Farmhouse over the Moat

[T. J. Albrecht]

Thanks for all of the tips and support. That old corner sink will be saved. Where I'm going to put it I don't know, but it will be saved. Gothichome, I have seen linoleum carpets, but I'm pretty sure there were actual carpets in my house. In the one upstairs bedroom, there is a very, very old carpet that was cut down to fit, and I assume it is probably one of the ones that came from the downstairs.

I have the kitchen entirely gutted as of this past weekend. I found that the bank of windows is not original. There were originally two tall windows, one about where the left set of windows is, and one where the door to the bathroom is. There was also a wall that cut the kitchen in half. That built-in in the picture was in a separate little pantry all by itself. I'm going to keep the bank of windows of course. I may put the wall back in partially to make an entryway in the one corner of the kitchen, and turn the back entry way in to a porch again. I'm not sure yet.

After work I'm going to look at an industrial-sized ice box (so the size of a modern refrigerator) in the basement of an old hardware store here in Sebewaing. I plan on converting that into a refrigerator. The kitchen lay out will depend in part on whether or not I acquire it, and I have to look at Ma's cookstoves (she has several in the shed) to see which one I'm going to use. I also have an Electrochef stove (1930?) that I'll put in too for ease of use, and so I don't have to fire up the wood cookstove in the middle of August when it's 102 in the shade. Once I figure out what all has to go in, I can wire and plumb accordingly. And there's that floor to do as well, but progress has been made, and someday (soon hopefully) I'll get some more pictures to post.

[phil]

If you pull the wire to the kitchen , check local codes but for example mine ended up to be about half my panel. every plug has it's own breaker so if you plug in a toaster and a microwave to two different outlets in the same box they are separate breakers. you might find code that defines so many per foot of counter-space. older kitchens tended to have less space between the counters and the uppers but we have more appliances now. I made all my uppers and the countertop 4" deeper than normal , I like it and this adds space to the cupboards without more wall space. that extra deep counter made it so my taps and behind the sink arent' up close to the wall. I was able to stick a hood fan in below the uppers so it isnt' too visible. If you buy the pre made boxes you might want to stick with the normal depth configuration.

a good way to sort out the layout is to make a scale drawing from what's there, 1 inch to the foot or so. ten you can make little cardboard pieces scaled to the sink fridge etc and explore the possibilities. the sing, fridge and stove are your work triangle try not to put your fridge too far from everything else. fridges really vary in size, stoves and dishwashers are standard. If you have some wiggle room for the fridge you have more options.

the cooler sounds neat. You could look up peltier coolers. these are things that run on electricity and make cold with no moving parts. You might find they could be used to convert the cooler into a fridge without needing to have the complexity of the cooling and heating coils a normal fridge has. I think most of the little cheap bar fridges use them, youll notice they dont make the whirring sounds like a fridge. You'd need one larger than for a bar fridge or maybe more than one could do it. I picked up a little electric Coleman cooler. it has a tiny one to keep the cooler cold and it runs on 12 volts.

you could transfer the parts of a modern fridge but you then need the coils on the back of the fridge and cooling coils inside. you'd probably need to open the loop to do the transfer of parts and then recharge it later. an appliance man would collect the charge as its bad for the ozone layer. They used to use freon but newer stuff uses a less harmful gas. If you're changing the type of gas you might need to change the size of an orifice or something. I'd check with a small appliance shop and see what they say about recharging them or changing the refrigerant. . old fridges sometimes loose some of the charge then work. but run more of the time. many are discarded while still functional. older fridges needed to be defrosted but newer ones designed out the need to do that. if you build your own you might need to learn more about the difference or resort to defrosting it.

[T. J. Albrecht]

I've looked up various ice box to refrigerator conversions, and most do not include a freezer of any sort, so I think that defrosting simply wouldn't apply. Besides, if I do have to defrost the cooling coils, it'd be no more work than most any other old refrigerator. The ice box is in rather poor shape, as the bottom is partially rotted from sitting on the damp basement floor, but this is what I wanted. I don't feel so bad redoing and retrofitting something to fit my needs when it's already in need of help. I have a friend who works in refrigeration, doing those big walk-in coolers for restaurants, so I'll see what he has to say. There is a company that does those conversion, so I know it can be done. If I can't get it to work, oh well, but it certainly would be neat if I could.

