TCDGIT - The Home Depot


May 19 - 2009

Green revolution


Lawn by Bostic Bolero. Today I trimmed it for the first time and put on the environmentally friendly
fertilizer Algomin to boost it even more!


To honour Lindesberg Raceway


The last bit of asphalt is finally in place outside our garage at home, just in time before the
premiere race at Lindesberg Raceway.


All the way up to the level of the concrete. Smooth transition.


Nice to see the plans fulfilled. More about our garage rebuilding here:




May 1

View with a bloom

My view now from my garage at home when the cherry tree blooms.
This tree is beautiful for just a couple of days. Well, its beautiful
also in the autumn when it's rich on the red cherries. Mums ja!





April 11 - 2009 - Easter Saturday

A day of much wonderful work


The family is at the cottage in Dalsland. I stayed at home to be able to do the things I wanted to do for
a long time, but haven't managed to get the time for. Like finishing the lawn behind the garage after last
year's rebulding af the garage and the dig out and draining.


The lawn seeds look like Gold Dust. After this was out, take the rake and harrow the soil and turn it.


Then I pushed the heavy roller to flatten it all. Yes, I had a beer in the sun after that!


Watering. Fun. Now I just have to sit down and look at the grass growing...



August 24 - 2008

Back at the back


It was a long time ago since I had time to work on the home garage project. But this warm Sunday
I could finally do the stone bricks on the back side. Axel was also at the site, at least when we had
the hot chocolate and coffee break.


After a whole day of digging and sorting it was done. Next step is to fill in dirt and top it with new lawn.
Some day. =)



May 30

WOW!


Our new entry is the biggest change for the house that came out of this project. Now we'll work on the
wood trimmings around the floor and also for the U-iron.


Remember how it was before?



May 29


Cutting and cutting and cutting! Lucky us that Agneta owns a diamond cutter machine.
She got it from her dad Tore who built it!


All pieces are finally placed and it's time to just view, relax and feel very satisfied! Now to fill the joints.


May 27


Entry clinkers' puzzle


Agneta is beginning to cover our home's new entry hall with clinkers.


What a nice change! After this it will feel like we're just about done with this winter's rebuilding project.
At least inside our house.


Less than half the entry is covered at this stage. First cover the floor with whole pieces of clinkers. Next
time we'll be cutting all the small pieces around the edges..


May 16

Garage floor done!


It took 3 days of dusty hard work. But now it's done. It's flat like the Pro ET pit at Santa Pod!
Next step is plaster and hardening paint. Later please. Pheew...



Walls are painted and the mirror is up in our entry. It became even larger in here. Two lights will
sit on each side of the mirror.


May 15


One more layer of fine concrete to even out the floor. Then wait until next day before grinding...


Agneta taking down the small ridge between old and the new floor in our new entry. Soon she'll work
with placing the clinker here. Her speciality. By the way, I've actually worked more with that *******
concrete grinding machine than Agneta, but I'm the only one who's taking pictures, OK? =)



It's warm now but sooner than later it's winter again and cold. You'll better insulate everywhere you can.
Hate cold, hate heating bills.


May 14


OK, I say it up front, Agneta hated this Dolce & Gabbana bag when she got it from me as a gift.
"My God, so ugly! Why!?" but after a while she started to use it because she thought it was kind of
practical. Now she throws it around and uses it every day when shopping and carrying things, like today
when we rented a concrete grinder machine. I just laughed at it and took this pic to the left. A bag like
this is worth around USD 1600. But I bought at "Fake Market" in Shanghai for USD 25. Who knows,
maybe it comes from the same factory? =)
Then throw the bag somewhere and start working...


May 13

More concrete fills the holes


Some fine concrete fills. Soon awaits some work with a concrete grinder to make the even surface.


May 12

Some minor work at home


After a well deserved break we dug into the home project again. Now we'll fix the garage floor, even out
some bumps and holes and the crater in between the old and new floor castings. Here I've primed.




April 25

Step is done!


