Build thread: house of freedom

freedom_in_4low

I'm a rooster illusion
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This is gonna be a catch-all thread for my griping about my GC and the process but also to keep it from being a complete dumpster fire I'll talk about the stuff that I took on myself that I'm pretty happy with.

On the gripes, I'm fully aware that all of this has "first world problems" written all over it, which is why I feel better about griping anonymously over the internet because it's hard not to come across as a self-absorbed entitled asshole complaining about this stuff to my relatives or peers, many of whom are not likely to ever have this opportunity. So yes, I'm keeping things in perspective, and rather than a "woe is me" thing, I'm really just talking about an unfortunately poor level of service and how much of society just seems to accept it.
 
For the rest of my life I will be advising people not to do this. If any of you happen to be custom residential contractors, then don't take this the wrong way because I'm sure exceptions exist, just none in the area I'm building in, at the price point I'm at.

I think what's happened, at least locally, to the building market is a small handful of builders who were smart and took a scalable approach to homebuilding became profitable and successful enough that they grew to where they can own their own subs, manage their supply chain, etc, but needed to build the revenue stream to support it and in turn started developing quarter-sections at a time and cramming as many houses as they could on it. Yards are patio-home sized, with barely enough width to squeeze a lawn mower into the back yard, and to me that's basically useless.

Then there's the good custom ones, but they need to build a big house so they build for oil tycoons and basketball players.

That leaves a big hole in the $500k-1M range of builders that aren't good enough to build mansions and aren't smart enough to be able to handle more than 5 houses in a year. And THAT is what WE hired. :rolleyes:
 
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now for something good.

We wanted steel railing around our stairs and "loft". Our GC immediately described that as a "budget buster". So I thought, hey...I have a $90 harbor freight flux core welder and an angle grinder, I'll do it.

Now for starters, these aren't the typical top-rail with vertical balusters. My wife wanted bars running parallel to the top rail. Nevermind that my kids are probably at some point going to attempt to use them as a ladder...they look cool. They also make fabrication and fitup a lot more tedious.

I chose 1x2 for the top rail, and 3/4 for the bars. They run between 1x1/8 flat bar, which then gets lag-bolted to the white oak newel posts.

Rather than repeating the same measurements and fitup 80 times, I built a fixture. It's narrow enough for the narrowest section, and then longer ones just extend past one side. The 1/8" flat bar sits on top of some 1/2 square tubing (because it's centered under the 1x2 top rail), and then the notched, 1/8 thick angle iron holds the 3/4" bars centered in the flat bar, I clamp the flat bar between the angle iron and a little c-channel, weld one side, then flip around and repeat 3 times until it's all done.

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Got tired of working on the floor, so I welded it onto my HF welding table.

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After doing paint prep on the first 2 weldments and using up an entire $20 clean & strip disc, I realized how tedious it was gonna be to strip mill scale off of all these. I'm used to small Jeep projects where it takes 15 seconds. So I did a little research, and found that soaking in vinegar for a few days will remove it. So I started putting cut pieces into a plastic tote and poured 3 gallons of vinegar in there to just barely submerge it all. That worked out really well until I got to the sections that were 6' long and my tote is only 52". So then I built this thing out of PVC that was just big enough to stuff (2) top rails or (7) of the lower bars in. I botched the glue job on the threaded fitting at the top so it leaks, which means I have to prop it up against the fence rather than laying it on the floor.

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It was around this time that I finally figured out what was going on with my paint. The finish kept coming out inconsistent....one section would be flat black as expected, then the next one would be more of a satin. I was tweaking my technique, paying attention to the temperature of my garage when I sprayed it...nothing helped and one even came out blotchy with some of both finishes.

Finally I realized it. I'm used to looking at the cap to tell me the contents of a spray paint can, but Rustoleum Professional Enamel uses the same flat-looking cap for flat AND semi-gloss, and apparently it tricked at least one Lowes employee into putting semi-gloss cans in the spot on the shelf for flat. The only way to know is looking at the bar code sticker.

