From finished floor, to barn floor

Today it was much colder than yesterday, and the temperature was expected to get into the teens overnight. Concrete needs some time to cure, before it is exposed to temperatures that cold. So, it needed to be covered today.

The concrete crew worked on putting up the forms that Newt took to the property last night. They made pretty good progress. The back wall (north side) is almost complete, and the east wall has 2 more courses of forms added.

Back wall, 8 1/2 feet from floor to top.

Then they laid all the foam we had out there, including the rest of the Nudura forms, on the concrete to help it stay warmer. There wasn't enough foam to cover the floor, so they got some straw, and some hay, and made my floor look like a large stall in a barn.

Hopefully the deer won't find it, and consider it a good place to eat and sleep.

Today was a good day for concrete

Well, I now have a floor.

When I got to the property this afternoon, they were just finishing, the finishing.

Overall, they did a very nice job. They even put a raised curb, on the utility room floor on the garage side, except where where the doors into the garage will go. There was one issue I spotted. They were supposed to leave the outside foam on the Nudura where the front door will go. That way there was going to be insulation on the outside of the floor slab. Instead they cut the Nudura all the way to the footer. If Newt or I had been there, we could have corrected that one, before it was cast in concrete.

There should be Nudura foam just inside that board, instead of the concrete coming all the way to the board.

I will have to see what we can do as far as adding insulation on the outside, and extending the door threshold to prevent the slab being directly exposed to the outside. I don't want the slab to conduct heat right out under the front door in the winter.

The power trowel, looks to have created a bit of pattern in the surface of the concrete. I will have to see what it looks like when it is dry and curred. It will be interesting to see how that plays with the concrete stain.

The trowel left a pattern.

We are having some trouble with the rain, loosening up the dirt around the excavation, and causing it to fall into the hole. They put down some plastic to try to reduce that. You can see the plastic on the ground in front of me in the photo above.

One of the concrete guys almost had to give me CPR. He looked at the pressure gauge attached to the PEX, after they were all done, and told Doug (the guy in charge of the concrete crew) that the gauge wasn't reading any pressure! Doug looked at him and said WHAT! and I about fell over. Then he said he was joking. It was at the same pressure my dad and I left it with last night.

The tubing in the utility room ended up looking like my hair in the morning. After we connected all the loops together last night, and added a bungee to hold it together off of where the floor would be poured, it looked a little tangled.

 

They trimmed the board that the PEX was attached to.

Oh, what a tangled web we crimped last night :-)

I should correct myself before my family does. My hair is worse than that in the morning.

Newt brought the rest of the Nudura forms to the property, so that they can finish the wall forms. They didn't pour any concrete in the wall forms today. They just wanted them in the correct place for the floor pour. It took Newt a little while to get to the property with the load of foam he had on his trailer. He said it felt like he was hauling 5000 pounds. It was stacked pretty high. We didn't unload it, Newt just parked it. With the forms strapped down to the trailer, that is probably safer than if we had unloaded them and stacked them.

We discussed the pour, and the issue with the door, and some items about the waterproofing that will be going on the walls and roof.

While I waited for Newt this evening I enjoyed the quiet, with just the sound of birds, and the babbling of the creek, it was lovely to sit on the pile of gravel outside of my home. Newt said, it is about time I stop referring to it as "the property". I will have to see if it is just my home, or if I come up with a fitting name to give it.

This was the sky I enjoyed as the concrete crew left.

Under pressure

Friday, I went out to the property and got setup to try to finish laying the PEX. As I was working on getting a fire started, the building inspector came by. He was there to check on things for the permit to pour the slab for the floor. I talked to him, and answered the few questions he had. He was satisfied that things were in order, and handed me the permit. As he was leaving, Newt and his son Jake showed up. Newt talked to the inspector a bit, then the inpector left. Jake was there to give me a hand finishing up the laying of the PEX (although, taming of the PEX might be more correct). The weather prediction for Monday sounded promising, so we wanted to be ready so the concrete guys could get a slab down, if the weather cooperated.

