In an effort to make our house a little more 're-sellable', I decided that I really wanted to replace all the really worn carpeted areas of our house with wood laminate. This idea was spawned by a flooring replacement I helped my father-in-law with at the family cabin. Seeing how easy it was to install (even with un-square 1930's - built pole walls) and the cost really made me want to do this in my house. Also, anybody that has carpet in a dining room...especially with kids...is just retarded. The carpet get's gross and starts spawning all sorts of groadies that cannot be cleaned out. Not only that, but the carpet get's really threadbare and un-stretched in highly traveled areas. Take a look at a few of the 'before' pics:
So given the flooring I'd done before I figured the main floor would take a day. The next morning I got started by with a trip to Home Depot to pick up a kick-ass
Ridgid 10-inch Sliding Compound Miter Saw. I hate dropping this kind of dough, but I kept telling myself that it will pay for itself in this project and any project in the future. And let me tell you, it was well worth it! I non-sliding single-bevel saw just wouldn't have cut it.
So I returned home eager to get this project done...
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| Cleaned up and ready to go... |
...anybody that has done this before can tell you, starting is the hardest thing to do! I kept asking myself, 'which way does this thingy need to go???? Once started, it went pretty quick. By 10:00 it looked like this:
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| Latte checkin' my progress... |
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| Watching Daddy work |
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| My foreman busting my balls..."you sure you know what you're doin'?" |
So the first day went pretty well, I got most of the main floor done and I was thinking I was going to be finished right on schedule...then I started the stairs. OMG, NOT FUN! It took me an entire day just to get the treads ready for the laminate!
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| My handy-dandy nose-trimmer jig thingy |
When using laminate, the 'nose' of the stair must be trimmed flush with the 'kick' board of the stair. I used the jig pictured above to transfer the line of the stair from the bottom of the tread to the top. Originally, I used a circular saw to make the cut, but realized after that it took me an hour to cut the ends of the tread and clean up the edge. That wasn't going to do it for me, so I fell back on plan 'B' and tried using a
Reciprocating Saw I got on sale at Harbor Freight. That was the ticket! Any clean-up of the edge was quickly done with my trusty
Oscillating Power Tool that was a gift from my father-in-law a couple years ago...thanks Kent! I can't tell you how great this tool is! Aside from the gripes about dust being everywhere, this was starting to go smooth!
So by the end of the second day I only had the stairs ready to start work on. On Christmas Eve, I cut and fit the treads and it looked like I was going to finish today. I finally got everything fit and started gluing and nailing the laminate at about 7:00...and then I ran out of glue!!!! Aaaurgh! Thinking Wal-Mart was open 24-7, I made a mad dash to get some glue. Come to find out, they close at 8:00 on Christmas Eve...just 20 minutes late.
Defeated and tired (mentally and physically), I returned home to my un-completed stairs...it's almost as if they were mocking me, "...and you thought you were going to finish us....ha ha ha, you silly little man! Now you have to look at us for a whole day before you can even touch us again! We Win!!!". Stupid stairs...
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| Mocking stairs |
The day after Christmas, I completed the stairs, trim, and moulding. And I have to say, it was well worth it!
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| Conquered stairs |
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| Finished dining room, from living room |
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| Dining room, from kitchen |
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| Hallway to bedroom and bathroom |
When all said and done, the whole project cost:
Flooring, trim, and pad: $390
Time: 3 Days
Tools: I'm not going to get into this...but the tools cost more than the flooring and time. And tools last a lifetime!
All said and done, my wife and I started to wonder why we didn't do this sooner. I'm a little bummed that we aren't going to be able to enjoy the floor for much longer (if the house sells). I will also have to say this project really made me hate my desk job...I was sore and stiff for the next week!
