My neighborhood

 It's starting to look cozy.

Update: This shows the garage at 15°. Apparently, I can't do 90-degree math problems and chew gum at the same time. We want 25°, which is 65° from 90°, or -115°, or 155° or -205° or 335°, depending on how you come at it.

Working with Chief

Trying to come up with a procedure for a set of remodel drawings.

In Chief, there's just one .plan file, but a set of remodel drawings will have:

• Demolition Plan - existing walls to remain and walls to be demolished; cabinets, fixtures, appliances to be removed. I don't think an Existing Floor Plan makes much sense--it should be clear from the Demo plan.
• Floor Plan - existing and new walls. Everything demolished is gone. New work is dimensioned, but we only need overall dimensions of existing house for reference. We may have a situation where an existing wall gets new siding--that'll be interesting.
• Foundation Plan - existing and new foundation walls. Most projects won't need a Foundation Demolition Plan; it's implied if you're removing walls. Only new work is dimensioned.
• Roof Plan (1/8") - new and existing
• Electrical Plan - existing and new electrical (lights and outlets, primarily)
• Floor Finish Plan - existing and new floor finishes
• Reflected Ceiling Plan - existing and new. (Not sure how to do this, but I bet Chief can do it.)
• Site Demolition Plan (1/8") - remove driveway, new grading, etc.
• Site Plan (1/8") - new and existing elements
• Landscaping Plan - new and existing trees, plants, hardscape

• The elevations and sections will want to make a distinction between existing and new work.

New: Blue poche (171 181 255)

Existing: Grey poche (227 227 227) and no layers (no wallboard). "Walls, Layers" is a layer--how confusing--so we need to 

Demo walls: Red polylines filled with faint red poche

Need a Walls, Demo layer--color: red (FF0000), line style: dashed

Need a Walls, New layer (maybe just keep Walls, Normal)

Need a Walls, Existing layer

Turned off auto dimensions and deleted dimensions for existing walls.

West Side Mockup

 Plan "C" and, in particular, Plan "D" calls for a 4' stair west of Casey's room. It fits within the required setback, but what would it look like? Well, in terms of massing, this:

Quick Mockup

By Scheme "C" (and there's a Scheme "D" on the boards), it seems clear that tilting the garage 25° is optimal. Scheme "A" only tilted it 15°. This creates a tiny patio area, almost an atrium. I put up some stakes to see where the proposed garage wall and breezeway sliding door would be. The plan is to raise the grade for wheelchair access to the sliding door, but this is what it looks like today.

The purple line at the right is the new garage eave at the height of the main house eave. The plan is that the electric meter and mast stay where they are. Turns out the electric service comes to the house at about 25° itself, so the wire will follow the garage wall.

Foundation As-Built

Before I dive into the foundation in Chief Architect, I thought I would study the as-built foundation as it is visible around the perimeter and in the basement. Credit to Peggy for suggesting taking elevation points around the house; advice I largely ignored because I have a survey.

The garage is at 260' 0" and the main house is at 263' 0". That may not be precisely accurate, but we can start there. The basement floor may not be 256' 0", but it is a convenient number.

Level	Terrain	House
Basement	256.0	-48”
Top of footing (SW corner)	257.14583	-34¼”
Garage, BR3	260.0	0”
Top of Garage curb	260.16667	2”
Breezeway floor	262.95833	35½”
Main House Fin. Floor	263.0	36”
Garage Plate	269.375	112½”
Main Plate	270.75	120¾”

 Main House

On the main house, we measure to the last lap siding board, the course that has vents between the 2x8 floor joists. It is maybe 1/4" below the mud sill. As I understand the floor construction, that means the F. F. to bottom of siding is 10 1/2", meaning that the bottom of the siding is at 25 1/2" (262.125).

The ground across the N wall is level at 20" (261.66667). The Porch is 35 1/2", the step is 28 1/2" (or 28" closer to the kitchen), and the front walk is 25" where it hits the step.

The ground at the E wall is level at 23" (261.91667). The NE corner is difficult to measure because of the brick veneer, but the ground slopes up a few inches as it turns the corner.

The ground along the S wall is 3 1/2" (260.29167) in the middle, sloping up to 22" (261.83334) at the SE corner.

The W wall of the main house in back, the concrete patio hits the house at 1 1/2" (260.125). At the kitchen in front, it is 20" (262.6667).

The bottom of the mud sill is 25 3/4" (262.14583)

Basement

The ground inside the N wall slopes from 1 3/4" (260.14583) at the NE to -8 1/4" (259.3125) at the NW. The sewer line punches through the N wall with an invert of about 9 1/2" (260.79167).

The ground inside the E wall slopes from 1 3/4" (260.14583) at the NE to -14 1/4" (258.8125) at the SE.

The ground inside the S wall is level at -14 1/4" (258.8125) to the half wall. The basement floor is -48" (256.0), sloping to the door and the catch basin beyond.

