This Old House

Kevin

Today on "This Old House"...

Richard

I'll show you the right way to get smoke and exhaust out of a kitchen.

Jeff

So, the dining room plan for the Cape Ann project is very formal, so they've asked us to come up with something here in the shop.

Kevin

What happened to all this plumbing here?

Richard

I've never seen anything like this before.

Roger

There's already rot going on in that trunk.

Kevin

So what have you found up here?

Tom

Well, a bit of a surprise.

Richard

It's really the classic plumber's lament.

Kevin

Nice!

Richard

It's five bathrooms, it's a kitchen, it's a full new mechanical. It's -- It's gonna be a biggie.

Kevin

It sounds like you guys have a plan.

Molly

I think we do.

Laughs

The money's in the detail. Kevin

That is beautiful.

Kevin

Hi, there. I'm Kevin O'Connor, and welcome back to "This Old House" and our 1890s shingle-style home here up in Cape Ann, Massachusetts. You can see that there is a whole new layer of shingles on this entire house. Original house ended there.

There's a little bump-out right here where we extended the kitchen. There's even a deck up top, and believe it or not, Charlie has got to turn this house over to the homeowners in about a week or so. There is a lot going on inside. Hey,

Charlie. Charlie

Hey, Kevin.

Kevin

So, am I right that you've got just a little more than a week to get this whole thing done?

Charlie

According to this calendar, I only have six days.

Kevin

Six days?

Charlie

Six days.

Kevin

What do you got going on? It seems like everything.

Charlie

Well, we have a little more trim to install. We're finishing up some kitchen cabinets. We're painting, and believe it or not, we're even wallpapering.

Kevin

You're way too calm, Charlie.

I'll leave you to it. Charlie

Alright.

Kevin

So, this used to be the kitchen back here, and you can see it's now becoming a new family room. The cabinet fronts are still going in. You can imagine a big-screen TV right there for a media center. And then here in the hallway, look at that -- the paint is still wet on the barrel-vaulted ceiling right there.

And check out this mudroom. That comes off of the garage. A lot of cabinetry, cubby space and such in there. And so, this...

Well, this was an architect's drawing, and these were the different ideas. This became reality right here. So, we've got the pilaster -- check that out, the pilaster right here, the faux beam to separate the front from the back half of this entryway. Mattie, this is your work right here.

Good to see you. Mattie

Hey, Kevin. How are you?

Kevin

And we've got the pocket doors, back in use after 120 years. Hardware was reset. They've been painted. Those are gonna look awesome.

But... Hey, Chris....the showstopper is out here on our new front porch. Now, none of this was ever here, and now, we've got beadboard ceiling, we've got an ip deck, and check out this railing system. We've got composite wrapped around 4x4 posts, and then mahogany for the top rail and the bottom rail, and then we've got fir for the balusters.

And the sweeping stone staircase that Mark McCullough built us. We've got bluestone risers and treads beneath the temporary stairs right now, and then the granite sweep on the left and the right. And today, they're fabricating metal handrails that are gonna match this sweep on this side as well as on this side, and they're being fabricated just down the street from here. Hey, Jay.

Good to see you again.

Jay

Hey, there. How are you? Hiya. Good, good, good.

Kevin

So, you're gonna be helping us out with this beautiful staircase we've got, huh?

Jay

Yep. Absolutely.

Kevin

So, you were out there to take a look at it, right?

Yep. Kevin

Very impressive

with the stonework. Jay

Looks great.

Yeah. Jay

Really does. Looks nice.

Kevin

So, you're gonna help us make it equally impressive with a handrail?

Yep. Kevin

What are we thinking?

Jay

So, obviously, as nice as that entrance is, they wanted to use something a little special, so they went with some bronze rail.

Kevin

Bronze, huh?

Jay

Yep. Pipe rail.

Kevin

And how do you guys think about this in terms of, I don't know, gauge or weight, length?

Jay

Well, it's a bronze pipe, 1.9 inches in diameter.

