Down with the old & Up with the new

[rvieceli]

[member=44099]Cheese[/member]

How is it going? Stuck waiting on deliveries? Cold making things unworkable? We got above 30 and sunny today so I managed to get the shop to slightly above 50.  [scared]

Hoping you are making some progress.

Ron

 

[jonnyrocket]

Hijack alert!

Snip

…it rather reminds me of Oregon in the summer...now that's even more depressing.

Now hold on [member=44099]Cheese[/member] …I’ve lived here in Oregon for 20 summers. While it’s possible that you may have experienced more than me due to the difference in age wisdom between us, I will say that from May to October, Oregon is a dream! It’s the other months of the year that are grey and gloomy. I’m specifically referring to the Portland metro area. If one were talking about the eastern or central OR areas, they get as many days of blue sky as the Colorado, Utah, or Idaho areas.

/End_Hijack

 

[Cheese]

Hijack alert!

Now hold on [member=44099]Cheese[/member] …I’ve lived here in Oregon for 20 summers. While it’s possible that you may have experienced more than me due to the difference in age wisdom between us, I will say that from May to October, Oregon is a dream! It’s the other months of the year that are grey and gloomy. I’m specifically referring to the Portland metro area. If one were talking about the eastern or central OR areas, they get as many days of blue sky as the Colorado, Utah, or Idaho areas.

/End_Hijack

Well [member=66966]jonnyrocket[/member] , I fully anticipated some blow-back from my comments but I expected it to be sooner rather than later. What took you so long?  [poke] [poke] [smile]

I've visited Oregon for pleasure and for business and it always seems to be "partly cloudy and drizzle".

However, from the business aspect, I spent a lot of time at Intel & Microchip which necessarily led me to some great restaurants/bars.
One of the BEST experiences I had and still fondly remember is a restaurant that offered a fresh oyster plate that offered 6 different types of fresh oysters. Really?... fresh oysters that taste different than another fresh oyster...well I took the bait and was stunned at the differences in taste. To this day, that experience is still eye opening to me.  [not worthy]

 

[Cheese]

[member=44099]Cheese[/member]

How is it going? Stuck waiting on deliveries? Cold making things unworkable? We got above 30 and sunny today so I managed to get the shop to slightly above 50.  [scared]

Hoping you are making some progress.

Ron

Hi Ron...the recent cold wave is making garage life difficult  [smile] too little insulation and too little LP gas does make for a terrible combination. Before the cold wave hit, raising the garage temp by 20º was a simple 30 minute process, now it's a 4 hour process. I've decided to shut down for the recent duration of the cold wave, it's just too expensive.
The good news is that I've been able to attack some of those projects that have been languishing for the last year...such as updated LED lighting and bathroom upgrades.

Insulation, or lack-there-of is my largest problem in the garage. It's too cold to heat which means it's too cold to insulate which means it's too cold to heat...it's an endless do loop. On a positive note, there appears to be a warm up in the next couple of days and that's my time to strike.

This lull in the action has also presented me with viewing many options for heat in the upstairs living area, some of which are very interesting. More to come on this subject, not a big fan of the staple-up process as you're working against gravity...work with gravity...it is your friend.

 

[rvieceli]

[member=44099]Cheese[/member] Yup we've been doing low single digits since last weekend, warmed up a bit and now back down for this weekend.

you might want to consider an old school solution for your heat upstairs. Hot water baseboard heat. Our small house was built in 1912 and originally had coal fired stoves. In the late fifties they put in a natural gas boiler and baseboard radiators. Works great.

Ours is a slant/fin product and they have pretty consistently been one of the industry leaders.
https://www.slantfinbaseboard.com/Products

Ron

 

[mino]

Hi Ron...the recent cold wave is making garage life difficult  [smile] too little insulation and too little LP gas does make for a terrible combination. Before the cold wave hit, raising the garage temp by 20º was a simple 30 minute process, now it's a 4 hour process. I've decided to shut down for the recent duration of the cold wave, it's just too expensive.
The good news is that I've been able to attack some of those projects that have been languishing for the last year...such as updated LED lighting and bathroom upgrades.

Insulation, or lack-there-of is my largest problem in the garage. It's too cold to heat which means it's too cold to insulate which means it's too cold to heat...it's an endless do loop. On a positive note, there appears to be a warm up in the next couple of days and that's my time to strike.
...

A garage that is to be workable needs same or better insulation than the house. FOr a new garage, giving it some nice 15-20cm of insulation should be a non-issue. You can easily make another layer of an outer or inner shell from non-structural timber. THat said, having some thermal mass helps a lot (I know, this is a foreign term in the US, but, still it does help).

