Tag Archives: new home construction

Planning My New Kitchen

Posted on by
10

It’s small but functional, with lots of counter space and plenty of light.

On May 20, 2014, I began blogging about the construction of my new home in Malaga, WA. You can read all of these posts — and see the time-lapse movies that go with them — by clicking the new home construction tag.

I had two main points of consideration when designing my new home:

  • The total living space needed to be less than 1,200 square feet. That’s because I’m not building a primary residence here. Instead, I’m building the secondary living space allowed by Chelan County on a lot zoned like my 10 acres. The idea is to leave the primary building location — the one that can take better advantage of the views — available for either me or a future property owner to build a house on. That house can be any size as long as this space is 1200 square feet or less.
  • I needed to include lots of windows. What sold me on the lot is that it has amazing views, especially out toward the Wenatchee Valley. Big windows would not only let me take in those views from any room in my home, but they’d also let in lots of light. So I have lots of big windows. The entire building has 21 windows, not including those on each of my five garage doors or three man doors. Sixteen of those windows are in my living space.

Got Windows?
Got windows? I do! My living space is above my garage. I designed it to have regularly spaced, large windows so I could take in the view from indoors.

These two factors combined determined my floor plan. The walls had to be placed between the regularly spaced windows. This made special challenges in the bathroom and kitchen — you can’t put fixtures or cabinets right up against a window that starts 18 inches off the floor and stretches five feet above that.

Although I played around with several designs for my kitchen, I finally came up with a design that utilized a “galley” style with an island/breakfast bar. The key was setting the refrigerator into a wall and putting the stove on the island. That gave me more than 47 square feet of counter space in a room roughly 9 x 13 in size, even though I can’t take the counter all the way to the window. And because my ceilings are so high, I was able to use tall wall cabinets and for extra storage space.

Floor Plan
Here’s the latest version of my floorplan, with my appliances and some of my furniture included. Measurements are rough and don’t account for the thickness of drywall (1/2 inch). The gray shaded area is a storage loft above the hall and utility area.

Understand that although my kitchen in Arizona was large, it was not ideal. The textured tile countertops made it impossible to do something as simple as roll out a pie crust or cookies — and let’s not even talk about the chore of keeping the grout clean in a household where only one person knows how to use a dishrag to clean up spills. The appliances, although supposedly high quality, left a lot to be desired, as I discussed here. Food storage was in the cabinets rather than in a dedicated pantry; small appliances lined the countertop because there was no other practical place to store them. And while it might be difficult to believe, the abundance of countertop space made cooking a chore by allowing multiple work surfaces to leave bowls, measuring spoons, and ingredients — and to clean up.

While I certainly didn’t have the same amount of space in my new home, I could design a better kitchen to meet my needs.

Help from Home Depot

Getting an idea of the kitchen layout was the first part of the process. Getting actual cabinet configurations was another. For that, I turned to the local Home Depot.

Kitchen Drawing
Here’s Home Depot’s first stab at my kitchen. In this original version, I’d planned to mount the microwave in the cabinet below the stove in the island. The island’s breakfast bar was also designed higher in the back. We forgot about cabinets over the refrigerator.

I visited Home Depot back in July to get the process started. This helped me see how cabinets might work in my kitchen. With their kitchen planning software, they selected and placed cabinets to my specifications, then provided me, on request, with a printout of the configuration and a conceptual drawing. This made the room more real to me and gave me some time to think about it and how it might work. It also spit out an estimate of cost, although I wasn’t really thinking much about that yet.

Time passed. I got my living space framed to fit the kitchen we’d designed. I got other things done, like the ceiling/roof insulation and, more recently, the HVAC air handler and ductwork. Although I’d toyed with the idea of going south for the winter, I decided to stick around and finish construction work on my home this winter so I could dedicate early spring to settling in and late spring to putting in the massive garden I was planning.

I’d also had some other thoughts about the kitchen layout. After visiting a new friend’s place in Friday Harbor, I realized that putting the microwave down low would not be a good idea — especially when I considered how much I used my microwave. And although I’d hoped to use the microwave I’d brought from Arizona — the one my parents had given me as a housewarming present for my New Jersey home back in 1986 (!), I decided I deserved a new one. I’d get a large shelf model and put it on a shelf beneath the cabinets. I also decided to keep the island all one level — I saw that at the Friday Harbor home, too, and really liked it. More homey and lots of contiguous counter space for baking and cheesemaking projects.

My goal was to fit a dream kitchen into a small space and I was pretty sure that the changes I had in mind would help me achieve that goal.

Getting Serious

With those changes in mind, it was time to get solid price quotes from at least two sources: Home Depot and Lowe’s. I visited both yesterday.

Lowe's Kitchen
Home Depot's Kitchen
The kitchen drawing as prepared by Lowe’s (top) and Home Depot (bottom). I like the way Home Depot does a cutaway of the fridge.

At Lowe’s, we created the kitchen design on their computer system — which is virtually identical to Home Depot’s — making sure to get every detail. It took a long time and, since my appointment was delayed due to the previous customers taking longer than expected, I ran out of time before we could get into the countertops. Still, she designed the kitchen as I wanted it and gave me a printout of the primary wall’s layout, along with a detailed price quote.

