Georgian House Renovation Up North - 5 Years and Counting
Discussion
Inkyfingers said:
I'm really enjoying this thread, keep up the good work.
It's really convincing me that our next house needs to be a project.
Have you ever done a project? This thread makes something massively hard seem easy =)It's really convincing me that our next house needs to be a project.
What's inspiring in this thread is not only the massive quantity of graft, but they seemed to stay happily engaged throughout! DIY is stressful enough, without adding a rather unmissable deadline =)
Some Gump said:
Have you ever done a project? This thread makes something massively hard seem easy =)
What's inspiring in this thread is not only the massive quantity of graft, but they seemed to stay happily engaged throughout! DIY is stressful enough, without adding a rather unmissable deadline =)
Also (forgive me if I've got this wrong OP) but it appears he started this ambitious renovation with zero skills yet has learnt through trial and error through the process and delivered what I think is a cracking job. Had all that been subcontracted out it would have been a crippling bill. What's inspiring in this thread is not only the massive quantity of graft, but they seemed to stay happily engaged throughout! DIY is stressful enough, without adding a rather unmissable deadline =)
So many of these old Victorian houses in Wales and up North are sadly falling down with the cost to fix so high it's simply not worth while. Stunning houses they could be and were being ravaged by no maintenance over countless decades is the issue.
Some Gump said:
Have you ever done a project? This thread makes something massively hard seem easy =)
What's inspiring in this thread is not only the massive quantity of graft, but they seemed to stay happily engaged throughout! DIY is stressful enough, without adding a rather unmissable deadline =)
I've done plenty of projects, but never in my actual home.What's inspiring in this thread is not only the massive quantity of graft, but they seemed to stay happily engaged throughout! DIY is stressful enough, without adding a rather unmissable deadline =)
Love the idea of quitting my job doing a full blown renovation for the family to live in. I would never aim to do it all myself, but i'd do as much as I could.
This is the first house I've ever owned so my first renovation.
I work in IT so am used to managing big projects so the prospect of a million things to do didn't really faze me but at the point of buying the house, I had no practical diy experience to speak of.
One of the biggest costs of the renovation was the buying of tools every time I started a new task. I think I've kept Toolstation in business the last few years.
As it's so different from my day job, I found this to easier to come home and do something totally different, talking to my builder, he's got a similar project on the go but because it's the same as his day job, he can never muster the motivation.
It isn't always marital bliss either, it's more good fortune than anything that we haven't disagreed when one of us had hold of anything deadly like a nail gun...
The only downside to all this is that even doing it ourselves, it hoovers up cash so my garage is very unph since I bought the house.
I work in IT so am used to managing big projects so the prospect of a million things to do didn't really faze me but at the point of buying the house, I had no practical diy experience to speak of.
One of the biggest costs of the renovation was the buying of tools every time I started a new task. I think I've kept Toolstation in business the last few years.
As it's so different from my day job, I found this to easier to come home and do something totally different, talking to my builder, he's got a similar project on the go but because it's the same as his day job, he can never muster the motivation.
It isn't always marital bliss either, it's more good fortune than anything that we haven't disagreed when one of us had hold of anything deadly like a nail gun...
The only downside to all this is that even doing it ourselves, it hoovers up cash so my garage is very unph since I bought the house.
As we'd kind of started doing the kitchen properly, we finally ordered a range.
On a tip from the electrician, we found an Iranian guy had a lockup in Bradford that specialises in refurbishing ranges and reselling them.
After a bit of driving around what seemed the middle of nowhere one Sunday morning we managed to find him. A token bit of haggling ensued and we got our range for £900 instead of the £1800 for a new one.
It has lasted about four years so far with only an oven bulb needing replacement so I'm happy enough with that.
Unfortunately, tips on where to find a cheap range was all the sparky was good for. I left him with two simple jobs to do and went to work.
