Excavating the Backyard, Part 1

We are trying to clean up the backyard, by removing all the rocks and making the dirt both deep and good for growing, for example, trees. Starting from the East Side of the backyard, we first scrap off the dirt, to reveal the rocks just under the surface. We have to be careful not to break the irrigation water supply line, so we mark it on the surface with a PVC pipe and try to stay back from it.



Then we dig out and pry out as much as we can -- dirt into one pile, rocks into another. This leaves some really big rocks, so we bring out the jack hammer and break them into smaller pieces that we can move out of the hole.



Once we remove all these rocks and the dirt, we have a pit. We need to make sure that it is all deep enough.



We are staying about 5 feet away from the back fence to leave enough room to move the wheelbarrow and lawnmower from one side of the pit to the other. We are running half inch PVC pipe on the surface just to mark this "5 foot from fence" line.

We have tried to be very careful around the irrigation supply line, but notice that it is barely above a large block of rock. Despite trying to stay 4 to 6 inches away from the water supply line, the dirt next to it just fell away, so the line is very exposed (while still being buried).



We still have one big rock to remove, up near the walkway. This rock appears to extend back under the grass into an area we were planning to leave undisturbed for now but it is probably better to get it out now than to wait until later.

The general plan for the back yard

With the South Pit done, we want to get back to finishing the walkway.

To finish the walkway, I need to excavate the section that connects what has been done to the back patio. This goes over the main irrigation water supply line -- a one inch PVC line that runs from the meter, by the street, along the East side of the house (thru Zone 2), and then across the backyard, and up the West side, and then across the front yard, effectively a rectangle around the entire house.

In addition, the remaining walkway goes over the telephone line, the cable line, and the electrical lines, all of which are buried and run roughly from the edge of the house, near the rain barrel, to the green transformer box in the middle of the backyard, by the fence.

All of these need to be below the walkway. I can't do much about the water supply line, but the others -- the cable, telephone and electrical lines, I want to put way down under ground, so that they don't get messed up if we work in the back yard. I know that at the moment the telephone and cable lines are just below the surface.

The idea is to bury a large 4 inch PVC tube as a conduit that will house the telephone and cable lines, and if they need to be replaced, the new line can just be slipped into the conduit; no one will need to dig up the back yard to do this.
So I need to find the lines, excavate down as far as I can and put in the PVC conduit from the house to the fence and run the cable and telephone in it, before I can finish the walkway. That is the current project.

I keep forgetting to take a picture before I start any work, but this is pretty much what the backyard looks like now. The idea is to excavate it down about 24 inches, starting on the East side and going all the way across the back yard to the West side. That will allow a couple of new trees to be put in, providing shade in the hot summer sun.



I started to dig in a line along the East edge.



I'm hitting rock almost immediately -- an inch or two below the surface in spots. No wonder that the grass would not grow.

New Smoke Detectors and the Electrical Circuit List

We have been having the smoke detectors going off for no apparent reason, in the middle of the night. One possibility is that these are the wired-in smoke detectors that were installed when the house was built, in 1986. Smoke detectors, in general, are only supposed to last 10 years; these are now over 25 years old. Probably time to replace them.

I put in two new new Kidde FireX Model PI2010 Dual Sensor Smoke Alarms. Home Depot, $64.89. These provide both an Ionization sensor and a Photoelectric sensor. This replace the earlier ones that were ionization only.

Both the previous smoke alarms and the new ones have a "easy connect" feature that allows the smoke alarm to be plugged and unplugged easily without the need for re-wiring, but, of course, the connectors are incompatible, so I had to first disconnect the old connector and re-wire in the new connector. This requires finding the appropriate electrical circuit for each smoke detector, so I could shut off the power at the circuit breaker box.

The bedroom smoke alarm is on circuit 25; the hallway smoke alarm is on circuit 35.

As long as I was doing this, I created a spread sheet to list each electrical circuit and what I think is on it.