Then I went to Home Depot. Fortunately, my design was still in their computer. We modified it to match what Lowe’s had drawn for me so I could compare apples with apples. I got a printout of the main, refrigerator, and island parts, along with a price quote. We also had time for me to pick out a granite countertop, select options, and get a quote for that. (That’s how I know I have 47 square feet of countertop.)

At this point, I’m leaning toward Home Depot. Their kitchen came in about $1,000 cheaper than Lowe’s for the same quality product — and that’s after manufacturer and retailer incentives. To get the incentives, I have to order at Lowe’s by December 15 or Home Depot by December 21. Both offer an additional 5% savings for using their credit card — which is one reason I have one for each company. Both will charge about $1,500 – $2,000 for installation, which I’ll likely get so I’m sure it’s done right.

As for the countertop, I need to get more estimates. Although the $54/square foot installed price sounds pretty good to me — and the few other folks I’ve asked — I might be able to get a better deal elsewhere. I will definitely check in at Lowe’s.

Keeping It Simple

One more thing… a lot of people have told me not to use Home Depot or Lowe’s for my kitchen. They say there are better options: Ikea, a local kitchen place called Bagdon’s (which I am visiting later today), and various local cabinet makers. But these people need to understand that my decision to use these big box companies is being driven by three factors:

  • Cost. I don’t have an unlimited budget. This is a small living space and I can’t pour a lot of money into it that I might never get back. (Although everyone seems to agree that I’ll have no trouble selling this place for far more than I put into it.)
  • Time. I can’t wait for various contractors to come and measure and plan. I want this done already. I’ve waited long enough.
  • Ease. I’m not interested in buying cabinets at Ikea and cabinet fronts at some local cabinet maker and finding some contractor to put it all together. I want to pick something out in one place, know it will work, and pay one organization to put it in my home. I have way better things to do with my time than play around with vendors and contractors.

While I’d love to spend my money locally with small organizations to get the perfect custom solution, I also need to do what’s right for me. And what’s right now is keeping it simple.

The Appliance Order

Posted on by
10

I order appliances for my new home to take advantage of Black Friday deals.

On May 20, 2014, I began blogging about the construction of my new home in Malaga, WA. You can read all of these posts — and see the time-lapse movies that go with them — by clicking the new home construction tag.

I went to Home Depot yesterday to order appliances for my new home. Although I’m not ready to take delivery of those appliances yet, I wanted to get my order in so I could take advantage of Home Depot’s Black Friday deals. I’d been told months ago by a Home Depot employee, during another appliance sale at Home Depot, that Black Friday was their best deal time and that if I didn’t need the appliances back then, I should wait for Black Friday. I waited.

Home Depot Appliance Sale
From Home Depot’s website; there were lots of good deals.

Refrigerator
Dishwasher
Range
Washer
Dryer
My appliances (not to scale).

The deals were — actually are — the sale doesn’t end until tomorrow — great. Not only were most appliances 25% or more off their retail prices — and yes, I know only idiots pay retail — but there were also additional savings when buying multiple items. For example, since I was buying 5 appliances — refrigerator, washer, dryer, range, and dishwasher — I could save an additional $300. And if I put the purchase on my Home Depot credit card, I could save another 5%.

I’d stopped in last week to take a look at what was available and get an idea of what it would cost me. I wound up going with Samsung products all the way: French door refrigerator, dishwasher with “Storm Wash technology,” and slide-in range with self-cleaning dual convection oven, and front loading washer and drier that could be stacked. I chose a stainless steel finish on kitchen appliances and white finish on laundry appliances. The only thing I didn’t buy was a microwave because I still have the one my parents bought me as a housewarming gift for my first home years ago and I really like it.

In every case, the appliance I bought was a huge upgrade from the Jenn-Air crap I had back in Arizona. Yes, I know that Jenn-Air is supposed to be good stuff, but I think it’s seriously overrated. The dishwasher was loud and didn’t do a very good job washing dishes. The oven had a loud fan that kicked in at temperatures over 325°F. The refrigerator was loud, too — I could hear it run, I could hear the ice maker refilling. And the idiotic electric grill on the range was better for filling the house with smoke than cooking anything other than grilled vegetables. (I made the mistake of grilling salmon on it just once.) Of course, I didn’t pick my old house’s original appliances. I lived in what had been a spec house and the builder had included what was considered “high end” appliances. I’m sure the next owner will be suitably impressed — until she has to live with it.

Samsung products are generally highly rated. The only thing I worry a little about is the dishwasher. Although Consumer Reports gave the one I chose a pretty good rating, reliability seems to be an issue with Samsung dishwashers in general. But I liked the styling, the feature set, and the spacious interior, which fit my rather large dinner plates and bowls without any problems. Since I plan to do a lot of entertaining when my home (and its deck) are complete, having a large capacity dishwasher was vital. This one fits the bill. Let’s hope I don’t have to test the warranty.

Yesterday, I went in to finalize the order and give them my credit card. With all the discounts applied, my appliance purchase, with free delivery and installation, was remarkably affordable. I’d originally budgeted about $8,000 for appliances, but wound up spending far less. Timing is everything, I guess.

And speaking of timing, I have about 3 months to get the place ready to receive all those appliances. This winter might be busier than I expected at the Flying M Aerie.

