Summer has past and Progress Continues

Time and Money have been the drive for the Summer. Because Cherie and I had the Summer to our advantage we took advantage of doing a good amount of our own work and save some money. If you have the time, you can save some money. There we also some unexpected surprises that came up.

Since the last post on the exterior we installed the a front concrete porch, a rear concrete stamped patio on the West and pavers for the front walk to the house. We thank good friend Rob Bottensek for doing a super job on the paver and helping with design. We also put final finishes on the storm drainage and septic system to get it fully functional for the up coming Winter/ Spring move in.

On the interior we installed an trimmed all the electric, framed the mud room, Demoed the unwanted walls and finished in the garage and finished pouring the self leveling topping int he crawl and rebuilt the sump pump pit to minimize moisture with in the house.

Unexpected delays is the HVAC contractor abandoned the job. Workmanship was poor and mistakes were made to the point I asked for the work to be corrected. I have to thank nephew Joey and Nick for taking a Saturday and correcting the substandard work. Unfortunately, the contractor also installed the wrong insulation on the main ductwork running in the unconditioned space. Due to the fact that the clearances were very tight to begin with, the change from R4 to R8 made it that much harder. We had a rough basic inspection by Tom our LEED Rater to help point out the good and bad installations of the HVAC contractor (and have it corrected).

Going forward we have a new HVAC contractor on board and Plumber to help finish the roughs and get to drywall in the next couple weeks. The drywallers and stair guys have been patiently waiting to move in and do their work.

The exterior property continues to be a burden and a blessing. We had hundreds of tomatoes and cherry tomatoes, zucchini, green peppers, green beans, cucumber for a fun summer crop. That was twice as much as last year. In the fall we were blessed with 1500 pears from our single pear tree. Cherie and I were able to share our harvest with friends, co-workers and and still give two big bushels to the two local food pantries of 92 lbs. We hope to give more next year. Landscaper's cut the grass this summer and the driveway went for a second patching and seal coating by hand (to prolong the life). Still leaves, branches, weeds and general cleanup takes 1/2 - 1 day a week to keep up.

May Mechanicals/ Water Returns/ LEED Incorporates

March and April came in with a splash. Although the sump pump had not run for 8 months, the winter thaw and rain found it's way back into one wall of the crawl space. Although the new self leveling topping reduced the risk of hydrostatic seepage trough the mud slab, the intersections at the floor still provides a weak point for water to find its way in. Water stop has been utilize to help plug the holes. A dehumidfier and fans help keep the area as dry as possible. On the exterior, a vertical trench/ curtian drain and additional sump pit was installed to capture water at 18" deep, which was finding its way into the new driveway stone and under the garage. Although the basement has drain tile inside at the footing, the crawl space does not.

LEED elements starting showing up. Low VOC Adhesives, Material cut-off reuse wood pile, Recycling, and protection of ductwork.
A marker board at the entry is used for logging hours and remind people of the basics of LEED for homes rules. Each contractor is breifed on what they need to do to meet compliance.

Framing and reinforcement of the existing structure continues, while HVAC and Plumbing are beginning installation. Its expected that the house will be near drywall installation at the end of May. Cabinets start fabrication at teh end of this month.

Spring brought beautiful flower into the west garden to be enjoyed during break time.

With the rain came growing grass and the hassle of maintain 5 acres. Although future plans is to incorporate native prarie grasses, this year the lawn is going to remain the same so finishing the house is kept as the focus. During permit review question were brought up about our property was in a a wetlands. Although the McHenry County GIS map reflected a wetlands foot print, a paid inspection to the Storm Water Management Person determine that the wetland indicated was not present when pyhsically inspected by the county. The next task is contacting the Army Corp of Engineer to make a correction to thier master GIS map for future reference for the new mortgage. The good news is the interor permit was approved as result of the stormwater inspection.

Rear NE Corner shot looking Southwest of yard after cutting the grass in the back.

West Gardern

Craw space with seepage. Cross indicate leaks. There nothing satanic going on here or grave. It was just markings by Mike on the wall.


The curtian drain installation along the West side of the driveway has helpped relieve pressure. We thinking there is a farmer drain tile comming from the adjacent neightbor to the West (but can't find it yet). Were still looking and waiting for the next storm to test our solutions. This continues to be our biggest unknown right now.

May is dedicated to finsihing the plumbing Pex water piping and installing the electric on the second floor. Much of the electric outlet on the first floor is existing and will remain. First floor ceiling light of LED's will be installed this month. Temporary electric provides light at night.

