I'm your average homeowner, and this is our first house. I've done everything from paint to plumbing, electrical to framing.... and everything inbetween. This year hurricane Ivan ruined the 30 year old bright red shag carpet in our basement and we've been left with an unuseable space down there for months now. We are planning a cheap remodel ourselves and I wanted a little input from the pros.
Flooring - we're going to use the Legato carpet "squares" for this. It's in our budget and we really don't want something permanent down there due to the possibility that we may get another extremely wet season again. We want something portable or removeable if you will.
Walls - this is my biggest hangup. The walls are currently wood paneling. It's a matte surface in a dark grey/brown color and there are knot holes, grooves, wood patterns, etc in it. It's not smooth at all. Ideally I'd like to drywall the walls but tearing down the old panel and fighting to get 4x8 sheets of drywall down the stairs and around two sharp corners doesn't sound like a fun job. We would also need to remove the existing drop ceiling and replace it if we took the panel down. We've decided to paint the panel (although I'm not truly happy with that). Are there any other options?
Electrical - there are currently two large flourescent lights down there. 2' x 4' in the center of the room. This results in the sides of the room being a little dark. I'm curious if I could remove these two fixtures and replace them with four "can" lights in the four corners of the room (maybe 3 feet from each corner. Would that provide more even lighting and would four can lights be a large change in current over 2 large flourescent fixtures?
Carpentry - I would like to do two built ins. One being a medium sized cabinet for our daughters toys, books, etc. The second being a small entertainment unit in the corner. The corner piece being the TV and electronics unit with two shelving units on either side. I was planning on 1/2 -3/4" MDF as this will be painted and doesn't need to be a hardwood surface. It will be dressed up with face boards and crown molding to make it look a little less "Trading Spaces-ish"
Without a table saw, what's the best way to get a straight cut using a circular saw on a sheet of MDF? Can I screw a 1x1 or 1x2 to the sheet as a fence or is there a better way? I suppose I could pickup a few small clamps and just clamp the 1x to the sheet I'm cutting as well. Should these cabinets sit on pressure treated sill plates? The basement floor is concrete.
Thanks for your help. I love home projects (we've remodeled the entire rest of the house ourselves) and I'm hoping this will look as good as I envision it.
Flooring - we're going to use the Legato carpet "squares" for this. It's in our budget and we really don't want something permanent down there due to the possibility that we may get another extremely wet season again. We want something portable or removeable if you will.
Walls - this is my biggest hangup. The walls are currently wood paneling. It's a matte surface in a dark grey/brown color and there are knot holes, grooves, wood patterns, etc in it. It's not smooth at all. Ideally I'd like to drywall the walls but tearing down the old panel and fighting to get 4x8 sheets of drywall down the stairs and around two sharp corners doesn't sound like a fun job. We would also need to remove the existing drop ceiling and replace it if we took the panel down. We've decided to paint the panel (although I'm not truly happy with that). Are there any other options?
Electrical - there are currently two large flourescent lights down there. 2' x 4' in the center of the room. This results in the sides of the room being a little dark. I'm curious if I could remove these two fixtures and replace them with four "can" lights in the four corners of the room (maybe 3 feet from each corner. Would that provide more even lighting and would four can lights be a large change in current over 2 large flourescent fixtures?
Carpentry - I would like to do two built ins. One being a medium sized cabinet for our daughters toys, books, etc. The second being a small entertainment unit in the corner. The corner piece being the TV and electronics unit with two shelving units on either side. I was planning on 1/2 -3/4" MDF as this will be painted and doesn't need to be a hardwood surface. It will be dressed up with face boards and crown molding to make it look a little less "Trading Spaces-ish"
Without a table saw, what's the best way to get a straight cut using a circular saw on a sheet of MDF? Can I screw a 1x1 or 1x2 to the sheet as a fence or is there a better way? I suppose I could pickup a few small clamps and just clamp the 1x to the sheet I'm cutting as well. Should these cabinets sit on pressure treated sill plates? The basement floor is concrete.Thanks for your help. I love home projects (we've remodeled the entire rest of the house ourselves) and I'm hoping this will look as good as I envision it.
