Alex's Major Home Improvement Thread

[AlexThePalex]

I also enjoy your dumpster diving adventures-probably because I have done the same.

Scavenging, recycling, repurposing ... yes. Dumpster diving ... no. We don't even have dumpsters here anymore. Normal garbage goes into big underground containers you can't access. And for big garbage like this you make an appointment with the city recycle company and they come pick it up. This time I just recycled it before they did. It is amazing how with a few tools you can make old stuff new again.

and making very good use of the lockdown.

Gotta do something, and it's the only thing I can do right now.

But, hrm.. your sanders are dusty [scared] [tongue]

It's what they do ... make dust. And they're all close to 15 years old by now. All that dust is like a medal for their accomplishments.

A knight in shining armour .... it is shining because he never did battle.

 

[AlexThePalex]

Front window primed.



And the door.



Have to fix a miter like this.



Time to make all the plinths white too. Got a bit industrial here. A painting station and a storage area.

 

[Bob D.]

That's man glitter, not dust.  [big grin]

 

[Imemiter]

By the way, I was sanding in the living room today with 180 grit paper on the DS 400, and an odd effect occured. Made a video of it. Shows why it is important that you can dial the suction of your vac down.

I am just holding the hose to prevent it from wandering off, the sander is stuck to the ceiling all by itself.

Is there anything the DTS 400 can't do?

 

[AlexThePalex]

Is there anything the DTS 400 can't do?

Iron your clothes?

 

[FestitaMakool]

Alex, in the army we polish our boots, every day, even more than once a day - and we proudly force our boot trough snow, slushy snow, sand, soil, mud, water... then we polish again.

Imagine, your sanders, reaching for them in their cosy home in each systainer.. 15 years, still looking good after countless hours of hard work, scratches are memories [wink]  [big grin] [big grin]

- Will you do the windows in gloss finish?

 

[AlexThePalex]

Alex, in the army we polish our boots, every day, even more than once a day - and we proudly force our boot trough snow, slushy snow, sand, soil, mud, water... then we polish again.

Like I said ... knights in shining armour never seen battle. Please show me your boots after 15 months of heavy shelling in the trenches.

Imagine, your sanders, reaching for them in their cosy home in each systainer.. 15 years, still looking good after countless hours of hard work, scratches are memories [wink] [big grin] [big grin]

I don't have to imagine, that's exactly how it is now. They simply look dashing.

- Will you do the windows in gloss finish?

Yes.

 

[FestitaMakool]

Haha, good Alex - Well, I like shiny paint, even that applied with a brush. Keeps the man in charge of preparation on his toes [big grin]

 

[AlexThePalex]

I haven't posted for a while, but I have been busy.

I got a new-to-me kitchen which I got for free from some very nice people. They bought a new house and planned to extend the existing kitchen. So the old kitchen, which was still in a very good shape, had to go and they put it up for free on marktplaats. Out of many reactions, I was the lucky one. He liked my plan, he said. You sounded like you knew what you're doing.

So I went to pick it up with my cousin who has a Landrover and a trailer the size of a semi.

Here it is after a long day's work to take it apart and drive it over to my place.



But of course, first the old kitchen had to go. It was nothing fancy, a 47 year old countertop and some newer cabinets I made when I was around 22. It did break my heart to have to demolish it, but yeah, the new kitchen is much nicer and came with some nice equipment the old one didn't have.

The old one is still in perfect shape though, after 27 years. I only re-painted the doors 3 years ago.







I had to cut an extra slot in the tiles to accommodate the new countertop, which was longer.



And everything removed.



I had to install a new socket for the gas stove and the dish washer. I like the dishwasher, this saves me tons of time.



Everything gone, slot cut, and ready to accept the new kitchen.

 

[AlexThePalex]

First thing I had to do was to fix the cabinet that was right under the sink. Due to leakage, the back and bottom were totally rotten. The sink can be placed only in one place, right under the faucet, so this cabinet decides how I can place the rest.



I cut out the bad boards, cut all the old dowels flush, drilled holes for new dowels, cut a new bottom board to size, and glued it together.

 

[AlexThePalex]

I thought long and hard about the proper way to optimise the cabinets I had. The original kitchen had a different lay-out from mine, and more cabinets than I could fit. Yet I wanted to use most of it, and of course the equipment like the dishwasher, oven and stove. There was also a cooking-air-away-sucker [tongue] but I can't place it yet. Ok, I don't know how it's called in english and have no lust to google for it now.

The stove must be on top of the gas pipe, and the dishwasher near the sink for the drain. So I thought, lets put the oven on the right. This maximed the space I could use, with only a small gap left on the right and the left.







It was a bit more difficult for the other wall though, the combination of cabinets I had left didn't really fit very well. The top row of hanging cabinets could only fit two, while I had three, and the bottom row looks ok like this, but now the oven can't open. I would really like to use the drawer unit. I decided to cut the unit with the two doors in half, and attach one half to the drawer unit. This left me with the exact size to make sure the oven could still open.