Our concrete step is finally finished! Agneta has already placed a matching pot with Lavender flowers
on the step and now we just want to have this step framed with the new black asphalt.


Agneta painted the walls around the water pit with damp stopper before painting it all white and
# 1500 grey. Axel is a real presenter!




April 23



Still watering the casting and it's looking good.


Then more constructors and machines arrived!


Time to remove some of the old asphalt on the driveway and prepare for the new asphalt.


Before and After. The old asphalt was in some places at the wrong level for the new garage door.


The electricians came and did the rest of the connections and put up all the sockets and also the
three-phase which we have been looking forward to.


KA-BOOM! Welcome to the sunbed! My ten fluorescent lamps got the power today! What a show!


It was truly amazing to finally see the light in our new garage! It's kind of an important
milestone in this project, which soon will be complete!






April 22

"I'll kill that cat!"


Agneta said last night "Let's hope no cat will walk on this tonight, that happened to my brother..."
Well, this morning we found the evidence of a cat walk in the casting! However, the foot prints were so
shallow so they will disappear in the finishing process anyway. But how did the cat do after getting
processing cement on its small sensitive pads? Now awaits watering the burning concrete at least
twice daily for a couple of days to keep it from cracking up.



April 21

Strong family work in the casting!


10 year old Axel just has to be in charge of all machines to be happy.


Filling the form with the old asphalt, macadam and stuff and top it with a reinforcement bar. Then the fun
part starts, with a sense of light panic of course. Once again time is running against you.


All three of us were working without break for a couple of hours to get this done. Happy amateurs!


Casting done...so, where are my reading glasses? I usually hang them in my t-shirt and therefore I
always drop them when moving around...


That little red Dodge again! Just throw the mixer in when done and washed.


April 20


Wow! What a difference paint does!


What to do with a Sunday? Paint and paint!


Form coming together. Measures and level, trix and fix...


April 19



What to do with a Saturday? Plaster, grinding, sanding, plaster, grinding, sanding...


South wall shows how long the original garage was.


I began to layout the casting form today. Need a step in front of the doors.



April 18


Mucho plaster work and painting awaits...


The Workmax Magnum 1000 that I got from my parents in law a birthday 2 years ago comes really in
handy now when the professional carpenters have left with all their stuff. Perfect for doing the fluorescent
lamps
fixtures on! Thanks Thore and Sonia!




April 17

First: clean up


The "little red Dodge" has been helpful in many ways over the years, like now when we could pack in
all scrap in two loads! It looked impossible when first seeing the scrap piled up outside the garage.


At the recycling station where we actually have to pay for sorting and recycling.


Okey, we had a third load - our small exclusive copper scrap pile.


We went to the commercial Stena Metall to recycle the copper because here you get paid. We got
1700 SKR for 48 Kg copper.


It took hours to paint the first layer on the ceiling because the garage door was already mounted and
had to be masked. We don't want white colour slush on the new door, do we? It doesn't look like white
in this picture because the sunset was so dominant. After the second layer is painted we will mount
the fixtures for our fluorescent lamps.



Beginning to look civilized. No scrap piles. And soon we'll have new asphalt here. But first we need
to cast concrete steps outside the doors.



April 16


In the chilly morning Linus and Stig-Arne continued with mounting the doors and trimmings around
them. Meanwhile Agneta and I did hundreds of other things - no photo proofs of that.


Linus complained about the heat of the black sheet metal roof when doing the last board mounting.


Before he was done he complained about the chilly rain. April weather - a blend of sun, snow, rain, hail...


Stig-Arne Frickéus and son Linus are now done with all their work and the project leadership of our
garage/entry rebuild. Now we're on our own for all the "small" stuff and the next time we see them
will be at the traditional "taklagsfest" - when all is complete and we host a party for all the craftsmen
involved. Thank you "Stickan" and Linus for yet another fantastic work!



Minutes after they had left the Hail Of The Year tested the roof which of course passed.



April 15


Agneta painting the window trim.


