Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Hard Core Remodeling but Were Afraid to Ask Part 11!

We're about to get all kinds of construction-like up in here today!

Are you ready to get your hard hat on?

Seriously, it's a great way to disguise a bad hair day.

And here at LIR, we're all about getting it done and looking good with

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Hard Core Remodeling but Were Afraid to Ask!

So let's get back to that nasty crumbled cement edge that wants to be a dining room/
living room border.

These are Tapcons.
Basically, they're screws that will go into concrete and hold on with
the kind of death grip Sylvester Stallone has on his career.

That board I cut so perfectly is going right across the lip of the edge.
 It's a tight enough fit that is wedges in without me having to hold it
while I work with it, and that's what you want.

 We're going to use this nifty little hammer drill set on, well, hammer.

We drilled pilot holes
(holes you drill first to put screws through)
with a masonry bit
(a drill bit specially designed to go through concrete.
And I'm not showing you a single technique or tool that I didn't use a minute later to finish the job.
Yeah, you can do this.
Or are you gonna let a middle aged, weak little redhead show you up?)

You can use a screwdriver for this, but a drill driver makes short work of it.

You want your screws in pairs every 16 inches or so, one on the top,
one on the bottom, slightly diagonal from each other.
Always stay about 2" from the end of the board so you avoid splitting the wood.

Now that that's firmly in place...

...and level with the floor...
(Oh, he checks my work!)

...it's time to fill in the gaps!

We're going to take 1x4s and create a lip by nailing them to the boards we
just screwed to the concrete.

We're going to mix small bags of cement in a 5 gallon bucket

in a 1:1 ratio...1 part cement to one part water.

I'm not using the big cake mixer attached to a drill this time.

My highly specialized tool?

A simple garden trowel.

You do not want to mix any air bubbles into this.
Air bubbles will crack the dried cement, but relax, it's not gonna happen.

Now, glop some of this stuff up next to the lip.

Using a scraper, spread it out, pushing it into the crumbled edge.
Pretend you're just frosting a cake.
Put more pressure on the side of the scraper furthest from the lip
so that the edge near the lip is slightly higher.

Looking good, eh?

Nice and even, huh?
It actually looks a lot better than my cakes!

Go allllllllll the way across, completely covering that nasty crumbled edge cake
with delicious gritty cement buttercrea...this metaphor is officially out of hand.

And yeah, he handed over the scraper and let The Redhead have at it.

(Those are my new footwear of choice.)

We'll take the leftover cement and fill in any cracks and uneven points.

Once this dries, we can use the floor leveling compound and
then we'll have a whole new floor!

As long as I still have a little left, these deep gouges can get filled,
and we'll save some money on the floor leveling stuff.

Sweeping immediately afterwards with a stiff broom will get up all
the extra sandy grit and high edges.

Nice manicure, huh?
Hey, we're all over this, and it's the last of the dull, drab,
prep type stuff.
This morning, we're picking up drywall.
Oh, and 1100 square feet of glorious bamboo hardwood flooring!
Ready for the pretty stuff?
Let's get to creatin'!!!