Shed pt 3

I was working by floor lights Tuesday night, but by this afternoon I had the roof on and a tarp mostly covering it.

 

Shed pt 2

I must have worked on the floor sometime during the week, because it is in.  I added some little blocks under the floor joints so the shed would sit higher then the deck on the front.  It was a good idea, but I still ended up trimming the bottom of the door so it would slide over the deck...  I didn't realize the door hung lower then the floor.

I made good progress and had the walls complete and the roof started on Sunday.

 

Oil cap goes pop?

On my way back from a volunteer event for Dakota County I pulled into the garage and smelled a terrible smell.  Like burning oil, and guess what it was.

The oil cap in my car was gone, I looked around and it had popped off and was fortunately sitting over on the right of the engine block.  However, it no longer would attach to the engine.  I ordered a replacement, and I could see that some little tabs had broken off, this riser piece that was added to this oil cap the year before my model.

Apparently, it was added so the oil wouldn't splash up and hit the cap I guess, but it introduced another point of failure I guess.

 

Shed

We purchased a shed kit with our new costco membership, so we had to find a place to put it.  We cleared a spot, and put in some pier and beams.  This spot in the yard can get wet in the spring, so putting it off the ground seemed wise.  I also allowed for a small desk on the front for a place to sit and watch the kids ice skate.

 

Wood Chipper

 Jen's Aunt and Uncle had given us stuff from their garage last year, one of those things was a wood chipper that didn't work.  I took the carb off and it was a mess, so I tried to clean it up, but there was gunk that wouldn't come off.  So I ordered a replacement and it came and worked, so now we have a wood chipper.

It is a bit undersized, but it did get through a lot of the stuff we cleared for our shed.

One more update on the Pool Pump

 Apparently it gets hot in there...

So we need to figure something else out.

Bathroom pt 9

We came up the previous week as well, but I didn't grab a picture.  Most of the tile is in now, I had pieces fall out on me, so I had to mix up a little thinset and re-apply.  Fan is in now too, that needed some work to get the hole right.

 

Update on the Pool Pump...

Pool pump overheating issues.  I didn't realize how hot an electric motor gets.  The fan that was installed in the pump broke, Nick tried to glue it, but it didn't hold up. So he 3d printed one, then another (center hole was too big, tried to print an adapter, but that didn't work at all...), then another.  The issue is that they get too hot and deform.

His current design is pretty tight on the shaft.  I had to heat it up to get it on.  Maybe it will work, not sure.  It ran for 2 hours last night.  Time will tell.

Septic fun

 Jen and Nick and probably Maddie too, noticed that the toilet in the basement was slow to flush and there had been some water coming up from the drain in the basement.  I might have noticed that the alarm light on the septic had been on for some time as well, but busy you know...

Anyway, went and out and found this when I took the cover off.

So that ain't right...  Made some calls Thursday, and Friday morning Mike's Septic called me back and said they could have someone out in the evening.  Of course it was my work golf outing, but I said I could be there.  Maddie had to take a driveway shower, but luckily we have hot/cold water at the faucet in the garage.

Fortunately, they didn't arrive till 5pm, which worked well for my schedule.  Matt and Matt were very nice and were able to replace the pump and also fix a baffle on the outlet of the first tank.  Or course they charged me an arm and a leg for it.  Especially $500 to replace the baffle which was less than 5 minutes of work.  But no one wants to jump into a septic tank, I get it.

I talked with an older septic guy, who couldn't come out, Thursday night and he helped me verify the problem was with the pump and not the switch.  There is a plug on the back of the switch plug, if you plug that directly in it will run the pump and take the switch out the equation.  Unfortunately, the pump was triggering the breaker each time I plugged it in.

Good times...

Update on the Ice Maker...

 So about 4 months after we installed and had been using the Ice Maker it went out...  It wasn't pushing the ice out anymore.  Turns out the issue is pretty common, Nick took it apart and found this:

You can see the screw has broken on the cylinder...  That piece turns and pushed the slushy water through and up and out the holes at the top of the mechanism.

Here you can see the cooling camber and the cap with the holes that the ice comes out.

Fortunately, we were able to get a refund for the machine through Amazon, but it took awhile as I originally contacted the seller directly.  They offered a replacement unit, but it didn't have the water line input which I wanted.  So they sent me back to Amazon.

Once we had the refund, I order a very similar looking one, which we have been using since June 12th...  We will see if this one has a bit more life.

Pool Pump issues and fix!

 A couple weeks ago the pump on our pool went out.  From the symptoms, humming noise, I thought it might be the starting capacitor, so I looked at it and it was bulgy...  So I ordered some replacements and tried that.  No good.

Luckily out friends (thanks Klimpke's!) have a similar pump and didn't put their pool up this year so we were able to borrow theirs while we worked on this.  It is a bit smaller though, so we didn't want to run it too much.

After the capacitor didn't work I found a video where the bearings had gone bad and the guy was able to replace them.  So I put Nick on the task of taking it apart and I ordered the bearings 😊

We had to order a bearing puller as well, which worked on 1 side, but the other side was falling apart, so I ended up using the demel to get it off.  Then he was able to put it back together.  On the first try the plastic fan fell apart (it was already partially broken) so he had to take it back apart and use plastic cement to fix it.  Then put it back together, and Success!