Kevin

Okay.

Jay

So we buy it in a straight length, 21-footer.

Kevin

So a big, long 21-foot tube.

Jay

Straight piece, correct, yep.

Kevin

Okay. And what is this here? This isn't bronze, right?

Jay

Nope. That piece there is a template that we have done

prior at the site... Kevin

Ah.

Jay

...in combination with some field measurements.

So it's steel. Jay

It's steel, absolutely.

Gotcha. Okay. Jay

Yep. And then we went down and we dry-fitted that to make sure when we get back here,

we had a true template... Kevin

Yep.

Jay

...to form the actual bronze with.

Kevin

And it looks like you've transferred some marks from one

to the other on this one. Jay

We did. Yep.

Okay. Jay

Just for reference marks.

Kevin

Alright. So, how do we fabricate it? How do we bend it?

Jay

What we'll do is, we'll put it through the machine.

Kevin

Alright. Let's do it. So interesting. He's got the level down there.

Mike's job is to keep that thing orientated right.

Jay

Correct. And then the rollers will pass it through.

Kevin

So now we're gonna get the sense of the radius, line them up to his marks. Look at that, huh? So you're pretty close, right?

Jay

Yeah. That looks good.

Kevin

Not much daylight in there. Okay. We'll see how we did here. They've got it traced out on the cardboard.

Jay

They do, right here, to simulate the steel one.

Kevin

What do you think? Looks pretty good?

It does. It looks great. Kevin

Nice job. And so, next steps?

Jay

Next step here is, we'll cut the end off that's long, and we can then solder our finished product on.

Kevin

Beautiful, and then when that's all put together, off to be finished?

Jay

When it's all done, it'll go off to the finisher.

Correct. Kevin

Nice, real nice.

Jay

Yep.

Mike

And that's about it. Now all we have to do is polish it and make it look pretty.

Kevin

This front room up here on the third floor used to have about 8-foot ceilings, but those were pushed up to 13 feet. A new beam was put in right there because we wanted a big, vaulted ceiling, open room. Hey, Mauro. Hey,

Molly. Mauro

Kevin.

Hi. Kevin

And the thought is that this is sort of a dedicated play space?

Molly

Dedicated playroom for our daughter.

Nice. Molly

We want her creativity and her imagination to thrive, and we see this as a place where she can do that.

Kevin

Plenty of room to thrive. Alright. So, what's the project for today, Mauro?

Mauro

Well, the project for today -- we're gonna use a chalkboard paint for these two doors. And the first thing that we did in here, Kevin, we... That one is primed, and I have my guy prime this one here, and...

Kevin

So we've got flat-panel doors, and they're sort of giving us access to the mechanical equipment. That's why we've got them here.

Nice-looking doors. Kevin

Primer first.

Mauro

Primer first. Has been like three hours that we primed. It's dry, and now it's time for us to put the first coat up for the chalkboard.

Kevin

Which is this right here?

Mauro

Which is this right here.

I don't smell anything. Molly

Mnh-mnh.

Kevin

How we doing on VOCs?

Mauro

Absolutely. This will start with the primer. The primer and the paint is completely zero VOCs.

Nice. Mauro

Since this is a playroom, I want, you know, the kids will play free of any VOCs.

Kevin

Alright. Molly, you gonna lend a hand?

Molly

Yes,

I am. Kevin

Let's do it.

Mauro

Alright. Alright, Molly.

Get your roller. Molly

Okay.

Mauro

Just dip into the tray, just enough for the first roll. You're gonna be doing this more than one time, okay?

Molly

You trust me?

Chuckles

Mauro

I do, absolutely. Okay,

got your handle there. Molly

Okay.

Mauro

Okay, and just... You can start from anywhere.

Molly

Start anywhere?

Mauro

Just go nice and easy. Go all the way down and come back.

Yeah. Molly

The edge, as well?

Mauro

Overlap each pass by about 50%.

Okay. Mauro

Yeah. Not a lot of pressure on the roller.