Circuit
1	Air Conditioner Compressor, attic subcircuits
2	Air Conditioner Compressor
3	Lights and Outlets in Guest Bedroom, GFI for all bathrooms, back porch
4	Air Conditioning Fan
5	Garbage Disposal, Light over Sink
6	Dishwasher
7	Dryer, Washer
8
9	Kitchen Island Outlet, outlets Left and Right of cooktop
10	Refrigerator
11	Outlets in Living Room
12	Kitchen Counter by Living Room, Dining Room outlets
13	Garage Outlets on outside wall
14	Central Bathroom Heater/Fan, Light near heater/fan.
15	Breakfast Nook
16	Microwave
17	Front Office outlets
18	Solar System Grid Tie-Breaker
19	Solar System Grid Tie-Breaker
20
21	Stove, Oven
22	Stove, Oven
23	Electric Dryer (?)
24	Electric Dryer (?)
25	Master Bedroom lights/outlets, Master Bath Lights, Floor Plugs in LR, Master Bedroom Smoke Alarm
26
27	Back Bathroom Fan/Light, lights over sink
28	Outside Backlights (Flood), Back Bedroom Fan/Light, Closet
29	Outlets in Front Office (some)
30	Dining Room Lights, South Track Lights, Hall Light, Outlets on South LR Wall
31	Kitchen Fan, Pantry Light, Utility Light, Garage Lights, Front Flood Lights, Attic Lights
32	Bathroom GFI Circuit, all 3 bathroom outlets, Computer Room outlets, Loft outlets, attic lights
33	Kitchen under cabinet lights (new work), left of sink
34	LR Track Lights (North), outlets on LR North Side, Fireplace, Entry Way, Hall outlets, Central Bathroom
35	Loft outlets, Computer Room/Closet Light/Fan, Master Closet Lights, Passthru Room outlets, Hallway Smoke Alarm
36	Kitchen Light, Breakfast Light, Office Light, Front Porch Lights, Entrance Way Light
37

This complements the previous circuit list that I had on two sheets of yellow tablet paper. One problem is how to refer to the rooms; trying to identify the bedrooms by occupant ("Kids, Guest, Lauren's, ...") is problematic since they have moved in, out, and around.

Dirt for the South Bed

We put down a final layer of really nice dirt on top of the South Bed. We ordered 5 cubic yards of Growers Mix delivered from Austin Landscape Supplies. $265.21 at $35 a cubic yard plus $70 for delivery.



We covered the South Bed, both left and right, with about 2 to 4 inches of this dirt, trying to create a nice smooth finished bed.



There was dirt left over -- we probably only needed 3 cubic yards for the bed itself, but we will be able to use this for the next excavation area.

Finishing the South Bed Irrigation

American Irrigation Repair came out and repaired the two broken sprinkler valves. The valve for Zone 4 had a broken solenoid; the valve for Zone 3 had a bad diaphragm, and had to be completely replaced.

The controllers for Zone 2 and Zone 3 are about 35 inches from the house foundation for the breakfast nook bay window. They cover from 20 to 35 inches from the South corner of the breakfast nook bay window. The supply line is 27 to 28 inches from the house foundation, and 2 to 6 inches underground.

The controller for Zone 4 is 23 to 29 inches from the sidewalk and about 12 inches underground.



The drip irrigation lines are meant to be about 6 inches down and 18 inches apart. I tested them before they were buried and they worked fine. In 110 minutes, Zone 3 used 700 gallons of water. That would be both the North Bed and the extended South Bed. The ground is still very aerated and loose, so the water does not seem to stay around. After it compresses and compacts more, it should work better.



One problem was noted. We bought a roll of 250 feet of the dripline for the first work, and used it all in the herb beds around the porch (Zone 5), the North Bed, and the right side (West) of the South Bed. Then we had to get more dripline. But they no longer carry the 250 foot rolls; I got 500 feet instead and used it for the left side (East) of the South Bed.

The original roll of dripline that I bought was XFS0912250; this new dripline was XFS0612500. This is the XFS subsurface dripline. The next two digits are the number of gallons per hour -- .9 gallons per hour for the old roll, and .6 gallons per hour for the new roll. The 12 is then number of inches between drip holes, and the last is the length of the roll (250 feet for the old roll and 500 feet in the new roll).

The problem is that this means the left side (West) of the South Pit has mostly 0.9 gallons per hour and the right side (East) has 0.6 gallons per hour. Visually it looked more like the East side was dripping more, but it should be only 2/3 the rate of the West side. We will have to see if this is (or is not) a problem.

Irrigation for the South Bed

Once all the rock from the Extended South Pit was removed, we could fill it back up with dirt.

This took all the dirt that we had been stockpiling in the backyard. Three full days of nothing but moving dirt from the pile in the backyard and dumping it into the pit. 

We next needed to re-install irrigation in this bed. As with the North Bed, we are planning to use underground drip irrigation. Back in November, we ran a supply line from the controller for Zone 3 to both the North and South beds. The first problem was to find that supply line. Not being smart enough to mark where it was exactly, we approximated and dug.

Nothing. Luckily we hit solid rock at 22 inches down, so we didn't keep digging in the wrong spot. To get a better idea, we looked at the one photo that we had of the supply line to the South bed, and used a hose to try to recreate the image of the supply line. 

This time, at 20 inches down, we found the supply line.

It was a bit longer than necessary, so we cut it off, and put a box over it. 

We attached a cut-off valve, and then the filter, and 30-pound pressure regulator needed for underground drip irrigation.