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So I'm gonna end up pulling 3 sections to respray them, after we move in because we close in 4 days and I've got other stuff to do.
 
the angled sections that actually go on the stairs are more tedious. The angle following the top of the posts is about 1.5° steeper than the one following the front lip of the stair treads, and I can't just use the same number of bars and spacing as the horizontal sections because the bottom bar would hit the stair treads at the lower end. So I'm following the stair tread angle, and only using 6 bars to result in the per-code rail height of 36-38", and the bars just don't meet the same height as the horizontal ones across the post. The top rail looks a little weird to me but my wife liked this option better than tapering the spacing so the bars were spread out more at one end.

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My fixture doesn't really work for the angled sections, and I didn't think 2 weldments was worth completely reworking it, so I'm doing some makeshift stuff on the floor again by stacking scraps. Also, when I welded the flat bar under the higher end of the rail, I botched the angle and it was too much of a PITA to cut off (would have been the 2nd time) so I just clamped it to a piece of rail I hadn't used yet and put the bars in place to hold it out.

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30 minutes later...
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one side welded so I can put it on the table to finish and stop abusing these knees.

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I feel like I often need about 1/2" of bead before my weld starts settling in which means a lot of my 3/4" long segments look kinda tapered...good thing my wife isn't a weldor...all she really cares about is that the kids don't fall 12 feet onto concrete, though if I had some really ugly boogers that would probably still be an issue.

With so many welds I've been able to get down to most of them looking about like this. Not surprisingly, the ones I do on the table look better than the ones I do on the floor.

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A lot of them are even relatively spatter free, though if that's to my credit I don't know what I did, other than just stumbling into the right settings and the right wire (.030 Lincoln Innershield). This one has more than most, or at least more that was stuck enough that the wire brush didn't knock them off.

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I just have one section left, and it might be a little bit of a bear because I have to terminate the bars in 3 different planes and tie them all together around the trim. I have a design in mind and I have an idea for the process that I think will make it as quick to execute as possible.

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oh, and a fun little fact. I asked at one point what it would cost to do a wooden handrail and then I would do steel bars underneath. They said $1000 installed.

I have $350 in steel, a 2lb spool of flux core wire and probably $100 in paint in this project, and I bought a $350 Evolution miter saw that I wanted anyway.

I'm not keeping track of my hours. :ROFLMAO:
 
So in Oklahoma, we don't get big snow, but we get ice. I still have memories of 2007 when I went without power for 8 days. Initially the problem was staying warm in my 1967 house with an open wood fireplace that sent more heat up the chimney than into the house. Then, 3-4 days in the weather warmed up into the 50s, and I had a freezer full of beef that I couldn't keep cold because everybody was sold out on generators and of all things, ICE. So that all went in the trash.

For this house, I have a generator hookup, but rather than dropping all the coin on an ATS I did a breaker interlock. I'll have to go out and set it up and get it started, but at least I can cool my meat.

For the heat side, the house sits on 4.3 acres with more oak trees than I could ever chop down, so I needed a fireplace that actually heats.

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Advertise as capable of heating 2500 sq feet and 10-12 hour burn times, this thing will keep us warm in emergencies (using the generator to power the integral blower fan) and if I'm down for chopping wood on the regular, might allow me to keep my heat pump out of stage 2.

The problem arose because all our GC does is gas/propane inserts, and they didn't have a connection with a FireplaceX dealer. So I subbed this out myself, as much as I could. Due to the roof pitch though, we needed a 10' tall chimney chase to support the pipe, and the framers didn't initially frame it, so they had to come back after the roof was on.


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Fireplace dealer came out to top it out, the chase was loose and 3' shorter than I'd instructed and not weather tight at all. I get up in the attic and it's just nailed into the roof, not tied into the rafters. Framers ended up coming out two more times to add height and tarp it and never did tie it in. Finally a different framer came out and took care of tying it in the DAY before sheetrock closed off the easy attic access I was using to check on it. That whole process probably took 4 months of back and forth.

