What did you do today?

[Floorist]

I don’t pay for transitions so I’m not up to speed on their exact price. A single 6’6” transition piece is $65? Used to be maybe $25 per transition. I figured current prices somewhere around $35 to $40 but damn $66 just hurts. I’d have @highup doing Z bar up to a clean cut raw edge for that price. I suppose the installers these days would have to be able to leave a clean straight edge though.

"Installers leave a clean straight edge"? Dreamer.

 

[Mark Brown]

You guys all understand that we are all "installers these days" right??
I would beg to offer that there are a lot of highly competent and fastidious installers out there, just we do not typically run into them seeing as they are off doing their own thing and do not need us to go and repair their work.

 

[Floorist]

I would not let any of the local installers put a floor in a doghouse for me. I would not do that to my dog.

 

[C.J.]

"Installers leave a clean straight edge"? Dreamer.

Prolly dreamin a little but if you’re not gonna cover your jagged ol janky assed cuts with a transition then a clean edge would certainly help to make you look like you know what you’re doing. Do customers actually accept a nasty lookin edge like that? I guess so if they accept that the installer doesn’t install transitions.

 

[Mark Brown]

I would not let any of the local installers put a floor in a doghouse for me. I would not do that to my dog.

You are a local installer in your area....

 

[zannej]

Damn, a 27 year old that I have known since he was a baby died of covid this morning. He just got married in June.

I'm sorry to hear that. It really sucks. My brother had a co-worker who was 22 and didn't seem to have any evident health issues who died from the first wave of Covid. Over 50 of his co-workers got Covid within the first few months.

The trip was for observing. Just a coincidence that the Perseid Meteor shower happens that week. And the 12th is my birthday too. Anyway, the storms in northern Pennsylvania and the smoke from the west coast made it less than ideal so we canceled.
Instead, I decided to paint my bedroom, which I wanted to do for past 3 years.
Came out pretty good. Done in 2 days. No trim to paint though.

That is a very nice color! What paint and color is that?

Younger people get it but they aren't usually affected by it much. That's the surprising part.

I've been reading and hearing that the Delta variant is hitting younger populations much harder. More children are getting sick. They had the first proven infant death from it in Florida I think last week.

A T & T sent someone out to dig a trench across our yard to run a line for a neighbor. No one had asked, so it is not happening.

I'm glad you were able to stop it. The city / utility companies can do whatever they want in town. They dig in people's yards and don't even cover it back up. They tear up driveways and don't fix them. The mayor is getting some sort of kickbacks so he lets them run all over people and overcharge.

I dont know but 'merica but here they don't have to ask. Utility has eminent domain.

I think it depends on the city ordinances and state rules. Even though I am waaaay out in the woods, the power company can come in, cut my trees, and poke around my yard without permission & police will let them. Doesn't mean I have to let them. Or more precisely, doesn't mean I have to let my cow let them. She usually takes care of trespassers for me. We've never had anyone come back and snoop around the yard since my cow chased people.

I don’t pay for transitions so I’m not up to speed on their exact price. A single 6’6” transition piece is $65? Used to be maybe $25 per transition. I figured current prices somewhere around $35 to $40 but damn $66 just hurts. I’d have @highup doing Z bar up to a clean cut raw edge for that price. I suppose the installers these days would have to be able to leave a clean straight edge though.

I looked at transition prices for stuff a couple years back and they have doubled since I last looked. Stuff that I thought was high at $30 is now $60. I saw some for over $80. A lot of stuff is out-of-stock too.

Reminds me, I wanted to get this for the transition from vinyl plank to sheet vinyl in the bathroom: A&A Surfaces Antique Mahogany 0.3 in. T x 1.77 in. W x 94 in. L Luxury Vinyl Reducer Molding-LVR6520-0017-R - The Home Depot
But it's out-of-stock. A single piece would do two transitions, but I'm not too worried about the transition inside the closet since it won't be visible, so a 48" one would do. Any idea where to get that? It doesn't even have an option to get an e-mail when it's back in stock. I even drew it in as best I could for my bathroom sketch in Sketchup.