So we saved probably $200, and kept it out of the landfill, win win!

Bathroom pt 8

 More tiling this weekend, trying to figure out how to do the recess and cutting around the faucet.  Also, ran the water to the faucet so I could test that out.  Used the pex clamp.

Another Flat Tire!

We had a busy Monday planned, Jen was getting her braces on, everyone (but me) had dentist appointments.  It was 6:50 in the morning and as we pulled up the driveway we noticed the tire was flat.

Not sure when it happened or how even, we jumped in my car and went on our way.  When we got back in the afternoon and got the tire off Maddie found the leak.  Nothing obvious.

Luckily Toyota was able to patch it the next day and it has been OK for a week now.

 

Bathroom pt 7

I was able to get the shower waterproofed and start tiling this weekend.  We have that nice accent tile, but it ended up being closer to the wall then the big tile, so I am not sure how that is going to turn out.  But I went with it.

Loving the tile spacers and levelers!

 

Bathroom pt 6

 Progress continues, slow but steady...  Hard to get a lot done 2 days at a time, when your family enjoys your company as well 😁

I was able to get some drywall and durock up.  I used my left over thinset from filling in hole and tried to tuck point the cinderblock wall a bit as well.

Looks like the lights were installed as well.  I forgot to mention a spend a good chunk of time vanishing the ceiling as well, before the show pan went in.  I had a good respirator for that, and I am glad that I did, because it made the entire cabin stink for a day or 2 after!

Bathroom pt 5

 Another weekend some more progress.  I was able to get the hole drilled for the vent, install the sliding door, and get the shower pan installed (with the issues I mentioned in the last post).

A playset for Kit

My niece is coming to live at my Mom's cabin this fall.  My Mom found a playset on marketplace and recruited us to pick it up and install it at the cabin.  Our trailer handled it well and we were able to get it up and running in short order.

 

Bathroom pt 4

 I was able to finish up most of the ceiling, and I put down self-leveling concrete in the shower pan.  However, self-leveling is a bit of a misnomer.  It looks really smooth and level, but it isn't 100% level there is probably at leave a 1/4 to 1/2 difference in some places...

I put some glue on the fins of the shower pan, but it didn't fix it entirely and the pan will squeak a bit here and there.  I may try to spray some foam under it, but it will probably not work well, since there are fins in the way...  If I could start over I would put down a bed of mortar, or make sure it was really level.

Bathroom pt 3

 As I was waiting for the concrete to dry, I started working on the ceiling.  Greg has a bunch of cedar he had planned to use for a sauna, but it worked really well as the ceiling in the bathroom as well.

I would end up regretting just putting the wood in there like that, as they were not easy to remove.  However, they did get the job done.

Bathroom pt 2

 I was eventually able to get the old plumbing out, I tried heat, that didn't work and probably wasn't too healthy...  The I used a reciprocating saw and cut off the trap, so I could use some drill bits and drill out the lead/oakum.  Eventually I was able to wiggle it out.

That is a lot of years of built up hair in the drain, amazing that it worked at all!

There is a rubber gasket that goes into the iron pipe, then this goes in and we start the looping.

I thought about putting the trap coming right out of the iron drain, but the guy at Ace said it would be best to have it right under the drain and it worked well like that.  Overall very happy with how it all turned out.  It seems to be draining well, and hopefully will be for a long time!

To redo a basement bathroom at the Cabin

 I am writing this on October 30th, because I wanted to finish the bathroom before I posted about it.  It is somewhat done at this point.  We did the demo on this day.  We had been up since Friday, but had played a lot!  Leading up to this, I had taken out the toilet, sink, drywall, and rewired for the new location of the switches.  But we had held off on the shower till now, since it is the only one!

That is the before.  We accomplished quite a bit that first day!

Then I saw this!

New Radon Fan after 10 years

 The radon fan in the garage has always generated a low hum, but lately it had been getting quite bad.

So I picked up a new one and installed it today.  It is amazing quiet!  I can't remember if the old one was ever this quiet, but it hasn't been in a long time.

Shower Door for Kids

We have been talking about putting in shower doors in the kids bathroom for awhile.  The shower curtain pole would fall down and water would come out if the curtain wasn't positions just right.

We purchased a tub shower door kit and I was able to cut the threshold piece and put that down.  Then when we put the jambs on noticed that we would almost hit our head walking into the shower.  So it was back to Menards to get the full sized door.  I guess out tub is very low.

I put the threshold piece from the full size kit back in the tub kit and returned the tub kit to the store.  They weren't sure they wanted to take it back w/o going through the box, but laziness took over and they took it back w/o too much issue.  Though I can certainly understand why they would want to be careful.

Our shower has a trim piece that goes around the top, so I have to take off the little ridge that is on the back of the jamb.  It looks bad here, but you can't really tell once it was installed.  The install would have gone very quick, except for this and cutting the threshold and top piece.  I used a Dremel and the results look nice, but it took awhile.  And a lot of cutting wheels!

I tried to use a titanium bit to drill into the tile, but it wasn't working well and I was nervous to do it...  So I picked up this set and they work amazing well!  Glad I waited and used the right tool.

Very happy with the finished product, I would do these everywhere but they are about $600.