The new base cabinet extension

I was very happy with the look and build of the base cabinets from Young Furniture. The installation of the cabinets was another thing that I didn't want to attempt myself. I wanted to make sure that they were installed correctly (level, plumb, nice cuts, etc.) so I wouldn't have any problem later on with the countertop installation. It took about 5 hours to get them installed, and I was very happy with the installation (props to Donald Kinder). Below are some pics of the installed cabinets. Notice I had already started installing the backerboard for the tile floor when these pics were taken.

Drywall

The old wall was made of plaster about 7/8" thick. I bought the 5/8" Fire-Shield board to replace it. The problem in putting up thinner drywall is that I had to level off the area where the new drywall met the old plaster (kitchen/dining room connection). In hindsight, I should have used small strips of wood to build up the wall beams to make up the missing 1/4". Instead, I needed to apply 5 layers of joint compound to slowly level off the drop. This was a high visible area of the room, so I wanted to make sure it looked seamless. I was happy with the results in the end.

Insulation

The old insulation was not that good. It was blown in insulation which appeared to be made up of newspaper and fiber. When I took down the old walls, this insulation would just crumble to the ground. It was a major pain to deal with...very messy. When I decided on my new insulation, my first thought was to the Pink Panther - Owens Corning, but after a bit of research I decided to go with Johns Manville ComfortTherm Insulation. It is wrapped in plastic for more comfortable installation with less itch and dust...I was willing to spend a couple extra bucks for a cleaner installation. It was very easy to cut with a utility blade and stapled to the beams nice and tight. I chose R-19 which is the recommended R value for external walls in the Northeast. Here are some pics of the insulation going up.

Electricity - Part 1

Most of the electric outlets were going to remain in the same location, but I did want to add a few outlets for the new base cabinets, one for the range (120V for the light and ignition of the gas), and I wanted to remove a 240v that was originally being used for a built in air conditioner. I also needed to add a new circuit that would be dedicated to the radiant heat and run that from the main circuit box in the basement to the thermostat that I would be installing in the kitchen. This was a job that I would prefer to get a professional in to do. Luckily, a good friend of mine is an electrician, and he was nice enough to help. He ran new wire for the additional outlets and created a new circuit for the radiant floor. I'll post some better pics soon, but this is the only one I have right now (2 new work boxes for additional outlets).

Installing a new exhaust fan

The existing exhaust fan, while quite retro, needed to go. We had decided to go with a range hood and therefore I needed to remove this old fan and create a new spot for the hood exhaust. To do this I needed to 1.) Remove the existing fan, 2.) plug up the existing hole in the exterior wall, 3.) cut a new hole in the exterior wall to fit the hood exhaust.

Removing the existing fan

This was a much easier task than I anticipated. Two screws was all that was holding the onto the wall. Once the fan was was removed I was left with the existing duct work, which proved a bit more difficult to get rid of. The duct work ran up behind the wall cabinets and out of the house. To remove it I had to work from the outside in. I first took off the vinyl siding on the exterior of the house where the exhaust was located. I then needed to remove some shingles so I could get to the nails holding the exhaust to the house (to my surprise I noticed that my house was once painted pink). Once I removed the exhaust from the exterior, the interior duct work came right off. Not so bad.

Plugging up the existing hole

To plug up the hole left from the exhaust that I just removed, I needed 1.) a piece of wood the size of the hole (3" x 10"), 2.) a piece of rigid foam insulation to cover the plugged hole. 3.) A new piece of vinyl siding to cover the bare spot. The only real difficult thing here was finding a piece of vinyl siding to match my existing siding. I was able to find a really close match at Home Depot. Because it wasn't an exact match, and this was a very visible part of the house, I decided to remove a piece of siding off of the back side of the house to use here, and I replaced the back side with the new siding from Home Depot.

Cutting a new hole for the range hood exhaust

This was a bit daunting at first...it was wierd to be cutting a hole from the inside of my house to the outside. A sawzall makes this job quite easy. Milwaukee makes an excellent sawzall and is well worth the price. To start, I measured the dimensions of the hole and drew the cutout on bare wall board. To start the cut I drilled 4 holes in the four corners of the cutout so my sawzall blade could fit into the cutout (this allowed me to start the cut). It was then a peice of cake to cut out the hole for the exhaust. I then installed the vent and was done (not the best pic of the new vent, but it is looking at the exhaust from the inside of the kitchen).