And now we have heat in the house and it feels good. It is so much nicer working in a house with heat even if you leave it at a lower temp than normal. I should explain that I now have a working furnace with an insulated house so while I am working I keep it at 50F for now. It will need to be turned up when drywall mudding and taping occurs and when painting but for now 50F is like heaven. So lets see how we got there.

On Sunday I went in and finished off pulling the new wire to the garage and hooking it up. The Brother in-law gave me a hand with this as it was easier to pull through the small dia conduit into the house and garage through elbows and fittings with two people than with one person. After it was all pulled into place I hooked it up and tested it and voila it works great. Closed it all up turned off the breakers and on Monday will call for re-inspection which should occur on Tuesday.

On Monday I did some work on the bulkheads in the basement until the spray foam guys showed up. Once they started I essentially cleared out and left them to it. I came in to check every once in a while but I did not do much today. By the end of the day they had about 85% of the basement done. Since they got there late they could not finish it. However since it is a set cost job I don't really care that it took them an extra day to finish it. First picture shows the front basement bedroom where they started. The shovel against the wall is used to remove the overspray on the studs. The second picture is one of the rec rooms and the third picture looks into the cold storage room. I had them spray the ceiling and down two feet. This should keep the cold storage dry and cool. I'll monitor temp in there later on once I install a door into this room.

On Tuesday I did a little more work in the basement waiting for the spray foam truck and the electrical inspector. The Spray foam guys showed up around noon and went straight to work spraying the attic. Three and a half hours later there was a 2"min layer of spray foam all across the attic. There was a little bit that oozed out here and there between drywall sheets and between drywall and wall seams but that was cleaned up quite easily. Early in the afternoon the electrical inspector came and rechecked my work. He gave me the OK and we now have legal electrics in the garage. I now have to work out a method of installing a thermostat to control the ceiling electrical heater I bought at Canadian Tire. This heater is 5000watts and uses a 30 amp breaker. However it did not come with a thermostat to control it. Since I know of no 30 amp contact thermostats, I'll have to install a suitable contactor and thermostat to control this heater. Here are two pictures showing the attic after spray foaming. One picture to the south and one to the north of the attic access. In the first picture you can just see a small box sticking up with insulation around it. This is the box where I'll install potlights. I've 10 of these boxes installed in the living areas.

On Wednesday the spray foam guys were back to finish the basement. After an hour they were done and the second team showed up to blow in cellulose insulation into the attic such that I have an R50 rating for insulation in the attic. Once they were done I did reasonably thorough clean up of the house. Here are two pictures showing the attic south and north again with the cellulose blown in.

On Thursday I started installing the shower bases. I took them out of the package and confirmed location of drain hole before drilling a 4" hole in the floor where the drain pokes through. I then siliconed the drain flanges before installing it in the shower floor and securing it. Once the silicone had a chance to harden I had the brother in law help me move them into place. I now need to secure the base in place with special clips and I may need a few shims under the base in the master bath to ensure it is as solid as the Rock of Gibraltar. Once this is done I'll install the walls and place some padding in the shower base to protect it during the drywalling and painting phase. I also brought three loads of furniture and effects from the storage unit to the garage. I figure I still need at least 6-8 trips to finish it all. Here is a picture showing the shower base installed.

On Friday the HVAC guys came and installed the last of the ductwork that could not be done before the insulation was installed.  As well they installed my HRV(heat recovery ventilator). All they have left to do is install the hot water tank, run some gas lines and then also run the air-conditioning lines before I install all the basement drywall. The air-conditioner will not be installed until maybe April time frame when the frost is out of the ground and I can install a proper pad for the the unit. As well i ran all my cable lines for internet and TV. I also took the time to install the majority of the piping that is needed for my Central Vacuum system I plan to install. In hindsight I should have installed this before all the heating ductwork was installed as two of the outlets upstairs were above the duct work and took a little bit of time to install. Oh well it all worked out in the end. Here is a couple of pictures showing a cable outlet and the vacuum outlet.

This brings us up to Saturday. One of the things I've been trying to do is of course find the best deals I can to keep the costs down. One of these items is drywall. All the drywall that I used on the ceiling was bought at Home Depot and was the cheapest around. However I had to pick this up and bring it into the house. Luckily enough buying 10ft sheets was not an issue and bringing them in the house with the help of the Brother in law was not too difficult either. However this worked for the attic ceiling which was 2ft centres from truss to truss. In the basement the ceiling is on bottom of the joists which are on 16in centres. Therefore you either use 12ft drywall or if you use 10ft sheets you have more waste. To have enough drywall delivered would cost me an extra 5-800$ for delivery and for them to bring the sheets into the house, including into the basement. So today I picked up 12 sheets of 12ft and 12 sheets of 10ft drywall, and with the brother in laws help brought them into the house. Well the truck managed it however not sure that I really want to bring a lot 12ft sheets this way. So need to decide over the next few days whether to get all the drywall delivered at once by contractor who then can deliver the sizes needed or stick with the smaller sheets that I can pick up and accept the extra waste. My guess is that I can probably still be cheaper my way but  our backs will most likely prefer the delivery method. Oh well decisions to be made later. Just for the record here is a picture showing the 12 sheets of 12ft drywall  in the basement. I figure I need another 30 sheets of 12ft, as well as 35 sheets of 8ft plus some 10ft to finish the basement. The main floor will get almost all 10ft due wall height and design.

Well thats it for now. Next week I should have about one more day of building bulkheads in the basement and then clean it up for drywall installation. As well on Monday will go to the town to get an inspection arranged for the insulation so that I can install all this drywall. Then I have a few hours of bulkhead work to do in the kitchen before I continue on drywalling upstairs as well. Hopefully by the end of the week I have a fair amount of drywalling done. Then I need to find a decent mudder and taper as I really don't want to do that work.

Well until next time have a nice week and keep looking for that sunshine.

Harold