Okay. Mauro

Alright. Oh, they look good.

Kevin

So, Mauro, not just ordinary paint, here, right?

Special paint. Mauro

Absolutely not. This is chalkboard. It's specific for you to put on surface, to write on and erase easily.

Kevin

Yep. Nice deep, dark black there.

Mauro

Yeah, well, the fun thing about this, the cool thing -- you can choose any color you want.

Kevin

Oh, really?

Mauro

Not only black.

Yeah. Kevin

Oh, okay.

Mauro

Alright. I'll let you work on, and I'm gonna check on my guy with the primer, and I'll check with you soon. Alright?

Molly

Okay, great. Thank you,

Mauro. Mauro

Have fun. Alright, Molly. This has been three days.

Molly

Mm!

Mauro

It's completely dry, so now I wanted to do this next step.

Okay. Mauro

You're gonna handle this piece of chalk. What I want you to do -- we're gonna rub on across the whole door. You know, just go across this way, you know?

Kevin

What's the point of that, Mauro?

Molly

Yeah, why are we doing that?

Mauro

This will make it more easy to write on

and to wipe it off. Kevin

Oh.

Molly

Huh!

Kevin

Got to set it up.

We got to... Kevin

Got to prep it.

Mauro

We set up for 5, 10 minutes, and then we come with rag and we rag it off, and it'll be ready to use in three days.

Okay. Kevin

Molly, you are in good hands. I'm gonna leave you to it, okay?

Thank you. Yes. Kevin

Alright. Thanks, Mauro.

Mauro

Thanks, Kevin.

Kevin

Hey,

Wayne. Wayne

Hey, Kevin.

Kevin

Hey, look at that, huh?

All going back in place. Wayne

Yes.

Kevin

And the repair went okay?

Wayne

Yes, they did. Here's one of the balusters that we repaired. So, what we did is, we actually glued up the break, cut it flat so we could drill-press it, and then put a -- inserted a dowel, glued it up,

and here we go. Kevin

Boy, and that's nice and rigid,

no problem there. Wayne

Nope.

Kevin

So this one's going back in?

Wayne

Yes, it is. And so we're gonna insert it

into the mortise. Kevin

Yeah.

Wayne

And then the dovetail goes in here.

Kevin

You got them all labeled, so they're all going right back into their same spot.

Wayne

Yes,

they are. Kevin

Beautiful. So then, you guys took off nosing that was holding these in?

Wayne

Correct. And here's the top piece of the molding...

So that goes back in. Wayne

...which will go

right here. Kevin

Right.

Wayne

And then what'll happen is this piece of molding will go right underneath it.

Kevin

Gotcha, and all of this ends up getting painted, as do the balusters, so all blemishes will be hidden.

That's right. Kevin

But natural stain on the top rail right here, the handrail?

Wayne

Yes, we've already stripped it, bleached it, and stained it.

Kevin

And what goes on top of these?

Wayne

We'll apply a coat of catalyzed lacquer...

Kevin

Yeah, beautiful.

Wayne

...and quite a bit of toner.

Jim is here mixing the color. Kevin

Mm-hmm.

Wayne

So what we've done is, we've started with a base stain, something that you can get off the shelf.

Kevin

Yeah.

Wayne

It is an industrial product. And then we're adding a pigment.

Kevin

So just straight pigment?

Wayne

Correct,

correct. Kevin

Okay.

Wayne

So we're adding a medium green and lampblack...

Alright. Wayne

...to achieve the color that the owner wants. Once the lacquer is applied, it'll punch it back up, it'll deepen it, and then to achieve the final color, we'll apply two passes of toner coat.

Kevin

Toner coat being...?

Wayne

It's lacquer with color introduced into it. It's either a dye or a pigment. We'll be using both.

Kevin

Alright. Let's have a look.

Wayne

So what we'll do now is, we'll let this set up. It'll take probably 20 minutes, and then we'll apply two toner coats,

which will enrichen the color. Kevin

Yeah.