Glad Feburary is over - Mechanicals to start

February of 2011 will be remembered as the 3rd Largest Blizzard in Chicago history and a pipe burst flood in the little accessory building.

Very old temps, bad weather and a small 3" flood during January and February limited working in the house to just the weekends. The February bizzard stopped work for the weekend. Drifts went as high as 5 feet at the door of the pull barn. Thank god for the snow blower that powered right through the 22" of snow on 450' for driveway in a little over 3 hours. The hard part was getting out of our current driveway and getting to Woodstock. It took 4 hours to dig out the 60 foot driveway in Carpentersville.

Since the house was fully insulated with the 1st layer of insulation, the bitter cold was kept out and temps stayed near 32 degrees or warmer in the basement and cold at levels going up. The bad news is the closed cell foam kept cold temps trapped inside the house when the weather turned warmer outside. Electric heaters provided some heat during the months to get temps to about 40 degrees inside. Since the moisture issues had temporally vanished, the sump pump has not run in 6 months , and environment was dry, we focused on installing hanging shop lights in the crawl space area and installing self-leveling concrete flooring over the vapor barrier and the cracked and broken mud floor. The objective was to provide a full seal of the crawl space cracks and provide a smooth surface for future storage. We used two products (Mapei quick setting self leveling underlayment cement mix and QuickCrete Self -leveling concrete mix). At $27.00 a bag for the Mapei it got expensive to do the 1st 1/3 of the crawl. Mike took a trip to the Home Builders Show in Orlando and found a Quickcrete product for almost 1/2 the price. We found that purchasing a 1/2 skid of 32 bags saved $2.00 per bag.. See photos of the finished product.

Brother Steve and Friend Rob help with the mixing and pouring. Doing a such large area, if I'd do it again, I think I would use the 12 set product, because in 5 gallon buckets the product set up too quickly (in 15 minutes)and was hard to feather into other pours in a large space. Se we had a few ripples. Rob was helpful in starting the old furnace. I had replaced a controller board, fixed a stuck inducer, repaired wires and installed a replacement igniter module, and BAM!, we had temporary heat.

We have finalized our interior remodeling permit and submitted for our drawings after meeting with the Plumbing inspector on-site. I really appreciate his feedback on my questions. Septic system drawings were approved and ready to start.

Drawings were completed. Bid came back for the HVAC and Geothermal. We found price for Geothermal to be extremely high even with a 30% tax credit. It appeared to me that Geothermal Contractors are asking a premium for their work and absorbing the tax rebate. The cost payback was not just not there when you weigh the high cost of Geothermal to high- efficiency natural gas furnace. Even if the systems were the same price wit the credit, the 30% tax credit is something you have to get back from the government off each years taxes (for up to 7 years). As a result you have to pay out the subcontractor an extra 30%. Money really is not in the budget. I selected to go with Carrier gas Infinity multi-stage furnaces and AC setup. Bid from residential HVAC contractors were commonly incomplete or inaccurate. Only one contractor of 4 followed the scope. contractor will start as soon as we get the permit.

Plumbing has been selected to be a PEX piping system. The biggest advantage is that the homeowner can do the work and save on labor. A major advantage of PEX over copper is that piping is more resistant to freezing, and not loosing heat energy from a metal pipe. A recent water test showed the PH of our water to be 7.49 (which is near identical to city of Chicago water). The balance of the testing is being done by a water softener company. We are serious considering not utilizing a softener and sticking with a no salt solution and a good filter system. Electric is going to be only a partial conduit system. Main home runs and existing electric will be conduit, however the balance of the wiring with be rope wire and have a license electrician to do the final connections. The existing electrical panel was replaced with a new properly grounded electrical panel by a union electric an.

Furring out the perimeter stud walls is taking place with Cherie, Steve and Nate while we are waiting for our permit review to be complete. The furring will allow perimeter wiring to be done and the 2nd layer batt to be installed over the closed cell foam to get a R-27 wall resistance value. Ceiling deign is R-49 flash & batt (sloped) and batt and blown insulation (flat ceiling). The county has been more cooperative now that they have seen that substantial time and effort is being taken to correct items from the past owner and taking extra steps to assure our home is well above building codes and standard for energy use.

Security cameras with remote access and an alarm system with was installed this week to keep unwanted visitor recorded and from entering the project. last thing we want is for someone to destroy our hard work. No valuable equipment or material is kept on-site.

I expect all mechanicals be completed by the end of March and Drywall to start first week in April. LEED for Homes scorecard and points will be shared on the next post. It was selecting points and assigning there cost ramifications to our overall budget.