Kitchen Renovations – 2009

Like many people do after purchasing a new place, we decided to make some changes to our kitchen. Nothing too drastic, just a few minor changes. We decided to add a dishwasher and at the same time increase our countertop size to cover the entire length of the dishwasher and the base cupboards. Sue’s Mom bought us a dishwasher for Christmas, so this stepped up our time frame and we dove into the project. (thanks Ma.)
I studied architecture in high school so when it comes time to do renovations I typically do the designs myself. I put together a drawing of the kitchen that included all the necessary measurments and detail on the placement of everything. The dishwasher we were installing was a small apartment size dishwasher (18″) wide, so the countertop needed to be increased in size from the current 7 feet (84 inches) to 102 inches.
We contracted a kitchen company to get the countertop and have it installed and chose our new countertop etc.
Countertop ordered and installation scheduled we had to prepare the kitchen for their arrival. I disconnected the existing plumbing and since it was 35 years old, all the drains and piping are a combination of brass and copper instead of PVC which is now commonly used. The faucet was hard soldered into the pipes, so after disconnecting the drains by loosening the nuts on them I had to cut the pipes going to the taps. Its normal for these to be replaced by fittings and flex hoses.
We attempted to arrange for a plumber but couldn’t find anyone available in the time frame we needed, so I opted to do the job myself and we headed to home depot for supplies.
We picked out our new faucet and all the required adapters and whatyamacallits to hook everthing up. While heading to the counter to purchase everything a young man came up to us and asked if we had a plumber to hook all that stuff up. We replied, no actually we couldn’t find one so we were doing it ourself. We then asked do you know someone who is available. He said: “well I’m a plumber and I’m new to it and always looking for extra work.” We decided to give him a shot and arranged for him to stop by after the counter top was installed to spec out what he needed and then complete the job on Saturday.
The countertop people arrived on Friday ready to install our new countertop, but things didn’t go quite as planned. For some unknown reason they made the countertop 1-1/2 feet too small. Apparently when they sent over their estimater to take all the measurements, he didn’t bother to look at the drawing and a language barrier prevented him from fully understanding…Sue said he nodded and smiled alot and she didn’t think he really got it.
So we were now faced with a non-working kitchen and a severely broken old countertop since they had broken out the old faucet and the counter being somewhat rotted had given way in the area surrounding the faucet.
When our plumber showed up, we explained the dilemna and decided to go ahead and hook everything up anyway to the old counter top to hold us over until the new countertop shows up.
The countertop company said they would try and have a new countertop for us by a week from the first try, or two weeks if it doesn’t arrive in time. They apparently order all of their countertops from Quebec, so shipping is a week apart.
I found out the cupboards were put in before the tile so I had to chip away some of the existing tile to move the base cabinet over in order to make room for the dishwasher. I messed up a bit initially, moving the base cabinet the width of itself rather than the width of the dishwasher, but figured it out part way through. Oh well, we wanted to replace the tiles anyway!
So as it stands everything is working in the kitchen now and we are waiting for the new countertop. Their were two new pieces of countertop requird for our kitchen. Besides the 102 inch one, we needed an 18 inch one as well. The counter top company put that one in and I posted a picture in the flickr connection here on our site as well as a shot of the old countertop with the sink removed.
Ah the adventure continues…..