New faucets to start the year

Finally got some time to install a new kitchen and RO faucets. Here you can see the finished product. The RO faucet needed an air gap so I found this one with good reviews on Amazon.


Here are the original faucets. The kitchen faucet has a terrible design in that the handle just channels water down the back of the faucet when you go and turn it off with wet hands. Then the water just collects on the counter. You can see the water ring around the faucet.


Here's the RO faucet. It started rusting at the handle and would leak water every time you turn it on.


My working quarters. After moving all the plumbing drains etc. it actually wasn't too bad to work in.


Here's a closeup of the build up in the drain pipe just after the trap. I didn't expect this would be there. This is probably 10 years of build up.


You can see the old valve stop I removed plus the drain gunk. You just turn them counterclockwise while pulling and they come right off. I put in proper 1/4 turn valves.


Here's a closeup of the hard water buildup on the counter.


Here's after I removed the hard water with a razor blade scrapper. It makes easy work of the build up.

Kitchen modifications

Sabbatical is a great time to finish all the things that we were just too busy to do. First was adding some storage for all the cutting boards and bakeware. We bought these Copco storage racks from Crate and Barrel but you can find them a little bit cheaper at Amazon.


We had to go with these removable racks because our cabinet has an electrical box and conduit in it that prevents us from mounting something more permanent.


Here's the finished product. So much better.


Here's another project that we've been meaning to do since we moved into the house. Here are the existing garbage cans. Notice they are square in shape so they only hold 27 qt. Also, with this design you have to open the door all the way and then slide the cans out.


Here are the new cans. These are 35 qt each and the door mounts directly to the system so you only have to pull the door open and everything opens up. This is a Rev a Shelf storage solution. Fairly easy to install but you need to make sure you order the right version to fit your cabinet opening.

Finally the kitchen is done!

The kitchen is finally done. After replacing the microwave, fixing the garage door, and replacing the tilt door hardware, we are finally done. You can see the before and after photos below.

Before


After


Before


After

Woodshop 101

More work was done on the kitchen. This should have completed all of the remaining items except there were still problems. The new garage doesn't really roll up or down well and the tilt out drawer hits the other cabinet doors below. I also asked that they fix the trim around the fridge but nothing was really done. So instead I took matters into my own hands. You can see some of the handy work below. Basically the trim wasn't aligned with the cabinet and it moved when you closed the fridge. I added some metal brackets so that the trim would stay in place. Any craftsmen would probably think this was sacriligious to use metal with the wood but it's a good thing I'm not a craftsmen. All I know is that the trim looks nice and doesn't move now.

More Kitchen work....almost done.

Well the garage has finally been installed sort of. There's a chip on the door so they'll need to order a new one. This is like the 4th garage now. At least this time they won't need to remove the frame. They'll just install the roller part.

This time the appliances actually fit under the garage. It doesn't get any closer than that. Here was the 1st attempt.

They also put in some skins to hide the screw holes that they created with the undercab lights.

Action shot of shaving away some of the trim around the fridge since the fridge bulges out.

Weird seeing the fridge without the blue. Man you can really those those fingerprints.

One problem we had was getting the fridge to be sturdy. For some reason it would rock even after being leveled. So in order to stop it from moving, a little wood is used to wedge it in.

Here's the new false door. The old one looked like crap.

Day X. Finally a little more progress

We were just getting use to having a normal kitchen without any work going on. Some of the cabinet pieces that were damaged or missing have finally come in. Here you can see the filler pieces around the fridge. One thing that wasn't accounted for was the fridge bulges out a little so they need to trim the filler pieces a little more.

Here's what the area looked like before.




So it turns out that the granite hangover actually did have metal bars routed into the granite for extra support so the bars we had on were unnecessary. So as a result, we had them removed. I'm sure many knees are thanking us now. The drywall has also been fixed up and textured.

Day 28. Dishwasher and more handy work

Well all of the kitchen work is being put on hold during the holidays. Luckily they were able to finish up some items like installing the dishwasher. They finished installing the hardware and installed the glass on the upper cabs as well as the wall plates. They also made the trim by the wine cooler sturdier but that needed fixing. Keep reading for that one.

Here's the dishwasher. Overall it's a lot quieter than our old one but still a little noiser than what we expected. The model is the S series which we had changed to the U series since those are quieter but unfortunately the S series showed up. So instead of waiting another 2 wks or so for a U series dishwasher, we went ahead and installed this one.

Here's the end cabinet with the glass installed now.

So what you are looking at here is my handy work for securing the trim. Originally the workers had placed that extra bracing piece and secured it with liquid nails but the adhesive didn't hold it and it fell down. So instead I screwed that piece into the trim and then down into the block holding the lower trim. Then to hold the lower trim in place, I screwed the brace and the lower trim piece as well. Overall it's a lot more secure than what was there before.

Also, here I put extra tile down to level out the area so that the wine fridge could slide in and out very easily. Since I didn't have a tile cutter, I had to get creative with a hammer. Really they should have cut the tile and put thinset down to secure them but time was ticking in order for them to finish on Wed.

Day 26. Wine anyone?

Okay so the wine cooler has finally been installed. The trim piece to the right had to be altered to add a toe kick. Now the fridge is flush with the cabinet door. Now we just have to fill it. Charles Shaw anyone?

Here the glass door for the island book case is being mounted to the door frame. Hopefully the glass for the upper cabinet doors will be the right size this time.

Some of the earlier tile work had to be ripped up again because they didn't put in the base molding first. You can see the unfinished molding.

Here's some minor touchup on the ceiling. Hopefully tomorrow the tile will be grouted and the dishwasher will be installed.

Day 25. All Done....well almost

Well today was the day in which everything was supposed to be completed. Due to some unfortunate circumstances with the contractors, they were short one man. As a result, our kitchen has a few things that still need to be completed which hopefully most of which will be completed early next week. A few things such as cabinet trim and the appliance garage might take a little longer.

Well after 4 weeks we finally have lights in the kitchen again. Overall the lights are much better than the track lighting they replaced but we probably should have positioned them a little better. Oh well.
So besides the lights, most of the hardware was installed. We can finally start moving stuff back into the kitchen. The glass came for the upper cabinets but somehow they measured the openings wrong and the glass didn't fit. Also, the reeds in the glass were horizontal instead of vertical. Hopefully those will be in by next week as well.

Since they were a man down, I helped install the dimmer switches. I installed dimmers for the pendant, undercab, and recessed lights. Even after installing a dimmer for magnetic transformers, the transformer still hums.

Day 23. Appliances

Grout was added to the tile backsplash.

The appliances were finally installed. Now we can finally cook again after eating out for almost a month.

Day 22. Tile

Here's the tile backsplash minus the grout. It's a 3 x 6 beveled edge travertine.

If you look carefully, you'll notice the appliance garage is missing. A new one has been ordered and this time should be installed properly so that the appliances actually fit under the door.

Day 21. Can I have some water?

Finally after about 4 weeks, we have water in our kitchen sink. You can see our new Grohe faucet, air vacuum switch for the garbage disposal, and soap dispenser.

If you look closely, you can see our new appliance garage to hide things in. There's just one problem with it though.

Our appliances are just a tad too tall for it. Hopefully they'll be able to work something out so they fit.

Here you can see they fixed the microwave opening by moving one of the cabinets. 30" on the dot.

Here's our backsplash tile. We removed some of the outlier tiles that are part of what makes natural stone so "beautiful".