Another Wall Bites the Dust

Are you ready for this? Hey are you ready for this? Are you hanging on the edge of your seat?

Ha ha see what I did there? Very punny or err funny.

This post has been a long time coming, so hang on kids, its about to get WILD.

This whole project started (and finished) about two years ago. The reason for the delayed post is because with a new baby and new house there was absolutely NO room for blogging. 

As I said before, in order to rent the house we decided the third floor needed to be a space where someone could comfortably sleep and live. When we purchased the home, the third floor was an attic space marketed as two bedrooms. It was basically not useable because these two "bedrooms" were much too small to be functional spaces. There was no way we could rent the house as a "3 bedroom" place or even a "2 bedroom" place in that condition. The pitched roof made it much too crammed for anyone to move around comfortably, without the very high risk of bumping their head. 

As I've posted about previously, we have experience with taking walls down in this house. So we figured whats one more wall to get this baby on the market for renters?

The order of how this project progressed is as follows:

1. Wall demo
2. Clear out rubble and debris
3. Install a door up to the third floor
4. Install electrical (take out old nob and tube wiring and put in new grounded electrical)
5. Sand the 3rd floor THREE times and put down THREE coats of polyurethane
6. Trim work, patching up ceiling and painting

This post will just cover the wall demo and clearing out the rubble and debris (#1 and #2 for those that read the syllabus ;) ). 


Ok so roll up your sleeves and prepare to get dirty cuz we're going to dive into the wall demo portion, NOW!

Here is a glimpse of what it looked like prior to our demo project:

This photo (below) is the landing when you first come up the spiral stair case to the third floor. It is the first thing you'd see upon entering the third floor and before choosing to enter one of the two tiny and height-adverse rooms. 

This photo (below) is a view from the landing on the third floor, peering into the room on the right. As you can see there is old carpet in this room that is BEGGING to be ripped up. So we obliged, you'll see the results in later photos.

This photo (below) is a view from the landing again, peering into the room on the left. 

Look out Margaret, the cat!  Both walls pictured below will soon toast. Bye Felicia!

Here is another shot (below) of the wall that separated the two rooms on the third floor. This is the view from the landing looking directly at the wall that separates the two rooms on the third floor. 

The walls in this 19th century home are not messing around. These walls are constructed to stand the test of time. The wood frame of the wall is built first with studs, then wood slats are nailed in across, then the plaster and mortar is piled on top of it and smoothed into a flat surface creating the wall. 

 This (photo below) is a view from the room on the left, standing in the dormer window, with the center wall demo in view. This photo shows the beginnings of the wall destruction.

                                    

Progress and more rubble!

"What did the hubs do to achieve these marvelous results?" you might be asking yourself. Well I asked him this same question and he wrote a nice little description for the blog:

Removing Plaster - I made every effort to control dust and debris from the get-go (based on my experience from the 1st floor wall demo).  Using a hammer, I would get a starter hole in the upper half of the wall, then expand out, prying off large, but manageable chunks of plaster, and drop them directly into a trash bag.  Large chunks mean less chunks, which also means less dust, but plaster is basically like concrete, so you have to be careful how big the chunks are, and where they are falling.  I accumulated something like 15 or 20 of the large paper waste bags (from Home Depot), and I estimate that each bag had about 50 lbs. of plaster debris.  After the plaster was off the walls, I would sweep up the chunks and dust on the floor and dust-pan it into one of the contractor bags.  I used the shop vac to get the really fine dust up off the floor.

Removing Wood Slats - The wood slats behind the plaster have the structural integrity of popsicle sticks, and are only held into the studs with 1-inch long old-fashioned square-cut nails.  I could pull them off by hand, or using a hammer and/or pry bar for expediency.  I made sure to use gloves, because these slats will give you splinters like crazy.  I placed the slats into a trash can, and when filled, I would take it downstairs and outside.  I tied some of the slats into manageable bundles, and we also burned most of this wood as fire-starter.

Next up for demolition, the wall that surrounded the landing on the third floor. Here are a couple of shots of it before it was taken down. 

Below is a shot of it after the hubs started demoing the wall. 

In between my husband side-bared into ripping the carpet up in the right room. Oh yea, and there I am in my pregnant glory looking at that white german shepherd dog.

Here (photo below) is after husband broke through the center wall on both sides. Now you can sneak a peak at what it looks like without the wall there.

We knew we would have to refinish the floors anyway, so we took no precaution in protecting it from all the rubble. 

Here (below) is a good shot of when the left side wall that encased the third floor landing came down. 

More progress! As you can see there is a HUGE amount of rubble that was amassed from this wall coming down. 

We used lots of Home Depot bags as you can see.  The wood got put to good use though (keep reading to find out how).

Because of our experience with the first floor wall removal, we knew the job would kick up a lot of dust that would spread like wild fire throughout the house. So, we took precautions from the start and hung plastic sheets, to help contain the mess. Even with these plastic sheets, dust still gets through, but it helps a lot.

But first, let me take a selfie. 

Crit is wearing this mask so he can look like be Bane from Batman, The Dark Knight Rises. 

The light shining through, in this picture below, really illuminates all the plaster dust that was in the air.

Good shot (below) of the progress and again, all the rubble accumulated. You can also see the tracks in the ceiling of where the walls used to be.

Below is a good shot with both walls removed, studs and all. All that is left to be removed is the rubble and debris. Don't worry, the electrical outlet that is hanging freely will soon be taken care of.

 Now, I will hand the mic over to my hubs to cover the debris and stud removal. 

Removing Studs - I used my Ryobi battery powered saws-all to cut the studs about 2 inches from the ceiling, then used a pry bar to remove the studs and the stubs (they were secured with about 3 inch long old-fashioned square-cut nails).

Construction Waste Cleanup - I asked my good friend Dave if he would help me out by using his truck (Toyota Tacoma) to cart all this debris to a dump.  Along with Dave, my friends Scott, and Burton helped move the bags of plaster, and bundles of wood down two flights of stairs to the street, where we then loaded it into Dave's truck.  This was definitely a test for the Tacoma, which is a half-ton truck.  I think the final weight of material we unloaded at the dump came to 1,600 lbs.

After reviewing the photos of the demolition, all I can say is WOW. I am most impressed with my husbands work, because trust me folks, my very pregnant arse did not do a thing to help besides enjoy the fires that resulted from the wood being pulled out of the wall. 

Its hard work, but someones gotta do it, and I'm always willing to sacrifice for the greater good.

Below is a sneak peak of the after results. Stay tuned to see how it all comes together!

Next on the blog:

1. Wall demo
2. Clear out rubble and debris
3. Install a door up to the third floor
4. Install electrical (take out old nob and tube wiring and put in new grounded electrical)
5. Sand floor THREE times and put down THREE coats of polyurethane
6. Trim work, patching up ceiling and painting