Our renovation diary

[BrettBuilt]

Hi all,  new to this group, but wanted a place to consolidate all the info, photos and our "trials and tribulations" related to our slowly progressing renovation project. This is a self-renovation meaning I am either doing all the work myself, or in the intrests of time, assisting various builders, electricians, plumbers or other trades that I have, or will engage, to complete the work.

The house is an old two-storey 70's pole home on the Brisbane Water at Point Clare (NSW, Central Coast). The orginal Pole house was converted many moons ago into the two-story configuration that exists today.  My wife and I (and 3 kids) purchased the house about 13 years ago and we have lived in it largely unchanged since then - but it is now getting very tired, despite the hours of maintence and just needs updating.

So far I have renovated 3 bedrooms by ripping up carpet, coating the quite nice Cypress Pine floor boards, replacing all the skirts and achitraves and repairing walls and painiting.  We have also installed a large deck (with a builder involved) from the second storey and installed a pool.  I will post some photos of those completed tasks and then provide a schedule of the projects upcoming and share details and photos of those as we go.

Big jobs, so this discussion may go on for quite a while....

[BrettBuilt]

Overall the Bathroom refresh came up Ok. If I had my time over I probably would have replaced all the floor tiles it would have made a bigger impression (for a price of course). But regrouting and replacing old outdated items with new etc has certainly freshened up the room. A few days rest and then I'll get stuck into the next bit - I do have a day job as well

[Jason]

Many thanks for the update and all the photos @BrettBuilt. Great to see what you have achieved and read about some lessons learned, too. I'm sure the rest of the community appreciates it.

Looking forward to seeing what you do next. Please let us know if you need a hand with anything.

Jason

[BrettBuilt]

When doing a final clean of the bathroom I noticed I still had a fine layer of grout residue on the walls even after several sponge wipe downs after tiling. I wiped down again with standard domestic cleaners but it wasn’t coming off. I had used a pre-mixed wall grout from Bunnnings which was very good to apply but appears to contain a PVA or similar type glue.

I spoke with a friend that does commercial cleaning for new builds and she suggested Acetone as that is what she uses. It was the only thing that I found that would remove this very thin haze. I did try turps and metho first as I already had some but they didn’t shift it. The acetone works a treat. It has made such a difference to what I thought were clean tiles.

Not the friendliest of chemicals to work with but got the job done. Got it from Bunnings as well. I was worried it would leave a nail polish remover smell but was surprised the odour is very little but the fumes are strong. You need to ventilate well. No odour at all after 30mins. Probably best to test on a tile before using and use only clean white cloths otherwise colour will transfer to your grout.

[BrettBuilt]

One last thing to do to finish off the bathroom project, repair and clean the skylight and ceiling plaster then paint the ceiling

The skylight surround needed replacing.

[BrettBuilt]

New Skylight insert built, ready for painting and instal

[BrettBuilt]

All done, installed. Slight issue because the skylight opening tapers so very slightly, which meant a bit of force needed to get the box seated properly.

Lesson learned was to ensure you measure the space where it will end up, not just were it will go in

All installed. Bit of ceiling paint needed.

[BrettBuilt]

Ok a few things have progressed after completing the bathroom. I stripped the hall outside the bathroom of trims, pulled up the carpets and sanded the floor

Ready for coating

First coat of satin clear done. Need to find a 4 hour slot when everyone is out if the house to finish it.

[BrettBuilt]

While waiting for the fam to get out of the house, I put the hall on hold and started downstairs preparing the room for the new kitchen

First up protect the rest of the room from dust

Now to clear the room. I had already skinned the small adjoining room that will become a butlers pantry

Skinning the wall to allow my sparky to run cables and run water pipes. Oh look double skin!!

Wall skinned, but found a steel support pole. Will need to build a frame to front that wall.

False wall frame build and installed. Next is to remove the door and frame up for a new window.