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Ask This Old House - Season 24 Episode 24 - Tile Soap Holders, Swirl Ceiling
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00:05On Ask This Old House, our experts travel across the country to answer questions about your house.
00:18Today, when a homeowner wants to add storage to their bathroom, Nathan steps in to give it a
00:25lift. This changed the gate. It looks so good. Then, the crew gets together for a round of
00:31what is it? Oh, now they're coming. And Morrow helps a homeowner patch a textured ceiling.
00:39Stretch it down a little more. On Ask This Old House.
00:53Hi Nathan. Welcome. Hi Jenna. Nice to meet you. So nice to meet you. I'm so excited you're here.
00:58Beautiful home you have here. Thank you so much. We've updated some things in the kitchen and the
01:03living room, but what I'm going to show you today is our bathroom. Okay Nathan, welcome to my bathroom
01:09stuck in the 1960s. Here it is. So we're not ready for a full remodel, but I am eager to
01:16get these
01:17ceramic tiles off. Okay. I think these used to hold things like bar soap. Bar soap holder. Toothbrushes.
01:25Toothbrushes. Yep, yep. But now, you know, we use electric toothbrushes. I prefer liquid soap. And
01:30this vanity is smaller, so it starts to get cluttered. So my dream would be to somehow get
01:36these off and add a shelf or something in this area. Definitely. Yeah, we can do that. Amazing.
01:42So remove the the toothbrush holder, the bar soap holder. I think it looks like we might have to
01:46remove this towel bar here, right? Nice wooden shelf. Plenty of storage on it. Little organizer
01:51underneath. To get started, let's remove these to see what kind of space we need to cover with that
01:57wooden shelf. Okay. I'll get some tools and we'll get started. Awesome. Can't wait.
02:04Looks great. Good to go. We are ready to go. So I'm going to attempt to take these off in
02:09one piece.
02:09But first we have to play a guessing game, right? So there's a few different ways that these could
02:12have been installed. It could have been a little bit of mortar on the back applied and then grouted
02:16around. It could have been a tile on the back of it, like a four and a quarter by four
02:20and a quarter
02:21profile. That way it kind of works into the layout. Again, mortared and then grouted. Or it could be like
02:27a
02:27cavity on the back side and a cavity in the wall. And they stuffed some newspaper in there and kind
02:31of just made everything bond. I think it's the second one. I think it has like a tile on the
02:35back
02:35of it. To get these off, I'm going to use a scoring tool. It has a really sharp carbide tip
02:40on it.
02:41And I'm going to try and ease out all the grout all the way around it. Get a pry bar
02:45in there and pop
02:46it off in one piece.
02:51All right. So as we thought, kind of the tile profile four and a quarter by four and a quarter
02:55essentially is on the back of this toothbrush holder. Looks like they said it was some mastic
02:59back in the day, which was pretty common. All right, while we're here, I'm going to remove some
03:03of this old adhesive
03:07with a sharp chisel.
03:12All right, Jenna, you want to do the next one? Yeah, let's do it. All right, here we go.
03:15So a lot of control, nice, easy scoring pulled towards you and just work your way all the way around.
03:20Okay. Nice. You can see those big pieces fall right out. Excellent.
03:29And when do I know like, okay, that side's good. I can stop scraping. I think when you pull and
03:32you
03:32don't feel any resistance. Okay. That sounds good. All right, let me grab that hammer and pry bar. You
03:39stand here, we'll switch places and you can pop it off. So again, control is the most important thing.
03:46So we're going to set this pry bar right here on that corner. So you have a little bit of
03:50room to
03:50swing over the towel bar and just light gentle taps. I'll hold this if you want to swing.
03:56And the point of being like gentle is so it doesn't crack? I just don't want to smash it. Okay.
04:00I
04:00can't resell it if I break it.
04:04Yep. One more. All right, I'm going to give a little pry. Oh, there it is. All right, here,
04:11you take over. Okay. I'll take that. Pry it off. And when I pry it, I should pull this towards
04:17me,
04:18right? Yep. Perfect. Like a glove. Nice. All right, so now we'll get the sharp chisel
04:23and we'll clean up all that that mastic that's left behind.
04:33All right, let's jump over here and same process. Okay, great.