The floor is the same at the W wall until the half wall. There the ground slopes from -28 1/4" (257.64583) at the half wall to -8 1/4" (259.3125) at the NW corner.

The top of the half wall is at -16" (258.6667), or 32" up from the floor. The top of the 6x8 girders is 27 1/4" (262.27083), which is the top of the mud sill and bottom of the 2x8 joists.

Footings are exposed at the SW area where the basement slab is. The top of these footings is -33 1/2" (257.20834). The footing on the W wall protrudes 12" into the room (and seems to align with the outside of the stem wall), making it 18" wide. The footing on the S wall protrudes only 6 1/2", but likewise aligns with the outside of the stem wall.

Sloping formwork (on W wall). Note exposed footing on N wall (right).

It appears that the footings on all but the S side (and maybe there, too) were not poured level. The formwork seems to slope, as well, suggesting that they only leveled the top of the stem wall. 

A more traditional 6" x 12" footing under the N and E walls seems to be partially exposed on the inside, making the top of the footing about 3" above the adjacent grade.

Breezeway

The Breezeway floor is 35 1/2" (262.95833). The ground on the north side is 24" (262.0). The ground on the south side is -8 1/2" (259.29167).

Garage + BR3

The floor is a 4" slab with top at 0" (260.0) and bottom at -4" (259.66667). There is a 2" curb all around. Top of curb is 2" (260.16667). The bottom of the siding is 1 3/4" (260.14583).

The driveway across the N wall is 0" (260.0).

The E wall in front slopes up to about 32" (262.6667) at the breezeway. At the back it is roughly level at -8" (259.33334) along the E wall of BA3.

The ground at the S wall is generally -23 1/4" (258.0625), but it is -12" (259.0) at the SE corner and slopes off to -31 1/4" (257.39583) at the SW corner.

The ground along the W wall slopes linearly from -12" (259.0) at the NW corner to -31 1/4" (257.39583) at the SW corner.

Thumbnail Doodles

 Here's what I'm thinking. Build a garage with an apartment above it. No, build a garage but put the apartment over BR3 so that it has a view of the forest. Or, maybe just build a solid carport. In all cases, the car area angles about 20° so that the new driveway gives the big Douglas Fir more leeway.

I'm working on refining the As-Built drawing in Chief Architect, after which I plan to create drawings for the project. The thing is, I still don't have a design that I can run with. So, in parallel with the as-built, I'm sketching thumbnails at 1/8" scale. Using Chief Architect as a design tool is fine, but not at this early a stage.

Scheme "A"

Scheme "A" has the apartment above the garage. I wanted to keep the stairs indoors, so that the house is attractive to large, weird families as well as to people who want two (or three) rental units.

Scheme "A"

Problems that became clear include not having a Carkeek view in the apartment and apparently not understanding how the roofs might work. It has the advantage of grouping the plumbing in a wedge aimed at the breezeway.

The second floor is about 719 SF. It makes for an odd, windowless hall, but it mostly works (except that I think the garage door has to swing in the direction of egress). We can get past the egress issue by providing a door to the side yard.

The breezeway becomes a kitchen for use as party central for the "large, weird family" scenario, or the kitchen for BR3 in the three rental units scenario. Recall that we retain the breezeway door because we want an accessible transition from the driveway to the main house for the "aging-in-place" crowd.

Another problem is how close the electric supply is to the apartment. We don't want the expense of moving the main breaker panel, but moving the mast and possibly the meter isn't that big a deal. It's a 2" conduit on the outside of the house with a big, unwieldy set of wires inside. What is a big deal is that the electric company has to come out and move the power.

Scheme "B"

The 2x4 rafters over the existing garage are sagging--the corners are drooping, which throws the gutters off, trapping rainwater. The breezeway roof hits the lower garage roof oddly (the two little half-gable ends), but the breezeway roof needs to stay where it is for the existing electrical wires. Also, the eaves around the garage are lower than the house/breezeway eaves, which creates a problem.

So, both schemes "A" and "B" imagine demolishing the roof (not the ceiling) above BR3 and framing a new one. In scheme "A," I'm showing a gable for more headroom in the attic storage.

Scheme "B"

I almost immediately turned the U-shaped stairs into L-shaped ones so the stairs start in the central hall and you emerge into the apartment above staring south at Carkeek. The stairwell becomes the divider between the living area and the kitchen. This change isn't shown on the drawing because I didn't do more than make a note.

As drawn, the bedroom and bath are too cramped, so the demising wall has to move west. In this scheme, the second floor is 598 SF. Not clear whether loft storage above the garage would be accessed from the garage (attic stairs, etc.) or from the apartment.

Scheme "C"

But then I thought: maybe we just need a carport. Skip the second floor apartment.

We could expand the Workshop and provide a dry path to enter the house.