Yesterday I had a dental appointment. Couldn't sleep the night before so I drew in the wallset for the shower that will be in as best as possible. Did the cutout for the window, plopped a pre-made sink that I adjusted to be the right width and depth into the vanity, etc. Then went and had two teeth drilled and filled. When they were done they told me to get up at my own pace. I hopped right up and was ready to go. Good thing I'd eaten at like 5 or 6am because I haven't had an appetite since then for whatever reason. Was really exhausted. Dentist had her work cut out for her on that back tooth. She had to put a metal ring around it to push the skin/gum away and give her something to support the filler material to rebuild the back of the tooth. I had to go pick up an RX for the next appointment (next Thursday) and had to wait 30 min for it. Picked up mail on the way home and then racked out. Mom woke me up sometime mid-evening wanting food-- my brother had refused to get her something. So I got her food and went straight back to bed. My brother woke me up even later asking if I was patching something. I told him I'd been asleep & wasn't using the internet. Racked out again and didn't wake up until almost 4pm. Checked on mom and made her something to eat and then back to bed again. I'm still feeling sleepy and not hungry. I was going to get some Ramen but my brother had left his chair knocked over on it's back in the kitchen in the way of the sink. I couldn't lift it and couldn't move it. He came out and tried to tease me about something but just the sound of his voice agitated me so I told him "shut the hell up". He seemed pretty shocked because he's always interrupting me and telling me to shut up but I don't reciprocate. I'd just overheard him yelling at our mom and being rude to her when she asked him to please move the chair so I was irritated with him. He tried to page me about 20min ago but I turned the volume down on the phone & ignored it. I don't know what he wanted but I'm too cranky and tired.

I just took my thyroid meds so I have to wait about an hour to eat anything. I'll probably nap some more. Just feeling very drained for no apparent reason.

 

[Floorist]

One of the guys that was going to dig the trench said he had been chased off with a shotgun before. I just turned my wife loose on them. They are independent contractors, so I kinda felt sorry for them.

 

[C.J.]

@zannej Zamma makes all kinds of matching transitions for just about any flavor of LVP out there and that’s who HD uses for just about all their transitions. Maybe check their website out? How about Lowe’s? Zamma is pretty big so I’m sure they’re available in more places than just HD. You may have to wait until they make that specific flavor again if they are out themselves but that could be sooner than HD is ready to place an order for that flavor.

Floors by southern boys has a YouTube video showing how to peel the LVP skin layer off and adhere it to a reducer for a perfect match. That may be an option if you can’t find a matching reducer out there.

 

[highup]

For Randy…
Today’s jobView attachment 12718

You're saying today's job is to unload the boxes? Damn, it's going to be easier working for you than I thought it was. You supply lunch, right?

 

[highup]

I don’t pay for transitions so I’m not up to speed on their exact price. A single 6’6” transition piece is $65? Used to be maybe $25 per transition. I figured current prices somewhere around $35 to $40 but damn $66 just hurts. I’d have @highup doing Z bar up to a clean cut raw edge for that price. I suppose the installers these days would have to be able to leave a clean straight edge though.

You laugh, but these guys actually did pretty close to a 45° angle in that living room. That said I've got a Starrett angle finder which shows the miter angle and the actual cut angle. That Starrett is usually dead on perfect but for some reason I made trip after trip to the saw to shave off an extra 32nd.. my fault fer sure. Starrett don't lie.
As far as installation costs go, I haven't figured out what to charge. I've got more than a few hours just placing the trim in the living room. That doesn't include the turn and tack to 22 ft of carpeting to the transition. I'll bill out the job out on Friday but I'm not sure what I'm going to charge for it. There are six, 36 inch doorways, plus 22-ish feet in the living room. I've never heard of a linear foot charge for stuff like this. I think they ordered 49 ft of this reducer. I mean I estimating an additional $175 to $200 for screwing with it. Probably not nearly enough.
I go as far as sanding the bottom of the reducer trim with my belt sander and 60 grit paper to give the adhesive something to grab onto.

 

[highup]