04:53Woo! That was great. All right, so we got our demo done. Now we can start talking about that new
04:59shelf. Okay, great. So you have a 24 inch vanity below. So I always like to work off of a
05:03center
05:04line. Just holding this up 16 inch on the center line. I'll cover all three holes if I make a
05:10shelf
05:11that's 32 inches wide. Okay. I think that'll be nice. Lots of storage. And then you have a little
05:18bit of a void that's four and a quarter tall. So if I made a five inch shelf, we'll cover
05:23everything
05:24across. 32 inches wide. I see some gold accents around the room. Amazing. So try and introduce some
05:31of that. That'd be great. Then I'll find something to cover up that hole. Okay. And you'll be good to
05:35go. I'm so excited to see this. This is awesome. All right, I'm gonna go make a shelf real quick.
05:39Okay, great. All right, here it is. It is perfect. I love it. I'm glad you like it. So we
05:47have a quarter
05:47sawn white oak. Okay. With a warm satin finish. Some of those nice gold brackets and a little jewelry
05:54organizer here on the bottom. Amazing. Some pre-drilled holes for when we mount it. So we're going to get
05:59it
05:59into place. Okay. And we need to do a layout first. You know, we want to put it about there
06:04to cover those three holes. Yeah. But we still kind of want to work off of the center line. Okay.
06:08So
06:08let's get some painter's tape on the wall so we don't lose any of our marks. And let's do a
06:12layout.
06:16Let me throw one more just a little bit above. Okay. And what is this to do? This is just
06:21going to help
06:22with our layout. So we're writing on tile, which doesn't really want to take pencil very well. And I
06:26want to do it with ink on the tile if we're not going to be drilling it out. Okay. So
06:32we have our
06:3324-inch vanity, right? Mm-hmm. 24. So we have 12 inches. I can make just a little tiny mark
06:40down here.
06:48Then I want to transfer that up. All right. So we have a 32-inch top. So we'll do a
06:53little mark,
06:5416 inches in for our center. All right. So we can bring our piece up, match up our center lines.
07:00But one thing I'm picking up on is it looks like we have a little bit of a hump in
07:03the wall, which is,
07:04it happens in every house. So when I fasten it, I'll probably split the difference, go equal,
07:09equal, instead of pulling one side tight or the other side tight. Oh, okay. So we'll just split the
07:13difference on that. I think the last thing I want to do is also I'm going to do, I'm going
07:19to do a line
07:19for a height because we have this old grout line here. Mm-hmm. And I'd probably want to be just
07:25a
07:25little bit above it. So that way we don't land on it and then you have like a little groove
07:29behind.
07:30Oh, smart.
07:30So to level it, we're going to use a torpedo level. Okay. That looks nice and level right there.
07:39Still above it? Mm-hmm. All right. That'll be the top of our shelf.
07:43Now that we have center line, we have a top line and I need you to hold it.
07:49You're going to kind of be watching the top, okay? Okay.
07:52We're going to use this marker that has a very long end to it that we can reach into that
07:56hole
07:56and transfer our layout. There's our two dots and that's where we need to put our anchors.
08:02And typically when you think of an anchor like this, you think of it like spreading on the backside
08:06of the drywall. Yeah. But in this case, you're going through tile and you're going through drywall.
08:10So it's not really going to like wing out like that. It's more just going to expand a little bit
08:14and fill up the void and allow somewhere for the screw to fasten into. This is a carbide tip,
08:20some are diamond tipped, and it's good to go with the masonry. If you used a wood drill bit,
08:25you'd have a hard time getting through this glazing that's on top of the ceramic tile. So some guys used
08:30to take a nail and like kind of chip that away. But any time you drill through tile, you run
08:34the risk of
08:34breaking it. All right. Let's see how we did.
08:38So what we're looking for now is that no tile cracked? No tile cracked and a nice clean hole.
08:44All right. Well done. Now we're ready to put our anchors in. So why do we use anchors? So the
08:50anchor
08:51helps us put a fastener where we want it. So you probably have a stud here or here, but that's
08:56really
08:56not really going to work because our shelf comes to here. There's a bracket here. I don't know if I
09:00can hit
09:00a stud. And we probably have a stud maybe around here somewhere. So it's like we using a shield
09:07allows us to put the fastener exactly where we want. Okay. So we're going to put this in
09:13and then we're going to tap it until it's seated. So that one's good.
09:23All right. We're almost ready to mount our shelf. So let's talk fasteners. So I picked up these number
09:2810 brass screws. They're two and a half inches long. And that'll be nice because we have to pass
09:33this through the oak shelf into our anchor. All right. Last thing I want to do is just adjust
09:43these screws just a little bit, just to make sure that they're kind of aesthetically pleasing
09:48and they're all clocked in the same direction. That's great. I would have never thought to do
09:52that. It makes a difference. Those look good. All right. Now we need to address that towel bar.