For the top row, I added the third cabinet but had to cut out a corner to accommodate the column in the kitchen there.

 

[Sparktrician]

Alex, it looks like access to the oven is blocked by the cabinets on the right.  How do you plan to address this? 

Also, the "cooking-air-away-sucker" as you call it, is called an exhaust hood. 

Maybe this is a job for Alexangelo...  [big grin]

 

[AlexThePalex]

I made one cabinet out of two. I like the drawers, I want those. I can fit one door next to it. So I cut the cabinet with two doors in half, and then attached one half to the drawer cabinet.

Dowel time. Unfortunately I don't have a fancy Domino for this. I don't do this type of joining often enough to warrant an expensive Domino. I get by with my little dowel jig. All you need is the guide, a drill bit of the proper size, a depth stop for the bit, and some pointy dowel helpers.



Place the guide on the side of the board to drill straight holes.



Insert the pointy helper thingies.



And then press the board on to the joining board. The points are pressed into the board so you can see where you have to drill your counter hole.



Drill the holes, insert the dowels with glue, and push it all together. This method is not very precise, sometimes a hole is a bit off and you have to enlarge it a bit.





I cut off a little piece of the sides so I could place the cabinet closer to the wall. I closed the exposed inside of the melamine board with a bit of iron-on edge banding. You can cut it flush with the orange knife that's especially designed for this.



Well, I made a booboo. The door and drawers overlap. Shouldn't have used a single board in the middle. I hadn't thought of that. Back to the drawing board.

I have a designer friend who would probably call this a feature.





I took it apart again, by gently cutting the dowels with the MultiMaster and a very thin blade. The cuts will never be seen they are on the bottom or hidden by a drawer. Then I added a second board in the middle.



And now it all fits the way I want. Maximum space used, and the oven door can open fully.

I don't have a proper 32 mm counter top for this part, I'll have to use an old 28 mm table top for now. I will replace that later on.

 

[AlexThePalex]

Alex, it looks like access to the oven is blocked by the cabinets on the right. How do you plan to address this?

Also, the "cooking-air-away-sucker" as you call it, is called an exhaust hood.

Maybe this is a job for Alexangelo... [big grin]

Yeah, I was still fiting it all together in that picture.

See reply #192 for Alexangelo's solution.

 

[FestitaMakool]

Well done and looking good Alex!
There must be a hefty ton on space and storage improvement.

And, your way of having the faucet on the wall gave me instantly the idea of doing the same when I do my kitchen. That’s rather extremely rare to see in a kitchen here.

 

[DeformedTree]

I haven't posted for a while, but I have been busy.

Un-acceptable, you have left us without the ability to discuss Netherlands building practices for months.  [sad]

[attachimg=4]

Soooo,  how did this setup work, where is the trap and where is the vent pipe?

I see in your new setup, you have a trap, though it looks like an S trap and no vent pipe.

 

[AlexThePalex]

Thanks Festita.

Actually, the storage space is not that much of an improvement because there are a dishwasher and an oven now where I previously had spacious cabinets.

As for the faucet, you still see them often here, but they're a bit old school. This is how it was original made in 1938, but modern kitchens mostly have them coming out of the sink or counter top.

This sink also had a faucet in it originally, but I obviously could not use that and had to plug the hole.

 

[AlexThePalex]

[attachimg=4]

Soooo,  how did this setup work, where is the trap and where is the vent pipe?

I see in your new setup, you have a trap, though it looks like an S trap and no vent pipe.

Errrr ...... wut?

 

[DeformedTree]

pic did not work.  The original sink setup shows no trap or vent pipe, it just has the 2 sinks join together and go into a pipe.  No trap, no vent. Maybe something is missing in the angle of the photo.

But the new one, you have a trap in there, but it's an S trap, looks to have no Trap arm to make it a P trap (legal), but still no vent pipe.  Is there some sort of wet vent going on here, or additional plumbing under the floor?

Maybe we have different terms, but I would pretty sure plumbing of this sort of thing is pretty universal.

 

[AlexThePalex]

The original sink setup shows no trap or vent pipe, it just has the 2 sinks join together and go into a pipe. No trap, no vent. Maybe something is missing in the angle of the photo.

But the new one, you have a trap in there, but it's an S trap, looks to have no Trap arm to make it a P trap (legal), but still no vent pipe. Is there some sort of wet vent going on here, or additional plumbing under the floor?

The old set up was just fine, the angle of the picture made it impossible to see the S-trap. We call it a Swan's Neck (zwanenhals) or sifon.



The new one is also fine, it keeps the water barrier very well.



I do find the new one ridiculously designed. It has no less than 16 screw connections in it. That means 16 places to leak. As I described above, the cabinet under the sink was wasted because of leakage. Well, duh!

The drain I made in my old kitchen only had two screw connections. Not a single drop of water leaked there in 27 years.

We don't generally use plumbing vents here in houses.