Yiephii! The doors arrived today (three weeks late) and we could look forward to seeing the final layout
grow. Wow, look at that light into the entry! What a fresh new thing!


Doors are there. Some work still remains around them. The unpainted boards will be primed and painted
blue when everything else around here is finished. We will also cast concrete in front of the doors
and also remake the layer of asphalt in front of the garage door. Later.


Even in the evening that tall window is making this entry room something far from the black hole we had.


Hm...we enjoy the changes. More to come.





April 12

What!? Snow again!?


Glad to see the roof completed on a morning like this! We had plans to do some light work for our
family on the outside today. That's changed.



It's nice to know that the new drainage is working when the snow melts and when it's raining.


Agneta is preparing to paint grey on the floor and steps in what we prefer to call "skafferiet" (larder).
Because we have no heating down here - it's always cool - and it's very suitable for storing food and
also wine in that midget wine cellar to be.


April 10


Now it's just some small work before the back side of the garage is done and I can start to work with
the stones, macadam and sand to finish it.


April 8

Time for black sheet-metal!


The sheet-metal worker Bengt came back today. He has been here a couple of weeks ago to take all
the measurements, and today he arrived with pre-fab parts. Another true professional whose work
is a real treat just to look at.


After all the snow, rain and hail that have blasted on the covered roof it feels secure to see the
black sheet-metal growing on
the roof, at last!


It will take a couple of days for Bengt to do the entire work with all the small custom designed pieces
that have to be made on location.





April 7



Agneta took good use of the sun when painting the patio furniture with a rust stop.


Now look at the wine cellar! We'll buy wine shelves at IKEA and put up some lamps in there.


April 6


- Mummy, there is a SPIDER in here!!
- Don't be like your dad

To work inside the old cold room can be adventurous...


Now Axel knows how to mix the fix. 1 water - 4 powder



April 5


Today we did hundreds of small things. And we did some shopping, at Hornbach we bought these
tiles which will cover the new entry floor of 13 kvm / 140 square foot. Very good price, 99 SKR per
square meter.



And we did a bit of cleaning up here on the front. Is it noticeable at all?


Saturday evening. A couple of Newcastle Brown Ales in the sunset, enjoying all work that is done.




April 4

Very much done on Fabulous Friday
My first hectic day on an almost three weeks leave from work!


Black paper to cover the entry ceiling.


The cutter was going hot today.


The black paper is to blacken out the 6 mm - 1/4" chink between the black painted planks.


When looking down from their work with the ceiling you could spot my first unsexy mission of the day -
to brake up the old hardwood floor - and the original cork mat floor - in preparing for the new tile floor.


Ready to rock'n'roll...


Neighbours and people passing by have understood what's going down since a couple of months back...


Then I could help out with insulating and wallboard covering of the "electric wall" where the electric feed
comes in and divides. The carpenters began to work on the long wall.


This is the result, if you can see it through all the dust flying in the air?


Always helpful Axel got some light for the technician Tony who came and mounted the garage
long awaited door motor. At last!


Axel is testing the range of the remote of the garage door! Great fun! The closest we come
to the Bat cave!


The 1st floor entry room is coming together. These stairs were cracked and water was spewing in during
every big rain thanks to the insufficient draining on the house, which now is fixed. On the bottom
here, our crawling height wine cellar. Dark and cool. I don't think the wine will be stored there for long...


That was the end of a fabulous Friday. Axel put on the Mao hat and played the rest of the evening while
his mom and dad watched "Space Cowboys" on TV, featuring Clint Eastwood and Tommy Lee-Jones.



April 3


Big men from the big Göteborg Energi - the city electricity - brought a big cable cutter and the
electricians could rearrange incoming feed and place the new control on the new wall.


It's good to have this picture for when putting up shelves and things later so we don't drill into a cable
accidentally. And we'll make a map on this and file it in the house documents so if anyone
will tear this garage down in some 30 years, they'll know...


