Progress on the living room ceiling

We finally dealt with the popcorn ceiling in the living room last weekend. It was the messiest, most exhausting project to date. We started by covering all the walls in 3 mil poly and the floor in 4 mil. We then sprayed the entire ceiling with water using a hand pump garden sprayer. While we let it soak in for about 20 minutes, we put on tyvek suits, goggles, and respirators. We then started scraping. It took 7.5 hours, and many gallons of water. In the end, we wound up with a giant dropcloth full of popcorn ceiling debris that looked like a giant haggis and weighed about 200 lbs. For anyone thinking about attempting to remove a popcorn ceiling, here are a couple things that will help. 1. Have a small sample of the texture tested for asbestos. I have read online that some popcorn ceiling texture contains asbestos and some doesn't. We had ours tested and it did not. 2. Fill up garbage bags with the popcorn material as you go. The popcorn texture soaks up an insane amount of water and becomes extremely heavy.

Before - popcorn texture with no central fixture (beautiful 80's track lighting though)
With most of the popcorn texture gone, we noticed a suspicious looking patch in the center of the ceiling.
As hoped, it turned out to be the original electrical box for the central fixture. The whole thing was just filled with plaster, including the wires.
Once the plaster was gone, I had to figure out how to get power back to the fixture. My hope was that the mystery switch that did nothing near our front door was the answer. This is the inside of the mystery switch. I found that the disconnected black and white rubber/cloth wiring in the lower left of the picture below led to the ceiling box. Incidentally, I still have no idea what the red wire in this box does. I was able to reconnect the old wires and found that they did go to the ceiling box and that it had power! I still find it bizarre that someone would plaster over a central electrical box in their living room, but I guess I find the track lighting pretty strange too. I am looking forward to putting the fixture up. It is the one on the left in the picture below. We got really lucky and found it on craigslist. It exactly matches the original dining room fixture. If anyone is looking for similar polychrome fixtures, this website has a great selection, though they aren't cheap.

Small Projects over the Holiday Break

I am really tired of working on the living room woodwork, so I decided to work on a couple small projects instead. The first was to strip and restore the upstairs door hardware. The hardware is nickel and most of it was coated in multiple layers of paint.
I started by boiling the hardware in a solution of water and dishwashing liquid for about an hour or so. I have this technique is even more effective if you soak the hardware longer, but I am not that patient.

Next, I used a little bit of Zip strip to get any stubborn bits of paint, and cleaned the surfaces with furniture refinisher. Unfortunately, the hardware really didn't have a nice patina underneath the paint, It actually looked like someone had stripped the hardware previously and removed the tarnish in the recessed areas of the pattern.

To restore the hardware, I used Brass Darkening Solution (bought at Rockler for under $5). This stuff works on nickel and steel in addition to brass. Once the nickel was sufficiently darkened, I used Maas polish to even out the finish, leaving the recessed areas dark.

It actually turned out better than I expected and the nickel hardware really stands out on the white doors.
After that, I decided to try the brass darkening solution on one of the unlacquered brass switchplate covers in the dining room. While you can still tell it isn't original, I like the darkened look better, and it definitely beats the hole in the wall that was there before.

Help with Missing Weatherstripping

I am trying to find a piece of galvanized steel weatherstripping that is missing from one of the casement windows in the dining room. Not sure why it was removed, but you can see daylight through the bottom of the window where it is missing. The window itself has a strip of bronze weatherstripping which locks under a steel flange the comes up a little more than a quarter inch. The back of the weatherstripping is a vertical steel piece that extends up about 1/2 inch and fits against the front of the window. Any thoughts on where I could find a replacement for such a thing? I check all the easy options (Ace, Menard's, Home Depot, etc) with absolutely no luck.

With weatherstripping

Without

Taking on the living room

The living room is not a pretty sight. The contrast against the recently finished dining room makes it look even worse. I can't put off dealing with it any longer. Here are the before shots.

The woodwork was painted at one time. It looks like someone tried stripping it, but gave up. Given how sloppy it looks up close, I am amazed I didn't notice this before. Check out the sweet mid 80's track lighting. Honestly, these are the world's dimmest lights. Given that I don't have any art on the wall, the only thing they light is a 4 foot section of plaster with a nice big crack in it.
I really think this is going to look great when it is done. I would just like to skip the many steps it takes to get there. The dining room took me a ridiculous 8 months, so I have to do better than that this time.

Paint and Something for the Wall

We finished painting the dining room last week. I was a little nervous as the paint was going up, but I really liked the way it turned out. The color is Benjamin Moore Forest Moss.

We also added a vintage map of our neighborhood to the wall. Actually using the picture moulding as opposed to the 30 nail holes I patched in the wall worked out very nicely. The map is from Althea Maps and Prints which can be found in the Coe and Channell Antique shop at 2727 Hennepin Ave S. The frame was custom made by Dard Hunter Studios.

Finally!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The dining room woodwork is finally all refinished. I was determined that I wouldn't post anything until it was done. It took me 10 months and who knows how many hours (definitely in the hundreds), but I am extremely happy with the results. While incredibly tedious, the 5 step refinishing technique worked very well. Here are some before and after shots.

Column header before

Same header after - none of the wood grain was visible with the old finish.
Built-in before
Built-in after
Bank of windows

Close-up of the board shown in a previous post

Another close up

Unfortunately, there is a little bit of bad news. We still need to repaint the dining room and I have the entire living room left to refinish. It better take less than 10 months this time. I am going to work on some other projects before I get up the motivation to go after that one. Here is what the refinished woodwork looks like next to the living room woodwork.

Woodwork Update

I have finally removed all the old finish from the dining room woodwork and have started the almost equally painful process of refinishing it. Normally, I think refinishing would be much easier, but I am using the same 5 step process I used on the crown molding. So far, I am almost done with step 1, which is the dye stain. I am using Transtint Golden Brown. I make up 8 ounces at a time: 1/4 ounce dye, 4 ounces denatured alcohol, 4 ounces lacquer thinner. You can see the difference between with dye (on the right), and without.
When I took the hardware off the windows, I was surprised to find the original finish. This is the color I am trying to match. In the course of stripping the woodwork, I realized it was previously painted, then stripped, bleached, and refinished (poorly, I might add). Somehow, through all of that, it appears the window hardware was never removed.