We laid out a plan of how to put in the drip irrigation lines. The greenhouse effectively splits the South bed into a left and right (or East and West) sides. For each of these we need to give special attention to the trees. 

We had to go back out in the dirt that we had just put in the pit, and trench it to about 4 to 6 inches deep. Our plan was to put the drip irrigation lines at 4 inches down, and then add an additional 2 inches of good dirt over the top. We trenched both the left and right (and front and back) of the greenhouse, and installed our drip irrigation lines.

The supply line is 1/2 inch PVC. The drip lines connect directly to these two lines -- one left and one right. We have a collection line at the other end which leads to a flush valve. In this case, we have 3 flush valves -- one in each corner and one in the middle for the right side (West) PVC supply line. For the North bed, the collection line was another 1/2 PVC. But for the South Bed, we decided to use the drip line itself. This should provide somewhat more drip area. 

Unfortunately, it seems that the valve controlling Zone 3 is not working correctly -- we can't get any real water out of it, not even enough to flush the lines. So tomorrow we have arranged for American Irrigation Repair to come out and replace the valve for Zone 3. Also the valve for Zone 4 that seems to have stopped working last year. Then we will be able to flush the lines, test how well the drip works, and then bury everything. 

The parts for the drip irrigation, including the low-flow regulator, filter, dripline, and all the connectors was $252.71to John Deere Landscapes plus $16.83 to Lowe's (for the connector box) and $73.84 to Home Depot (for the PVC parts).

Finishing the Excavation of the South Bed

Having the cement wall and limestone block wall under the fence to define one side of this bed, we turn our attention to finishing the excavation. There is a clear layer of rock, about a foot thick which can be removed.



Starting at the low spot, we first start removing the rock along the side of the greenhouse, moving North.



We break the rock up between the olive tree and the greenhouse and haul it off



And then continue around the olive tree up to the stone wall.



breaking the rock into as pieces as large as we can manage



and clearing it out, to create a lower floor for this pit. We are about 4 feet down at the stone wall.

Once that section has been excavated, we then turn back and do the same to the section along the fence.



The utility trench forms one side of the area we want to excavate -- up to the olive tree. Again, we break up the rock.



Again, we haul all this rock off, putting it out on the driveway, to empty out the South Pit.



With all this rock gone, we can now start filling this pit back up with dirt. We bring back the dirt that we dug out, mixing it with leaves and grass to improve the quality of the dirt. We want good drainage around the olive tree and good soil.

Should the olive tree not make it, we will want to dig down and take out the last layer of rock that is immediately under it. We don't want to try to remove the rock from directly under the tree at this point.

Stone Edging for the Extended South Bed

We excavated down to bed rock. Near the fence that was not too far down; near the raised garden we were down a couple feet.

When they put the utilities in as the neighborhood was developed, they cut a trench into the rock down a couple of feet, put the telephone, cable, and electrical lines in it, filled it partly with sand, and then pushed dirt and rock in to fill it back up. This trench runs about 17 to 19 inches from the fence, and is 6 inches wide. If we figure the fence is 1 inch thick, plus 4x4 posts, then the trench runs about 24 inches from the property line.



The idea is to leave the rock between the fence and the trench, and use it as a base for the cement wall that edges the yard. Once we have that wall in place, we will then excavate the rock on the other side of the trench, to give us plenty of soil depth for the South bed.

So first, we frame up for the concrete, using masonite boards spaced with 1x4's, held in place by sacks of compost and manure.



Then we pour the concrete. This section took 15 bags of 60-pound concrete mix. Removing the framing the next day, we have our cement wall.



With one 80-pound bag of mortar mix, we can put the limestone rocks on top to give a finished look. Experimentally, during the process of mixing concrete, mortar and cleaning up afterwards, we can all see that this holds water.



Now we can fill in the section behind the greenhouse -- we've already removed the rock from this section, and we can work then on removing the rock around the base of our oldest olive tree (without upsetting it).

Digging in an Extended South Bed

With the rock wall in place, we have an extended definition of the South Bed.



The old South Bed stopped at a line from the raised bed to the fence that goes thru the middle of the greenhouse. Now it extends further west, to the rock wall, and is no longer rectangular. In addition to the sort of trapezoidal shape, it has the oldest olive tree, the greenhouse, the two shin oaks and one of the newer olive trees.

But not all of it has been excavated, particularly the area between the rock wall and the greenhouse.



So the first problem is to dig out all the rock and dirt to get down to bedrock. This produces a bunch of rubble rock, and a couple big rocks.



In addition, we use the jack hammer to break up the rock between the greenhouse and the fence.



The big rocks are taken around to the curb to get rid of.

In addition, Linda says she doesn't like the ring of rocks at the base of the shin oaks on the other side of the South bed.



So these are also hauled out to the curb.