Scheme "C"

My temporary plastic carport proves that a roof with open sides keeps the rain and pine needles off the cars. (Alas, the cedar pollen blows with the wind.) 

The Main House shows some of the improvements Peggy designed a while ago.

I have some decisions to make regarding the breezeway. There's no reason the main house has to include a circulation doughnut. We could close off the kitchen and the hall. However, I would like to be able to park in the carport and walk through the breezeway to get to the main house. Maybe that's just nostalgia. Anyway, putting a kitchen and an apartment-sized washer/dryer over the basement would be much easier than putting it anywhere else.

"One-piece," or tilt-up garage door

In the workshop, I'm imagining a tilt-up door. Lightweight aluminum frame with corrugated aluminum on the door. This would effectively extend the workshop into the western side of the carport for bigger projects. This photo shows a spring unit, but I'm thinking of a triangular frame on a pivot so that the door, when open, is part inside and part outside the wall.

Over on the east side of the main house, I'm imagining new garden doors. Off BR1, a tiny space surrounded by a 6' bamboo fence. Off the Living Room, a full patio with access to the front yard and a narrow path to the backyard. Room for a table and some chairs.

Andersen 100-Series

A new garden door in the breezeway would have a lock for keyed entry. Andersen Series 100 gliding doors are the least expensive. They come in 5', 6', and 8' and are solid vinyl ("Fibrex"). There are many other choices, obviously.

Opening the east wall of BR1 means that the bed must go against the fireplace wall. The wall is 73" and the Queen bed is 66", so it might be nice to design a custom headboard that eliminates the need for nightstands.

The drawing also shows a proposal for an outdoor kitchen hiding the basement door, as hinted at in the previous post. 

Staring monomaniacally at Scheme "C," I realized that the carport roof could overhang the setback such that cars could be parked somewhat closer to the street. That could make the Workshop larger and improve the windowless hall. I could put the BR3 kitchen out there (except I don't know how to deal with connecting to the sewer. (I could add the kitchen sink to the existing sewage pump and hope it has the capacity. Or, if wishing and hoping is a thing, maybe the kitchen sink could drain through a pipe under the breezeway and still be high enough to tap the main sewer--that isn't an option for a toilet or a shower.)

Scheme "C" - Alternate 1

The problem with Scheme "C" is that I'd like to be able to advertise the house as 2000+ SF, not 1600 and change, and this adds almost no living space to the plan.

One of the things that inspired Scheme "C" is the idea of a corrugated polycarbonate roof over the carport. It's pretty dark on the north side of the garage with huge trees to the west. A "glass" roof would be welcome, I think. Suntuf panels are available at Lowe's for $1.85 per SF, so the roof materials would be about $1,000.

Cellar Door

I woke up yesterday determined to settle the cellar door problem once and for all. Having forgotten the issues, I had to reinvent the wheel, but now I think I've got it.

Use a standard Bilco door. Steel doors on a steel base. Done. It doesn't work because they are about 22" high and with these stairs, the top of the door opening is just 4' above the stairs.

Okay, then, remove the existing stairs and replace them with 7" x 11.5" good steps. More or less the same problem.

Well, I guess we have to build our own doors. A 24" x 80" fiberglass door weighs 95 pounds. Where do you buy hardware like Bilco uses? Nowhere I can find. So, we build the doors from plywood. We cover the plywood with mineral roll roofing. This is starting to sound like a hillbilly solution.

Well, Bilco has a line (BR series) of doors designed for sloping accessways. So, we build a sloping accessway. A flat roof extends 30" from the house about 36" from the top of the existing cellar stairs wall and that provides 6' 1" clearance on the stairs. Only 6' 1" because that's the height of the basement door--truth in advertising. The largest Bilco door, BR-3, fits and they do the "heavy lifting" with the door springs.

This seems good for the BR2 egress window. Currently, if you use the window, you fall 11' feet to your death. With this design, you have a platform.

Home Depot sells the Bilco BR-3 for $950 (including tax). They'll ship it to my local store for free and it looks as if it is as returnable as anything you buy at Home Depot--that is, it's not a custom cabinet.

I'm sure we could build the accessway walls in wood, but I'm not sure it would look professional. I could frame it in wood and get a pro to stucco it, but there's no other stucco on the house.

I kind of like the look of the rendering above: Pay a pro to form, pour, and finish concrete, including a header beam under the top of the Bilco door. For the roof, I'm thinking two slabs of cast concrete that we could just place by gravity, then go nuts with the clear silicone.

If we went with wood framing, we'd need wood siding just about touching the patio slab. You can do that with cement fiber siding, but it doesn't look right. Then the new siding dies into the concrete foundation wall? That doesn't look right. Whatever we do, we paint it all to match, but still.

Then I thought, what about hiding it behind furniture?

Maybe we do slanted wall as shown on the right (east) side, but build a low wall on the left (west). A place for drinks that hides the Bilco door altogether.