Construction: Wiring My Shop

Posted on by
4

I expand the circuit in my shop area to include more outlets and an arc lamp.

On May 20, 2014, I began blogging about the construction of my new home in Malaga, WA. You can read all of these posts — and see the time-lapse movies that go with them — by clicking the new home construction tag.

Back in early September, I finally had the ground work done to bring electrical power, water, fiber optic cable, and a septic system line into my building. I got all the required inspections done, including the one with Washington State Labor & Industries (L&I). That required, in part, to set up a circuit that included an outlet, a light, and a light switch. Although I wanted to do more than just that, I decided to keep it simple to pass the inspection.

Of course, once the initial inspection was done and the power was turned on, I was free to wire my building however I liked — as long as it was within the requirements of the local electrical code. An inspection would be made before the walls were closed up — likely sometime in the spring. I didn’t have to keep the original circuit as it was on inspection day. I could expand the circuit to include more devices: outlets, lamps, switches.

So that’s what I did. I finished the wiring of my shop/RV garage area — the 36 x 48 foot space on the left side of my building.

More Outlets

One double outlet was clearly not enough — although I was making it work through the use of extension cords and outlet strips. I’d plugged in my Internet router and chest freezer on one side of the big garage door, with an empty outlet for the drill I’d need to get through the studs to run more wire. On the other side of the big garage door, I’d plugged in my mini fridge, wine cooler, radio, and four battery chargers (for power tools). There were spare outlets for my tile saw and kiln, which I use for my glass projects. To get the power from the outlet on one side of the garage door to the other side, I’d run a heavy-duty extension cord across the garage floor at the door. Not the best solution for long term.

So I started laying in outlet boxes. One by the fridge, one by my work desk, and one on the other side of the post in my storage area. I had to do some creative work with scrap lumber to hammer the outlet boxes on the underside of the girts — the L&I inspector had warned me that outlet boxes in unfinished walls could not be above a girt. And then I had to run the wire around the two windows in my shop area and behind two posts to connect them. Wiring them together wasn’t much of a problem at all.

What was a problem was getting the wire from the first outlet on the circuit over the garage door and back down to the next outlet near the fridge. The garage door is 14 feet tall and 20 feet wide.

Scaffolding
The nearly $500 I spent for this set of scaffolding is probably the best money I’ve spent so far on building equipment. I’ve used it dozens of times — this post just lists a few.

I’d bought scaffolding on Amazon a few weeks before and a friend had helped me assemble it. (It’s simply not possible to put together a 12-foot scaffold by myself.) The scaffolding consists of two 6-foot scaffolds stacked one atop the other with outriggers to prevent the whole thing from toppling over. A guardrail around the top scaffold platform gives me the illusion of safety — I’m not fooling myself: if I fall sideways while standing up there, that flimsy rail is not going to prevent me from falling over the edge.

It took some time getting used to climbing up and down the side of the scaffold, but after doing it a dozen times, I became quite proficient. Not only did all those trips up and down make me more comfortable about climbing the scaffolding, but it was great exercise that really wiped me out by the end of the day.

I brought the coil of wire upstairs and set it down on the floor. I fed it through the framing toward the post at one side of the garage door. Then I went downstairs, positioned the scaffolding, and climbed up. I fed the end of the wire between the post and metal wall — remember, the metal is fastened to the girts, not the posts — and into the space atop the garage door. I pushed it as far as I could, then climbed down the scaffold, repositioned it, and climbed back up to pull. I got about halfway across the top of the garage door when the wire got hung up on something at the other end. Back down, climb the stairs, free up the wire, push some forward, down the stairs, up the scaffold, pull the wire. It was clearly not a one-person job, but I was making headway.

That is until I got to the far end of the garage door and needed to pull the wire down to the outlet. Several trips up and down the stairs and scaffolding got me only a few inches. At that rate, it would take the rest of the day. I needed help.

Fortunately, a friend was coming by to help me move my heavier furniture — the red sofa bed, my bedroom set, a desk — to the back of the building to make room for the helicopter and possibly the RV later in the season. When he and his son were finished with the furniture, I asked him to climb the stairs and push the wire while I pulled it at the other end. Within 5 minutes, we were done.

I suspect that a lot of my friends would be helping me feed wire during visits over the next few months.

Once the wire was run over the garage door and stapled to the posts as required by code, I got back to work wiring the outlets. I did them in a sequence, then covered them up with the cheap covers I’d bought for the garage. (I’d use nicer ones for the living space.)

That part of the wiring was done.

The Arc Lamp

Is it really an “arc lamp”? I don’t know. Donn called it an arc lamp and Tom didn’t correct me when I called it an arc lamp. All I know is that it’s huge, has a big 500 watt bulb, takes a good 3-5 minutes to warm up, and is almost as bright as the sun. I suspect it might get hot.

My friends Donn and Kathryn had built a cherry packing shed on their orchard earlier in the year. They’d lighted the place with arc lamps that Donn had obtained used from some source. Donn had hired an electrician to do all the wiring. When he was finished, he had a few lamps left over. On the day I came to admire the shed, he offered me one. I thought it would make a good light for my RV garage so I took it.

