending on the internal flush-button mechanism to hold the button in place.  So far, so good.

 

 

 

Everything is hooked up and the tank is filling.  After putting the top back on, we look good-as-new, with a fancy new button sure to confuse friends and family.

 

 

For those not in-the-know, this has two buttons on it.  The smaller button is for flushing liquids, and the larger for flushing solids.  Using the smaller button conserves water, and is a better option than the old “If it’s yellow let it mellow” adage.  That leaves rings, people.

 

Oh, and I don’t want to hear anything about the empty TP holder, there.  It’s stupid.  Who can reach back there?  Nobody, that’s who.  We have it on a shelf instead.  Don’t like it?  Don’t poop here.

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On occasion, I’ll grant some lucky friend or family member the glorious gift of me doing physical labor on their behalf.  This was one of those times. 

 

My Father-in-law does a lot for Dani and I, and so when he asks for some help around his house, I drop everything gradually work my way over there to help him out.

 

The upstairs bathroom in their house is a bit cramped and there are no windows.  As it’s not an option to make the bathroom any bigger, he’s opted to go up, instead.  By eliminating the small attic space overhead, he’s able to get vaulted ceilings and put in a skylight to allow some natural light into the room.  He called me in to help put in some studs and drywall.  Willow and I jumped in the car and off we went.

 

Here’s how the room was when I got there.  He’s taken down the ceiling and relocated some ceiling joists.

 

 

 

 

Now I’m a bit of a stickler for doing things the right way the first time.  This slows down my progress on a lot of things.  My Father-in-law isn’t.  I don’t think he’ll be too offended by that.  Here’s how I imagine he decides if he should do a project:

 

 

And when he’s done, I think it goes something like this:

 

 

While his approach may not be my own, I have to say that he gets far far more done than I do. 

 

Ok, back to the task at hand.

 

We needed to add some studs for the drywall to adhere to.  You can see in the picture above with the roofline that there’s just nothing there. 

 

 

   

 

Willow came by to check on our progress.

 

 

 

Once all the studs were in place, we put in some drywall and called it a day.

 

When I went outside to head home, I found Periwinkle on my car.(!)  I dared not shoo her off in fear that she would use her claws for traction, so I waited around for a few minutes for her to get bored.

 

 

 

He’s over there mudding and filling in the gaps from the not-exactly-correct-size drywall pieces.  I’m sure there’s more help needed over there; so more to come on this project.

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