Wayne

And in between the toner coats, we'll touch up these repairs that you see are very light.

Kevin

Make sure that they match.

Wayne

Exactly, and then we'll apply a final coat of 30-sheen lacquer.

Chuckling

Kevin

It's unbelievable how many coats, how much work,

but nice job. Wayne

Thank you.

Kevin

Cannot wait to see it finished.

Wayne

Very good.

Richard

The homeowners have picked really eclectic appliances. The cooktop is induction, and it's gonna go right here. So, the pot gets hot, but the surface doesn't. It's very efficient.

They also want a teppanyaki griddle. Now, if you've ever been to a Japanese steakhouse with the chef and the flying knives and the smoke and fire, they cook on a teppanyaki grill. But we're not here to talk about cooking, actually. We're here to talk about air.

Anytime you have a kitchen with a cooking appliance, you need to exhaust air and smoke to outside. And range hoods are measured in a term called CFM -- cubic feet per minute. This box represents a cubic foot -- 12-inch by 12-inch by 12-inch. Now, if we just had the electric induction top right here, we'd need a hood that had about 400 CFM.

That means 400 of these boxes would need to move up through the fan every minute to outside. If we add the teppanyaki grill, we need 750 CFM leaving the building. So, where is this air gonna come from? When we build a house like this, it's super insulated -- unbelievable windows, air-sealed.

And so now that air will try to come from anywhere it can, which means it might come down chimneys, it might come in through bathroom fans, but it's gonna try to fight its way in. So, what I thought we would do is give you a little demonstration of what happens. We've sealed up this room..

Zipper rasps

Richard

And now I'm gonna turn on this fan.

Fan whirring

Richard

Watch what happens. Okay, it's trying to find air anywhere it can. It's pulling on everything it can, any crack, all the -- everywhere we've sealed it. And what I've got over here...

I could just open up a window, right? And that would give me some air to come in to offset it, but look how much air is coming in here. Okay, this is a measurement of air speed. So that's more than 5 knots, which means it could be 6 miles an hour of potentially freezing cold air or super hot air that you've already paid to heat or cool this building.

So the only real solution is to install a makeup air unit. A few weeks ago, we put one in here. Now, that has a blower, a filter, a muffler, and an electric duct heater that will actually modulate according to what it needs based on how cold the air is. Now let's turn it on.

So, here in the pantry, we've got the intake of the makeup air right here. The unit's underneath. That's about 10 feet from the hood. Now, when that unit comes on -- you can see the fan just coming on now.

Fan whirring

Richard

And that air is slightly conditioned, and that's great, and we'll have a grille right here that'll make it disappear, but look at the difference it's gonna make for our operation here. So, now let's pull the tape and put our meter on, and look at this. Remember, there was almost 6 miles an hour of air coming in. It's at zero.

This building is in perfect balance. 'Cause, remember, all we're trying to do is to get smoke and grease out of the building efficiently... like that.

Jeff

So, the dining room plan for the Cape Ann project is very formal, so they've asked us to come up with something here in the shop. So the designer, Shelby, came up with a sketch, and then we've given it to Eric to try to figure out how we're gonna build this thing. So, what do you got?

Eric

Well, we have a 12-foot-long table, 4 1/2 feet wide, 3 inch thick, and with four curved legs. So our first concern was stability and weight. We added a mid-span stretcher. We decided to reduce the thickness of the top to an inch and a half and adding a 3-inch-thick band around it to make it appear to be 3 inches thick.

Jeff

Sure. So this is that detail here where this will shiplap into the top there.

Correct. Jeff

Yep.

Correct. Jeff

Makes sense.

Eric

She also wanted a 1/4-inch dado up the center of the legs,

so we created that detail. Jeff

Yep. And this is what it's gonna look like.

Eric

And that is what it's gonna look like.

Jeff

Wow. That's a good-looking table. So, the homeowners chose black walnut for the species for the dining room table.

