This picture is from the opposite side of the room after the hallway walls are gone...

And so the drywalling begins... A few years ago, I bought this drywall lift while it was on sale.



Generally putting drywall on a ceiling is a huge nuisance... nearly impossible to do without two people AND some way of bracing the drywall up until it's secured in place... Having the lift allows me to do this solo.

Two steps forward... le sigh...

If you look closely at the picture above this post, across from the rectangular cutouts (vents), there is a lump in the centre sheet of drywall. Initially I was going to leave it... but my fussy nature showed up. I ended up removing half the screws, letting the sheet partly down so I could access the space above where I found one of the braces (similar to this one) was 1/4" too low. So I shaved off the extra 1/4" and screwed the drywall back up again. Problem solved.



After fixing the issue, I put up the final 12'x4' sheet. My back was starting to get grumpy so I decided to work on the walls for a while instead.

Another productive day. The most challenging wall so far, I would say...



Oops!! I started writing 0.5 of an inch and that looked wrong so I changed it to 1/2 inch... but I missed a number.

The rim joist itself was level and plumb. The bottom sill and the studs of the upper area, however, weren't straight. I used a saw to remove around half of an inch in two areas (they're lighter in colour) and then used a hand plane to smooth things out.

How much did I cut & shave? Well...



Once I got that sorted out, I cut strips of half inch plywood which I placed at several points to create a more level and plumb surface for the drywall... and then I hanged up the drywall... I think it's looking good so far...

Not sure if this panoramic pic will work or not... The rec room is nearly 24' x 15' so my pool table will fit...

Sanding sanding sanding... At this rate, I might be priming tomorrow...

Here's my dust abatement strategy (as per above) and while it isn't a complete solution, it works well.

After a couple of hours of frantically doing touch-ups, cleaning up etc., we sprayed the first coat of primer-sealer. We went through two gallons rather quickly... and didn't paint the ceiling... but overall, I'm pleased with the results.

Pam says she thinks she'll use a roller when it comes time to do the final painting. It was her first time using an airless sprayer and I think she's worried she won't do as good of a job as she might with a normal roller...

The picture is a bit deceiving... the room is nearly 24 feet long and nearly 15 wide...

I reinstalled the barn-style door. It's metal & glass.



This HVAC return vent has a bit of a story. I find it amusing; hopefully you do too.

That wall is a weight bearing wall and, being close to a corner, the space between the studs is less than the usual 10 inches. The return vent ties into the HVAC system by a 5 inch which is the standard size for HVAC supply lines. Whoever installed it originally created a custom inlet which might sound good but it really wasn't... It was a piece of sheet metal basically pounded, bent and warped before being nailed between the studs. The previous vent cover was modified... literally cut to fit... When I looked at the house, I noticed the odd hacked up vent cover but I figured as long as it works, who cares? I wasn't aware of the ugly mess behind it.

So when I removed the old drywall, I looked at the old modified vent cover and tossed it, figuring I would come up with something better. I looked at the custom inlet and shook my head. I can't imagine any professional taking pride in such a mess but I guess craftsmanship isn't common anymore.

When I was ready to drywall that corner, I decided the best way to deal with it was to scrap the "custom" inlet. I replaced it with a standard 4x10 outlet which I turned 90 degrees to fit the confined space between the studs. It fits the 5 inch return line perfectly... and 4x10 vent covers are available. The louvers are normally supposed to face down for esthetic reasons and supposedly to inhibit dust from getting sucked into the system. I mounted it such that the louvers face toward the corner.

DogloverTerri wrote: »

Wow. Love the door. So much going on behind the scenes

This house is a "back split" with three levels. The main floor has the kitchen and living room. Upstairs has three bedrooms and the main bathroom (6 steps up) and the lower level has the rec room, the laundry room and a second bathroom.

As a result of the configuration, there is a crawl space (around 4 feet high) under the main part of the house. The HVAC system is housed there and plenty of room for storage. It's called a crawl space for a reason... moving around inside to replace the furnace filters or access stored items is not easy... The half-door was original to the house, giving access to the crawl space.

When I renovated, I removed a small hallway which originally separated the laundry room from the rec room and bath. I built a new wall making the laundry room smaller (although it's still far from small) and got a new barn-style door, this meant I had a couple of extra doors and frames. So I modified one of the doors and it's frame which I used to add a second half-door directly across from the HVAC system.

In this pic, the new half-door is on the right. In the background, you can see the original half door and the sideways HVAC return. The hole for the other lower level HVAC return is next to the new half door...