It was a chilly day, but not near as bad a Thursday had been. Newt ran and got us some lunch, and Jake and I started laying the PEX. Then after a chilly lunch around the fire, Jake and I went back to work with the PEX. Getting the PEX off the rolls, without it tangling up like an overextended Slinky, is a challenge. With two people, it is easier. The bathrooms presented interesting challenges. First, I want to have the floor warmer in them than the rest of the house. So I wanted to place the tubing closer together. This will result in a more even heating, and add more heat for a given area of floor. The challenge was that the tubing wasn't wanting to bend for the wide loops I had been doing, so narrower loops, so that the tubing would end up closer together, were going to be out of the question. I had to use the wide turns, but overlap the run. The master bathroom, looked organized compared to how the guest bathroom turned out.

Not a lot of space for tubing in the master bathroom. Some is going under where the tub will be, on the right side.

No, I did not just throw it down on the floor. But it does look chaotic doesn't it?

The other challenge with the master bathroom, was that it was going to use almost as much PEX getting to and from that room, as I was going to lay in the floor of the room. To try to reduce how much heat I loose to the other parts of the floor, as I get over to the master bathroom, I added some insulation to the PEX. We didn't want to add foam to the PEX, since that would have made it more likely to try to float to the surface when they do the pour. What I did instead, was to put the PEX through PVC conduit. The PVC won't transfer heat as easily as the PEX. So it should reduce the heat lost before the water gets to the master bathroom.

 

Here you can see a couple sections of the grey PVC conduit with white PEX coming out of it.

Jake and I manage to finish laying the PEX. We were pretty chilly so we called it a day. Had I known how Sunday would turn out, I would have done some more work out there after Jake left. Here is how we left things on Friday:

All the PEX laid, now we need to pressure test it.

Sunday (today), my dad and I came to the property to pressure test the PEX. I wanted to make sure there were no leaks, before they tried to pour the concrete. Unfortunitly, with other obligations, it was late afternoon before we could start hooking all the loops together. We had a fair amount of rain overnight, and earlier today, and everything was soaked. But at least temperatures were moderate. I put a plug in the end of one loop, then we went from loop to loop, and connected them all together as one long loop. By the time we finished that, it was dark. I turned on the headlights on the truck, and we kept working. We got the pressure test fittings connected on (we put those together Saturday night, wait till Newt sees what we put together). Then it was time to cross our fingers, and pressurize the system with air. I had bought a little compressor, for filling tires. It worked reasonably well to get the system up to a little over 20 PSI. Then we used the air that dad had stored in his compressor back home, and boosted the pressure some more. It was at about 25 PSI and was holding pressure. I decided that I would come back after we had some supper, and see if it was holding. If it wasn't holding, there was nothing we would be able to do, and the pour would probably have to wait. When I came back after dinner, about an hour later, it still had the same pressure. So it looks like it is holding. So if the weather is OK, and the contractor is available, we should be able to pour a floor tomorrow.

Rain, wind, snow, and really cold work

I talked to Newt on Tuesday morning. I was worried that some of the foam sheets we had stacked up and some of the Nudura forms that hadn't been laid yet, would get blown into the next county, by the wind they were predicting we would get. Newt ran out to the property, and re-stacked the foam down in the excavation, beside the walls, so it was sheltered, then piled some wood and re-bar on top to hold it down. He also set the unused forms down in the excavation. Tuesday night the rain started. We got a fair amount of rain, then the wind picked up. We were supposed to get gusts to 55 MPH. I was a little worried about the Nudura forms that had been laid, since they are just attached with spray foam adhesive to the footers at this point.