Riley

Yeah, it's a super dense hardwood. It's got a beautiful, nice, dark grain, super durable over time.

Yep. Riley

It's gonna be exciting to build this nice table out of this material.

Jeff

Yeah, I mean, some of the dimensions we needed and the thicknesses, you know, you don't just go to a lumber supplier and get this stuff off the shelf. So our friend Pat Hunt, who has helped us with hardwood flooring in the past, sourced this from a mill out of Missouri. So, most of the black walnut is harvested in Missouri.

Riley

Yeah, so the most challenging part of this table is gonna be those curved legs, and you're obviously not gonna take this and bend it, so we've got to cut this into laminates,

and we'll bend it that way. Jeff

Alright.

Riley

Now, we need 30 plies at 3/32nds to get to our 3 inches thick.

Jeff

Okay. Alright. Let's rip it up. Alright.

So, that should be enough.

Riley

That's it. Alright. So we're gonna get this going. We're gonna mix up some two-part epoxy.

Gives us about 90 minutes of cure time. Alright. That's the last pump. Now we mix it for a full minute.

And then we can start rolling this onto our laminates. Alright. Got a nice thin coat on all of the laminates. Now we bring it over to our form, just like that.

But we're still too stiff to bend this here by hand, so we've got this jig made up with a long strap connected to a winch on that end. Alright. That's good there. Now we'll get the rest of it with a clamp.

Jeff

Okay.

Sweet. I'm pumped. Jeff

So we'll let this sit for 24 hours, and it'll be ready.

Yeah. Worked out great. Jeff

Nice job, Riley.

Riley

Alright. So, here we have our tabletop.

Jeff

Yeah,

looking good. Riley

It's beautiful. Got the grains matched up best we can.

Jeff

Yep.

Riley

We've got inch-and-a-half boards,

ranging between 6 and 8 inches. Jeff

Nice.

Riley

And we've also alternated the pattern of the grain. So the cupping on this is up, the next board is down, and so forth, all the way down.

They oppose each other. Riley

The reason we do that... Exactly, they oppose each other. So if one starts to cup this way, the other one is gonna balance it out by pulling it back down that way. And then we're gonna attach our breadboard end to give us that 3-inch-thick profile that we want.

So, again, inch and a half on the inside here, and we'll have slotted screw holes in the bottom to allow for that movement.

Saw whirring

Jeff

Nice. Looking good. So, we got a few more pieces to go.

Yep. Let's do it. Jeff

I'll give you a hand. Alright,

piece number 20. Riley

Alright. That's it.

All the pieces ready to go. Jeff

That looks good.

Riley

We're gonna use epoxy, glue it up, clamp it up. We've got loose tenons running right down the center

on every board. Jeff

Yep.

Riley

And once it's glued up, we can cut off the edges and put on that nice, thick nosing.

Jeff

Alright. And then we got a lacquer finish

going on top of that. Riley

Yes, we do.

Jeff

Sounds like about a week's worth of work.

Gonna get to it. Jeff

Alright.

Kevin

John and Molly want to get a handle on their electricity consumption in this house. It is a big home, and it also has a solar array up on one of the roofs, so our electrician Heath is actually adding some smart technology to help them do that. Hey,

Heath. Heath

Hey, Kevin.

Kevin

So, wow, look at this.

Heath

Yeah, we ended up pulling 400 amps into this, so we split this into two 200-amps -- one up here, one here -- and we've also added solar. And we put this particular unit in because we want to be able to monitor everything for the home-energy monitoring system in one spot, and this allows us to do that. So we can feed the solar in, and we have our two separate 200-amp feeds.

Okay. Heath

And what we've done is installed the actual monitor right here.

Kevin

So, where is the smart monitor?

And let's talk about that. Heath

Right in the...

Kevin

So, this is a system that's gonna let us sort of understand what everything is?

Heath

This is.

Kevin

What does the installation entail?