You'll also notice in the photo above that there's no seam tape on zip boards above the first floor. The house was like that from being framed in May and I sent DOZENS of messages to GC about it and it was only me out there handing tape to guys as they were installing siding and laying brick in DECEMBER that the house actually got dried in, or so I thought.

Then it rained last week and we discovered water on the floor.

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I flew my drone up there and couldn't see flashing around the chimney chase, and GC sent the roofer out who confirmed. But it's been sided and painted, so now the roofer is going to have to pull the siding off so he can flash it and the painters will have to come back.

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Roofer also said he would pull those 2x4s off and seal up the nail holes.
 
Dude, those railings look awesome. Great work.

And I get it on the safety of your kids at that age. Trust me, when they are teenagers you will often be tempted to remove those railings...;)

thanks!

Yeah, they're 4 and 7 and don't follow instructions

When they're teenagers I might just pull that railing and wall it in. :ROFLMAO:
 
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with lumber prices through the roof, and a very lumber-intensive framing design, we decided to cut some wood out of the one place we could - floors. For the entire main floor (about 2000sf), we did our own concrete.

First we power washed, then we acid-etched, then we degreased (those two might have been swapped, it was July/August), then we used a tinted sealer. 3 of those steps involve large amounts of water inside a framed house (can't do an open slab unless you want to wait 30 days for the concrete to cure before you do the floors, and then can't really protect them while it's being framed). They installed exterior doors the week before we went in to do it, so my plan of just squeegy-ing it out the door was kaput, which means we ended up having to suck it out with a shop vac.

but dang the house was clean, for a while.

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there are definitely some variations in the color that show from above, but it looks good at ground level and furniture and rugs will make it nearly impossible to see.

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then I covered it up with Ram board and vapor permeable tape to let the concrete breathe. If moisture is held against it by a non-vapor permeable barrier, it can leave tape lines or cause the finish to fail.

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So in Oklahoma, we don't get big snow, but we get ice. I still have memories of 2007 when I went without power for 8 days. Initially the problem was staying warm in my 1967 house with an open wood fireplace that sent more heat up the chimney than into the house. Then, 3-4 days in the weather warmed up into the 50s, and I had a freezer full of beef that I couldn't keep cold because everybody was sold out on generators and of all things, ICE. So that all went in the trash.

For this house, I have a generator hookup, but rather than dropping all the coin on an ATS I did a breaker interlock. I'll have to go out and set it up and get it started, but at least I can cool my meat.

For the heat side, the house sits on 4.3 acres with more oak trees than I could ever chop down, so I needed a fireplace that actually heats.

View attachment 394218

Advertise as capable of heating 2500 sq feet and 10-12 hour burn times, this thing will keep us warm in emergencies (using the generator to power the integral blower fan) and if I'm down for chopping wood on the regular, might allow me to keep my heat pump out of stage 2.

The problem arose because all our GC does is gas/propane inserts, and they didn't have a connection with a FireplaceX dealer. So I subbed this out myself, as much as I could. Due to the roof pitch though, we needed a 10' tall chimney chase to support the pipe, and the framers didn't initially frame it, so they had to come back after the roof was on.


View attachment 394219

Fireplace dealer came out to top it out, the chase was loose and 3' shorter than I'd instructed and not weather tight at all. I get up in the attic and it's just nailed into the roof, not tied into the rafters. Framers ended up coming out two more times to add height and tarp it and never did tie it in. Finally a different framer came out and took care of tying it in the DAY before sheetrock closed off the easy attic access I was using to check on it. That whole process probably took 4 months of back and forth.

You'll also notice in the photo above that there's no seam tape on zip boards above the first floor. The house was like that from being framed in May and I sent DOZENS of messages to GC about it and it was only me out there handing tape to guys as they were installing siding and laying brick in DECEMBER that the house actually got dried in, or so I thought.

Then it rained last week and we discovered water on the floor.

View attachment 394220

I flew my drone up there and couldn't see flashing around the chimney chase, and GC sent the roofer out who confirmed. But it's been sided and painted, so now the roofer is going to have to pull the siding off so he can flash it and the painters will have to come back.