That was months ago. For months, it sat in a big box in the upstairs of my building, out of the way of builders and movers. Four big pieces: transformer, light bulb, reflector, and lens. My job was to make sure the thing actually worked, fasten it securely to the rafters 16 feet off the ground in the center of the RV garage, and wire it to a light switch near the door.

The wire coming out of the transformer was simply cut about 3 feet from the fixture. I had two options to test it. I could hard wire it into a circuit and switch or I could put a plug on it and plug it into an extension cord. I went with the second option.

I also went to Home Depot and bought a two-foot length of chain with a screw-closure carabiner. The transformer, which weighted at least 30 pounds, had a heavy duty hook for mounting. I used the chain to hang the transformer to my scaffolding, screwed in the lightbulb — which is about 16 inches long — and plugged it in. The transformer hummed, but no light.

I wasn’t really surprised. I knew it couldn’t be that easy.

I examined the label on the transformer. It listed four different voltages, including the 120 volts I was using. Maybe the lamp was wired for a different voltage?

I (carefully) put the lamp in my Jeep and drove it down to Platt, the local electric supply store. I brought it inside. No one there could help me. They directed me to a lamp repair shop on Mission Street. I drove over. It was located in what used to be a house. I went in and described the lamp. The guy there said he couldn’t help.

Back in the Jeep, I called Donn and asked him. He said he didn’t know because he hadn’t done the wiring. He gave me the number of the man who had, Tom. I called Tom. We tried to get together that day, but weren’t able to connect. Instead, he came up to my place the next day.

Lamp Works
These lamps come to life slowly. Within minutes, it was very bright.

He brought tools. We chatted a bit. He admired my “man cave” and then made the now familiar comment about me having a “great setup.” Then he opened the transformer and fiddled around with the wires. Apparently, it had been wired for 277 volts. He rewired it for 120. He closed it back up and we put the bulb back in. I rehung it on the chain and plugged it in. It immediately came to life with a hum. In about 3 minutes, it was at its full brightness, like a second sun inside my shop.

Whoa.

When he left he gave me a spare bulb. He wouldn’t take my money.

Of course, testing the lamp and making sure it worked was only the first part of installation. I still had to get the wire and the lamp up into the rafters.

The wire wasn’t that difficult. The route I chose was pretty much clear of obstacles, so the wire was easy to run. I did, of course, need to stand on the scaffolding. Up, run wire, staple wire, down, reposition scaffolding, up, run wire — you get the idea.

It was about this time that I got sick and tired of hammering in the wire staples, which were required a maximum of every four feet. There had to be a better way. I took a break for the day and headed out to Home Depot. I came back with a good stapler designed to drive in those damn wire staples. Not perfect — I still needed to tap them a bit with a hammer — but a hell of a lot better than what I’d been doing.

(Any job is easy when you have the right tools, eh, honey?)

Back to work the next morning, I finished running the wire between where the light switch would go and where the lamp would go. Easy peasy.

Next, I had to lift the lamp into place. I fully assembled it with the transformer, bulb, reflector, and lens. Then I tied a rope to it at the bottom of the scaffold, climbed up, and pulled. I lifted it about 2 feet off the ground when I realized that I would probably not be able to lift it 16 feet off the ground. Again, there had to be a better way.

Warn Winch
Wow! Is this ever handy for general use around my shop and garage. It makes it possible for me to lift or move up to 1,000 pounds with the touch of a button.

The better way was with a winch that I already had. You see, I’d cooked up a solution to lift my kayaks off the floor of the shop. I was tired of walking around them, so I’d put pulleys in the rafters between two posts and run line down and around them. Because I couldn’t manually lift them, I’d bought a small electric winch on Amazon. I’d fastened the winch to a hook on a post and had fastened the ropes to the winch. Squeezing a trigger lifted the kayaks high enough to walk under them.

Hung Kayaks
Hanging my kayaks was another little project I did this summer. You can see the winch hanging from a post. (If I blogged about all my projects, I wouldn’t have time to do any projects.)

Winching the Arc Lamp
In this shot, you can see the winch attached to the rafters with the cable running down to the arc lamp. If you look closely, you can see the wire I’d run along the bottom of the rafters.

The winch was still holding up the kayaks, but I rigged up a rope on the same hook to do the job, freeing up the winch for other duties. I carried the winch up the scaffolding and secured it with a rope atop some rafters near where I’d hung the chain for the arc lamp. I ran an extension cord to the winch. Then I dropped the winch cable down to the floor — it’s 15 feet long — went down, and hooked up the lamp. Then back up to run the winch. I brought the lamp up slowly until it was high enough to fasten to the hook. That was probably the hardest part: disconnecting the lamp from the winch and connecting it to the chain without dropping it. I was mighty relieved when I was done and the lamp hung securely from the rafters.

Hung Lamp
I left the wire long in case I wanted to move it someday and needed a longer wire. Rather than leave it hanging, I draped it around the rafter. I hope L&I doesn’t mind.

Next, I had to mount one of those blue plastic boxes to the rafter to connect the wire from the lamp to the wire from the switch. Not a big deal. I hammered the box in place, ran the wires in, and connected them with wire screws. Then I fastened a cap over the blue box. I stepped back on the scaffold to admire my work — and take a picture, of course.

