Week#6 - Beams, Beams...More Beams

Good morning everyone,

It been a challenging week with Louise in the hospital and then at her mom's and aunt's for the next 7 to 10 weeks.  The kids have been fantastic and without them I do not think I would of survived.

It is the last Sunday in January already.  Time is flying by and our recroom project is moving along. Yesterday we finished putting up our last 3 beams. Alex continued working on removing the screws out of the drywall and Jacynthe helped out in putting up some beams.  The next picture shows our progress so far.




Beams Completed

 I now need to build 3 more shorter beams so that the beams will reach the north wall. This is shown in the next picture.

End of the Beams

Before I finish off the beams I need to remove the drywall and put up the knotty pine. The completion of the beams will only happen once that part of the project is completed.
We bought a central vacuum last week and I'm now trying to figure out where I'm going to put my outlets.  The basement outlet is no problem because the walls will be opened. I'm still trying to figure out how I'm going to get an outlet upstairs with minimum damage to my walls. I have a couple of ideas.

I'm going to buy an angled drill for the job as I figure with all the renovations I need to do over the next few years, it will come in handy. Right now I'm looking at a Milwaukee which can be found at  Home Depot. I might go with something a little cheaper though.

Week#5 - Putting up The Beams

Good morning everyone,

Wow, is it ever cold out there, -36°C this morning.  Good thing we have a nice fire going in our woodstove, it is nice and toasty in our house.

We finally have started to put our beams up.  I thought it would be much harder but Alex, Jacynthe and I are able to put them up together. I thought I would have to hire someone to help me but I think we are going to be able to do it without any extra help. At the moment we have 3 beams up. This can be seen in the next picture. 


3 Beams

There is a little problem where the beams are joining each other.  They are off about 1/8", so I will have to figure something out to line them up. Not sure how I will do that yet. This can be seen in the next picture.

Problem

I'm hoping to finish putting up the beams next Saturday. I have 3 more to do. The next step in this project is to remove the drywall off the North wall.  This wall will be covered with knotty pine. I was able to figure out how we are going to remove the drywall. I used this video as my guide: Video on Removing Drywall. Alex started removing some screws yesterday and he almost has one sheet completed.

We are also planning to put in a central vacuum since we have access to behind the wall. It will make vacuuming a lot easier for the kids. Well that is all for the news for today, hope everyone has a great week.

Week#4 - Insulation

Good morning everyone,

Last week I decided to clean up my blog.  I removed all posts prior to the start of the recroom project. I figured that I'm only going to blog on the renovations that I'm actually working on.

This week I figured out how I'm going to hang my beams. I'm going to use a piece of 2" x 4" and attach it to the beam and then screw the 2" x 4" to the ceiling joist. This is shown in the next picture.

This week I fixed up the insulation and put some new duct tape on my heating ducts.  I found a toy in one of the ducts and too it apart to take it out. It was a pain to put the ducts back together. The next picture shows how the recroom looks at the moment.




No Drop Ceiling

I hope to get a couple of beams up next weekend and finish off the weekend after that.


Once I get all of my beams up I will start taking some drywall off the walls. This will give me a chance to look at the existing electricity. I'm going to be running a new circuit for the receptacles that I'm addition to the room.

Week#3 - Faux Beams

Good morning everyone,

First week back at work was a busy one. Did not have much time to work on the recroom project.  I've completed varnishing the beams and now in the process to taking down the ceiling tiles. Alex is taking part in this project and hopefully learning some useful skills.  The next picture shows a side view of one of the beams. The side are built out of oak and the bottom one quarter inch oak veneered plywood.



Beam - Side View



The next few pictures were taken in my shop as I was building the beams. I used some Danish Oil on the beams prior to varnishing them.

Beams being built in shop

Right now I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to hang the beams to the ceiling.  I want to bring them down as much as I can and will probably use pieces of 2" x 4" to do this. The reason for bringing the beams down is that I want them to show as much as possible.
I started thinking about the electrical part of this project.  Each beam will have a pot light in it. I hope to attach the pot light to a 3-way switch.  I still have to figure out how to wire everything.  When I remove the drywall I should be able to figure things out.

January 2 - 8, 2011

Week#2 - Moving Things Around

Hello everyone,

I want to start off by wishing everyone a Happy New Year. I know that for us it's going to be a busy one with the baby and all. Last week  I finally finished moving my office upstairs in our laundry room.  The weight room is now in my old office and the recroom is ready to be renovated.  This week I started to work on the drop ceiling part of the project.

I decided to build some faux beams and put my potlights in them. I got my idea from a drop ceiling website.  This is the picture I'm basing my design on. My beams are going to be a little bit wider (10.25").  This will leave me with 4 rows of ceiling tiles.

Inspiration Picture

The picture below depicts the beams (red lines), the location of the potlights (blue circles) in the beams and the floor joists (blue lines). It was quite a challenge to get the potlights to line up with the spaces between the joists. I still have one problem to solve because the potlight closest to the woodstove is lined up with a heating duct.

Beams and Pot Lights

I have 6 length of beams built and I'm in the process of varnishing them. This past week, I was lucky to have Alex's help. This speeded up the process of building the beams. My son is quite the little worker once I get him out there. Next week I will put up some pictures of the beams. I am returning to work this week so I will not have the same amount of time to dedicate to this project.