Removing Popcorn from Dining Room and Guest Bedroom

The weather has been nice for digging outside, but it's also been almost pleasant enough to leave the windows open both night and day -- actually a bit too warm in the daytime (up into the 80's), but not bad. This is probably only a temporary situation however. Soon we will need to keep the house closed up and air conditioned.

But it's been obvious that the hardwood floor in the dining room needs to be re-finished. And I had been intending to remove the popcorn from the ceiling in the guest bedroom and then paint the walls and ceiling. Both of these will be easier to take if we can leave the windows open to allow the paint to dry and air out. So now is the best time to do this, at least until October or November.

And to refinish the floor in the dining room, I have to move all the furniture out. As long as it is out, I may as well remove the popcorn from the dining room ceiling and paint the walls. And as long as I have the furniture out of the guest bedroom, I can refinish the floors.

So two rooms, the same process: remove the popcorn, texture the ceiling, paint the ceiling, paint the walls, sand and re-finish the floor.

Monday, I put down plastic on the floor, and taped it up to the baseboards. Then I hung plastic down the walls and taped it right up to the ceiling. Once this was done, I removed the popcorn from the ceiling in the dining room. This involved wetting it down to make it soft enough to scrape off with a hard plastic trowel. I brought in a garden hose from outside, with a hand sprayer set on "Mist" to spray the water on the ceiling.

The dining room is sort of a sloped tray ceiling -- the walls go up 8 feet and then there is a 2 foot section at a 45 degree slant to the horizontal ceiling. This gives the room somewhat higher ceilings without having walls that are not a standard 8 foot height. Plus the slanted part matches the roof joists on the outside walls.

The slanted part was harder to work with since the water would tend to run down the slant towards the walls. The water on the horizontal part pretty much just stayed there.

The easiest thing to do was to just scrape the popcorn ceiling off and let it drop on the floor (which was covered with plastic). After the ceiling was all done, then it had to be scooped up off the floor. And the plastic on the walls was also covered with a wet popcorn/drywall-compound mix. It was easiest to just take that plastic down, roll it up and throw it away. I tried to clean it for re-use, but it was wasn't really possible.

Tuesday morning, I repeated this in the guest bedroom. The guest bedroom is somewhat smaller (12 feet by 12 feet) and the ceiling is all flat.



Tuesday night I went over to my daughter's place and borrowed her husband's tools for texturing drywall: an air compressor, a hopper for holding and spraying the drywall compound, and a big blade for flattening the half-dried drywall compound.

Wednesday I textured the ceilings.

Texturing the ceilings involves mixing up a thick soup/gravy consistency of drywall compound (mud), and spraying it on the ceiling. This creates lots of little lumps of drywall compound. Let it dry for 15 to 20 minutes until it starts to harden, then run the big trowel over this to flatten everything down -- a "drag" texture.

I had never done this before, and had problems with too runny a mixture when I started, but by the second room I thought I was doing okay.

By Thursday, I painted both ceilings with a simple pure white primer. At this point, you can actually see how well (or poorly) you've done. I should have learned on someone else's house first.

On Friday, I put the final coat of paint on the ceilings. Linda had picked out "heavy cream" from Martha Stewart Living(MSL058) for the ceilings. I got two gallons from Home Depot for the ceilings.

Linda picked "hemp" (MSL229) for the walls. I got the wall paint up in the dining room on Friday afternoon. It took a bit more than a gallon to do the dining room walls.

Saturday I painted the guest bedroom walls.

Also, I went back to the dining room and repainted part of it. The sloping part of the ceiling can be considered either part of the ceiling, or part of the wall. Kat and Linda had suggested painting the sloped part to match the wall, rather than the ceiling. I used masking tape to try to get a nice straight line and repainted the sloped part in "Hemp".

After all this, I was able to remove all the plastic -- from the walls and the floors. The walls and ceiling are done, so the ceiling fans and light switch plates and outlet plates can be put back on.

To refinish the floors, on Monday, I rented a sander and sanded the dining room and guest bedroom floors. I started with 120 and later with 150. The idea is to get part of the polyurethane finish off, but not the wood itself. After sanding, I used a 150 grit sandpaper by hand to sand the baseboards.



Then we need to vacuum completely, and I mopped it with clean water in a bucket with a rag.

Tuesday morning, I went over the rooms with a rag and paint thinner, to get up all and any dirt and dust. Then I coated it with polyurethane. I did the baseboards first, with a brush, and then the floor itself with a lambs wool
applicator. (I think this was a mistake since afterwards I found a lot of stuff in the polyurethane that I think came from the lambs wool; I should have used a brush).



Wednesday and Thursday was letting the floors dry. On Friday, we put the furniture back in the rooms.

In all, it took 2 weeks to redo these two rooms, with the windows open almost all this time.