Started our kitchen remodel
 

So today was the first day of what they say will be two months of mess. Kitchen and all the floors on the first floor will be replaced. Here's a couple pics of the carnage from today:

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Looks like you may have had water wick under the planks of the flooring. Is that one thing that contributed to your decision to remodel?

Good eye! Yes, the damn ice maker leaked under the wood floor and over two days warped about 20 sq ft. We were planning a remodel already and this issue sped it up.

Well I admire your determination to go ahead and get the reno done. My wife still has the original kitchen counter! However we have replaced linoleum, appliances and painted. We had problems with the ice maker leaking so we shut it off and isolated the water supply to it. Are you replacing the wood floors with something else or sticking with wood type floor? Guy

Been thru a couple of remodels with young children to boot, sucks large green donkey balls....

Guy, we are replacing all of the first floor with travertine. There goes my engine rebuild budget.

Be sure the floor can handle the additional weight of the tile.

The floors are rebar reinforced concrete 6 to 8 inches thick. Where the hardwood was put down, they laid 2x4's on there side and and glued 3/4 plywood to them (not sure why). They spent three weeks running utilities and reinforcing the wall for my wife required giant stone range hood.

Anyway, I was out of town for two weeks and when I returned last Monday they finished laying down the floors (still need to build the steps down to the family room), started staining and installing cabinets, and installed the range hood (still needs grout):

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They may finish installing the cabinets this week and actually get the granite in before the holiday. I can't believe how much lighter and airier the kitchen and family room are now that the dark hardwood is gone.

Oh the joy. I remember that feeling. It took me nearly 9 months to remodel our kitchen. I had to tear out everything. (Floor heating and ventilated/floating floor did complicate things though).

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Hey, That's a beautiful kitchen. Tell me about those lights in the ceiling. Are they LEDs?

I love it! And yes tell us more about the lights.

Thanx! Heh, I'm most proud of ventilated-heated floor...not the lights :)

I pounded the lightning issue a lot. Being photography-nerd, I'm not impressed by current CFL and LED lights due to bad colour response. So I still fancy dimmable 12V halogen. I opted for LED where lights are to be used a lot.

Incandescent bulbs are basically "black body emitters" so spectral composition is spot-on and corresponding to their 2800K "color temperature". LED bulb claiming to be "warm white" are a uneven mix of couple of primaries trying to look like white. I bought a 40$ dimmable Philips LED lamp (which was supposed to be best) and found out that a child toy painted in something that could be described as "cold white" became purple under LED lights. So incandescent it is for now.

Emission spectra for different lamps, blue is LED, pink is halogen (yes, majority ends up as heat and infra-red ;) ), green is CFL and yellow is sun:

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Lights used in kitchen are 18 pieces of Hide-A-Lite 12V 10W downlights:

1201 | Hide-a-lite

Those downlights need almost no additional height despite being 12V halogen, so the ceiling doesn't need to be lowered a lot. They emit pleasant "warm glow" when dimmed down (which LED cannot mimic). When ceiling is painted (and some grain is mixed into colour), these downlights are flush with ceiling and non-intrusive when switched off.

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mreid, sorry for spamming your thread ;)

Another member of the remodel club checking in. 100% DIY. The flooring was numbered and carefully removed, then put back in exactly as it was before after repairs were made. I sanded and refinished it with Monocoat oil.

Formal living room before:
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During. Did I forget to mention that there were crawlspace moisture problems and ALL the joists were rotten?
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Encapsulated the crawlspace and added a few piers and beams while I was in there. New joists are doubles.
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Today: I need to get the grasscloth picked out and put up already.
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Godspeed my friend. Thanks to an employment gap I just spent close to two months doing a total gut and remodel of two full baths, a half bath, hardwood on the main floor, and a ton of little stuff like trim and doors throughout. NEVER AGAIN!:)

Wow, it must be a whole lot harder with the house built on the side of a hill like that! ;)

but serial, love the oven/stove, cabinets, and flooring.
The jury's still out on that mantle/hood thing, but based on everything else so far I bet it's gonna look great.

What a difference a week makes! Cabinets all in, several pieces of granite, most of the backsplash, and the stone on the bar. My wife is just loving it, so she's pushing me to get the engine for the 904 rebuilt. They say about two more weeks and they will be finished!

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That looks great! Love the granite and the space.

Well, had a little set back. The large double island slab cracked when they brought it in last Friday. Then our builder was in a bad motorcycle accident on Saturday. So we're in a bit of a holding pattern. They did install all of the appliances.

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