Were I to face such a problem (assuming my slab had proper insulation below it), I would look to put a non-stucture brick or, better, sand-brick wall on the inside to give the structure some accumulation capability. That helps also in the summer as it does not allow the bulding to overheat so easily.

You probably know 99% of that .. so just in case.
[cool]

 

[Cheese]

You probably know 99% of that .. so just in case.

Some good thoughts Mino as the EU communities are typically 4-5 years ahead of the US. That doesn't mean they're smarter...but most certainly less prejudiced.  [big grin]

For the thermal mass you mention Mino, the garage floor is 26' x 28' poured concrete containing chopped fiberglass strands and 4" to 5" thick with a 12" thick footing and covered with a single row of concrete block around the perimeter. The garage floor is insulated/separated from the earth with 2 each layers of 2" thick 25 psi Styrofoam rated at R10 for each layer. All the seams of each layer of Styrofoam are taped to preserve the vapor barrier characteristics and each layer is offset by 18" so that none of the vertical seams line up.

On top of the insulation I stapled on 3 runs of 1/2" Pex tubing with each run being approximately 150' long. On top of the Pex is 1/2" tied rebar and on top of that is some square mesh reinforcement.

The footing contains both 1/2" & 5/8" tied rebar.

The exposed concrete block and footings are covered in 2" thick Styrofoam. Once I get the hydronic heat up & running, I think this slab will produce a lot of thermal emissivity.

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[attachimg=5]

 

[Cheese]

Took a while to find this thread...sheesh embarrassed as hell as I started it.  [eek]

So...I'm reinforcing the trusses today to eliminate some of the sponginess felt when walking across the loft floor because 7/8" subfloor is needed to span 30" as opposed to the 3/4" stuff.

At that point I noticed that the subfloor that came together at the corners was probably 1/8" proud...just the corners & not the rest of the sub floor. I decided to take the LHS 2 225 with some 80 grit Granat to the juncture.

Incredible...it took the high spot down immediately without all of the drama of when you use a belt sander.  I know Festool doesn't recommend this application but I fail to see why this isn't a viable option for some flooring/decking issues. I'm thinking about using the Planex for sanding issues other than what Festool recommends.

 

[rmwarren]

Been waiting for a new episode to drop... [popcorn]

RE the spongy floor, if the issue is the deck material thickness, rather than reinforce the truss, would it make sense to double up the subfloor by laminating another 3/4" from below between the trusses? Construction adhesive and fasteners so in that bay you'd have 1-1/2" thick subfloor?

If the trusses are flexing this probably wouldn't help.

RMW

 

[Cheese]

Been waiting for a new episode to drop... [popcorn]

RE the spongy floor, if the issue is the deck material thickness, rather than reinforce the truss, would it make sense to double up the subfloor by laminating another 3/4" from below between the trusses? Construction adhesive and fasteners so in that bay you'd have 1-1/2" thick subfloor?

If the trusses are flexing this probably wouldn't help.

RMW

Thanks for the suggestion [member=8712]Richard/RMW[/member] as well as a shout-out to [member=297]Michael Kellough[/member] and [member=3192]rvieceli[/member] for their input also.

My original idea was to try adding a single 2x4 set on edge, below the subfloor, perpendicular to the lower truss chord and screwed and glued (PL 400) to the subfloor and truss. This would support the middle of the DuraStrand panel because it was at the 24" dimension that the flex was the worst.

Originally I was going to let the PL 400 set overnight and then test it the next day...well my curiosity got the better of me and about 20 minutes later I tested the reinforced area. OMG...what a difference, at that point the increased structural integrity was so apparent that I decided to fix the remaining areas.

That was the good news, the bad news is the next day when I walked the floor the spongy locations were now the T&G joint between the 3/4" DuraStrand sheets. I never thought that would be a problem as during installation the T&G seam is glued with what appears to be a polyurethane glue and the panels are driven home with a maul & board to drive the T&G into a tight fit.

For the seam issue I decided to place a 2x4 width-wise across the seam and screw & glue on both sides of the seam.

[attachimg=1]

 

[mino]

For the thermal mass you mention Mino, the garage floor is 26' x 28' poured concrete containing chopped fiberglass strands and 4" to 5" thick with a 12" thick footing and covered with a single row of concrete block around the perimeter. The garage floor is insulated/separated from the earth with 2 each layers of 2" thick 25 psi Styrofoam rated at R10 for each layer. All the seams of each layer of Styrofoam are taped to preserve the vapor barrier characteristics and each layer is offset by 18" so that none of the vertical seams line up.

