It has been a few weeks since I posted an update on our renovation. The kitchen is demolished as much as we want at this point in time. These next pictures were taken on February 17th.
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| Old plumbing and knob and tube wiring |
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| Closer look at the old drain pipe |
The bedroom above the kitchen has a sink in it so we did know there was more recent plumbing but had not idea that there was older drain pipes in the ceiling. Why were they never removed?
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| Who would do this to a major floor joist |
At this point I could have cried. That is the top of the wall that separates the kitchen and the dinning room. The joists run front to back meeting above this wall and doubling up. From what we saw as we tore down mainly drywall from this wall, obviously the radiator upstairs was moved and to make that possible they cut right through a major floor joist leaving about two inches at the top. We don't want to take down the dinning room ceiling at this time, our question is: how do we fix this reinforcing that joist and the ones on either side?
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| Richard pulling down the ceiling and had a surprise |
Richard was careful while pulling down the ceiling and it was a very good job. Near where he is working in the above picture he felt a pipe that was loose.
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| Galvanized Pipe |
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| An idea how big that pipe was |
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That is the loose pipe that he felt, if Richard had just ripped the ceiling down without taking care that eight foot piece of galvanized pipe would have come down on top of him. Again you have to ask; what were the people thinking when they left that in the ceiling?
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| The rubble that had to be cleared out |
We covered all the cupboards and appliances with plastic the openings to all the other areas were covered with plastic. Even with all this care we were still left with a thick layer of dust everywhere.
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| These tiled counters will also be replaced |
The dust is everywhere not quite as bad as this in the other parts of the house but we are still cleaning up. We can wipe surfaces down and by the end of the day there is another coating of dust. I can see why the DIY shows on TV move people out of their homes when they are doing this type of work. The dust is in every room and will take time to get rid of it all.
The knob and tube wiring is live, some of the new wiring has been run from it, this means in all likely hood that the house was not rewired as we thought, indications in the basement were that someone had rewired the house. With the kitchen ceiling down we now know that there is still knob and tube probably through out our home and it will all need to be replaced. We decided we will not just cover everything up but will rewire. We will get the necessary permits and find an electrician who will over see Richards work, probably help, hopefully we do as little damage as possible in the rest of the house. Lots of work to do and very little free time to do said work. So I think we are living in this mess for some time to come.
Pictures of the bathroom to come.