Today I got to go out to the property, to see if any damage had been done. Thankfully, the walls seem to be where we left them, and there were only a few pieces from the garbage pile that had gotten blown around. I cleaned that up, and got to work on the second loop of PEX for the master bedroom. A nearby weather report, indicates we had winds gusting to 25 MPH and only got up to around 23 degrees F today. Yes, I can verify, it was very cold, and quite windy at my property. I managed to get the tubing laid, but the zip ties are not tightened down yet, and they haven't been clipped off yet. I'll do that tomorrow. It is supposed to be warmer, and less windy tomorrow, so hopefully I can build a fire, and that will help.

Now most of the PEX is laid. White and red loops in the forground on the right side, are in the master bedroom.

Why, yes that is snow along the south wall. The funny loop in the red tubing, in the middle of the left side, is where the front door will come in. It will be good to have a little extra heat there.

Tomorrow, I am hoping to be able to lay the last three loops. I have most of the parts I need for pressure testing the tubing. So if I can finish laying the tubing tomorrow, and pressure test on Sunday afternoon, then we would be ready for an inspection, and concrete pour. Monday looks like it might be warm enough to pour concrete, then it looks like it is going to get cold again. So I am hoping I can get the work done on the radiant floor tubing by the end of the weekend.

3 days of fire, zip ties, and PEX

Well, its been a fun three days.

Saturday:

I loaded up the PEX in the truck and headed to the property. Newt met me out there, and we got a fire going, from some of the lumber waste from making the concrete forms in the garage, and from some dead wood on the property. It ended up being a smoky fire, but it did help take the chill off to occasionally stop and lean over it. I had gotten some marking done Friday night, but it wasn't much as you can see, and the lines for the walls hadn't turned out all that well.

I had just a few lines.

With Newt's help, we got all the walls marked out, marked where the doors would go, and finished marking things where I didn't want to run the PEX under. Then we started our battle with the PEX. First we put a board up, that we could attach the ends to. This is in the utility room, and it is where the PEX will get connected to all the valves, pumps, and the manifolds for the distribution system. Then we started with the PEX for the office. While Newt unrolled the PEX, I followed my diagram, and used zip ties to attach the PEX to the wire mesh that the concrete guys had layed out.

The office is in the top center, and has the white PEX looping back and fort on the floor.

The PEX was very stiff, and kept wanting to twist up on us. After we got the office done, we decided to continue on with the family room. The family room has two loops of PEX. Its layout was quite a bit more complicated than the office. As we went, we were learning how to get the PEX to cooperate better. By mid afternoon, we had the family room done.

 

 Office, and family room now have PEX.

From another angle.

 

Here, you can see where we are attaching the supply and return for each loop, to our board.

We both had commitments elsewhere for the evening, so we called it a day, as far as the PEX was concerned.

Sunday:

I went back out to the property Sunday afternoon, as the weather was good, and I wanted to get some more of the PEX layed. It was slower with only one person to both attach the PEX, and to try to manage the unrully roll of PEX. But I managed to get one of the loops in the kitchen almost done before dark. At least working down in the excavation, I was sheltered from the wind, so it wasn't as cold as it might have been.

Monday:

Today was an adventure. We had just a skim of snow, but it froze into a sheet of ice in places. I made good use of the 4 wheel drive on the truck this morning. I ended up taking a detour since people were sliding off the road on my usual route to the property. On my detour, I saw a few incidents where someone was definitely driving too fast for conditions. I took it slow, so it took me a while to get to the property. The snow did offer nice views.

 

 Foam forms, and my Mt. Fuji of gravel

I decided I wanted a fire, since I knew I was going to get damp today with the snow covering the floor, and the PEX. It took a bit, but I managed to get a nice little fire going. I used it quite often today to try to dry out my gloves, and to keep my hands warm.

I worked most of the day by myself. It was slower going, as I was battling the PEX roll, trying to do zip ties, with the gloves on, and trying to get the cold PEX to bend into the loops I wanted. I was also stopping regularly to try to dry out the gloves. I managed to finish the loops in the kitchen and start the loop for the guest bedroom. Newt was able to escape from meetings in the afternoon, and came out. With his help, we finished up the guest bedroom, and got one of the two loops done for the master bedroom. That finished off the roll of red PEX. I am estimating I have between 10 and 12 feet left. That was cutting it close. We must have layed it down pretty close to the plan, I was supposed to have 21 feet left, and that wasn't counting the lengths that we are leaving at the board.