09:56I picked up one of these hooks I was planning on putting here, but that's not going to work out.
10:00Oh. So what do you think if I introduced a second one? I made a really nice quarter sawn white
10:06oak
10:06board and we mounted it the same way that we mounted the shelf. I mounted the hooks onto that and
10:11then
10:11mount that to the wall and we'll hide that hole and you'll have some good usable hooks. That is a
10:16great idea. I love it. All right. I'm gonna go make that. Great.
10:33You are quite the decorator. Nathan, this came out amazing. I can't thank you enough. I absolutely love
10:39it. I'm glad you like it. And look, I can now keep my toothbrush right there by wanting to ask
10:44you,
10:44because I don't want to ruin it. Is this water resistant? Can I put things on there that might
10:49be wet? Everything's sealed up, water resistant. You can even spray a cleaner on it, wipe it down,
10:53no problem. Amazing. And I love how the towel holder over here came out. It looks so good.
10:58Lots of usable space. This changed the game. Thank you so much. You are welcome. And listen,
11:04I wanted to ask you because now I'm inspired with the gold. Yeah. I have to update this faucet. Do
11:08you
11:08know anyone? I know a guy. Perfect. I'll call him on the way home. Thank you so much. All right.
11:12Take care. Bye Nathan. Nice to meet you.
11:14Thanks for writing in. All right. I use the term loosely, but gentlemen, here's a piece of metal
11:32that's bent at a 45 degree angle on one side with a point and a 90 degree angle on the
11:38other end.
11:39It's metal, about a half an inch wide. What is it?
11:43Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Me? Can I go? Can I go? All right. Go ahead, Kev. Absolutely. A hundred percent.
11:46I know what this is. It's a come-along. A hundred percent? A come-along? You know what a come
11:50-along?
11:50I know. That's not a come-along. Oh, this is a come-along. So we've all got kids,
11:53right? And something happens to them when they become teenagers. You'll find out. Anyway,
11:57they never listen to you. They roll their eyes. You're like, come on, let's go. They know it all. Oh,
12:00dad. So this, oh, now they're coming. Now they're going to come with you. Come on, let's go get in
12:05the car.
12:06And then, you know, when you've got to take a family photo and like, smile.
12:10I think that would work, but it's not what it is. That's not what it is.
12:14I've got to really say tools have come a long way.
12:19But that's not what that is.
12:21A cootie tool? You see my fingers, how damaged they are?
12:23What's up with the tape? That's actually not purple tape. That's, uh,
12:27blood blisters from all the years of construction, but no more will I have that problem because now
12:33if I miss when I'm hammering, completely protect it. So you get two or three or seven of these and
12:38you're good to go. That's what that's for. All right. Well, that works, but I love nuts. I mean,
12:42I don't know if everybody knew that or not, but I do. I love almonds. I love walnuts. I love
12:48pistachios.
12:49Pistachios are better for you. Yeah, I know, right? In the shell, right? Yeah.
12:52That's why I need this. Boom. My pistachio. That's not it. Nice try. Nice try.
12:59That's not it. All right. Well, you guys probably would have got it, but I did.
13:02I have a surprise. I left out one little part. Got it right here.
13:06We would have got it. Yeah. Oh, that changes everything.
13:08That does. That's the goal. Where'd you get that?
13:10Now this piece is just bent on one end and nothing on the other end.
13:16Okay. So now if you ever want to have, let me have that siding right there.
13:20Look what just happened. That's convenient right there.
13:23So you take the second part of the tool with only the one bend,
13:27put it underneath the siding and push down gently.
13:31And you'll notice that the siding bulges out and bends enough so I can slide this
13:35other one up and rest it on top of the siding below. And you create a hook.
13:41So let's say you want to hang something on your wall with this type of siding.
13:46You use that hook. You don't damage the siding. You hang whatever you want to hang.
13:51And you haven't done any damage. And you can take it up, put it away,
13:57take it out and move it somewhere else or just use it for another day.
14:02Wow. That's nuts.
14:03There you go.
14:09Hello. Hey, Mauro. Thank you so much for coming.
14:11Nice to meet you. How are you doing?
14:12Good. How are you?
14:13All right. Oh, nice house.
14:15Yeah. So we just moved in about a year and a half ago.