The electricians have been here. This is our first floor hallway, untouched since 1969 with awful flower
wall paper and everything. We've been working - and are working - with every room attached to this
hallway and when all that is finished it's time for a refreshing of the hallway.


There is much to do for all of us right now.



April 1


Linus covers our new superstructure with wallboard/drywall/gypsum board/plasterboard (my God! Can
you decide on ONE English word for gipsskiva or not?!?!?!)


I love the inviting feeling in a view like this! And in a couple of days I can join this adventure when
going on a three week leave from work!


Agneta paints what will be the ceiling in our new entry hall.



March 31


Looki looki! The new garage door mounted, less motor! This is the grey color we'll have on all doors
on the front. Now please hurry up with the motor and things, we want to play with the remote control!


A much better use of this corner. A new superstructure over the entry and stairs from the bottom floor
gives us a big shelf for stowaway things that can't be elsewhere...like...many things. :)


March 30


Looks like a small entry room from this angle but it makes a huge difference for the whole house!
I guess this will feel like the biggest change of all when all is done!


I'm not certain, but I think that to cement the electric feed into the house was already unlawful in 1969!?
A new feed line is already prepared and this will be cut off in a day or two.



March 27


Linus is making concrete in the "tombola" and making the new entry floor, burying the water heating.
You still see the old front door (on right hinges) that soon will be changed to our new door (on lefties).



March 24

Wind eyes finally shut!


When coming home from the short Easter holiday I was glad to see the new windows mounted in the
garage. Did you know that the English word "window" is coming from the Danish word "vindue" which
means "wind eye" and that was the place in the viking longhouse that conveyed the smoke
out from the house?



March 21

Merry Christmas!
...eh...I mean Happy Easter?



Axel Fighting the Elements! Last week we really thought that winter was over (we always do)
- when the great snow hit us again! It won't hurt the garage rebuild, more than chilling the
carpenters of course. But they are off for the Easter holiday anyway.


March 20


Car port is now at least delivered.


The wall between the entry and garage is now up. And the water pit is coming along.


March 19


The plumber did the water tubing for the floor heating today.



March 17

Does it really have to snow right now?


Not a good start of the Monday - snow and ice cold! The sun was warming yesterday...


Stig-Arne, Agneta, Linus and I were experiencing the Point of No Return, front door is going down.
Well, it's relocated to the new doors' place in waiting for the arrival of the new doors.


And then the wall was gone. WOW! How about this then då? It became even better than we imagined!



March 16



I cut the flanges of the u-iron that otherwise would stick out.


The 110 bricks that were removed from the patio at the front door will now be used as a decoration back
here close to the wall where they will cover the draining mat.


March 15



Lars-Inge and Ann-Sofie visited us today just to see that we were working. Agneta painted all day.
Both white and blue.


March 14



Will the wall fall down or do father and son know what they're doing?


Stig-Arne working through the wall.


Two u-irons inserted one by one from each direction, bolted together when meeting in the middle.


Yes, this looks good!


Keep it clean!


We want it as simple as possible. But we know that we have to find a way to cover the iron which
now is sticking out from the wall with an inch. Agneta had a really good idea which you'll find out.


The garage to the left, entry to the right. No, we will not have a door to the garage directly from the entry
as we first thought. It would've been too expensive with all doors and stuff because the law says you
then need a kind of airlock room with two doors! It also would have taken too much of the newly won
space. We will use the outside doors as we have always done.


Just a nice photo I think.



Agneta has painted the wall...


...and she was unstoppable...


...she went around the whole house!


March 13



Agneta and Linus discussing the awaiting issues while we can see that the east wall is soon finished.
And part of the ceiling is covered since the electrician Dick has been here and placed all the cables
for our 10 fluorescent lamps and also for all the sockets for the work bench.


March 9


Today Agneta and Axel began to put on primer on what's going to be the outside panels.


Meanwhile I was stationed in our entry to unscrew all things and make place for The Big Change...






March 8

International Women's Day and
Spring Celebration


At last we had time to level the macadam on the back side.


Dressed for the occasion.