On top of the insulation I stapled on 3 runs of 1/2" Pex tubing with each run being approximately 150' long. On top of the Pex is 1/2" tied rebar and on top of that is some square mesh reinforcement.

The footing contains both 1/2" & 5/8" tied rebar.

The exposed concrete block and footings are covered in 2" thick Styrofoam. Once I get the hydronic heat up & running, I think this slab will produce a lot of thermal emissivity.

Nice. Thanks for the pics!

As compared to how it is done "over here":
- the wall foundations would be deeper, below freezing depth which is about 1 meter over here .. but your is not a brick house, so not really applicable
- the slab would be poured onto about 6-8" of non-load-bearing insulation, the whole slab would "be one" with the foundation "rim" and stand on it, not on the insulation
- the slab and wall foundations would contain about 10x more rebar than your setup, needed as the slabs here are designed as "unsupported" in the centers
- the slab would be lower and, once completed, there would be below-floor-heating insulation - comparable to yours - with about 3" flooring concrete poured over it, the flooring concrete slab would be "floating" on the insualation inside the room, would not be connected to the walls

Rest would be mostly the same (assuming timber framing, over here we would use autoclaved concrete or hollow bricks).

As for your setup:
What I would do differently, assuming the general outline being same, is to take the concrete bricks to 3 or 4 layers high and use more insulation on the outside of them which would continue above the bricks level - 6" or so.
The wall insulation inside the cavities would use 6" or 8" walls or additional 4" of insualtion inside a secondary/supporting framing cavity.

But that is very climate-dependent. Over here we have - 20 C casually during the winters, so buildings are made to be heatable comfortably up to - 25 C.

 

[Cheese]

Still pretty high on using the Planex in unconventional situations. I did some more sub-floor sanding tonight and it really is pleasant. I'll typically use a belt sander to true-up sub floors or a Rotex, but both of those tools keep you kneeling on the floor resting on your knees. The Planex is a standing, walk-around situation, so easy and so pleasant.

I used 80 grit Granat and that works well, however if speed is the need, then go to 60 or 40 Granat. That would start to approach the speed of a belt sander.

The 80 grit Granat does provide an extremely smooth surface, smoother than you'd think. I sanded over 300 sq ft of sub floor in less than 1 hour.

I'm thinking there are more sanding opportunities for the Planex in the future. Festool presents it as a one-trick pony but I think it's more capable than that. It is after all a RO sander, just a bit larger than usual.

I think the reason Festool does not recommend using the Planex for floors or decks is because it has a tendency to pick up shards/slivers of wood and place them between the Granat paper and the backing pad.
So after 10 minutes of use, shut it off, look at the pad, remove the slivers and then move on. The pads are consumables and I used a single 80 grit Granat disc for over 300 sq feet of area.

That same disc will be used tomorrow for other tasks.  [big grin]

 

[peter halle]

I would suggest that anyone who is working with trusses and decides to make alterations or repairs to such to consult with a structural engineer.  The design of the trusses is dependent on the interaction of the entire system.  Alterations or repairs in one area can cause issues or worse in other areas.

Peter

 

[rmwarren]

Still pretty high on using the Planex in unconventional situations. I did some more sub-floor sanding tonight and it really is pleasant. I'll typically use a belt sander to true-up sub floors or a Rotex, but both of those tools keep you kneeling on the floor resting on your knees. The Planex is a standing, walk-around situation, so easy and so pleasant.

I used 80 grit Granat and that works well, however if speed is the need, then go to 60 or 40 Granat. That would start to approach the speed of a belt sander.

The 80 grit Granat does provide an extremely smooth surface, smoother than you'd think. I sanded over 300 sq ft of sub floor in less than 1 hour.

I'm thinking there are more sanding opportunities for the Planex in the future. Festool presents it as a one-trick pony but I think it's more capable than that. It is after all a RO sander, just a bit larger than usual.

I think the reason Festool does not recommend using the Planex for floors or decks is because it has a tendency to pick up shards/slivers of wood and place them between the Granat paper and the backing pad.
So after 10 minutes of use, shut it off, look at the pad, remove the slivers and then move on. The pads are consumables and I used a single 80 grit Granat disc for over 300 sq feet of area.

