Gallery Archives - Page 3 of 9 - Capital City Grange

February 10, 2020 and on–new ceiling tiles!

June 14, 2020 by Tim Swartz

Volunteers moved all the movable tables, the Kids Trade & Play shelves, all the folding chairs, and everything else into the alcove area, to clear the way for ceiling and carpet-tile work. We got the ceiling tiles for the entire basement delivered by Sticks & Stuff in early February; another good crew of volunteers unloaded them and brought them downstairs. Kurt Giavara and Tim Swartz installed them all in the next couple of weeks, while Stan installed railings.

Here’s the stack of panels in the center of the cafeteria.

Stan had re-installed the wall angle supports for the ceiling tiles, and we began dropping new tiles into the open spaces in the ceiling support grid. The new tiles in the cafeteria area are divided into 8 squares per 2′ x 4′ panel, to make the ceiling look less like a typical grid.

Kurt is laying out cuts on tiles–the narrow ones needed around the edges, and the ones that had to fit around the lolly-columns.

All the tiles are installed in the cafeteria! Note the new paint on the sheetrock above the FRPs on the wall; more volunteers did all of that painting before the window trim and the ceiling grid and tiles were installed.

Next, Kurt and Tim installed new, fire-resistant ceiling tiles in the kitchen. You can see the difference between the old, gray-looking ones and the new, white ones! This change made a big difference in the feeling of light in the kitchen, as it did also in the cafeteria.

While we worked on the ceiling tiles, Stan installed new wood railings in the stairwell. The wood railing stock was pre-finished by Liz Benjamin and Tim. The old pipe railings (still in place on the right side) never looked as good as the new ones! Changing wall levels created challenges for Stan, but he came up with creative and attractive solutions.

February 17, 2020 and on–carpet tiles!

June 14, 2020 by Tim Swartz

After we got all the ceiling tiles in, we cleaned the floor, and asked Country Floors to start installing the carpet tiles in the cafeteria section of the basement–most of the tables, all the chairs and the KT&P shelves were still stored in the alcove.

Caleb from Country Floors starts to clean up the floor–carbide knives on the rotary head scrape off any loose paint, to give a solid surface for the carpet tile adhesive to grip to

Once the floor was scraped, it was time to fill the seams, and any holes in the concrete. Lots of time on the knees for these guys!

Now the installers are rolling on the water-based adhesive (no solvent fumes!) on the scraped and patched floor.

The first section is laid–the redder-colored tiles from the base of the stairs, and the start of a 36″ wide “path” around the front of the bathrooms and the kitchen. The grayer-colored tiles fill the rest of the area. They hide the dirt even better!

After a couple of days of work, the tiles are laid, all the way to the North end of the cafeteria! You can see the KT&P shelves, bins and other items still piled in the alcove….

….so we got in a few volunteers, mostly from the Kids Trade & Play volunteer corps, to move all the stuff out of the alcove and make room for the carpet installers. Above are Dean and Oliver.

Here are Stephen, Ginger and Fred re-assembling the KT&P shelves. It’s great to have a hard-working crew like these folks!

And now the tiles are laid in the alcove! Plus the new ceiling tiles installed above. We hope we can develop this area to be a small-scale performance space–think “coffee-house” size. The red tiles are designed to set off this area as somewhat different from the cafeteria.

Then it was time for Country Floors to install carpet on the stairs. Quite a change from the way the stairs used to look!

We hope that the carpet, as well as being much more attractive, will remove some of the dirt and/or moisture from the shoes of people going down to the lower level. Our cleaning service will be cleaning the stairs regularly, of course!

Also, see the next set of photos for our other dirt-capturing innovation!

February 24 and on–kitchen improvements

June 15, 2020 by Tim Swartz

With the completion of the ceiling tile installation in the kitchen, we ended up with a lot of dust over the kitchen surfaces; we also needed a place to store janitorial items. They were previously stored in an inefficient, but huge free-standing cupboard in the alcove/Second Stage.

Thanks to donations of “hours” in the Onion River Exchange timebank, we were able to get a volunteer cleaner to remove the dust from the kitchen. Nancy Gore worked hard on Feb. 24th to vacuum, mop and wipe down the various surfaces–and the dishes in the top of the kitchen cabinets!

Here’s what the closet looked like before remodeling–with mildewed particle-board shelves and unpainted sheetrock walls, it was unattractive and smelly too!

With the walls primed and painted, new shelf-support channels and white melamine shelves, everything is easier to clean and brighter. Items on the shelves are easier to see.

With the doors reinstalled and re-painted, it’s easy to tell Hall users that the supplies are in the “Blue Closet”.

February 28th, 2020: just in time for Leap Day, sump pump and dehumidifier are installed!

June 15, 2020 by Tim Swartz

The new, commercial grade dehumidifier is installed on top of the partition in front of the Kids Trade & Play shelves. The fan inside will circulate around the whole basement. The condensate drains through the clear hose you can see to the right of the dehumidifier….

….and into the sump! Along with any water that drains from the drainage channel, the condensate will get pumped out of the basement, and across the ceiling, and under the driveway on the West side of the Grange Hall. With the insulation, this will keep the air in the lower level drier, preventing the growth of mildew.

By mid-April, the soil was defrosted enough that the crew from Northern Basements could dig the trench for the sump-pump drainage.

The trench for the drain-pipe puts it a couple of feet below the surface of the driveway, safe from the weight of cars, oil trucks and snowplows.

March 11, 2019–grate developments start

June 14, 2020 by Tim Swartz

We had enough money in our budget for the lower-level project that we decided to install large grates in front of both entrance doors. We started off in early March, on a relatively warm day…which turned out to be just a couple of days before the Coronavirus stopped all work. See below for a few pictures from the installation of the grate in the porch at the original entrance, and then a few more from the end of May installation on the newer, accessible “Main Entrance”.