Here is what it looked like, before we started on the master bedroom.

We still have 4 loops. The second loop in the master bedroom, the loop in the hobby room, and the two that will probably be the most challenging, the ones in the bathrooms. The bathrooms will be challenging, because I want to place the tubing closer together to provide more heat in a given area of floor. But the rooms are small, and the PEX is proving quite obstinate in how it wants to bend. So I am going to look over the plan, and come up with a different way to arange the PEX for those two rooms.

Ready for tubing, lots of tubing

Well, today didn't go quite as planned. I was delayed getting to the property, and when I did, I only had about an hour to work before it was too dark to check my measurements. The concrete guys look to be ready to pour, once we have the PEX layed out. They also need a day that is warm enough. Since the concrete will be my finished floor, once it is stained, it is important that the pour goes well.

The only area that doesn't have foam, is the garage.

I talked to Newt. We decided since I am not heating the floor in the garage, to forgo the foam under it. All the forms are in place to do the first pour. They have the forms set up, so that they can pour all the living area, and the slab for the utility room, which will be 2 inches lower. We are doing this, so if there is a leak in there, it is unlikely to go into the rest of the house.

I tried to lay out where the walls, and other things are. However one person, trying to get accurate measurements with tape measures sitting on top of wire mesh, well lets just say it was not that productive. So tomorrow, Newt and I are going to get an early start. We are probably going to build a fire to try to warm ourselves, and the PEX. We will just have to see how things go. We will discuss a couple issues, such as exactly how the front door is going to play into the poured concrete, and get things marked. Hopefully, we will also be able to lay a good amount of the PEX tomorrow.

I am going to have a well insulated house, or a very large ice chest!

Newt ran around yesterday tracking down the foam I wanted to use for under the floor. He had a challenge, because we didn't want to wait for a special shipment, so he had to visit multiple Home Depot stores to get all the foam that is needed for under the slab.

Today, the concrete contractors were busy laying it down. They added more gravel, so the plumbing was pretty well buried. Then they got the gravel evened out.

Here he is spreading the gravel and getting it roughly even.

 

Then he uses a screed, just like it was concrete, to get it very level, and even.

Once the gravel is evened out, he lays down the next piece of foam.

 

They are cutting out places for the plumbing to come up through before they can lay this piece down. You can see where the radon vent is sticking up through the other piece of foam. 

Once they get the foam sheets down, they are putting tape over the seams to hold it in place, and to work on making it resist passing vapors up from the ground.

Putting tape on seams.

When I left, they were expecting to be able to finish the foam, put a layer of plastic sheeting over top, and get the wire mesh down by lunch tomorrow. Tomorrow afternoon if all goes well, I am going to go out, and paint lines where the walls, doors, windows, cabinets and radiant tubing will go. I am going to do that so that when Newt and I work on laying the tubing, it will already be worked out where everything is suppost to go.

With the walls and other features marked, if we decide to make a change to where we are laying the tubing, we will know where we should avoid. We don't want to lay tubing under cabinets, because it won't heat effectivly under them, and if food is stored in the cabinets, the food could go bad prematurely. I certainly don't want to put heat under my refrigerator. It is best to avoid putting the tubing under walls, because when they attach the walls to the concrete, they could punture a tube, if the tube is up too high in the concrete.

It looks like Newt and I are going to try to lay the PEX down on Saturday morning. I am not sure how successful we will be, since it can be difficult to bend it when it is cold, and Saturday is certainly not looking like balmy weather.


Now I have mentioned that we have quite a bit of wild life in the area. We also have interesting domesticated animals nearby. At one house on my road, they have peacocks. I decided to take a photo today through the windshield. It didn't turn out too bad, but I will have to get some when they have their tails spread.