View attachment 394221

Roofer also said he would pull those 2x4s off and seal up the nail holes.

Who the F nailed 2x4s to your roof!?!
 
Who the F nailed 2x4s to your roof!?!

Not that I can blame them, it's a 12/12 pitch and I'm terrified of heights. I did get up there to tarp it one time before they had added height and my knees were shaking even with the 2x4s. :ROFLMAO:

but, it almost certainly had to be the B-team guys that the framing contractor sent to do the chimney. The guys that framed the house originally were pretty good and conscientious. After that, they haven't touched a thing that they didn't screw up. The same guys also did the siding, where they buried the doorbell wire under it so the stone mason was like "wtf do I do with this?"

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electricians had to holesaw a bunch of openings to find it.

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the stove has been fun.

First, the electricians put the outlet in the wrong spot. Like, specifically in the one place the stove install manual says not to put it. The plumbers also put the propane connection in the wrong spot, but I'm assuming my GC never gave either of them the install manual that I sent, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.

Then the sheetrock guys just covered the outlet completely. I printed off the page of the install manual and taped it to the wall.

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Electrician comes, cuts out the sheetrock and terminates the outlet but completely ignores the paper that he probably moved out of the way while he was working.

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the plumber has since moved the line.

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sheetrockers came and patched it back up...

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and electrician is supposed to be back out today to move the outlet, after which sheetrockers will be back AGAIN to patch it up.

It's really a comedy of errors with these people. I think of all the crews that have been out there, the painters are the only ones that have gotten everything right on the first try.
 
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Not that I can blame them, it's a 12/12 pitch and I'm terrified of heights. I did get up there to tarp it one time before they had added height and my knees were shaking even with the 2x4s. :ROFLMAO:

but, it almost certainly had to be the B-team guys that the framing contractor sent to do the chimney. The guys that framed the house originally were pretty good and conscientious. After that, they haven't touched a thing that they didn't screw up. The same guys also did the siding, where they buried the doorbell wire under it so the stone mason was like "wtf do I do with this?"

View attachment 394226

electricians had to holesaw a bunch of openings to find it.

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Fking A if this weren’t your real life it would be funny.

I sure as shit wouldn’t be getting on that pitch roof. If I built a custom house I’ve always said I wouod design it with big over hangs and no gutters so everything dumps onto sloped ground away from foundation so I almost never have to get on the roof!
 
this was just funny. We had placed a couple of dummy security cameras (on our framed house with no power or internet) to deter intruders from walking on our floors until they had dried and we got them covered. Apparently they look legit enough to have fooled literally everyone.

When it was in the way of sheetrock, they moved it to the outside of the garage. Then when it was time for brick, the bricklayers bricked AROUND it.
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I removed the camera and the hole was gone the next time I came out without me even having to say anything.

Now you'll notice the brick has mortar smeared all over it? That's apparently what our GC interprets as "messy" and it's NOT what we wanted, because we actually like our brick. Fortunately I caught that after only the front face of the garage was done and they acid washed it back off.

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as far as I know, this was the only jobsite theft, and even the thieves left the job half finished.

One of the line sets for our AC turned up missing, AFTER brick was in. So the AC guys had to break out a hole to run it. At least it was the short set.

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this was a lucky catch because I just walked out to check on him while I was fabricating rails. We provided the numbers for our mailbox on a cedar plank, to stylistically tie in with the house, and help the numbers show up better than they would against relatively dark brick. For some reason the guy was cutting tiny slivers of brick to fill in the standoff space, hiding the cedar board. Mystifying.

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He of course had to call his boss to act as a translater because we didn't speak a common language, but apparently our GC didn't effectively communicate the intent. It took him all of about 15 minutes to fix because the mortar was still wet.

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We close on Friday and wow if I'm not just as excited to be done with this process as I am to be in the house. We're walking through to generate a punch list this afternoon, and on that list will be dealing with whatever is going on with the brick over there on the right, I think they need to clean some mortar off or something.