It's so great to have all of this fixed, the draining and all. We're so happy we did it!


And something is happening here as well, the new entry room is coming along...




March 5


Now she's crazy...!


Agneta!? Agneta!? Where's my wife? AGNETA!!!? This morning I finally found her in the backyard
sawing bushes! What the...


...are you doing back here Agneta?
Aha...she had a deal with a flower shop to deliver - what we in Sweden call Vridpil - in exchange for
some nice roses! The Vridpil had grown too big back here. The flower shops like to cut some pieces
from things like this into their flower bouquet arrangements. I had no idea. And now we all know.


March 4


Stig-Arne mounted the insulation on the same day we had a biting frost in the morning. Sun made the
rest of the day warmer. At least in direct sun. Wonderful.



March 2

- What's so funny Agneta?


We took good use of our 4th scrap container when going down to our basement and dug out our old
sauna completely. Agneta has future plans also for that room. And for the first time she asked for the
camera to take a picture. Wonder why?



February 29



Great! Now we can visualize how it will be! The doors and the remote controlled garage port will be in the
same grey color. Garage port will be only 237 cm / 93" wide. Doesn't need to be wider since we'll have
our 40 cm deep shelf on the right wall anyway. It's just a question of speed. I remember Sammy Miller
when he got the question on what it was like driving his rocket funny car "Vanishing Point" from
a stand still to speeds over 480 kmh / 300 mph in less than 4 seconds...? He answered:
-It's like aiming for a garage port in 200 kmh (125 mph).


The new entry "hall" will be something like this. What an improvement for the whole house!


Seen from the inside. It will of course be better than the Photoshopped picture to the right.


Our main electricity line just hangaround for a little while more. On the backside you could hear her
curse everyone and everything for not making functional products, or selling complete. And she's right.


My Dear Agneta! I stayed home from work in the morning to give an extra hand to up the 2 m / 6.5 feet
wide Platon mats which will give us a better drainage than before. Hopefully!?


Finally done, only the plastic trim strip on top is missing here but Agneta sent to me to back to
my work again. "-I'll fix this".


And she did.


February 27



Agneta is much more than a wife. Actually she's a project manager of everything in our life! She's in
control of everything. I feel ashamed of being at work when knowing she is working like "two men" on
our home. Here she has found out that the diggers didn't dig deep enough so she just started to dig
by hand for hours. No, sorry she's not for hire. She's mine!


Agneta has painted all the walls with some good stuff.


"Damned men inventing and selling this total "#¤%&/ crap announced two-way adhesive film,
my ass! I'm so totally bad...go away Anders, go to work...NOW! GET OUT!"
Yes dear...kiss?
SHUTTHE****UPANDGO! AND DON'T TAKE PHOTOS GODDAMMIT!!!
Oh I love her so much! =)


This is the extra length we get on the new garage. We have to be happy for the little advance even if we
wanted it much longer. At least it'll give that extra space so I can take home the SS for small works.
Front entry door (copper) will be flipped 90 degree towards the street, making room for a larger
entry hall, another nice feature from this project.




February 26



Coming home again, seeing the result of what Agneta and Stig-Arne had been working on all day in
pouring rain and chilly heavy winds - the concrete extension of the garage floor. I got humble.


February 25


Axel shielded his eyes when destroying parts of the wall with a hammer. Stig-Arne had destroyed most
of it and our family carried it all to the (3rd) scrap container. Behind that wall, in this little room, we had
the oil tank before we invested in Geothermal Power heating in 1999, one year after moving in.
BTW, that investment reached break even already in 2004 because of the increasing oil cost. The best
investment we ever did, which also made us to invest in floor heating all over. In the garage we will take
use of a heat pump. We are very modern, aren't we!?


February 23


Cleaned out by Agneta, Axel and me. We want Stig-Arne to feel welcomed to the project every morning!


February 22



New drain piping which will work compared to the originals... Note those black "leaf-filters" on top.


The professionals went home after all problems were fixed.