Heath

So, normally, this piece would actually just go in your main panel, whether you had a 100- or a 200-amp panel. This would go inside of it, and you'd have a CT clamp that would actually go around the feed wires, and that's how this would connect.

Kevin

Our situation here is a little different because of the different panels and the solar generator.

Heath

Right, little different. We have a little more going on. So we actually had to go to the home center, get a few parts, a couple of boxes, a little bit of conduit. And we wanted to make sure we got this piece inside here because it's conditioned space.

Doesn't want to be outside where our main connections are.

Kevin

So, those CT clamps that you're talking about, literally those half circles that go around the wires...

Right. Kevin

...are you putting them around the wires going into each individual breaker as it goes down the panel?

Heath

No. Luckily, we don't have to do that. That's the nice part of this. You really only have to do it to the two feed wires coming in.

Kevin

So, if you just put it on the main feed wire, how does it know the difference between a circuit that's a vacuum or a toaster, versus a refrigerator?

Heath

That's the great thing about this. It's actually the software. So this has machine learning inside of it, and it can actually detect what's being used when.

Kevin

Huh! Okay. So there is an antenna on that thing, which means it's sending information out, to...?

Heath

To the Wi-Fi network in the home. That way, the owner can actually pull it up

on an app with a smartphone. Kevin

Oh, yeah, look at that. Okay, and it's got it up on a tablet here, too. And you can see on the bottom, we've got timeline, so this is minute-by-minute usage, spikes, peaks, and valleys. So that's our consumption, and how do we know the individual breakers and the individual appliances?

Heath

So, we actually have a device list.

Kevin

Oh,

look at that. Heath

And it will show what it's discovered in the system so far.

Kevin

It's already figured it out.

Heath

So, being on a jobsite, it's found a bunch of saws, our vacuums.

Laughs

Kevin

Right, right.

Heath

But the really cool thing is, we just plugged the fridge in -- it's already found the ice maker within a couple of days.

Kevin

Ah, cool. Okay.

Heath

By watching this, you can kind of learn what's being used, what isn't being used, what's on, and where you're losing power. You can correct some things.

Kevin

And the longer the homeowners are here, presumably, they've lived here a while, the saws will go away, and they'll be replaced with televisions

and computers and such. Heath

Right. Yeah.

Kevin

And it will continue to learn.

Heath

The longer it runs, the better it gets.

Kevin

Gotcha. So these are the things that are consuming. How do we deal with the production? Because in this case, we have solar up on the roof.

Heath

Sure, so this actually ties in with the solar, and it shows you how much you're producing.

Look at that. Heath

Today, it's kind of cloudy -- we're obviously not getting much.

Heath

But it would actually show you this is producing so much in solar. It would show you on this end how much it's using. And the advantage to this is, you can actually balance this out and see what you're using, what you don't need, what's on that doesn't need to be and bring it back down, so you can adjust accordingly and really kind of get a net-zero effect on your power.

Kevin

Once you have this level of information, you can start changing your behavior

and get more efficient with it. Heath

Exactly. Yeah.

Kevin

Wow. So, is this the future?

Heath

This is definitely the future.

Kevin

Very cool. Alright. Well, the future for us is one week away, and that is a wrap party because this project will be done. So next week, come on back -- everything will be finished.

And until then, I'm Kevin O'Connor...

Heath

And I'm Heath Eastman.

Kevin

...for "This Old House" here on Cape Ann project. Alright, so let me see what's going on here, 'cause I'm expecting to see...

Continues indistinctly

Kevin

Next time on "This Old House"... When we first got here, this 1890s shingle-style was in need of some serious restoration. The doors were broken, the railings rotten, and the carpet was loud. Eight months later, we're ready to turn this Cape Ann classic back over to the homeowners.

Tom

Boy, you guys must be excited!

We are thrilled. John

We are thrilled, yeah.

The place looks amazing. Kevin

Nice job on the table.

Thank you for the custom build. Jeff

Yeah. A stately room deserves a stately table, right?

Kevin

Unbelievable, right?

Molly

Exactly.