Radiators

After the mushroom debacle, we began the radiator work we needed to get done before cold weather comes (and before moving back upstairs). There's a few things we need to take care of including (1) repiping a radiator Glenn had to cut out (2) prepping the radiators taken out for the flooring project for painting (3) painting the radiators and (4) reinstalling the radiators.



For the first bit, Glenn had to unhook the pipes that had been cut so they could be replaced. He's had to do this a few times, and has learned some tips along the way. But, it still involved a fair amount of brute force to get pipes that haven't been touched for 70 years to move. He was able to successfully take off what he needed to (plus some other parts that came off also). Now, he'll have to get the replacement parts and hook them up before he could rehook up the radiator. Thankfully, the pipes he removed only connect about 5 inches beneath the floor so it won't be as bad to reconnect them, though still challenging.

After trying to scrape off the flaking paint from the radiators, we ended up bringing the radiators to our backyard for pressure washing. Of course, "bringing the radiators to our backyard" is a lot more arduous than that phrase implies. Each radiator is a couple hundred pounds of cast iron which needed to be lugged down a curving porch staircase before resting in our back yard. Glenn was on his own on this one, and thankfully no damage to Glenn or the porch resulted. (the radiators were the dangerous ones). At one point, it appeared that one radiator was en route to take out the neighbors fence-but fortunately that was just an illusion. I'm not looking forward to getting the radiators back up-as that will be even more difficult.

The pressure washing did a really good job and revealed a number of different previous paint colors-including bronze. We had contemplated putting stripper on the radiators, but the water is working so far that I don't think we'll have to mess with the chemicals.

Tomorrow, I'll probably work more on the radiators and other painting and Glenn will be back to doing some molding. If all goes well, we hope to be back upstairs next weekend--have to keep our fingers crossed on that one though.