Status Update
I completed the painting of the walls and ceiling. It took one coat of primer and two coats of white latex semigloss before I was satisfied with the coverage. The fact that it took 3 coats surprised me as I was painting over clean new plywood which is a fairly light color to begin with. I decided to go ahead and use a texture. Drips, runs, and brush marks count as a texture right? Seriously, it’s not that bad, but it’s not perfect either. A year from now it will all be forgotten but for now every little mistake haunts me.
I am not sure that I can share any great wisdom about brush painting latex, but I can share one thing. If you just brush it on and walk away, you will have sags and runs. If you brush it on and then keep working the brush back and forth until it starts to drag the brush down, like you are brushing on glue instead of paint, it won’t run. Better yet, brush it on one way, and then dry brush it the other (like vertical and horizontal for example) and most of the brush marks will cancel out. I welcome anyone who is a serious painter to jump in and straighten me out on this….
I started putting on the electrical outlets and covers, which takes a surprisingly long time since there are so many of them. I found that the plywood gaps around the boxes are ever so slightly too large to be covered in some cases. I could use oversize covers, which they sell in two larger sizes, but I want to use the small, or standard size. Almost all my outlets and covers will be between shelves in what amounts to permanently mounted book case style cabinets and I don’t want them bumping into the shelves or the vertical supports. I will just have to add a little caulk around the edges of the boxes to fill any gaps. In truth, I could just ignore it, but I am just nitpicky like that.
I am also a little unhappy with a few of the AC plugs. It another fusbugety thing, but a few sit just a little too deep and will need to be shimmed out. I don’t like the way they distort the unbreakable plastic outlet cover plates so I will just have to fix them.
All the ceiling lights, fan, air conditioner etc. are installed. I still need to install the hand cranks and the pointing handles for the two antennas. I also need to install the WIFI amplifier and cover plate for the broadcast TV amplifier box. If everything fits as planned it’s just a matter of a few screws and possibly a lick of paint here and there.
I installed the wired remote for the inverter. It also has a wireless remote which I believe communicates with the wired remote. The bottom line is that I can now turn the inverter on/off from inside the living quarters. It’s handy for now, but in the long term it will probably be left on 24/7. Then again, I may get in the habit of turning it off at night to conserve battery power. Then again, again, it doesn’t draw much when idling, and I have a ton of batteries.
I installed the plywood floor on top of ½” of R-max as planned. The next step is to fill in the gaps and seams to prepare the floor for vinyl flooring. That will probably happen this weekend.
I will need to special order the vinyl flooring. I didn’t realize how expensive that stuff can be. Sure, you can buy the cheap stuff for a buck or two per square foot, but I haven’t been cutting corners on materials to this point. Also, the cheap stuff looks like every crappy little apartment I have ever lived in and I just can’t stand to look at it. The good stuff is almost $4 per square foot. At 14’ by 7’ I have 98 square feet, but that’s irrelevant. It comes in 6’ wide or 12’ wide rolls, so I will need to buy 14’ by 12’ and that is 168 square feet, or about $672 plus tax. I may look around for a better deal, but will probably just spend the money and keep moving forward. In the big picture it is not that much, and this is planned to be my one and final home for the rest of my life, so I don’t want to regret the $100 I saved.
To be continued…
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