So the installation of these doors in the basement has been about as much fun as hammering a nail into your thumb would be... only I imagine that hammering a nail into your thumb could actually be more fun than installing these doors... this just gives you a frame of reference to better assist you in empathizing with my suffering. I'm not sure if I mentioned it when we first moved in, but the previous owners basically had their basement finished shortly before they sold the place, and I noticed immediately when we saw the place that the contractors really did a piss poor job on the whole thing. It doesn't look bad, especially since I made a series of changes down there when we moved in, but they clearly didn't pay any attention to the smaller details of the reno.
One such detail is that they used metal studs... now you may not know what steel studs are, so let me fill ya in. When a renovator comes to work at your place, they have two main options for doing the frame work (studs) on new rooms, or finishing a basement. One is to use wood studs, the other with metal studs. Crappy renovators (and I don't say crappy lightly, it's a simple fact) will use metal studs because they are cheaper, and marginally quicker to put up and work with. Their main intention is to get it done quickly and as inexpensively as possible, while half the time they're probably charging you the same as wood studs. Quality renovators will insist on wood studs because they are simply the right and professional way to do framing, and those guys won't compromise a quality reno just to save you a buck... which is the way it should be... period. The problems with metal studs are numerous, but in my case two of those weaknesses were a real pain in my *literary edit*!
One is that when putting up doors, it simply involves hammering nails through door jamb material into the roughed-out door opening. With wood studs this process is quick and easy... with metal studs you just want to take your hammer and start beating yourself senseless out of pure, unadulterated, frustration. The problem is this, the metal studs don't puncture very easily, and once punctured with a nail, don't hold that nail AT ALL! So out the "door" goes your quick and easy door install. To compensate, I had to screw one inch thick strips of wood to the metal studs using a specific type of screw that is designed for metal, and then and only then could I tack the door frames into place relatively quickly. But wait, the process isn't over that easily, because you see the screw heads can't poke out of the wood strips at all, as they could basically get in the way of the leveling/squaring up the door frame, so I had to pre-drill the holes in the wood with a special drill bit for counter-sinking the screws into the wood. AND because the steel studs don't pierce easily, I had to pre-drill tiny holes for the screws to drive in easily and securely... if this isn't the appropriate time for an obscenity to be cursed once or twice then I don't when would be.
So that was one of the problems with the door project, the other problem with the studs is that they are SO flimsy and unstable, they bend and warp and move so much that they're just time consuming to work with to create a stable door frame structure. Think of it this way, remember as a child when you'd fling your buddies around into walls... well a wall built with wood studs would stand still, one with the metal studs would bend/break/twist/shift/move/etc... your wall would basically look like it's trampoline-ing the kid off of it... pretty funny to watch... not so funny to work with.
Anyways, it's not like I was going to rip down the basement and re-do it for a couple of doors, so I made it work and finally finished up the main part of the door work last night. So we now have the two normal doors up completely, with the door jambs completed for the two sets of bi-fold doors, and all of the trim up. So it looks really nice down there now, we just have to paint the doors, jambs, and trim, and then put up the bi-fold doors. We're very close now, which is exciting. This is basically where I had hoped to be by the end of last weekend, so not too bad.
Oh yeah, to make matters worse, the guys who did the basement didn't even use 2 x 4 metal studs, rather 2 x 3... I mean honestly... who the hell throws a shoe?!
That's pretty much it for now, it's the end of the work day and I can't wait to go chillax at home!
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