I did look up those air coolers, and I'd really have to look into them further, and see what sort of air circulation I'd need in the refrigerator, etc. I haven't written them off, but I'm not entirely sold either. As far as taking apart a new fridge to use the parts, I think it'd be easier to buy the parts and custom-build a system.

All good suggestions. Thanks!

[T. J. Albrecht]

More pictures! The first is the kitchen when it was partially gutted, the second of the dining room, and the 3rd and 4th of the front room. I know, there's a Lot of stuff laying around and it looks like heck , but I have to wait till spring to get the chimney put up, and after tearing out walls, cabinets, stairs, etc... it's gotta get worse before it gets better. And please ignore the Anderson box. NONE of my original windows will be replaced. I got some new windows give to me and didn't have a good place to put them at the time, and haven't moved them yet. Thankfully, I'm not living there yet.

[mjt]

If you pull the wire to the kitchen , check local codes but for example mine ended up to be about half my panel. every plug has it's own breaker so if you plug in a toaster and a microwave to two different outlets in the same box they are separate breakers. you might find code that defines so many per foot of counter-space.

Is the "every plug has its own breaker" a Canadian code or something? That's definitely not U.S. code...

U.S. kitchen code requires:

• at least two 20 amp GFCI-protected "small appliance" circuits with tamper proof outlets; no more than 48-inches between outlets; all countertop of more than 12-inches must have an outlet
• basic lighting circuit; 15-amp
• dishwasher circuit; dedicated wire; 15-amp
• garbage disposal circuit; dedicated wire; 15-amp
• microwave circuit; dedicated wire; 20-amp
• range circuit; dedicated wire

Though it is not required, I'd put the fridge on its own circuit. You don't want something else tripping the breaker and causing your fridge to stop.

[phil]

yes there may be Canadian, US or even regional differences. I didn't need any 20 amp breakers. My fridge does have to be separate but it can share a clock plug so I did that. the idea is then you knew when the fridge went off if it does. not much draw on a clock plug. I reused mine, that was about the only part I did reuse. but you can get new ones, they have a hook and an inset plug .

check your box sizes. the way it works here is it goes by the number of wires entering a box and the wire nuts ( marettes) are each counted as a wire, then there is a certain box size required. on some of mine the inspector said the box was too small although he liked the neatness and everything else was ok.

when I ran my circuits I did not group all the bedroom plugs together, then I found the bedroom plugs needed to be on spark-fault breakers. then I needed three spark fault breakers for the bedroom plugs. ( $300) one circuit could have handled that.

I wonder how the microwave outlet is identified? in some kitchens there may be choices where to place it.

I put a switch on my hood fan, maybe not necessary because it has a switch. dont forget if you want a garbage disposal and dishwasher. I put outlets some may hard-wire them. nice if you can unplug for servicing but you aren't supposed to bury plugs in weird spaces that aren't accessible. even a switch with a lockout could be considered because how many go turn off the breaker before they reach into a garbage disposer to get a spoon or something. I put the switch inside below the sink , you dont want it to inadvertently get turned on if you need to go fishing down there.

check the orientation of the stove plug. I got mine upside down It says top on the outlet probably.

you might choose a standard height for switches to make them uniform. I moved all my plugs out of the baseboards because I didn't want to make Swiss cheese out of them
and about doubled the number of plugs. I put the bottom of the box at 11 inches so I can just measure with a sheet of paper. had to fix the old holes in the baseboards but removed them for stripping anyway.

compare boxes before you buy too many some will go in through a hole and can be installed without opening walls I used that type with screws into the studs from inside the boxes so I didnt need to damage any walls except for my run from panel to attic. I also put a mast out there on the outside of the house through the roof and it needed to be U bolted to framing so the access helped for that as well. I needed bigger wire for 400 amps to the poles and had to move it because it was near a window.

