Repair Story

I spent three weekend afternoons to tear down the bathroom and to clean up the debris. It was nice to have an extra day-off (Veterans Day 2018). I was able to work on the project at a comfortable speed. I am getting old and do not perform well when I rush myself. All in all, I took up the do-it-yourself remodeling project to learn new things and enjoy the process for the most part. So the biggest hurdle so far was to remove the near 300 lbs bathtub by myself. I managed to cut the tub into 8 manageable pieces. I was right assuming that it was made of steel, not cast iron or galvanized steel. The cross section of the cut surface showed shiny metal gloss, indicating the bathtub was made of steel. Once the bathtub was cut into eight pieces, it was easy light enough to move it out of the bathroom by myself. I wondered if anyone driving by my house would be interested in scrap metals to make some cash money by recycling. I took the cut pieces of steel bathtub out and left them on the

I have been busy on the weekends since last week. I've spent four weekend afternoons so far to gut everything there is in one of the bathrooms except for the Windows. I still need a couple more afternoons to finish up the stripping and doing minor repairs (water-damaged floor board, etc). The house was build in around 1954 or so. There were two unexpected challenges while demo'ing the bathroom. One was that the three sides of wall underneath the bathtub tiles were about 3-inch thick motor + cement with chicken wire. The other surprise was that the bathtub itself weighed tons, because it was made of galvanized steel (or steel). I posted some photos showing the wall demo and the bathtub removal. The bathtub was so heavy like at least 250 pounds, I had to use an angle grinder with metal blade to cut it into four manageable pieces. Yes, that was a lot of work, too. It was smart thing to protect myself with 3M respirator, ear plugs and a pair of eye goggles. This photo was