I brought all my tools and the winch back down the scaffold. I had one step left.

Tying It All Together

So far, I had three new double outlets and an arc lamp wired. But none of them were wired to a circuit. That was the last step.

I’d already set up a light switch and outlet beside the circuit panel near the door to my RV garage. I decided to tear that apart and replace it with a box that would house two light switches and an outlet.

I should mention here that L&I, on its inspection, had told me that the outlet needed to be GFCI protected because it was the first one on a garage circuit. Although they passed me, it was contingent on me replacing that outlet. Doing the rewiring to add outlets and the arc lamp seemed to be a good time to make the fix.

Switches
The final outlet box after rewiring the outlet to a GFCI and wiring the two light switches. Note that the power comes from this box and crosses over the garage door to the other side of the room.

I shut off the circuit in the panel, rolled over my cart full of electrical tools, and got to work. The wiring wasn’t difficult — I had done it all before. When I was all done, I put one of the cheap plates over it, crossed my fingers for luck, and turned on the circuit breaker.

No explosions, fires, or even smoke. Always a good sign.

I tried the light switch for the existing fixture beside the panel. It worked fine. Then I tried the light switch for the arc lamp. It came to life immediately, sputtering a little as it warmed up. Then I crossed the room and tried the outlets. They worked.

Success!

Second Sun
I’d originally thought I’d need more than one light in the RV garage and that this one would be a good start. But I soon realized that I wouldn’t need any other overhead light in this space. It’s that bright!

Later, I’d ditch the extension cord across the garage doorway and plug everything in to the closest outlets. (Still needed a power strip for all those darn battery chargers.)

That night, my friend Bob stopped by for dinner. After watching a beautiful sunset from my Lookout Point bench, we went into the garage and I flicked the switch for the arc lamp. The light started off dim but warmed and brightened as it usually does. It lighted the entire space. Not only that, but the light shined through every single window in my place, making it glow from outside.

Lighted from Outside
This was the first time my building had been lighted at night since the night before the concrete was poured.

As far as I’m concerned, my shop/RV garage is now wired. Whether I add another circuit in the future is something I’ll deal with when I find a need. It’s good to go now and extremely functional.

Up Next

My next circuit will include my entrance lighting, entrance hall lighting, one outside outlet (near the front door), a light (with a switch) for just inside the first bay of the garage, outlets inside the first two garage bays (including for garage door openers), and light fixtures for outside the first two garage bays. The entrancee hall lighting will be interesting because it requires a three-way switch that makes it possible to turn the light on or off from the top or bottom of the stairs.

And don’t worry: if the job has any unusual challenges, I’ll blog it.

Construction: The Concrete Driveway Apron

Posted on by
1

The last important part of my building to be finished this year.

On May 20, 2014, I began blogging about the construction of my new home in Malaga, WA. You can read all of these posts — and see the time-lapse movies that go with them — by clicking the new home construction tag.

Back in September, I hired my favorite earth-moving guy, Jeff, to level a space in front of my building’s big garage door. As part of that job, he also dug and later buried the trenches for conduit that brought power, water, fiber optic cable, and telephone lines to my building and water and power to my garden shed. I blogged about that three-day project here.

Although I don’t expect to live in my building this year, it was vital that the ground work be done before winter so that I could get a concrete apron laid in front of the door. The apron was necessary for me to park my helicopter’s landing cart so I could land out front and pull the helicopter into the building. I didn’t want it outdoors any longer than necessary and certainly not over the winter.

I got the concrete work done at September month-end. Bill, whose company had laid the concrete inside my building, came by on Monday at around midday to lay out the forms. The apron would be 22 feet wide (in front of my 20 foot wide door) and about 30 feet deep. He made quick work of laying out the area with strings and stakes, triangulating or whatever it is these guys do to get things square.

There was some confusion, at first, about the slope to the concrete. He expected a constant angle slope while I expected it to be nearly level close to the building with a steeper slope on the half farther away. I don’t think Bill liked the idea, but that’s the way I had Jeff prep it. Still, we had to go at the gravel substrate with a rake and shovel in one area to ensure that the concrete was at least 4 inches deep. When he was finished, we confirmed our order for 14 yards of 6 sack concrete and got a delivery time of 9 AM the next day. I drove a pair of t-posts and put ribbon on them to keep the workers off my just-planted grass seed.

Concrete Prepped
The apron framed out and ready to be poured.

Bill and a helper showed up the next day a little after 8 AM. The did a bit more framing and got out a bunch of tools. Then they waited. No one else showed up. It was going to be just two of them.

The first concrete truck showed up at about 9:45. It backed into position and the driver got out to assemble the chute. And then they started pouring.

Pouring Concrete
They began pouring concrete at about 9:45 AM.

Smoothing Concrete
Bill’s helper spread the concrete at the edge of my garage.

The work went quickly. I stayed out of the way. Penny stayed inside. The first truck delivered about 2/3 of the concrete we needed.

From the first truck
The first truck poured most of the concrete we needed.

The second truck arrived just as the first one was ready to pull out. They poured the rest of the concrete. Bill and his helper worked it.

Finishing the Concrete
Finishing concrete properly takes a lot of work and expertise. Bill and his helper definitely know what they’re doing.