14:17Yeah.
14:18And I just got married two months ago.
14:19Wow. Both house and the wife?
14:22Yes.
14:22That's a perfect combination.
14:23Yeah. Thank you very much.
14:24All right.
14:25So yeah, it's been pretty busy.
14:26We've got this crack here on the ceiling. It's a bit of an eyesore.
14:29And also some water stain on this ceiling. Do you have any bathroom or anything upstairs?
14:33No bathroom upstairs, but the roof was leaking.
14:36The roof.
14:36Yeah. So we've since had the entire roof replaced.
14:38Wow. So that's all taken care of. It hasn't gotten any worse or anything.
14:41All right. I also noticed some pattern on that ceiling.
14:44Yeah. My wife and I really like the swirl pattern.
14:46Yeah.
14:46So if we could keep that, that'd be perfect.
14:48Of course we can.
14:49Yeah.
14:49Okay. I am going to step out, get some stuff, get back, and we start the work.
14:53Great.
14:54All right. Will, the walls are protect, floors are protect.
14:58That's time to open a little bit of the gap so we can start to patch in the ceiling.
15:03All right. That's what I'm going to do.
15:04And why do we have to do that?
15:06We have to open up so we can patch it.
15:09So how wide are you trying to get it then?
15:11Just about an inch of an inch. If you need to go back, go back again.
15:16And the other thing too, we don't want to disturb the pattern.
15:19Right.
15:20All right.
15:22All right. Time to prime.
15:25So what kind of primer are we using?
15:27We're going to use this shellac base primer. It's a prime sealer for water stains. Perfect.
15:33Let's start with this area here.
15:35So why do we need to use the primer before we patch the crack?
15:38Well, number one rule. Everything that hit with the water, water stain on your ceiling,
15:43walls, or any other area, you should prime it before you paint because if you don't prime,
15:48once you put the coat of paint on, the water stain will bleed right through the paint.
15:53Really? Okay.
15:53It's like a prime sealer. You're going to seal everything before you paint always.
15:59Makes sense.
16:01And not only are we priming inside the cracks, but we're going to prime all the water stains.
16:10All right. You want to take it over?
16:11Sure.
16:12All right. It's all yours.
16:16Just go nice and easy, all right?
16:17Mm-hmm.
16:20Let's finish the cracks first, right there.
16:24That's good.
16:26All right. Is that about enough?
16:27Yeah. So once you start to go into the pattern,
16:30just follow up the pattern design with your brush, all right?
16:35Don't go across. Just follow the pattern like you're doing the pattern yourself.
16:39Yes. There we go.
16:42I even like the sound of the brush going to the patterns.
16:46Mm-hmm.
16:47Right?
16:47Yeah. It's very satisfying.
16:49Oh, well, prime is in process drying.
16:53All right.
16:53Let's talk about the materials that we're using in this house.
16:56Okay.
16:57We have different types of joint compound.
17:00Oh, so this is all joint compound.
17:02It's all joint compounds, different times to dry.
17:04Mm-hmm.
17:05Okay.
17:05So over here, we have the regular joint compound.
17:09It takes a little longer to dry.
17:10All right.
17:10If you're doing the whole ceiling, this is the way to go here.
17:14Got it.
17:14Because you got more open time.
17:15Mm-hmm.
17:15And then for repairs, we might use something that dries faster, which is the dry mix.
17:21Put a little bit of water.
17:22It would take about 20, 25 minutes to dry.
17:25For a small batch, this is really nice.
17:27And then here, we have the popcorn ceiling, which is another texture that you can use on your ceiling.
17:33Mm-hmm.
17:33Yep. That looks just like what we have upstairs.
17:35All right. Let's practice.
17:37So we're going to apply the wet joint compound, and then we're going to create that pattern.
17:43Okay. Perfect.
17:44Yeah. I was hoping we could get a little practice first.
17:46So why would you want to use the wet one for this?
17:49Because you have a little more open time to work over your patterns.
17:53So we're just building up enough to work with right now?
17:55Let's build enough to create the pattern.
18:03Now, there's two ways we can do this.
18:06There's this little, like this little teeth tools.
18:11Mm-hmm.
18:11Then you can go like this, curve, and come back.
18:15Right.
18:16Or we can do it with the brush.
18:19Mm-hmm.
18:19All right, which is a thick, stiff brush.
18:22You start right here, go out, make your turn, and come back down.
18:28Yeah, that looks more like what we've got above us there.
