It ain't over til it's over

A few weeks ago, we posted about running Pex for the two bathrooms upstairs.  Words like "quick" and "easy" may have been thrown around and we thought we were just about finished with the plumbing.  It turns out we were overly optimistic!  On Sunday, we tackled adding the valves for the tub and the showers.  We have a double shower in the master bath so we had to install a total of three shower valves, plus the tub valve, and it took much more time than expected to figure out where and how to install each valve.  After a long day, though, we now have all four valves installed and we're that much closer to being ready for inspections...though just in case something else comes up, I'm not going to say it's finished, having learned that lesson once already...

And now...

...for a little relaxation. A little water would be nice, though. We unpacked the tub and started laying out the rest of the bathroom. Tomorrow we'll finish up the shower pan and all the valves.

Big delivery

Lots of goodies came via freight today. All our bathroom fixtures and our master bathtub showed up. Now I have to hit Home Depot for all the fittings I need and mount up the faucet valves for everything. Most of the other work is complete - electrical is run, plumbing and hvac are done. Just a few finishing touches and we should be ready for inspection soon.

Shopping Spree

We have not, despite the appearance of this blog, packed up and moved to a hotel.  In fact, we've been continuing to make progress on the house over these last two weeks, with Brian taking advantage of the non-100 degree weather this week to run cable on the second floor and finish up the electrical wires in the attic.  Last Sunday, we spent the day running one of the three HVAC lines through the crawlspace and into the new addition.  It took longer than we expected but now that we've got the process figured out, it should be much faster to run the remaining two.  On Saturday, we spent the entire day shopping for, and deciding on, various fixtures and bathtubs for the house.  It was one of those tasks that sounded fun and easy (showrooms! shiny fixtures!) but in reality was just frustrating and exhausting.  One complicating factor was that our master bath needs just about every fixture known to man - faucets, tub filler, regular shower, diverter, and rain shower.  Trying to find a line of fixtures that we liked and offered all the options quickly became an ordeal.  Fortunately, at the end of the day, we decided on some options that seem to fit the bill.  At the top is our big soaking tub - the Kohler Escale, a 72" freestanding tub.  I can't wait to take a bath in it (someday).  Just below are the faucets for the master bath from the Moen Icon line in brushed nickel.  Below that are the faucets for the other bathrooms from the Moen Eva line.  (Don't be fooled by the picture - they are not faucets for giant people and are, in fact, normal-sized.)  Once we picked out the fixtures, tubs, etc., we spent a long time online researching prices and put together a spreadsheet to track everything.  Initially I thought we were going to have to order from six different stores to get the best prices but then I called faucetdirect.com, who offered to price match.  So, we were able to place our entire order through them and save several hundred dollars in the process.  Most importantly, we're now done with this project and I'm avoiding all kitchen and bath stores from now on.       

PEX rough-in complete

We finished up the PEX rough-in on the lower level. This stuff is so easy to run. Next week we'll cut over our existing fixtures and start running the system full time. Hopefully it is leak free!

We also started the lower level HVAC. We only have 4 vents to put in so it shouldn't be too hard. There's still a page long list of odds and ends that need to be completed, but hopefully in another week (or maybe two) all our rough-ins will be complete and we can call for an inspection. We'll be just a few weeks shy of 6 months from the time we got our building permits. The project is moving along a bit faster than I thought it would.

Another ceiling down

What do you do on one of the hottest days of the summer?  If you're us, you spend the afternoon in the non-air conditioned part of the house taking down a plaster and metal lath ceiling.  It's hot and dusty work on a good day and this was not a good day for such a project!  But it's done now and will allow us to run the last of the water lines through the ceiling joists and up to the new laundry room on the second floor.  For now, though, we're taking the evening off and using a gift certificate from Brian's parents (thanks, Joan and Jeff!) to go out to dinner...and we'll be staying inside in air conditioning for the rest of the evening.

Rough in work... Still

I took the week off from work to put a dent in all the rough in work we still have to do. So far most of the electrical is done. The plumbing upstairs is mostly done and I worked on the downstairs plumbing today. It's way too hot in the 2nd floor so we'll have to wait to finish everything up until after this heat wave passes. It seems like we have a lot of little things to do before we can call for our inspections. We're still hoping we'll be ready in a couple weeks.

Here are some quick pictures of how to connect the PEX fittings. First you cut the tubing to length. Then you put one of the crimp rings on and slide the tube onto the fitting. Last step is to use the crimper to permanently attach the tube to the fitting. Easy and leak free. It took me about and hour to run the lines and crimp everything.