Home Improvement Today?

Lol , OK

 

Only problem is that rack rusted as fast as my frame.
It also was the only rack out at the time.
I'll post an album soon of some of the worst things I've seen done by owners.

 

I thought that one was aluminum

 

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/irony

 

Poorly done powdercoat.

 

Guy I was working under wanted to start the crown at the ceiling wall point. No fing way was I doing that when the orderd the giant crown profile. And he didnt want to do that because he didn't know how to make that cut...

 

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My 27 boxes of kitchen cabinets arrived at the warehouse last Tuesday and are being held until my electrical, flooring & sheetrock work is finished.

I am behind schedule by about 3 months and eating at the local Chick-fil-A is getting old. ...

Have been taking pics to post later & hope to have kitchen finished in next 2 months. probably have to store the cabinets in the living room and wife will love that. ...

I only have a helper on the weekends and am slow.

OZ, I wished you lived closer.
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My kitchen will be last. Trying to decide on the cabinet configuration. I'd like to add some base cabinets but I'm already behind the ball on the square footage game. It's a year or more away so I have time to figure it out out. I'm dreading the bathroom more than the kitchen

 

I like installing cabinets , it's actually one of my favourite jobs for some reason

 

I've never done it. I built cabinets for a living for a few years. I'll probably have the Amish build them. Undecided on countertops. I'd like to see some of the dyed concrete in person.

 

Same here. Except when its for a company I wont name. I'm pretty sure the person who does the layouts has never seen a kitchen. I get called for the larger, high end and more complicated installs and I know due to that its going to add 2 days of extras because they have shorted me on trim or a cabinet, or like on a job the layout was larger then the room...

 

My wife and I did our own concrete countertops. We took a 3 day class with Buddy Rhodes. For my wife and I it was about $2800 for the class, airfare, hotel and rental car. Plus we spent about $700 in tools. Materials was about $500 for the concrete $200 for the dye and $200 for the edge molding.

We have about 55 sq Ft of counter space in the kitchen.





For our first countertop, I practiced in the laundry room:

 

If I go that route I'll probably just get some friends that are concrete guys to come help make them. I'm guessing you had to buy sanders and polishers to smooth it?

 

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... ^^^ ... What great looking counter tops ...

Do you have any concerns with expansion/contraction and/or when the concrete fully cures and shrinks ... just curious as I have never done that project before ...

Congrats on a great looking job and having the guts to do it too.

I will try and can do almost anything except ... can't do brick & block work and counter tops ... those are off my lists.
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Glass doors are up. Wine rack left to build then the uppers will be set after lighting is figured out.

 

Yeah I agree. I like the concrete idea. I'll have to do more research on them and see what I think. I won't touch any kind of masonry either. I can struggle through almost anything, but won't even attempt brick, block, or pouring a slab.

 

... ^^^ ... Placing a slab is a piece of cake as long as you have HELP to move the stuff around and not too much direct sun. I put about 200 cu yards in this place with about 15,000' of #4 & 5 rebars (on metal rebar chairs), 3,500 PSI with fiber. Concrete is easy for me, I just get super scared if trucks are late and the the pour might get cold joints' On large slabs, I pour it solid without any joints (except expansion joints where needed) and cut it DEEP (25-30% of total thickness) about 24-36 hours after the pour.

I am getting ready to start a "learning curve on sheet rock now. Oh, bye the way, can someone post that ... "DIY Sheetrock School Link" ... again ?? ....Sorry, lost it again .... Can't find it and lost it ... Thanks

Brick & block take a lot of practice and a long learning curve to be good at it and I don't have that experience.

My problem is .... I am getting too old to do this stuff myself and with 1 weekend helper, it takes forever. On big concrete jobs, I get about 5 or 6 guys to help or I wouldn't make it.

Concrete counters just fascinate me .... and I love them. I am doing quartz and that is being done by a pro (I can't do quartz).

Another semi-cement trick I learned from some European guys is how to (let me get this right) ... do concrete cement sculpting on stucco (not dryvit or foam, but real built-up cement) around windows, doors and etc. It takes a lot of time, but is fun to do when you get the hange of it and it takes help to run the mixer and carry the cement. You need to hand make some aluminum scrapers to rake across the top layer of the cement to make the pattern you want ... i.e. flutes, groves and etc.. I will take some photos and post them. I still have problems getting my photos to post correctly on this site. It's basically like forming concrete on the ground, but it is cement with fiber on a wall and you form- scrape-sculpt it over hand formed wire mesh secured DEEP into the base under the hardcoat stucco or even on brick.

Many of the guys on this thread are real pros and I love to see & study their projects and sometimes try to copy their work

I love those concrete counter tops, but would never attempt to do them without a pro right beside me ...
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Note to myself. Real term for "doing concrete" is "placing concrete" and "not pouring concrete". Was reminded of that in school and a long time ago here.

 

http://www.drywallschool.com/

 

this is concrete and you did it yourself? awesome!

 

I bought a wet polisher and a large handheld power mixer like this one: