Kitchen Remodeling . . . it WAS going so well, and then!

Melensdad · Dec 29, 2005

PBinWA said:
I like our ceramic cooktop too. My wife hates it because it shows off all the crud that now has to be cleaned off after each use. I think she like the old elements where that crud just fell down below and she could pretend it wasn't there.

Our old unit was far more industrial or commerical looking and it was a nightmare to keep clean. The old top was modular and you could move around the burners, pull them out and put in a grill or a griddle, or even change the burner size, it was ideal for a gourmet chef. But it was a PITA to keep clean. When we decided to replace the kitchen counter tops the cooktop became an issue. I wanted the old unit tossed out, the lovely Mrs_B wanted to keep it. But about 10 minutes of playing with the new top, she already likes it even if she looses the 'commercial' look and flexibility of the old cooktop. I'm glad the old one is gone. It was much larger (wider side to side and it protruded out the front too) and had 5 burners. The new top has 5 burners, takes up less space and is easier to clean. I know the trend is to build 'gourmet-style' kitchens with commercial style equipment, but I can tell you that I'm glad we got rid of that big commercial style top!

DaveNay · Dec 29, 2005

B_Skurka said:
Our old unit was far more industrial or commerical looking and it was a nightmare to keep clean. The old top was modular and you could move around the burners, pull them out and put in a grill or a griddle, or even change the burner size, it was ideal for a gourmet chef. But it was a PITA to keep clean. When we decided to replace the kitchen counter tops the cooktop became an issue. I wanted the old unit tossed out, the lovely Mrs_B wanted to keep it. But about 10 minutes of playing with the new top, she already likes it even if she looses the 'commercial' look and flexibility of the old cooktop. I'm glad the old one is gone. It was much larger (wider side to side and it protruded out the front too) and had 5 burners. The new top has 5 burners, takes up less space and is easier to clean. I know the trend is to build 'gourmet-style' kitchens with commercial style equipment, but I can tell you that I'm glad we got rid of that big commercial style top!

You wouldn't still happen to have that stove would you? I found that my stove is too small for holiday cooking, and we have the extra width available where someone took out a wide stove and put in an average width one.

edit: Was that a full stove with oven, or just a top?

Melensdad · Dec 29, 2005

DaveNay said:
You wouldn't still happen to have that stove would you? I found that my stove is too small for holiday cooking, and we have the extra width available where someone took out a wide stove and put in an average width one.

edit: Was that a full stove with oven, or just a top?

Nope, I gave it away to the guy who is remodeling my office and he's done some work on my house (gave hime the old sink/faucet too). But it was only a cooktop, we have a built in double oven because the lovely Mrs_B likes to bake. Sometimes I regret building a 'normal size' kitchen because when she gets into holiday/party cooking mode, we could use 4 ovens and 2 dishwashers!!!

bczoom · Dec 29, 2005

Bob,

Did your new unit come with a bunch of warnings about care of the cooktop?

In particular, make sure sugar and foil don't get on the burners.

Watch out for abrasive cleaners as well.

Melensdad · Dec 29, 2005

Yup, lots of warnings of what not to do, how to clean it in the event you didn't heed the warnings, and it came with a special cleaner too.

Doc · Dec 29, 2005

What's her name? (the special cleaner)

Big Dog · Dec 29, 2005

B_Skurka said:
Yup, lots of warnings of what not to do, how to clean it in the event you didn't heed the warnings, and it came with a special cleaner too.

Bob you better mind all the warnings! We got cleaner too but it didn't help. I hate ours and it's a mess now. I can't wait until we get gas to the house from the well. I buying a gas range ASA gas is available.

bczoom · Dec 29, 2005

Big Dog said:
We got cleaner too but it didn't help. I hate ours and it's a mess now.

Well, there's your issue. Quit cooking with the darn thing. That's what we do and have had no problems.

Also, ours is a black top which seems to help. The white (or light colored ones) show everything.

Dargo · Dec 29, 2005

Sweet! My daughter would like your place, she has most of her stuff painted green as well.

When I bought my wife a cooktop like that, it was because I got a deal on it. Literally, it had fallen off of the truck.

It was damaged quite a bit, but not where you would see it installed. At the time, it was the most modern available but it isn't nearly as fancy as yours. Anyway, we have not had a single issue with it since it was installed in '92.

I don't know what Mrs. Dargo uses to clean it with, but we've never had any sticking or staining issue ever. As a matter of fact, I just now had an idea. I wonder if whatever she uses on that cooktop will work on the glass in my woodburner? Seriously. I can't get some of the stuff off of the inside of the glass and I like to see the fire. Heck, it has lots of glass. That's one of it's better features. I'm off to find out...thanks for the idea!

XeVfTEUtaAqJHTqq · Dec 29, 2005

We have a white one. We use CeramBryte to clean it on a day to day basis. It works best when you let it sit on the crud for a few minutes and soak in. I use a flat razorblade paint scraper to take care of the bad stuff. Had ours for three years now and it still looks good. Only one small scuff/scratch where my wife tried to use steel wool on it (even though I told her not too).

bczoom · Dec 29, 2005

Dargo said:
I wonder if whatever she uses on that cooktop will work on the glass in my woodburner? Seriously. I can't get some of the stuff off of the inside of the glass and I like to see the fire.

Dargo,

There's a woodstove glass cleaner available. I went to look for the brand but can't find the bottle.

The best thing I've found for cleaning the glass is to use a razor/utility knife. The kind with the square blade used to scrape stickers off windshields. When the glass is warm/hot, everything comes right off. I've never had any scratching or marks. Obviously, wear your fire gloves if it's hot...

BoneheadNW · Dec 29, 2005

Dargo said:
As a matter of fact, I just now had an idea. I wonder if whatever she uses on that cooktop will work on the glass in my woodburner? Seriously. I can't get some of the stuff off of the inside of the glass and I like to see the fire. Heck, it has lots of glass. That's one of it's better features. I'm off to find out...thanks for the idea!

Dargo- Here is what you do. Take a page of newspaper and wad it up. Dip it in water to get it fairly wet, then dip it in some of the (cool) ash on the bottom of the fireplace. Wipe the inside of the glass, discard the newspaper (duh), and wipe the residue off with a wet towel. I really works well! No fumes, no expensive cleaner, just left over ash and old newspaper.
Bonehead
P.S. Clean when the firplace is cool (another duh)

Melensdad · Aug 17, 2006

Here is an update . . .

The lovely Mrs_B wanted to put up some wainscotting (sp?) but didn't want the normal beadboard. She wanted cherry. We have cherry cabinets so she wanted everything to match. Damn, cherry is expensive. :smileywac

So here is the start of the project. Some before and after photos. This is the 1st section that is completed, there is A LOT MORE to go. The first photo is the BEFORE shot, the other two are AFTER pictures.

And yes, I will be changing out all the outlets, covers, etc to a darker color after everything else is done.

DaveNay · Aug 17, 2006

B_Skurka said:
Here is an update . . .

Beautiful! I absolutely love the look of paneled wainscotting. :applause:

Melensdad · Aug 17, 2006

A little more . . . The corner of the room with the cabinet in place before the wood is in place followed by 2 shots of the corner in progress.

buckle97 · Aug 17, 2006

Your kitchen is looking good. I love Cherry; my wife on the other hand :blahblah:

.

Spiffy1 · Aug 17, 2006

Sure nice to see other people's projects skyrocket in price to meet the expectations of their fairer half!

That sure is beautiful though, Bob.

Melensdad · Aug 17, 2006

The only thing I worry about at this point is that the kitchen will be very dark when all the wood is up. There are 6 sheets of 1/4" by 4'x8' cherry plywood that will be going into this room. The panels in the photos so far are the easy ones, they are roughly 40" tall by 24" wide. But these will also be fitted in between the counter top and the wall cabinets in the kitchen area and I suspect that our energy bills will go up as the darker walls will cause us to use the lights far more often, even in the daytime hours. That is just a guess, but he lovely Mrs_B wants cherry so she gets cherry.

We decided not to extend the panels into the adjacent hallway, however, now that it is going up, I expect that there will another project coming right on the heels of this one.

There are lots of little things to finish up first. All the existing trim had to be taken off and a 1/4" routed out of it to 'fit' the panels into, so all the nail holes have to be filled. I've already decided that the trim around the windows in the kitchen area will be taken off (again) but replaced with newly finished wood. The old wood is showing some wear and age and it is very visible over the sink so that will have to be stained up, routed, cut, installed. . .

bczoom · Aug 17, 2006

B_Skurka said:
The only thing I worry about at this point is that the kitchen will be very dark when all the wood is up.

I can't see the entire picture but I don't think you'll have an issue since you have the glass door and at least 1 window (that's all I can see in the pics).

I have wainscoating as well as a wood ceiling, cabinets, venetion blinds... and it's not too bad.

Melensdad · Aug 17, 2006

This is the last of the major wall sections so the work will begin to slow considerably from this point forward. One thing I did was space the vertical stiles at what I thought were visually the best places as opposed to sticking with a specific spacing. For example the panels in this area are roughly 28" wide instead of 24" because if I would have stuck with 24" panels it would have forced me to make one very narrow panel along the longer of the two walls. I just like the look of this better. So the panel widths vary slighty from wall to wall.

Ice Queen · Aug 18, 2006

Just thought you might like to see my kitchen!

Dargo · Aug 18, 2006

Ugh...thanks for reminding me. I promised my wife that I'd replace our two front doors this summer. One is still the light blue primer color and it's been there for 13 years.

At least I painted the other about 10 years ago. When I built the house I was forced to save money in some areas but couldn't in others. For example, I used cheap steel entry doors figuring that they could be replaced later. However, I did have to dig the basement when I built the house. It would have been rather expensive to add later.

We made it for about 10 years without our porch. If you opened any back door for the first 10 years, there was just a 4' drop to the ground. I guess it was about 5 years ago that I finally got the wrap around, country style, porch installed. It is about 1500 sq ft and took almost 9000 brick and 63 yards of concrete to build. That doesn't include the huge expense for the vinyl railing and the roof which includes 16 ceiling fans, intercom system, 16 recessed lights, and Polk speaker system. Most people couldn't understand why it took me nearly a full year to build my porch.

Well, now that Bob has brought this post up again, I see I need to make good on two new front entry doors. I've waivered between solid wood or a high quality fiberglass stained to look like wood. When I finish that, I need to put up crown molding in the family room...

It never ends.

Thanks Bob :moon:

Oh yeah, nice kitchen. Since I personally did all of our tile work, hardwood floors, and stone floors, I wanted to comment that I like your ceramic tile floor and the pattern. I actually enjoy doing that work. It just takes so long and is so hard on the knees and back.

Melensdad · Aug 18, 2006

Anita . . . the only thing I see missing from your kitchen is a stack of "carry out" menus from the local restaurants. In my other house we tore out the kitchen and lived on carry out food. We eventually got pretty inventive with "cooking" in a microwave oven.

Dargo . . . I have a wood/glass front door and you are welcome to come get it. Mine is oak. It is the only oak in our house other than a couple threashold pieces. As you can see from the kitchen we used cherry. Every cabinet in the house is cherry as are all the fireplace mantels, surrounds. We used poplar for all the other trim. So the grain pattern of the oak just doesn't look right. I've been considering making my own front door but just never got around to it. At some point I will either do it or buy a replacement just because we don't like the look. Its 11 years old and has held up very well, although it will need some varnish touch up within the next year.