1. Add a new consumer unit to get shot of the old 'make your own fuse and try not to die' thing.
2. Run a separate supply to the cooker point ready for the range.
I don't have a photo of how the consumer tails were left first time around but trust me there was about another metre of tail on each feed from the meter to the unit. There was so much spare cable hanging down, I could have used it as a washing line.
He'd also managed to fit the consumer unit on the meter board, sort of. See if you think there's anything odd here.
I made him come back and put a board behind as I wasn't happy with hanging the unit with two screws on the end
As for job 2, to give him credit, he did route the cable as instructed so I could conceal it behind skirting but when I was wiring the range into the supply point, I noticed he'd got the blue wire wired into the live and brown into neutral on the socket.
This meant I didn't know whether he'd wired it wrong or been lazy, so I had to stop what I was doing, squeeze my fat arse back out from behind the range and check the wiring from the isolator switch to the range point to see if it was crossed. Then check the wire in to the isolator and out of the consumer unit to make sure the polarity was right all the way through.
It wasn't a big job, just a pain in the arse when I'd paid someone to not cock it up in the first place.
On a tip from the electrician, we found an Iranian guy had a lockup in Bradford that specialises in refurbishing ranges and reselling them.
After a bit of driving around what seemed the middle of nowhere one Sunday morning we managed to find him. A token bit of haggling ensued and we got our range for £900 instead of the £1800 for a new one.
It has lasted about four years so far with only an oven bulb needing replacement so I'm happy enough with that.
Unfortunately, tips on where to find a cheap range was all the sparky was good for. I left him with two simple jobs to do and went to work.
1. Add a new consumer unit to get shot of the old 'make your own fuse and try not to die' thing.
2. Run a separate supply to the cooker point ready for the range.
I don't have a photo of how the consumer tails were left first time around but trust me there was about another metre of tail on each feed from the meter to the unit. There was so much spare cable hanging down, I could have used it as a washing line.
He'd also managed to fit the consumer unit on the meter board, sort of. See if you think there's anything odd here.
I made him come back and put a board behind as I wasn't happy with hanging the unit with two screws on the end
As for job 2, to give him credit, he did route the cable as instructed so I could conceal it behind skirting but when I was wiring the range into the supply point, I noticed he'd got the blue wire wired into the live and brown into neutral on the socket.
This meant I didn't know whether he'd wired it wrong or been lazy, so I had to stop what I was doing, squeeze my fat arse back out from behind the range and check the wiring from the isolator switch to the range point to see if it was crossed. Then check the wire in to the isolator and out of the consumer unit to make sure the polarity was right all the way through.
It wasn't a big job, just a pain in the arse when I'd paid someone to not cock it up in the first place.
Inkyfingers said:
I've done plenty of projects, but never in my actual home.
Love the idea of quitting my job doing a full blown renovation for the family to live in. I would never aim to do it all myself, but i'd do as much as I could.
Would be easier if I had quit my job, this was all done on evenings and weekends (and a couple of weeks of holiday when there were too many things that were tight in the the schedule). Love the idea of quitting my job doing a full blown renovation for the family to live in. I would never aim to do it all myself, but i'd do as much as I could.
Cracking on, we took out the old wall units and I'm guessing whoever installed them must have got the shock of their life.
I'm quite please I'd had the consumer unit done. When pulling one of the units off the wall, it pulled the mains cable out along from behind the wall as one of the screws holding the units on hand been screwed through the cable
The old extractor hole wasn't needed anymore but I took the opportunity to use the isolator for the extractor as an extra circuit for a set of outside plugs and chucked a run of cable through the wall before sealing it up.
We got our plasterer, Steve back to do a skim over the wall to make good and Sarah spent some time restoring the dresser that was covered in dust a few photos back.
We got it at auction for about £120 - the missus is a dab hand at sprucing that sort of thing up.
I'm quite please I'd had the consumer unit done. When pulling one of the units off the wall, it pulled the mains cable out along from behind the wall as one of the screws holding the units on hand been screwed through the cable
The old extractor hole wasn't needed anymore but I took the opportunity to use the isolator for the extractor as an extra circuit for a set of outside plugs and chucked a run of cable through the wall before sealing it up.
