To enter into a long woe-is-me tale about my goings-on for the past couple of months would be the subject of another blog, so I won't get into it. But I will say that the dust is settling and that, besides a few dozen additional grey hairs, a quasi-nervous breakdown and some lost sleep, I'm pretty much okay now.
CURTAILED BY CURTAIN WALL PT. II
The early spring has turned into late spring. The flowers have bloomed, the leaves are on the trees, and another summer season in the Hamptons is in full swing. But here I am merely reading about it online (http://beach.curbed.com) rather than actually being there to enjoy it. I could have never imagined, even in my worst nightmare, that I would be sitting here with a half-finished house a year after groundbreaking.
As before, the main source of my angst has been the curtain wall contractor. And boy could I kick myself for allowing him to string me along for such a long time. I did everything in my power to try to coerce him into action. I tried to guilt him into acting by going on at length about the negative impact of prolonged exposure to the elements. When this didn't work, I mixed my pleas with a bit of Philly street thug ("After a while, yous gotta sh*t or get off da pot."). When this didn't work I threatened to can his lazy a$$ off the job. He finally wrote me an e-mail that he would have the entire job, including curtain wall, sliders, sealing and break metal completed within a month. But that is only if I would advance him the next milestone payment, even though he had not completed the previous milestone! He said that he needed the money because he was having "cash flow issues" and that Efco would not take any orders until they received some cash upfront. And given my utter lack of confidence in this clown and my realization that he was not ever going to finish, I refused; I would not throw good money after bad. So without cash he would not be able to reach the next milestone. But he would not receive any cash from me until he reached the next milestone. Classic standoff. After a couple of weeks of playing out this silly dance I finally canned him at the beginning of June without any idea of how this will be completed or will complete it. Admittedly, considering the work that has been done thus far, I would say that I have the upper hand with the curtain wall contractor- the project is about 35-40% complete, even though I paid less than 25% towards it. But considering the thousands he has cost me in terms of fees, interest and penalties (due to his prolonging my construction period by five months), he had better not even consider coming after me for the difference!
THE SEARCH GOES ON
Is there a curtain wall contractor in the house? After calling dozens upon dozens of storefront/glazing contractors in the NYC/Long Island area, I found only a few places that would even consider doing a residential project, let alone one that is partially completed, let along one that is located way out on the East End of Long Island. And then there are those who do residential projects... but they are strictly union shops, which means that they will take as long as they want to take and demand top dollar. This is definitely a situation where beggers cannot be choosers... but then again, I find it hard to believe that in one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the entire world, I cannot find a single contractor who would be willing to do this. Yes, I am getting nibbles here and there... but I desperately need someone to step up to the plate and say that they will not only get the job done, but that this would be their utmost priority. Hey, a boy can dream!
ARRGGH-DEX
One of the biggest challenges of working with a non-weathertight structure is how to carry on the momentum. The HVAC ducting/roughing is complete. The rough plumbing is complete. Most of the electrical wiring is complete. So what about the floors? My original intention from the get-go was to do a concrete slab for the first floor. We even anticipated the additional load by utilizing 2 x 12 floor joists. All of the door openings were adjusted to accommodate the thickness of the slab. But when push came to shove, we all had cold feet about doing this- could a wood deck support the dead weight of concrete. And when the concrete contractor is the biggest skeptic of them all, that's when you know that it may be time to consider Plan B. After doing a bit of searching online, I came across the various different poured flooring systems (like gypcrete), which are typically underlayments used on concrete slabs to seal and level high/low areas, and then finished with either tile or engineered hardwood flooring. However, I was interested in using this sort of system as the finished flooring. For me the biggest advantages of using a poured floor were that they were lightweight (only 1/4 - 1/2" thick), very quickly installed, and they are fully cured within 24 hours. Gypcrete was immediately ruled out because it was never intended to be a wearing surface. I looked into a couple of others but was told by a flooring contractor (who used lots of different products) that Ardex was the best of the lot. After calling them for a local referral, I spoke with a flooring company (not a concrete contractor) who said that they could definitely use Ardex SD-T (using a multiple step metal lath, priming, pouring, sealing process) on a plywood deck. The only caveat was that the deck would have to be at least 1.5" thick, which would require putting on a second subfloor. This would help to minimize deflection and the development of cracks. However, he did caution me that spider-vein cracks are likely to appear around the T&G joints in the plywood. Eh, whatever- as long as it doesn't result in big chunks of the floor flaking out over time. It adds character, right? They eventually gave me a proposal to apply the Ardex system for $6 a square foot (not including the second plywood deck). I thought that was an okay price, if not a great price. I decided to get a second opinion from another flooring contractor. Boy did they sing a different tune! After getting the local Ardex field representative involved, they determined that they would not recommend putting Ardex on a wood deck and that it was more than likely that massive failures would occur due to the different expansion/contraction coefficients for wood vs. Ardex and deflection in the floor joists. I asked them if installing control joints over the plywood seams would help ease this issue, and they said that it could. Ultimately they agreed to give me a proposal, but they were not be able to guarantee the job. At first I thought their proposal had an extra digit in it! $16 per square foot! For that kind of money I could have put in a metal deck and poured a conventional slab and still had thousands left over. Needless to say, I will probably be utilizing Flooring Contractor #1 for this project, even though I am now a bit more paranoid about the potential for failure. I am heartened to see that many of the art and furniture galleries in SoHo (in 19th century cast iron buildings) appear to use these poured floors over hardwood flooring, and they look great, despite all of the commercial traffic.
Now wouldn't it have just been easier to go with hardwood flooring?? You try to do something a little different...
I'VE GOT THE POWER
After a couple of months of delays, the solar panels for my house were finally "allotted" to me. Apparently these are quite in demand! The 4509-watt system pretty much covers the entire surface area of the angled/shed roof section, so I am glad that I used regular 30-year asphalt shingles up there. But I have to admit that it looks really, really neat:
The inverter has been activated, the power company, LIPA approved the electrical box and now I officially have power! In fact, the meter is spinning backwards like a top, even on overcast days. If there is one ray of light (pun intended) amidst all of this doom and gloom, this is it.
BELLO DOOR-O
As I had mentioned previously, I opted for the Clopay Avante door for the garage. It was a no-brainer. In fact, I couldn't imagine there being anything else there. However, I have to admit that I was a tad disappointed with it. It's a beautiful door for sure, but the "obscure" glazing looks a bit chintzy- it has the look of pebbled glass, as if it were covered by condensation. When ordering the "obscure" glass I had assumed that it would have more of a frosted appearance. Still, I can live with it.
No comments:
Post a Comment