The kitchen is going up very quickly. But there was a lot of prep work before these panels started going up. All the trim had to come off and a dado was cut on the back side to accept the panels. All the new trim was obviously done the same way, so these pictures simply show it being assembled on the wall.

Today starts all the hard stuff. In the kitchen, between the counter tops and the wall cabinets there will be panels set into place. That will require removing some lights and making a lot of electrical cut outs, in addition to working in tight spaces.

Here is a photo of the last of the wall panel before moving the work into the kitchen. The adjacent trim panel is missing and a trim piece from the top rail too, but it will be done in a few minutes.

Dargo · Aug 18, 2006

Okay, first off, what's with your chin up bar being about 3" off the ground in the doorway? How are you going to get a workout like that?!

Is your oak door exposed to sunlight and the elements? I'm trying to figure if a actual oak door would last in our main entrance. Our porch extends 13' out over the door and I also have a storm door over it, so whatever I use likely won't get too much exposure, but it will get some direct sunlight during certain hours of the day. Since most all of our interior wood is oak, I figured that oak would go well with what we have. I'm still having sticker shock on what a nice 36" oak door with any glass in them costs. I can probably put the addition on my barn I want for the same price these two doors look like they are going to cost me.

Melensdad · Aug 18, 2006

OK, taking a break, got the window trim off the wall, removed some outlet covers, loosened the under cabinet lights, etc.

The "chin up bar" is actually the bottom brace of a "dog gate" that keeps the little yappy dog out of the dining room.

As for the door, it is exposed to the morning sun. But the porch roof probaby extends 10' out from the front wall of the house so the door gets quite a bit of protection from the sun. I do NOT have a storm door for additional protection. The door also faces east so it is protected from west prevailing winds and when DaveNay farts, burps and spits up his beer, all that comes at the west wall of the house along with any rain or snow storms. The wood door has been up for 11.5 years and it was re-varnished about 5 years ago.

EDIT 10:00am: Today may be a long day!

Its almost 10 am and this is as far as I've gotten.

In the BEFORE photo you can see the window trim is not the same color as the new trim. The new trim is installed above the tile border at the bottom edge of the wall where the wall and the countertop meet. That new trim is a dado cut to accept the cherry panels. So the old window trim had to come off and new window trim had to be installed so now the trim and the panels match the cabinets.

EDIT AGAIN ~ NOON . . . PICTURE #3 is the corner, finally finished. The electrical cutouts caused some problems, but the main issue was the under cabinet lighting. Hopefully the rest of the kitchen will go smoother than this did.

Melensdad · Aug 18, 2006

Going much faster now.

Melensdad · Aug 18, 2006

The last BEFORE and AFTER.

There are still lots of little things to finish up but the bulk of the project is done. I think the room feels much 'warmer' with all the wood added, also, as the room is about 30' long, the wood wainscotting on the walls in the dinette side of the room seems to balance out the wood in the kitchen and helps to unify the look of the whole room.

It is probably a lot more authentic this way too. The house was designed in 1912 so it is very likely that it would have had wood details similar to this???

Dargo · Aug 18, 2006

I don't recall what counter top you opted to buy. Is it quartz or granite? It looks a lot like what I have in my pool house. Mine is quartz and I really like it. After I recover from putting up two new doors, I'll likely change her counters in the kitchen to the much more durable quartz or possibly granite.

Melensdad · Aug 18, 2006

Quartz. I believe the brand was Silestone. We looked at granite. And my brother has it. I'm glad we have quartz. Granite, IMHO looks a little bit better, but the seams are not as tight, the edges can chip, and the surface can stain. The higher priced Quartz is in line with most granites. So costs are reasonably similar unless you go into the exotic granites. Some of the smaller aggregate quartz is lower priced.

Junkman · Aug 18, 2006

Why not a wood panel on the dishwasher door or am I not supposed to ask that question.... :hide:

Kitchen Remodeling . . . it WAS going so well, and then!

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