Concrete Blocks
A closeup of the concrete “blocks” I made with extra concrete and a mold I’d bought. This was an experiment; I expect to do a better job when I need to.

I got a wheelbarrow full of concrete and used it to experiment with the concrete block mold I’d bought. Within about a half hour, I had a 2 x 6 “block” pad in front of my shed. It wasn’t pretty, but by the third 2 x 2 section, I had the hang of it. With the right concrete — without big rocks in it — it might actually look nice.

Intials in Concrete
The last time I carved my initials into concrete at a home was in 1997. Although that was a milestone in my life, this one was much more meaningful and rewarding.

When the guys were done — but before they left — I brought Penny outside on a leash. I carved my initials and the year into the wet concrete and pressed one of Penny’s paws into it.

The concrete work was done by noon on Tuesday, September 30. According to Bill, I’d have to wait until Sunday, October 5 to drive on it.

Coincidentally, I had a flight scheduled for that day. I realized that if I got everything set up properly in advance, I’d be able to put the helicopter inside my building before nightfall on Sunday.

Construction: Wiring the Shed

Posted on by
12

The biggest challenge was getting the damn wire out there.

On May 20, 2014, I began blogging about the construction of my new home in Malaga, WA. You can read all of these posts — and see the time-lapse movies that go with them — by clicking the new home construction tag.

If you’ve been following these posts, you know that in late August, I finally got permanent power run to my building under construction and that I had taken on the task of doing all the electrical wiring in that building. You might also realize that when the Chelan PUD workers left, the only access to electricity that I had was from a single outlet inside the building.

I’d lost my 30 amp RV connection the previous day when I took down the temporary power pole I’d been plugged into. I was living in the RV but had no easy access to AC power. Instead, I was relying on the RV’s two batteries and the solar panel on the roof to keep them charged. While this is a very workable short-term solution, it did mean that I’d have to rely on propane for my refrigerator and hot water and that I wouldn’t have access to some conveniences, such as my microwave and coffee maker. Yes, I do have a 2 KW Honda generator that I could have pulled out and fired up, but who really wants to listen to that noise?

The Task at Hand

My task was clear: get the 30 amp RV outlet set up at the shed, which was on the opposite side of the driveway from my building, about 25 feet from my RV.

I’d run the 2 inch schedule 40 conduit under the driveway to the shed earlier in the week and it had been approved by Labor and Industries (L&I). All I needed to do was run a set of 10 gauge wires through the conduit and set up the appropriate sealed boxes on the other end for the outlet. While I was at it, I’d run a set of 12 gauge wires through the same conduit for a 20 amp circuit so I could put a 115v outlet on the outside of the building as well as an outlet and light inside the shed.

Running the Wire

Although the shed was only about 80 feet from my building, the conduit did not run in a straight line. Jeff, my earth-moving guy, had run it with the 3 inch conduit toward the transformer box, then turned left and ran it with the water line to the shed. Near the shed, it turned right to get to the north side of the shed where I wanted the utilities. (The frost free valve for the water was already installed there and running well, supplying my RV, chickens, and garden with water.) I’d walked the trench with my long measuring tape: 96 feet.

It was the bends in the conduit that could pose a problem: 90° at the building, 90° where it met the water line, 45° in front of the shed, and 90° where it came up out of the ground at the side of the shed.

The first job was getting a wire pull line — sometimes referred to as a fishing line — through the conduit. This was remarkably easy. I tied a bunched up plastic shopping bag to the end of some garden twine I had and tied the other end to the water valve near the conduit opening at the shed. I stuffed the bag into the conduit, then went into my building, plugged in my Shop Vac, and put the Shop Vac’s business end to to other end of the conduit. I fired it up and it sucked.

The shopping bag didn’t quite make it. The garden twine wasn’t long enough. No problem. I attached one end of the pull line the PUD guys had given me the day before to the end of the twine, went back to the Shop Vac, and sucked some more. Whoosh! The shopping bag stuck to the Shop Vac hose. I turned it back off and pulled the twine to bring the pull line all the way through.

Pulling Wires
Necessity is the mother of invention and I can get pretty inventive.

For each circuit, I needed 3 wires: black, white, and green. That meant six wires. I’d bought them on 100-foot spools a few days before. I carefully grouped the ends together, wrapped the strap around them, and used duct tape to make a smooth, somewhat pointed end on the pull line. I pushed it into the conduit. Then I rigged up my old copper grounding rod (from the temporary power pole) on two saw horses near the opening of the conduit, went back to the shed, and started to pull.

It was easy at first. Hand over hand, I pulled the wire, watching the spools turn by my building. Then I hit a snag. I pulled hard but didn’t get anywhere. I went back to the building, pulled back, then went back to the shed and pulled again. The wire started to move again.

This went on for a while. The wire got harder and harder to pull. So I did what any machine-loving woman would do: I hooked up the pull line to my ATV and used that to pull. That got me another 20 or so feet, but it was pulling sideways and damaging the top of the conduit. I needed a better solution.

Dowel Rig
My friends tease me about having so much “stuff,” but every once in a while, some of that stuff comes in handy.