February 21


Coming home for the work, I needed to duck rightaway! Sorry, sorry, sorry for the WAR, neighbors!
Noisy machines, trucks and everything everywhere and blocking the street!


Funny sticker! I think it's globally understood...


Old drain pipe was stuffed! Stuffed thanks to that one idiot carpenter we hired for doing our bathroom,
which we would've thrown out if it wasn't for the fact that he never returned (he just disappeard in the
middle of everything so we had to finish everything ourselves). We found big chunks of cement which
he had drained in this pipe...


No water comes the right way. No water at all... Damnded is that Carpenter De Idiot!!! Well, these guys
fixed it with a dig-out filled with macadam. But still...#$£@€{\{"¤%/(=! Is killing people still forbidden?

February 20


Excavator contractors, Agneta, Carpenter De Excellence Stig-Arne (and me) in discussions of what to
do on the front. "Old" asphalt has to go of course, new cement here and there, and this and that.


Wow! Just back away, these guys started without any delay and they didn't take a break before all was
done! And then..they went home! Axel missed these machines! Phew...


Agneta flushing one of the drain pipes to get rid of blocking rotten leafs.

February 19


The rotten reason why we had to build the new garage.


Yeech! We had to throw it in the scrap container ourselves, of course...


- No! It's not ours! No no no, you can't drive it!
- Why?!
- Because!


Too odd to throw away! Someone must be needing this special radiator!? Come and get it for free!

February 18


Everyday when coming home from work give a surprise!


February 13

What a day for a new roof!


The carpenters didn't complain about the weather today. And nothing else either. A new garage roof is
born and a happy sun makes it even better. Cold? Yes, but sunny!


This new project will give the home a much larger entry room and the new garage will be more roomy
beginning with a taller ceiling.


February 12


Now it's for real!


When I came home a big Scania was backed up into the garage! Old murky garage roof was gone and
an excavator was spinning around inside the former garage. Wow, now the show has really started!


Backside. While at it (rebuilding the garage) we wanted to reach the bottom of the house and the garage
so we can make a better drain. In 1969 that was not so important, they just throw in some sand to the
walls and hurried home to see the moon landing on their black-and-white TV's. We've had rain water
coming into the house in a couple of places!



It's one guy in the excavator and one guy directing, not really seen here because of the very popular
reflex working gear. Damn, that Axel is missing all of this exciting action! He's with Agneta at the
country cottage and just ordered me by the phone to go out and both film it and take picture of it! =)



What? A pipe here? Hm... It must be going towards the floor drain in the front? Armstrong was jumping
on the moon...so who the hell was interested in doing a blueprint of all the drain piping?


6 feet under.


Towards West. When they were gone it was a very silent, melancholy and empty feeling. But
spiritual as well, we have waited many many years to do this!


Towards the East.




February 8 - 2008

Bye bye 1969


This is the last we'll see of those old windows and this ceiling in our garage at home. The carpenters
have already begun to take it all down to make place for our new design. Our house was built in the
moon landing year of 1969 and it's about time to freshen up this garage as we already
did the rest of the house.


At last - time for change!


Before... Ours to the left.


The unused back corner which we wanted to extend the garage area on. Neigbours said OK, City of
Gothenburg said "No way". Have a nice day.


So this is what we wanted to do with the garage - to expand it to the length of our house. A perfect plan and our nice neighbors
said OK too. Then the City of Gothenburg said "No way" because there is a restrictive law for our area which allows a maximum
of 65 % build on the land area, since some people in the wild past built too much on their areas, out on to the sidewalk etc.
But we said this corner in the back is not used anyway and the neigbors thinks it's just fine. "No way". They didn't even care to
come and look! Years of making sketches and begging resulted in a small expansion on the front. And we still need to throw
in the money and renovate the rain water leaking and murky old garage. Red marks origin design.


Always on the outside. Old garage was as deep as the Impala SS was long. With the hitch the door
couldn't be closed. Our guess is that garages was built for the Saab V4 in 1969?