outside I need arc-fault breakers. I put a razor plug in the bathroom it has its own . I just put two outlets outside. the rule was that if they were over 10 feet they didn't need to be on arc fault so I put one on my porch that as a regular breaker. I switched one of those plugs from inside a closet, it's for the christmas lights. a switched outside plug could be nice, like if you use a block heater or car warmer or something its nice to be able to turn things on without looking for your shoes

I just refereed to a simplified Canadian codebook for most and my brother is an electrician so he stopped by and supervised, left me a to do list each time . you could consider getting an electrician to do that. technically you may not be able to do wiring without a ticket. I don't think an apprentice can even work without a tradesman present but there may be some laws , the argument is that you should be able to maintain your own house . I'm not sure where the law falls. I can get help from family but not others technically. The inspector was happy because my brother oversaw it and helped me a lot. Its really worth having an electrician show you how to tuck the wires and wire a box using pigtails professionally because there are tricks to doing it neatly. the inspector will call you on it if it looks messy and disorganized. whether you inspect or what you do inside your own castle isn't my business but I'd try to keep it neat, you dont want issues later. I ran a thick wire on a 20 amp for AC or heat in the attic. It was a red wire, I guess to signify 20 amps. Your codes will vary some for sure so don't quote me on the regs.

for some I used romex 2 wire you can put two wires under each staple. with the three wire , its round, and only one wire under each wire staple. no more than a meter apart I put them closer. he wasn't concerned if I fished in wire and had no access to staple.

the way that works ,, with three wire and two separate breakers running it, they are on opposite poles of the panel. two hot wires, the neutral is shared. I guess if you looked at that on a scope you'd see that the two hot wires are out of phase and the neutral "returns" the two phases.. that's probably oversimplified and perhaps incorrect. AC travels both directions..

my point is you can run two breakers two circuits with 3 wires and save more wire runs. This is ignoring the bare ground every wire has a ground joined to every box and that is not part of your electric circuit it is for safety. if a wire touches the box it blows the breaker. Technically the word "bonding " may be more correct?

I used a square D panel on those the phase alternates on each slot some panels are not like that. stick with a common brand, if you have some off brand or re-use the panel you might have trouble getting breakers and things. Id' replace really old breakers. Old screw in fuses are ok because fuses can't stick but old breakers can. if a breaker sticks that's when you can have a fire inside a wall.

dont walk on the wire he may not like footprints on it they can be fussy like that. if they spot a nick or something its a new wire back to the panel or a junction box.

getting all the boxes the right height is more difficult than it seems. many I had to adjust to make myself happy. there is sometimes a knot or something affecting placement if the wall isn't opened to install the box. in some places I put a dab of epoxy on the outside of the box and placed it accurately then later put the screws. all the epoxy does is keep it from shifting while I screw it in. I used countersunk screws at about a 45 degree angle , that was permitted. a lot of those boxes are designed for new construction. some need the wall open for nailing. I didn't choose plastic ones but they meet code. surprising how many choices there are. I bought lots and returned what i didn't need.

If you are getting inspected I'd remove any old lamps and things get them inspected with new so that doesn't become a code issue. .later, if you want vintage push buttons and old fixtures, well .. its your castle..

I found some bad connection sin the old knob and tube, some were blackened and twisted together, hidden in walls by shoddy contractors in one spot. I'd also check where the wires leave your house and go to outside lights like the porch light. I found those had bad insulation. the inspector didn't care about removing old unused wires I just had to cut anything that showed. as i go if I open walls I remove them.

I'm not an electrician so take my advice with a pinch of salt. I just wanted to pass on some of the stuff I learned. even if a pal wants a new outlet in their house I wont touch other peoples wiring. I'm a millwright though so I do some electrical troubleshooting and some repairs inside machinery. most house wiring electricians dont know their way around in a control box. then there are electronics technicians.
so the responsibility can get grey. any time I'm unsure of what I'm doing I ask someone more qualified. I do not go around pretending to be an electrician.
If i'm swapping failed parts I'm usually OK with that, If I need to reconfigure wiring to fit different components or if it gets complex at all then I work with an electrician. then they leave me alone if I'm just changing a switch or plug. I won't open an electrical box that I dont own. I won't even disconnect something hard wired in. They handle wires to the machinery. I will do things like work on motors or start circuits and things like that but I'm not shy to ask for help.