I went into my shop and fetched one of the dowels that had been a curtain rod at my Arizona home. (There’s a funny story about these “curtain rods” and why I took them, but I’ll save that for another post.) I cut it to about 2 feet in length and then rigged it up to the side of the shed with some scrap wood and nails. Then I moved the ATV into position. Now I could use the ATV to pull straight up.

Pulling wires with ATV
It seemed like a good idea at the time.

That got me another 5 or so feet. That’s all. The wires were stuck hard. Repeated attempts simply pulled the dowel off the shed. (So much for that idea, huh?)

I could tell by the amount of wire left on the spools that I was almost all the way to the shed. The thought of pulling it all back and starting over was too much to bear. My arms already ached from the effort I’d expended. I called it quits to think about it some more.

I called my friend Bob. He told me to pull the wires out and check the connection between the wires and the pull line. He said the connection was probably getting hung up on one of the bends in the conduit. He said I should then bunch the wires together every 3 feet or so and wrap them with electrical tape. Then feed them through again.

I really didn’t want to do it. I knew that once I got the wire out, it would be a two-person job to feed it back in.

So I invited him for dinner. (Did I mention that there are no free meals here?) I grilled sausages and made a nice salad with fresh mozzarella and tomatoes from my garden. We ate outside as the sun was setting. It was very pleasant and relaxing.

After dinner, we pulled the wires out and bunched them with tape as he’d suggested. He reconnected the wire to the pull line using a different technique and we worked together to pull the line through.

And that’s when I got the really bad news: the wire wasn’t long enough.

You see, although I’d measured the trench distance, I failed to account for the sweep down from the building and the sweep up to the shed. The trench was 96 feet long and 3 feet deep. That added at least 8 feet to the length of the conduit, which stuck out at least a foot on either end. The wire was about 4 feet short of what I needed.

And no, splicing additional wires on was not an option.

So now I had about $150 worth of wire I couldn’t use.

Loose Wire
The wire guy at Home Depot gave me two bunches of wire: one set of 10 gauge and one set of 12 gauge.

The next day, I went back to Home Depot and bought 120 feet of each type of wire. I had to buy it off the bulk reels because the next size reels were 250 feet and I already had 100 feet of wire I didn’t need. When I talked to the wire measuring guy about my situation, he told me I could return the unused wire. All I had to do was get it back on the reels. (Talk about a job for a rainy day.) They’d just resell it from the bulk wire area.

Of course, now I had six loose strands of wire — not on reels — to feed into the conduit. Another two-person job. I prepped as well as I could and called my neighbor, Kathy, to come give me a hand. She promised to come later in the day, after work.

Wind Chimes
I hung my big wind chimes from the bottom of my front deck, just outside my front door. This spot is relatively sheltered from the wind so they don’t get tossed around much. I love the sound of these chimes and am so glad I didn’t leave them behind.

I busied myself with other odd jobs while I waited. I’d begun unpacking boxes with flower pots and other outdoor items in them. I was using the shed for anything garden or bee related. One of the boxes included my wind chimes. I hung the big, deep-toned ones by the building and the smaller ones by the shed. Later, when I heard them chiming, it brought back bittersweet memories of my home in Arizona, where they’d hung together at the front door for so many years.

This was the Friday before labor day. I was also expecting the Chelan PUD fiber optic guys to come by to re-run my fiber optic cable through the new conduit I’d laid to my building. (I’d cut the old fiber optic line when I took down the temporary power pole on Tuesday and didn’t have Internet either.) That afternoon, a PUD truck rolled up and a guy stepped out with some disappointing news: they wouldn’t be able to run the cable until Monday. No, Tuesday because Monday was a holiday.

Another three days without Internet. Ugh.

The PUD guy and I chatted for a while. Like everyone who comes by my place to do work, he commented on the view and what a “nice setup” I have. (Everyone uses that phrase: nice setup.) I told him I was doing all the electrical work myself and mentioned my current challenge: getting the wire run to the shed. I told him I was waiting for a friend to come help me.

That’s when he offered to help me.

I’m not an idiot. I said yes.

Wires Pulled
I sent this photo to my friend Bob to show him the hard part of the job was done.

He pulled at the shed, I fed the wire at the building. It took five minutes. I thanked him, still rather shocked at how easily it had been done. Then we wished each other a good weekend and he left.

I called Kathy and told her not to bother coming. Then I took a picture of the wire coming out of the conduit and the shed and texted it to Bob.

Wiring the RV Outlet

Before I could wire the RV outlet, I needed to finish work on the conduit at the shed. This meant adding a junction box and fittings and mounting the RV outlet panel.

It should come as no surprise that I needed another trip to Home Depot to get the fittings. The most challenging part was getting the fittings to downsize the 2 inch conduit to 1 inch conduit. That required a trip to Lowes because Home Depot didn’t have all the adapters I needed.

Conduit Done
In this shot, the conduit to the RV outlet is complete; the wire hanging outside the junction box is for the other circuit.

Because all this has to pass L&I inspection one day, it was important to do it right the first time. I used some scrap wood behind the conduit so I could clamp it to a solid surface. Then I cut the conduit to remove the damaged edges, assembled the fittings, and glued them all together. I used the junction box to separate the 10 gauge wires for the RV outlet from the 12 gauge wires for the other circuit I’d set up in the building.

