4th of July? Barbeques and pond parties? Are you kidding? We call it a 3 day weekend of productivity without having to use a vacation day. - I spent a day setting boxes and running Ethernet wire, coax, and speaker wire. I understand the speaker wire and the coax, but I'm runnin' kinda blind on the Cat5e wire. Some of the PB brethren have offered super advice and support; many thanks. The nice part about running all this wire junk is that my toughest decision is where to terminate it. Then, just leave enough extra wire length hanging in that area and forget about it...at least forget about it until the time comes to tie it into a structured wiring panel. Anyway, we are going to use the linen closet cuz it's upstairs, has the available room, and is centrally located. Wiring for the shop is now complete. - The next step is another milestone for us. It's been a little over 2 years since we broke ground and the time has finally come to lay in some fiberglass insulation. We considered the possibility of using spray foam, but nixed it for cost. As we often say, if it was our actual home, it might get more attention and priority. For our gar/apt, fiberglass with some specific, focused applications of the smaller cans of spray foam will do just fine. - Speaking of small cans of spray foam... The plan is to keep the mechanical room heated throughout the winter when we are not there. All the Pex water lines will be installed to facilitate quick gravity drain back down to the water tank inside the mechanical room. The point, tho, is to have the mech room very well insulated; perhaps a notch better than the rest of the house. There a bunch of boxes in the walls of the mech room. This means the insulation between the back sides of the boxes will be pretty thin, comparitively. We are taking a little extra step to not only increase that area for R value, but seal up the holes at the back of the boxes.
- - Way back when we were putting together the second floor framing to support the floor deck, we encountered a 29 foot long lam beam of questionable integrity. Long story shortened, we were sent a replacement and told to scrap out the rejected lam beam. I cut the length in half (to ease handling)and plan to use it for a workbench countertop. In the meantime, at 16" wide x about 15 feet long, it serves as an ideal insulation workbench.
- - Let the itch begin! We called a very, very old portable window air conditioner back out of retirement to help us endure the hot, outside temps. In the end, it made a notable difference. And, as more insulation was installed, we knew each piece was increasing our potential of beating the heat....anything for inspiration to keep going.
- - We got about 2/3 of the wall space insulated in the shop area. Filling in the wall that separates the shop from the rest of the garage was our first (obvious) step to create the cocoon that we charged Dski's old portable A/C window unit to cool. Finishing this wall also creates the boundaries of the space. We both needed to experience this progress because it sparks a bit of inspiration. We can now stand in there and look around and say "yep, this will definitely be a square footage improvement over the 10 x 12 shed that we have been living in for the past 2 years". It makes me smile when Dski starts telling me where she plans to put the bed, the table, etc. Like I said....we both needed it. - - To cap off the shop/garage wall, we temporarily tacked in the metal entrance fire door and the metal door for the mechanical room access.
- - We got about 2/3 of the wall area insulated and gave it up to come back home. We will finish the walls on the next trip. The real bugaboo will be the ceiling. I am seriously considering RockyTopper's suggestion to use blown-in insulation. The jury is still out on that one...