We got our plasterer, Steve back to do a skim over the wall to make good and Sarah spent some time restoring the dresser that was covered in dust a few photos back.
We got it at auction for about £120 - the missus is a dab hand at sprucing that sort of thing up.
Edited by stewjohnst on Sunday 9th October 22:13
So we'd kind of settled on a what the other half informed me was a 'country style kitchen'.
I had visions of Daisy Duke, Jean shorts and the like but the reality was two slabs of oak worktop, a Belfast sink and the daunting prospect of cutting out a recess for the latter in the former without making a total b
ks of it.
Left in situ as I psyched myself up for it.
I didn't want to use the circular saw at first as I wasn't sure if I could be precise enough. I started with a brand new jigsaw blade first but that was scrapped quickly as the blade was being asked to do so much and wasn't staying true.
I got round my worry about the circular saw by holesawing the back corners so I had a bit of breathing space at the end of the U-shaped and it turned out fine.
I'm particularly fond of the taps, it was a long job to find ones we liked that weren't a gajillion pounds and I think we paid £180 in the end for these but I had to ring around most of the stockists in the country until I found someone with them in.
We needed a bit of storage space to replace the cupboards but couldn't find anything we liked so I popped off to the timber merchant for a big block of hardwood and we got a few brackets from ebay and up it went.
I had visions of Daisy Duke, Jean shorts and the like but the reality was two slabs of oak worktop, a Belfast sink and the daunting prospect of cutting out a recess for the latter in the former without making a total b
ks of it. Left in situ as I psyched myself up for it.
I didn't want to use the circular saw at first as I wasn't sure if I could be precise enough. I started with a brand new jigsaw blade first but that was scrapped quickly as the blade was being asked to do so much and wasn't staying true.
I got round my worry about the circular saw by holesawing the back corners so I had a bit of breathing space at the end of the U-shaped and it turned out fine.
I'm particularly fond of the taps, it was a long job to find ones we liked that weren't a gajillion pounds and I think we paid £180 in the end for these but I had to ring around most of the stockists in the country until I found someone with them in.
We needed a bit of storage space to replace the cupboards but couldn't find anything we liked so I popped off to the timber merchant for a big block of hardwood and we got a few brackets from ebay and up it went.
We didn't have quite enough storage space, so I reinstated the chimney breast cupboard with a few off cuts of wood and some lazy freehand mdf jigsawing.
We'd originally removed the cupboard as we have consent to take out the wall between the utility room and kitchen but those plans have been changed for something grander in a year or two.
Also a gratuitous shot of the new radiator (the other reason for keeping the wall).
Finished, the old radio on top of the cupboard is one I've cleared the knackered old guts out of and added a new amp and speaker so we can play our phones / tune in radio, etc in the kitchen or we would if I ever finish messing with it.
Not much happened in the kitchen since these shots.
We still haven't got round to putting a beam in above the range although I do have a length of tree trunk I cut down drying in the garage that I'll be using for this very purpose.
We found a few enamel signs in a salvage auction and used them to box up various bits and pieces and fill the walls. The high voltage sign is boxing in the meter box.
The spice rack on the worktop is the sawn off end of a pallet that we got something or other on, Sarah takes the credit for that piece of genuine diy genius though.
We'd originally removed the cupboard as we have consent to take out the wall between the utility room and kitchen but those plans have been changed for something grander in a year or two.
Also a gratuitous shot of the new radiator (the other reason for keeping the wall).
Finished, the old radio on top of the cupboard is one I've cleared the knackered old guts out of and added a new amp and speaker so we can play our phones / tune in radio, etc in the kitchen or we would if I ever finish messing with it.
Not much happened in the kitchen since these shots.
We still haven't got round to putting a beam in above the range although I do have a length of tree trunk I cut down drying in the garage that I'll be using for this very purpose.
We found a few enamel signs in a salvage auction and used them to box up various bits and pieces and fill the walls. The high voltage sign is boxing in the meter box.