18:31Yeah.
18:31Look at that.
18:32All right.
18:36Not a lot of pressure.
18:38Okay.
18:38Just enough to create the pattern.
18:40Mm-hmm.
18:42Nice.
18:43Should I try another one?
18:44Try another one.
18:52Nice.
18:53Cool.
18:54All right.
18:54It's not so hard.
18:55So we're not done yet.
18:57There's another pattern to go here.
18:59So we're going to start.
19:01We're going to get right in between the two of them, right here.
19:06You get the first, the second, and then this hits the bow 50% higher.
19:11Okay.
19:12And then you're going to go just like this, start right on the center,
19:15and then create the pattern.
19:18Should I go counterclockwise like before?
19:19You can go.
19:19Whatever you feel more comfortable doing it.
19:21I think I'll be the consistent way.
19:23Yeah.
19:25Perfect.
19:26Okay.
19:27How could I have made that a little bit better?
19:29That's part of the pattern.
19:30Oh, okay.
19:31Yeah.
19:31Look at that.
19:32A little bit rough.
19:33They're all different.
19:34Try redoing one to see what happens.
19:37Those follow up the same pattern.
19:41All right.
19:42That's great.
19:43It's time for us to patch, but before we need to make the mix.
19:48We got the dry compound right in there.
19:52So what kind of consistency are we going for here?
19:54We don't want it too stiff.
19:55We don't want it too smooth.
19:57We're just going to be right in the middle.
20:06Take a look at here.
20:10Then it goes up like this.
20:12All right?
20:14And then you start to apply.
20:16Just like that.
20:18Okay.
20:20So not too much then?
20:21Not too much, but you know, try to cover so you can start the filler right in there.
20:30All right?
20:31Just like that.
20:36All right.
20:37Now we use the brush.
20:40You're going to follow up the pattern.
20:42Whatever the pattern goes this way, this is where the brush goes.
20:45Okay?
20:46Just like that.
20:48It's going to stretch it down a little more if you like.
20:53Yeah?
20:54Because the important thing for us now is just that line of crack up there.
21:02That looks good.
21:04Okay, Will.
21:05Time to paint.
21:07All right.
21:08You go like this.
21:09What we're using here is a flat water base paint.
21:12And it was a match from the existing color.
21:15This is a paint and primer in one.
21:18All right?
21:19Just way to here.
21:20You can go any direction you want.
21:22You want to follow up the pattern, that's fine.
21:24If you want to go side to side like this, it's all fine.
21:28So I know we did the primer earlier, but why are we doing paint and primer now?
21:32There's two different types of primer.
21:34One was a shellac base that will seal all the water stain on the ceiling.
21:40And this one is a water-based primer paint.
21:43All right.
21:44It looks dry.
21:45What do you think?
21:46How can you tell that it's dry?
21:48Well, when you see a little sheen means the paint's still wet.
21:51Right.
21:52When that sheen disappears, it goes away.
21:54Yeah.
21:54It means the paint is dry and it's ready for the second coat.
22:02Okay.
22:02It's looking dry.
22:03Oh, Will.
22:04Look at that.
22:05Yeah.
22:05Looks much better than before, doesn't it?
22:07I think so.
22:08So is there anything else we need to do at this point?
22:10Oh, I think we're all set.
22:11Unless you have more work to do.
22:14Anything else?
22:15Upstairs, we have the same exact crack and the water damage from the roof like before.
22:19Yeah.
22:19But it's a different texture.
22:20It's the popcorn.
22:21Popcorn?
22:21Yeah.
22:21Well, you know how to do it.
22:23Same system, just different texture.
22:25Right.
22:25Like the demo from before.
22:26Absolutely.
22:27You're going to do a great job here and there too.
22:29All right.
22:29Yeah.
22:30This was the harder part.
22:31Thank you very much.
22:32Thanks for having me here.
22:33Yeah, of course.
22:41Next time on Ask This Old House, Ross talks about some products that will elevate your
22:46outdoor movie note.
22:48Then, do you have questions about your home's insurance policy?
22:52We have an expert on hand to help explain what you should have and what you may not need.
22:59And Tommy revisits an old project when he rebuilds the picnic table at the barn.
23:06All that on Ask This Old House.
23:29All that on Ask This Old House.
23:30We'll see you next time.
23:31Bye.
23:31Bye.
23:31Bye.
23:34Bye.
23:36Bye.
23:38Bye.
23:39Bye.
23:41Bye.
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