Kitchen remodel progress

[Snipe Hunter]

I'd like to thank the woodnetters offering their cabinetry services. I'm pretty sure our budget would be blown out of the water with anything other than stock cabinets. Also like to thank the woodnetter who recommended Stock Cabinet Express, where we bought the cabinets. We saw the same cabinets from other on-line suppliers but Stock Cabinet Express seemed to have good reviews and a good track record for shipping and customer service. I can tell you the entire cabinet price came in at about $7000.00. I've had quotes between 10k and 14k for our last kitchen (our last house) with about half as many cabinets. The 7k includes kick plates, crown molding, dove tailed (front and back) drawers, pull out trays in most cupboards, filler strips, slide out garbage cans and glass doros on a few cabinets. The doors are birch with MDF panels. The cabinets are birch plywood. Face-frames are birch. Before you give me a hard time about painted wood, this is my wife's kitchen. She gets what she wants and she wanted white shaker cabinets. Happy wife, happy life. All cabinets are "RTA (ready to assemble)". There have been some issues with quality but not insurmountable. These are assembled with metal clips. Some of the cabinets have the clips installed wrong so I had to re-install them to get every thing to line up. Some cabinets are perfect, some have several misaligned clips and some have some warped wood. One had so many warped panels that I had to use cargo straps to keep it together while I put it together. I glued everything I could. Once together, they are solid and pretty square. At this price point, I expected issues and I wasn't disappointed. Once installed, they are fine for our purposes.

We're in a colonial style house with smallish living room, dining room, family room and kitchen. If you open the refrigerator door, you can't walk past it without turning sideways. So we're moving the bulk of the kitchen into the dining room, eliminating the dining nook and moving the dining room to where the old kitchen/breakfast nook was. This will give us a bigger kitchen and a little bigger but less formal dining room.

I have to keep the old kitchen working while building the new one. Today I installed the new micro wave, new stove top and moved the old sink to the new space and moved the dishwasher. We're using melamine counter-tops until the kitchen is done and trimmed. Once that is done, we'll have a counter top put in. Either granite or quaertzite.

Here comes a bunch of pics...

This is what it will look like. We used Home Designer Suite software to lay it out.







Wife wants to watch a movie, I'll post progress pics in the am.

[Snipe Hunter]

I needed to take out the taller vinyl windows in the dining room and replace them with shorter ones because the new kitchen cabinets and countertop would obstruct them. I also took out all the drywall on the walls to make wiring easier. Unfortunately all the house wiring is between floors as opposed to the basement so it isn't readily accessible for moving. The old owned didn't ever clean walls before painting so I'd have to sand all the walls prior to painting anyway. Might as well start fresh. Almost all the drywall will be replaced. There's soffits in the kitchen which will be removed to facilitate ceiling height cabinets so a lot of ceiling drywall will be needed. I'll do as little ceiling drywall work as possible.

The new window is again... "off the shelf" to keep costs down. Lowes stocks the Pella 450 series wood window which did the trick. I like wood windows. I prefer the Pella because I've put quite a few in and they have a fold down nailing flange so I can slide the window into it's rough opening from the inside, fold out the flange and nail it from the outside. This way I can do it without help. The Pella 450 also has a clever and inexpensive mull it (special order $14.00) to join windows together. We used them upstairs in our bedroom too. Eventually, we'll re-side the house and might replace all the existing vinyls then. We'll see what budget allows when the time comes. Existing siding is aluminum and pretty beat up so it's a little tricky removing and re-installing. I can't match it so I can't afford to loose any to scrap. I had to put in a filler on the outside to make up for removing the tller window and used vinyl board. We'll probably put a flower box in front of it.




The vinyl board under the new window. If we ever re-side, it will come back out.

[Snipe Hunter]

Walls are mudded, sanded and primed in the "new" space. I didn't sand behind the cabinets. I'll have to paint the kitchen when it's all done. We've (brother in law helped me hang the uppers) installed as many cabinets as possible in the finished area, temporarily moved the sink and dishwasher and put in a melamine countertop. Microwave and cooktop are in. All the plumbing was done in the basement ahead of time. We still have a functional kitchen.




Microwaves are 30" wide but the cooktop is 36". Code says I can't have combustible materials over the stovetop so I had to make a 36" gap between the cabinets over the stove. I'll install stainless fillers on either side of the microwave later down the road. Still looking for a reasonably priced source. GE has them but I don't like the price... still looking.

[Snipe Hunter]

This is what the old kitchen looks like now. Today I'll take out the wall between the rooms and take out the old cabinets on the exterior wall. All that sheetrock will come out. I need to remove a window and soffit and install a door and there's tile on the wall.... the drywall has got to come out.

The pantry on the left will also come out. There's a supply duct in it so I'll frame and drywall around it. The new fridge will be next to that chase. There are return ducts in the wall behind the existing oven feeding the spare rooms upstairs so I'll have to figure out a way to re-rout them. I have a couple options (none perfect) and will do that when the kitchen is done.



Old layout



New layout

[museumguy]

Very nice job. I like the new layout, bright and more open, room to move.

[Phil Thien]

Looks fantastic.

Did you sell the old cabinets/counter tops?

[Snipe Hunter]

Looks fantastic.

Did you sell the old cabinets/counter tops?

No. My bil is taking a couple cabinets. I'll use a couple in the garage.... and unless someone here wants some, the rest will go to the dump.

Same with the granite. I'll keep a piece for truing planes and chisels and give the rest away or take it to the dump. The granite is in pieces light enough for me to carry to the dump trailer. If any one here wants any of this, let me now. BIL gets first pick, me 2nd.

edit... wife just told me she wants me to make stepping stones with some.

[R Clark]

...
Same with the granite. I'll keep a piece for truing planes and chisels and give the rest away or take it to the dump. The granite is in pieces light enough for me to carry to the dump trailer. If any one here wants any of this, let me now. BIL gets first pick, me 2nd.

edit... wife just told me she wants me to make stepping stones with some.

I have a big pile o' quartz countertop material which I just can't quite bring myself to put in the dumpster.  I've been toying with the idea of reusing it outside for stepping stones somewhere, but the smoothness makes me wonder if it will be slick when wet.  If you reuse your old granite in this manner, I'd be interested in hearing how you deal with the surface, if anything at all.

[Snipe Hunter]

I have a big pile o' quartz countertop material which I just can't quite bring myself to put in the dumpster.  I've been toying with the idea of reusing it outside for stepping stones somewhere, but the smoothness makes me wonder if it will be slick when wet.  If you reuse your old granite in this manner, I'd be interested in hearing how you deal with the surface, if anything at all.

the plan is to flip it upside down and step on the rough side. I've never seen the underside of quartz so don't no if it's rough enough or not.

[Snipe Hunter]

Got some demo done today.