The spice rack on the worktop is the sawn off end of a pallet that we got something or other on, Sarah takes the credit for that piece of genuine diy genius though.
Edited by stewjohnst on Sunday 9th October 23:39
Looking good.
I had a similar project, not quite as big but a around the same age and needing the same amount of work.
Unfortunately for us I was posted to Germany and that combined with the slow progress killed the relationship so it had to be sold, for a significant loss.
A cautionary tale to all those who think it looks easy.
I had a similar project, not quite as big but a around the same age and needing the same amount of work.
Unfortunately for us I was posted to Germany and that combined with the slow progress killed the relationship so it had to be sold, for a significant loss.
A cautionary tale to all those who think it looks easy.
ChocolateFrog said:
... A cautionary tale to all those who think it looks easy.
Indeed, it probably looks easy on here as I'm not listing all the minutiae of st that goes wrong or that niggles as you go through. It is hard but you have to try and approach it with a kind of "Oh well, best crack on" attitude and view it as a perverse episode of the Crystal Maze...
Outtakes & Bloopers
Why did that window swing open and take out a lump of my skull and why are the corners of windows so sharp?
What sort of deranged mind runs a company that offers this tap and sink as a viable combination? Maybe they're expecting me to chop my fingers off so I can get my hand under the stream of water?
It's so much fun trying to figure out which bit of a bath tap/washer combo is leaking for about three months and being annoyed about the fact you can't tighten any of it up because you've made the bath fit so snugly.
However, this is soon topped by the joy of chasing small birds around the house (on three separate occasions) because I simultaneously had the bath side off trying to fix the above issue and a large hole in the brickwork where the waste pipes went outside meaning birds could fly in, come out from the bath and then start s
tting themselves (literally) about where the hell they were whilst bombing around the landing and smashing into windows. This little fella died before I could get him out but the other two made it out safely after I'd pinned them with a towel, following a series of Benn Hill style chases around the house.
... and here's the missus painstakingly oiling the worktops.
You'll notice she has the tin on the worktop.
Of course the base of the tin left ring marks so I had to sand the worktops down to get rid of it and start again...
Oh and there's this one too.
Not long after she'd moved in, we hadn't got round to having enough keys cut, she'd gone out after me and flicked the latch on the kitchen so it was locked and I didn't have a front door key.
She was working late so after a couple of hours sitting I the kitchen I had to shoulder in the door. Stupid me expected the door latch or the rim to pop out of the frame but nope....
The whole damn side of the door came off.
It's actually a lot more secure now as I used a massive drill bit to embed a few steel rods back through the door and the pink gripped it back on like a ludicrously over engineered dowel plug arrangement.
All good fun
You'll notice she has the tin on the worktop.
Of course the base of the tin left ring marks so I had to sand the worktops down to get rid of it and start again...
Oh and there's this one too.
Not long after she'd moved in, we hadn't got round to having enough keys cut, she'd gone out after me and flicked the latch on the kitchen so it was locked and I didn't have a front door key.
She was working late so after a couple of hours sitting I the kitchen I had to shoulder in the door. Stupid me expected the door latch or the rim to pop out of the frame but nope....
The whole damn side of the door came off.
It's actually a lot more secure now as I used a massive drill bit to embed a few steel rods back through the door and the pink gripped it back on like a ludicrously over engineered dowel plug arrangement.
All good fun
stewjohnst said:
I'm particularly fond of the taps, it was a long job to find ones we liked that weren't a gajillion pounds and I think we paid £180 in the end for these but I had to ring around most of the stockists in the country until I found someone with them in.
Where did you get the taps from? I need something like that to replace the stupidly short ones we have that drip water all over the worktop.Posting retrospectivly probably makes it seem more appealing and easier. I'd imagine that the OPs experience is similar to mine, you spend an inordinate amout of time doing prep work, which feels like you aren't going anywhere, but is actually what makes the finished article look good. Fun bits, destruction and the final bits of decorating when it all seems to come together are only a fraction of the time spent.
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