Floor report: having spent a good deal of time at Home Depot and Lowe's, floor options have narrowed to two. Bamboo, installed by the good folks at Home Depot. I'm guessing $500-$1000 to have that done, but the estimate will come on Tuesday or Wednesday. I'd prefer to do it myself, but Lilya really likes the bamboo, and it's very light, which we like. Why not do it ourselves? Well, bamboo does not come in the engineered or laminate variety (at least, not yet), and so requires adhesives (thus necessitating the cleanup of the ancient black goo under the linoleum) or nailing (thus necessitating a very special nail gun precisely calibrated for that particular flooring). However, we also found a light oak engineered hardwood that uses snap together technology (not exactly like the Pergo, but the same idea) that looked workable as well.I want that, since I'm comfortable installing that myself, but the bamboo is probably prettier and possibly more durable (although possibly not). So, tomorrow I think we work on the walls, repairing cracks and holes in the plaster. Also, Home Depot will rent us a van for $20 (75 minute rental), so I can drive home the big sheets of drywall and something we have always needed desperately in this house for other home improvement projects; a ladder. I think we'll buy a lot of dry wall (by a lot I mean six or eight sheets), since we have often talked about finishing the walls in the laundry room downstairs.
Posts
5 comments:
The bamboo is lighter than the oak, actually, although the reverse appears true in these images. It's almost a white. The oak is light, but not so light. And both are in stock. Also, I got awesome safety goggles, a great pry bar, and some very nice work gloves. And Jasco.
Oh, hell. You got Jasco.
You might want to add a respirator (a standard rubber nose/mouth, with cartidges) if you're going to use Jasco.
As you know, I've worked with plenty of horrific chemicals over the years, and I've got to be honest, the only one that scares me is Jasco. I use it, obviously. I have a gallon of it in the garage as I write. But dammit, it is some powerful nasty shit and it is going to teach you to respect it in a very painful way. I've never used it without getting stung one way or another.
When you go back to Home Despot tomorrow, get a couple of pairs of neoprene gloves (shopping list below). You're going to need them. One of the nasty aspects of Jasco is that not only will it burn the living shit out of you if you get it on your skin, but even the fucking VAPOR will burn you (which is why you need full-surround googles, the kind that fog up and suck, but you'll need them). You get some on your sleeve, it's gonna go right through the cloth. I swear I hate fucking Jasco more than anything - but it's the only thing that can get the crap up.
Washing the afflicted area seems to help some, if you get some on you.
Of course, if you go with the laminate, you DON'T NEED TO GET THE ADHESIVE UP. Just make sure the surface is reasonably level, put the underlayment down (I really like Home Depot's "Harmony" underlayment, it worked great here) and put your laminate on top. Floor solved.
If you go with the bamboo, I'd pretty much recommend an installer. It's gonna cost you, but I'll tell you what, I'd be hestitant to take on a real wood floor. You need an air nailer and all that crap. If you do decide to do this, call our stepfather for some pointers, he's done it at his house and did a really good job of it.
So, the Jasco safety list:
Full-surround goggles.
Cartridge respirator.
At least 2 pairs of neoprene gloves.
At least two cheap metal buckets to put the scraped-off adhesive and Jasco sludge into.
A couple of metal-bladed scrapers ("drywall knives" work well) for scraping up your newly-manufactured toxic waste.
Full-body clothing, old.
Open all the windows.
So, how nasty is the Jasco?
After I was done with getting the adhesive off the kitchen floor, I still had a lot of Jasco sitting there soaked into the concrete. I took a cotton mop (your traditional restaurant-style mop) and hit that shit with water, took the stripper and water-soaked mop out to the driveway and rinsed it out. The stripper came out along with quite a few of the cotton fibers as it ran down the driveway.
The next day, I was surprised to see that the cotton fibers that had been chewed off the mop had dried into a thin film on the driveway, one that looked and somewhat felt like paper.
Be careful, please.
Oh yeah, put on the safety goggles BEFORE YOU OPEN THE CAN OF JASCO. Sometimes it sprays.
AGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!! it's in my EYES!!!!!!! I can't see ANYTHING!!!!! LKJNknjajb h LKJNA981hiu jn kjnaz!@#$%RTF
Just kidding. I used the Jasco today, wearing regular safety goggles, a face mask, and heavy duty leather work gloves. I bought the super chemical gloves, but they were—and this doesn't happen very often to someone my size and with hands as small as mine—too small to put on.
I think I got Jasco that is several degrees less hellish than what you use. It's a goopy paste, with no smell at all, no vapors to speak of. I opened up all the windows, but there was really no smell whatsoever. I rinsed it with mineral spirits, but that seemed to do nothing, but water worked fine. Applied, scraped, rinsed, waited 5 minutes, re-applied and wiped down with a wet cloth, and did some finally spot cleaning and scraping. Cleaned up and thoroughly washed my hands.
That was hours ago, and no itching, burning, or other irritation. Just my EYES!!!!!!!!!!! Oh God Oh God Oh God!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just kidding.
The August issue of Consumer Reports is dedicated to kitchen remodeling and includes evaluation of different kinds of flooring. I'll pass it your way ASAP.
Post a Comment