That same disc will be used tomorrow for other tasks.  [big grin]

Creative use [member=44099]Cheese[/member] got me thinking. I had to sand down a treated wood deck a few years ago and rented a floor sander from HD, used belts. Granted the deck needed major work due to an overzealous treatment with the power washer by my queen and the FIL. We have around 700SF of deck and I wrangled that critter around for ~6-8 hours total over 2 days, afterwards it took a week for the aches to subside. Felt like I’d spent a week wrestling bulls @ NFR.

I doubt Planex is up to that job but this year I need to do a light sanding before giving it another coat of stain. Still, guessing an outdoor deck is a different challenge than newly installed OSB. I’ll probably rent a floor disk sander this time.

Given your experience, how far would you push the Planex?

RMW

 

[Cheese]

I doubt Planex is up to that job but this year I need to do a light sanding before giving it another coat of stain. Still, guessing an outdoor deck is a different challenge than newly installed OSB. I’ll probably rent a floor disk sander this time.

Given your experience, how far would you push the Planex?

RMW

Richard, at least 20 years ago I helped a neighbor remove paint from his Sky Blue ( [eek]) painted deck. He rented the typical 16" (Clarke?) diameter floor disc sander and remembering back on that experience, the actual sanding task really wasn't much different than using the Planex. What was different is the larger area that can be sanded and you also need to control the sander by keeping it flat on the surface. I became involved in the project because of my previous experiences in buffing floors.

Most of the deck boards were fairly flat but I gave him the job of hand sanding/scraping the cupped ones because the large diameter disc only sanded the outer edges. In that situation the Planex would probably work out better.

The large disc sander needs to be "driven" otherwise it will take you for a ride. The Planex on the other hand, because of the gimbaled head, always stays flat on the deck surface and is really a pleasure to use. It really is a simple walk-behind, one hand guidance affair.

Tool Nirvana sells 5-packs or custom assortment packs of paper. They also offer Saphir in 24 & 36 grit, I don't need that but I will probably order up some 40 & 60 grit Granat.
https://www.toolnirvana.com/collections/sander-accessories-abrasives-225mm-8-1-2

 

[rvieceli]

[member=8712]Richard/RMW[/member] If your deck just needs a little bit, you might want to consider a rotary floor buffer with either a non-woven stripping pad or a sanding screen. Depending on who you know you may be able to borrow one.
https://www.virginiaabrasives.com/products/mesh-screen-discs/large-discs

Ron

 

[rmwarren]

[member=44099]Cheese[/member] [member=3192]rvieceli[/member] I got learned on a rotary buffer just out of high school, polishing floors in a hospital on graveyard. My recollection is you lift up or push down to put a little pressure on the forward or rear edge of the disk and it shoots sideways into the nearest wall.

I’m assuming the disk sander works the same way, hadn’t considered the issue of cupped boards though. I think I knocked most of that off when I belted it last time.

Cheese, do you rent your Planex?

RMW

 

[peter halle]

Re the Planex for sanding wooden floors, if you watch the Festool live where the 3 models of Planex are compared Sedge does mention floor sanding for the random orbit models.  It struck me as strange whereas I had asked that question when the first Planex came out.

 

[Cheese]

Cheese, do you rent your Planex?

No Richard I purchased it from Festool Recon, I didn't want to repeat my past foibles by sanding rooms out with an ETS EC 125 and an HSK 80 x 130.  [doh]  I figured a 26' x 28' room with an upstairs was worthy of the investment along with a vac.

Besides, there is no-one in the Twin Cities that I know that rents Festool equipment.

The Planex from Festool Recon looked like it was brand new but there was a certain amount of residual white dust in various passages...tsk...tsk.

 

[Cheese]

Re the Planex for sanding wooden floors, if you watch the Festool live where the 3 models of Planex are compared Sedge does mention floor sanding for the random orbit models.  It struck me as strange whereas I had asked that question when the first Planex came out.

Thanks for that heads-up Peter, I do remember seeing something...somewhere, that stated that Festool didn't recommend the Planex to be used for what they termed "deck refinishing". I checked the latest Planex owners manual but to no avail...however that's a good thing.  [big grin]

It really is an easily guided, one-handed sander held at waist level to finish floor level substrates.  [big grin]  I'd never use it for flattening floors but for sanding between top coats it would be fine. Certainly easier than renting, hauling, returning similar equipment to perform the same task.
It rather reminds me of the Milwaukee SHARP-FIRE® floor installation screw gun manufactured by PAM in Germany that you also held at the waist and simply "walked the line" and screwed the sub-floor to the joint/truss structure. Easy peasy for both of these tools.  [big grin]

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