[phil]

it ocurred to me after writing that that my microwave is happy on 15 amps. If you went and bought a fancy big microwave it might be a convection oven and have heat elements. I think there is a different plug configuration for 20 amps with the two power legs not parallel. If you go switching outlets and breakers it is important that the wire in the wall is heavy enough to do that. maybe you need to go up one gauge , not sure. If you only changed the outlet, that's an infraction. anything but a regular 15 amp receptacle is a bit unusual except of course industrial wiring or dryers and stoves etc. I dont own anything with a 20 amp lug but there are charts that specify the voltage and plug pin orientation. in hospitals they use red outlets , i assume they are protected by an isolation transformer to prevent electrical shock. If i work on radios I use a 1:1 transformer, it's purpose is to stop higher amperage in case of a short. the transformer has no direct connection between the wires in and the wires out and the current is limited to about 2 or 3 amps.
my microwave only has a regular 15 amp plug on it. If it had the 20 amp plug Id' be screwed if I found it needed thicker wire to support it.
evidently they dont like range plugs in the basement because then you are considered building a suite.. anyway to prevent such BS I installed a plug for my welder with a heavy cable to support that , range cable basically and 220 volts so I can connect my tablesaw or welder. perhaps the code is there to make you running at least one 20 amp capable wire. this might prevent the homeowner from trying to overload the wire by swapping only the outlet and breaker?

I think my main point was before you go installing cabinetry check and see if you need to upgrade the electrical because its easier to deal with that prior to than it would be as an afterthought. some are a bit unaware and think the electrical is fine but if it needs inspection it's nicer to see things right first. and no one enjoys blowing breakers often because it's underwired to suit really old requirements. Some will say Knob and tube stil meets code or it is safe if not messed with but what I saw were some dangerous issues and I only saw them when I was removing what was there. so many things want the ground prong that it becomes inconvenient and people do things like putting grounded outlets where there is no ground Grounding all the boxes and making the connections there and not on the fly is safer.

you probably know this but for about 10 bucks you can get a little tester that plugs in and shows by LEDs if it's wired the right way around without opening a box. the other handy cheap tool is a sniffer. you just hold the thing ( looks like a pen) near a wire and if the wire is live it beeps. good habit to have and use one just to prevent issues like forgetting you turned a breaker back on for example. it happens.

I ran lots of cablevision and cat 5 and stuff to one panel for that. I made a little adapter that fits with a 9 volt batter so if I wanto ID a wire in the (smart panel) I can just go looking for the one with 9VDC nowadays I wouldnt rn so much cat 5 partly I wanted antenna connections throughout the house for my antenna for AM radio. they can't be all connected. even if a radio is off it robs signal so I wanted an easy way to connect various ones to the antenna without distributing the antenna signal everywhere.. I can do similar with cat 5 and internet cables or cablevision for satellite or whatnot. so its just a whole lot of wire running to one panel where I can interconnect things in different ways. now routers improved so maybe its somewhat obsolete, I cut the phone line too. why pay two bills.. I liked my old wall phone though.

[T. J. Albrecht]

I'm going to have my uncle come over because he's an electrician for Chrysler motors down in Pontiac. He can tell me what I need, how to do things, and what I can and can't do. All of the old wiring is coming and new is going in. Some things are just easier when you start right from scratch. Lots of good ideas. Thanks!

[mjt]

I'm sure your uncle is well aware the residential and commercial electrical codes are different. He'll make sure things are done properly.

And you don't have to worry about how they do electrical in a hospital because, well, you're wiring a house, not an operating room.

As an aside, I've yet to run across a residential appliance that had a 20-amp plug.