Once the box was mounted, I wired the RV outlet. This wasn’t difficult at all; I’d already done one of these on my temporary power pole.

Then I went back to the building side of the setup. I had to drill a hole in my building (!) and fix up the conduit there. Again, I needed a good, weathertight seal that would pass L&I inspection. I also needed another trip to Lowes. (Of course.)

Once the wire was in the building, I ran it up to the service panel above it. I flipped off the main breaker and used my multi-meter to confirm that there was no power going to the board. Then I wired the white and green wires to the grounding bus and the black wire to the 30 amp circuit I’d bought. I snapped the circuit breaker into the board.

Or at least I tried to. The damn thing wouldn’t go in.

It took a while to figure out that the breaker I’d bought wasn’t compatible with the service panel. The breakers that came with the panel had an extra cutout that was necessary for a piece of metal to fit in. My repeated attempts to push the thing in was only scratching the plastic where that cutout should be.

I did not want to go back to Home Depot that day. I’d already been there twice and it’s at least an hour round trip drive.

Fortunately, I still had a 30 amp breaker in the temporary power pole now lying on the ground beside my driveway. I went out and pulled it off. I can’t tell you how relieved I was to see that it was compatible with my panel.

I attached the black wire to the circuit and snapped it in. Then I popped out the metal tabs on the board cover and put it on the panel. Finally, I turned on the main breaker and the 30 amp breaker I’d just installed. No breakers popped. So far, so good.

Plugged In
Plugged into my brand spanking new 30 amp RV outlet.

I went outside and swapped out the 100-foot 30 amp RV cord I’d been using for the temporary power pole with the 25-foot 30 amp cord stored in the RV basement. Then I plugged it in.

I went into the RV and looked at the microwave. The clock was lit up: 0:00. I had power. Success!

I can’t tell you how good it was to use my coffee maker the next morning.

Wiring the Rest of the Shed

After all this — hell, I’m tired from just writing about it — wiring the rest of the shed was pretty straightforward. I started it the next day after another trip to Home Depot.

First, I had to put a rectangular hole in the wall of the shed for the outside outlet. I marked where the outlet would go on the inside of the building and drilled holes in two opposite corners. Then I used my reciprocating saw with the wood blade on it to connect the holes along the lines I’d drawn. The resulting hole wasn’t neat, but it was the right size. I mounted the blue outlet box inside the shed facing out.

Then I mounted blue boxes for the inside outlet, light switch, and overhead light. I ran 12/2 wire from the outdoor outlet box to the indoor outlet box to the light switch box to the light box and tacked everything down with wiring staples.

Outdoor Outlets
Here’s what the outdoor wiring looks like on the side of my shed after wiring the 115v outlet.

Next, I had to put a round hole in the building for the wires to come inside. I fed the wires through various conduit and connectors and into the building. I glued and caulked where necessary to seal everything off neatly. From there, I ran the wires into the outdoor box.

Inside Wiring
The inside wiring, completed.

Then came the fun part: wiring the outlets and lights. The outdoor outlet had to be GFCI protected and I did that one first. Then the indoor outlet. Then the light switch.

Shed Light Fixture
This light fixture was originally mounted on the wall inside my building; it’s much better in the shed.

Finally, the light itself. I’d taken the fixture from the inside of my building after replacing it with a different style that I’d bought during one of my many trips to Home Depot. (Yes, I’m already replacing fixtures.)

When I was done with all the wiring and had checked it over to make sure it was right, I went back into my building to set up the 20 amp circuit. At the same time, I wanted to replace the 30 amp 2-pole circuit breaker I’d installed the day before with a single pole circuit breaker I’d bought to replace the incompatible one.

Completed Panel
When I was finished, I had three completed circuits: the small one for the panel area and two for the shed.

So, once again, I turned off the main breaker, tested the board to make sure power wasn’t flowing through it, and did some wiring work. The breakers snapped into place easily. I covered up the panel, turned everything back on, and went out to shed to test my work.

The GFCI had to be reset and tested; I followed the instructions to do that. I used a fan to test the outlets and flicked the light switch. Success!

Lessons Learned

I learned a lot during this project. First and foremost, the most difficult task ahead of me is probably going to be to run the wires. While it isn’t always physically demanding, it often requires two people. I suspect I’ll be making a lot of lunches and dinners for friends in the coming weeks.

I also learned that no matter how many times you go to Home Depot or Lowes to get the things you think you need for a project, you simply won’t get it all. There’s always another trip ahead of you. The solution is to always buy more than you need, including some things you might not need at all. Home Depot has a excellent return policy; each trip I make there starts with a stop at the return counter to bring back things I didn’t need. It all goes right back on my Home Depot credit card. I don’t even need to bring a receipt; they scan my card at the beginning of the transaction and can see exactly when I bought an item. No rush, either. I’ve returned things months after buying them.

I have a lot of electrical projects ahead of me. My goal is to complete one circuit each week, starting in my shop and garage before moving upstairs. I hope to have 90% of the wiring done before Thanksgiving. I’ll blog about the more interesting projects, like the arc lamp project I finished this past week.

Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Want to volunteer to help me pull wire? Use the comments form for this post. I’d love to heard your construction and wiring stories, too!