Mike and Jeff's New House

Today( Sunday, Jan 22nd) we taped up plastic sheeting to the doors and walls on our first floor and applied two coats of acid stain to the concrete. Later this week we'll have to rinse the floor several times to get rid of the acid residue and then apply two coats of sealer. Here in Sacramento there is a place to buy specialty concrete supplies, it is called Spec West. They have a ton of info and a great web site, see it here: http://www.spec-west.com/intro.htm Want to learn how to stain concrete yourself? This site has a lot of info: http://www.concretenetwork.com/concrete/acid_etch_staining/index.html?source=gooaw&kw=13b Our color is the exotic sounding`tan' from Triple S Chemicals in Los Angeles - see it here: http://www.concrete-stains.com/color.html

This pic shows the final look of our south facing roof, the big panels on the left and right are photovoltaic collectors and will be making electricity and hopefully making our house a net producer of energy. The panel in the middle is the hot water solar panel. Water coming from this panel on a sunny day will be at approximatley 180 degrees F. The two skylights are also visible in the lower middle roof...

Our hot water solar panel weighs about 150 pounds, even with a scaffold, it was quite an adventure to get it up to the roof..... Read all about solar hot water at the website for Heliodyne, this Richmond, CA company ships their collectors and systems all over the country and they were VERY nice to work with: http://www.heliodyne.com/

Airsmiths, our totally excellent HVAC (heating, ventilation & air conditioning) company sent out one of their guys to complete the loop of pex-al-pex on top of our living room bench. The guys from Airsmiths are top notch, and so far they are one of our favorite subcontractors. http://www.airsmiths.net/ Paul from Voodoo Rock is going to pour in place and finish a 4'' concrete bench over these radiant heat loops in two weeks. Yes, hot butts ARE the goal....

We found a great guy to dig our utility trenches and highly recommend Jason with Blackmon's Breakout Service. Jason had to dig down to 50 inches to find the 10 inch cast iron gas main that is buried under our redwood trees.....We found the famous hard pan layer that this area is known for.....it was like shale down there..... Did you know that natural gas is piped at around 7 psi in the mains but when it goes into your house it only comes out at about .5 psi?

This picture shows the sewer, water, and electrical trenches going to the rear alley. Trench requirements are a bit of a mystery, the challenge is that different inspectors, utilities, and city agencies interpret the requirements differently...that's all I'm going to say or I'll start to sound even more bitter than normal....

We found a great guy to remove a number of our redwood trees today. His name is Bob and his business is called Busy B Tree Service. He was prompt, friendly, insured, licensed, and inexpensive.....The new look is REAL different, taking 7 redwood trees out will do that to a landscape.... The house is now much more visible from the freeway...Shown above is a pic from the other side of highway 50...

During the big rain storms over the holidays we discovered some leaks...One was at the big window on the East end of the house...the other was in the French doors in the master bedroom.......The stucco contractor wanted to make sure it was not his fault, so he has removed the stucco around the areas where the leaking occured....It looks like a window flashing problem..The window/door supplier stopped by twice this week and has caulked the hell out of the two suspected leaking areas....hopefully it fixes the problem... Regardless, the third and final stucco color coat is NOT going on this week as there are now two huge holes to repair.... The stucco people and the window people are already arguing over who has to pay for the stucco repairs.... The joys of general contracting.....

Construction loans are typically written as one year loans that don't involve interest payments. At the one year mark the loan converts to a regular mortgage.....On Tuesday of this week we hit our one year mark of being funded for the construction loan.....We're not done...So, we had to pay a $4,400 fee to extend the loan for two more months...The new deadline date is March 10th. nice.....