[phil]

while I had my walls open I ran a wire to each window. I figured I'd connect them to a sensor for a burglar alarm at a later date. Never used them yet. Yes the red plugs were not really important for house wiring.
one bedroom I restored the plaster. I was admiring your cove ceiling corners in the photo. In the room where I restored the plaster I coundn't insulate, but it only has one outside wall. In other rooms I just opened the outside walls and filled them with insulation. I had already fished in the wiring so it was a bit backwards. My attic had panelling and beaverboard so I just pulled all that out but I wired it first

on some interioor walls since I had removed all the baseboards and trim I used 1/4" drywall that cleaned them up and made them ready for taping and finishing. on most I used 1/2" drywall. since my street is really loud I wanted the layers and I put green glue between the sheets. it is a sound blocker not glue.
on the outside walls of my living room I put ISO board in the wall cavities and also used 5/8ths soundproof drywall . its expensive 75 bucks a sheet but blocks the same sound as about 7 sheets of drywall. I put some spray foam between the ISO board and each stud and screwed bits of lath in to keep them in while the stuff set so all the walls are pretty impervious to sound.
in the living room I had plaster that was curved like that. I restored that curved feature and it took a lot of work to get the curves to look just right. there may be a corner bead with a round shape , that would help. I thought Id make the point in case you tear into the walls the curves are a bit of work to get back so perhaps you wont muck with that.

I made most corners square and used the metal and paper corner bead. I mix a bit of white glue in the mud when I bed them and the tape, and I soak the tape in 50/50 glue and water before i apply it so it never lifts or peels. If you mix white glue in your mud to a proportion of about a spoonful to a fist sized clump it dries really hard and stiff much like plaster. Hard to sand but I use that for the structural areas like holding the corner bead. I also use a few drywall nails to keep the bead in place and tight to the wall. for big gaps I mix batches of plaster and add mud to that , then you can put it on thick and it sets up rather than staying mushy and taking forever to dry and reduces the shrinkage and cracking... you can buy mud for that instead if you desire. The taping mud is more yellow and I think it just has more glue in it. i do use that for taping and then use the various grades, medium fine and finishing , the solids are finer in the finer mud so I like that with quite a bit of water , almost runny, for skimcoating.

I guess you have a choice of saving it as is or insulating or maybe the cove part could be left alone if you do open walls to insulate. some here cut holes and put in dense pack insulation through the holes. there may be a bit to know about how to keep moisture from collecting in walls and differences in opinions on using a vapor barrier. If you seal up the outside walls too much the walls cant' expel moisture but I've used in under the drywall where I felt it might help. you dont wan to create pockets with more layers of plastic. dont put plastic behind the insulation against the shiplap. I filled a few obvious holes in the shiplap but tried not to stop its ability for the wall to breethe so if any water did get in there it can leave. the ISO board is a vapor barrier in itself it has a thick foil barrier and it is closed cell. I kind of like it. more expensive than rock wool or fiberglass but higher R value too. I found a lot of my materials on craiglsist, i love getting the leftovers from other peoples jobs where they overbuy , it helps with the costs. everytime I buy drywall I go to lowes, they have a bunch of sheets that have broken edges. I find the supervisor and offer half the price and they are happy to get rid of the sheets with broken corners for half price to clean up that stuff. especially with the soundproof stuff it saves some cost. insulation and drywall isn't worth storing so often it appears cheap or free on craigslist. Just dont bother with part sheets and small pieces or you will have more joints than necessary.

having an experienced electrician guide you a bit will surely help. Its nto too hard to install boxes and pull wire, so perhaps you could do some of that so when he arrives he can help with some of the connections, Id try to set up the circumstances where he can help with the details and perhaps you'd be ok doing the bulk of the work. for me that meant a lot of running back and forth pushing and pulling on wires being careful not to damage them, a helper is handy if you have one otherwise there is always a way.

you might want a fish tape , they come as a stiff wire spool or as fiberglass rods that screw together. also a long or extended drill bit about 4 - 5 feet long is handy then you can put it in an outlet hole and drill down through the sill plate to get down to the basement. you can buy the drill or we just welded a bit to the end of a piece of springy tool steel. once you have a hole you can put the fish tape down and tie a string on then pull your wire up through the holes.
make sure when you are drilling holes that you do check to make sure you dont hit any other wires.
I took a hunk of wire and taped some fridge magnets to the end to use as a pickup tool , great when you drop stuff inside walls. I can coil it up and keep it in my toolbox. handy and cheap..