Changing plans on doing my dashboard mod to add 3 gauges. I want the dash itself to look somewhat stock so I removed the radio and that's where I'm going to put the gauges.
I bought a 5 ft long piece of 1/8 inch aluminum today and that will block in the area where the radio was. I'll drill three 2 inch diameter holes into the aluminum to install the gauges.
I'll decide later on what I want to do for a radio.
I was going to start my modification by the two heater vents in the center of the dash, then make a piece that from that place all the way down to the center console in one piece. Too difficult, and it just wouldn't look right.
I was originally thinking of making the console/dash all in one piece, but in a 1993 pick up, I think it would look kind of corny trying to over modernize it. I'm going to take this one step at a time as the Rice Krispies tell me what to do next.
So far I've removed a small section of the dash that contained the radio, cigarette lighter and vents.
I cut out the radio opening and made it slightly wider than the original radio opening.
I then cut an piece of 1/8 inch thick aluminum to fill in that radio void.
I drew out an accurate template for the three gauges. I'm going to cover the piece of aluminum with some black formica for the background behind the gauges.
I could have made this out of stainless but then it would match nothing else in the truck and look kind of like out of place.
To connect the piece of aluminum to the back side of the section of dashboard , I glued in two 10/24 nuts into the plastic piece above the radio area. Those two fasteners will hold the aluminum in place after I mount the gauges. I haven't figured out yet how to secure the bottom part of the aluminum so it doesn't rattle around, but I have some ideas.
Film at 11:00, as they say, but I don't recall them saying which day at 11:00.
Here's the aluminum in place and here are the threaded sections that I have epoxy into place to mouth the aluminum too.

 

[C.J.]

You laugh, but these guys actually did pretty close to a 45° angle in that living room. That said I've got a Starrett angle finder which shows the miter angle and the actual cut angle. That Starrett is usually dead on perfect but for some reason I made trip after trip to the saw to shave off an extra 32nd.. my fault fer sure. Starrett don't lie.
As far as installation costs go, I haven't figured out what to charge. I've got more than a few hours just placing the trim in the living room. That doesn't include the turn and tack to 22 ft of carpeting to the transition. I'll bill out the job out on Friday but I'm not sure what I'm going to charge for it. There are six, 36 inch doorways, plus 22-ish feet in the living room. I've never heard of a linear foot charge for stuff like this. I think they ordered 49 ft of this reducer. I mean I estimating an additional $175 to $200 for screwing with it. Probably not nearly enough.
I go as far as sanding the bottom of the reducer trim with my belt sander and 60 grit paper to give the adhesive something to grab onto.

When I was ‘polishing turds’ I would charge as much as I could have made had I gone and done a new job that wasn’t all messed up for a different customer that day. If I can go and make $500 a day installing LVP for Suzy homemaker then I’m gonna charge $500 to polish a turd for somebody else otherwise I’m gonna go and make $500 putting Suzy’s LVP in and you can figure out how to polish that turd yourself. Your numbers may vary but $500 is just an example. You do top notch work so don’t feel bad for charging appropriately. In fact when was the last time you gave yourself a raise? I think it should be today.

 

[zannej]

Thanks, CJ. I looked at the Zamma products & they had some negative reviews about the way they attach to the floor. Apparently they glue on and stuff doesn't line up right and the pieces don't stay on. The MSI/A&A stuff comes with a metal track and screws down. Also, I didn't see any of the Zamma in a matching color (and I looked). If they actually had it in stock at the stores it would be nice so I could compare but they hardly have any at all. I've looked at both HomeDepot and Lowes. It sucks that my good neighbor is no longer in the flooring business. He might have been able to find something for me.

Taking the lamination off of the vinyl plank made me wonder if I could scrape the backing off of some scrap sheet vinyl (it's somewhat thick-- I'll have to get pics at some point) and then adhere it to a wood or metal transition strip (tucking it under the edges). Since I intend to use whatever is left from my mom's bathroom to do the floor in the guest bathroom, I might not have enough to go in to the doorway so I want to bring the vinyl planks in to the doorway more and have the transition piece go to the edge. Probably won't look the best. Alternative is to use scraps for the doorway. I think I have some scraps left from my bathroom. I had given a large chunk of scrap to some friends to put in their trailer. It covered the whole room. So there's not much scrap left from my bathroom.

Is it even possible to do the vinyl sheet glued to a transition strip or should I just go with something that is "close enough" for a match?

I finally got up around 9pm and had some ramen but I still feel exhausted.

 

[highup]

I appreciate that a lot. The shop I am working for originally said that they wanted me to start doing all the patterned material. I was told I would measure it and give them my estimate rather than them trying to guess. Well, someone else is doing the measuring and he's actually doing quite well. The shop gives the customer the price for the carpet and pad and then bills them whatever I decide to charge. It's a better relationship than most stores would ever offer someone and I probably cut myself short because I don't want us overstep the boundaries....
......the boundaries that I probably put on myself. I tend to rethink my charges a few times over and then come to a fair conclusion prior to billing it out. Something is fair to me, and still fair to the customer. I suppose I could build $2,000 for installing a hundred yards of carpet....... But I don't work that way.

