Project Basement - concrete cont'd

This is a challenging shot to explain. This is taken with the camera sticking out the back door to the outside. The plywood is leaning at a 65 or 70 degree angle against the back of the house, protecting the new concrete steps from getting wet. The concrete you can see in the photo is the top of the stairs and the first actual stair. The wood on the bottom-right of the photo is plywood covering the remaining stairs and actually is more for security than anything else - making it so no one can slip into the basement from the outside.

Mike and Edgar will be back on Monday to remove all the forms, which will be cool. Our new windows also arrived and are leaning up against the back of the house. There are 6: 4 for downstairs and 2 on the main floor for our bedroom and wombat's room. Not sure when those'll be installed.

After Monday, Mad Dog Remodeling will take a week-long break to allow the concrete to set. They'll be back on Monday 2/13 to get the house jacked up & level, and then we'll be back to the races. 

Project Basement - Concrete cont'd

I think this is a cool shot - this is taken with the camera sticking in the top of the concrete forms - that gray stuff is concrete and the wood on the left is the form itself. 

Project Basement - Concrete!

This shot is facing east towards the interior (right) and exterior (background left) doors. The dark/light contrast on the floor is the new concrete! You can see the forms on the left side of the house; those are full of concrete and Mad Dog only had two cracks in the forms, which given the amount of material is pretty excellent. They were minor cracks and were easily patched/repaired.

Mike & Edgar worked from 7:30am through lunch to 5 yesterday; Mike had worked till 7:30pm the night before. The steps to the outside are my favorite part - Mike did such a great job on those but unfortunately this picture series won't do them much justice because they're covered.

Project Basement - Week 3 cont'd

Looking east on the south side of the house. You can see the temporary walls having been framed in. If you follow the walls down to the floor, you'll see three dark rectangles - those are the holes in the slab where 10" thick concrete will be poured for pads for the permanent walls for the house. They're also going to be used to jack up the house to be level. As such, once the concrete is poured, Mike will be off the project for a week to let everything dry nice & hard. Then he'll be back to work & hopefully the real fun should start; once the house is level, they'll start officially framing. Stay tuned... 

Project Basement - Week 3 cont'd

This picture is taken with the back door behind me - facing west. As you can see, Mike has framed in the temporary walls to hold up the 5-7" of new concrete width and 36-48" of new concrete height. He's got about 2/3 of the walls all done in prep for concrete to be poured Friday. 

Project Basement - Week 3

Yesterday and today were spent cutting concrete and framing in the forms for the concrete that'll be poured this Friday. Yesterday Mike went through two tanks of gas on the 2-cycle concrete saw, so needless to say, Heidi and I came home to a house that smelled the part. It's really an interesting scent. :-P

In any case, the picture here is facing the back door. As you can see, Mike has cut down to the slab - that dark stuff below the door is dirt. At the end of the project, the door will be level with the ground & there will be steps from the outside that bring you down level with the foundation. They'll be tying in a drain from the base of the new concrete steps outside with the drain inside the house which ends conveniently just a foot to the right of the door - literally perfect.

I believe Mike will take care of the outside digging and framing in the steps tomorrow and/or Thursday, as well as the remaining walls inside.