 

[highup]

When I get done applying the black formica to the aluminum which will hold my three gauges, it's going to look sort of like this.
.....
Except it won't be a piece of paper, and the gauges will be real, and with any luck it will look happily decent. Good enough for an antique S10 pickup.

 

[zannej]

Looks like the project is coming along nicely in planning stages, Highup. It will look very cool when you are done. Are there any places like U-Pullit in your area where you can go pull parts off of old junkers? I wonder if you can get any of the parts you want from scrapped vehicles.

Got a call from my friend's gf. She's upset because Walmart called her back & said that she doesn't qualify to be hired (despite having been told they would hire her earlier). Not sure how she can't qualify because they hire people with criminal records and all sorts of things. My only guess is someone who knows her told them knot to hire her. Her current place of employment called her to yell at her for not returning to work yet. She's got active Covid but tested negative earlier but my friend tested positive. Everyone in the household is sick and having fevers. She did the responsible thing by not returning while sick. The casino clinic told her to quarantine for 14 days. Her boss wanted her to only quarantine for 10 days-- but she is still sick. They basically told her they are firing her for not returning to work while having active Covid. I told her to go get tested again and then if they try to fire her, sue for wrongful termination and/or unemployment benefits for being wrongfully terminated. She's currently trying to figure out where she can work since she needs to pay for her car and cellphone. She also told me that her sister, her sister's husband, the sister's baby, the sister's husband's brother, etc all have Covid and are using nebulizers. Her mom (who has Covid for the 3rd time) is not doing well. She said that my friend's ex's son has Covid. Which means my friend's daughter has Covid and is likely the one who gave him Covid (if he didn't get it at school) since the ex brought her home halfway through quarantine. That means they likely infected classmates and possibly teachers. The school by all rights should shut down, but they insisted the kid with Covid had to attend classes in the first place so I doubt they will.

 

[highup]

Zan, I've been looking up ideas for a console that goes to the dashboard. Custom-made stuff by do-it-yourselfers, not commercial pre fab stuff.
I want to put a main power switch, a switch for the gauge lights with possibly a reostat/dimmer, and a manual switch for my radiator fan. I also like to install two or three USB ports for charging.
Once I had this part of the dash done, console can be done separately and it doesn't have to mold up into the dash like I had previously planned. I'll have to wait and see how this turns out to see what I need to do next. I've never been good at planning a project from start to finish in one step.

 

[zannej]

That makes sense. I was just thinking that maybe there are some bits and pieces you could pull off of old vehicles that might work- a mix & match to make something custom out of them-- if that makes any sense.

I've been thinking about my flooring again & trying to figure out what will be the best starting point for laying it out. I went and measured and realized that what I thought was around a 4" bumpout is almost 7-1/2" (it's two 2x4s and light box switches in between. Now, I could always pull that back a bit so long as the switch boxes still fit. I plan to have a double rocker switch in a single gang box on one side and a GFCI outlet on the other side with the outlet higher than switches (so I can plug in the washing machine).

I'm thinking it might be easier to start on the lower right part of the diagram & notch the first board to fit in the doorway-- leaving room for a transition strip & track. The transition strip size may end up determining how far into the doorway I need to bring the flooring. I think I may err on the side of caution & do it a bit long just in case. I can trim it off if it is too long. I saw some stuff about up to a certain point in the doorway. Although, I don't want to waste any flooring.

This is my layout:

It's ~122"x94.5" and planks are 7"x48". I saw a suggestion to stagger the starting boards like so: full board, 2/3 board, 1/3 board leaving the shortest one around 16", but I need to remember that it has to go in to the doorwway ~2.5"

Leaving an expansion gap I think that means I would have to notch the first board about 2.75" deep and also notch around the door frame so roughly 5.5" (since it's about 5.25" and I'm adding expansion gap of 1/4").

I'm going to add to my thread about this and have more pics.

 

[Mark Brown]

today.... the flooring fought back!



Apparently you cannot work with safety floor for weeks on end and not suffer the consequences.

 

[zannej]

I was wrong about the Zamma flooring. I was confusing it with another brand that had bad reviews. Zamma had decent reviews. They don't seem to have the "antique mahogany" to match the MSI/A&A flooring, but I'm wondering if the "Shadow Hickory" is close enough. I can order cheap samples to compare. Although, the sample for Shadow Hickory is from Lifeproof and it seems Zamma made something to match. I checked both Lowes and HD. The latter had a larger selection but none are in stock.

Ouch, Mark. That looks painful!