Budget Breakdown and Remodeling Goals (Remodel kitchen 10×8 ideas):
I completely transform this kitchen while in the same process saving the homeowner $50,000 and that’s no small pittance considering the fact that this home owner received a $75,000 quote for this entire kitchen remodel which we were able to keep under $25,000 but let’s get to the fun part of this project the demo most of these cabinets are secured to the wall with just a hand full of screws which makes it extremely easy to remove as well as making sure you have a helping hand to make this process go even faster these kitchen cabins are quickly and easily removed and as you get to the appliances the one thing you have to be careful of is to make sure everything is disconnected properly before trying to remove it that includes all the hoses and electrical that goes to the dishwasher the sink and of course our range especially in this case since we’re working with a gas range.
Tools and Techniques for Safe Demolition
As for tools a drill and a sledgehammer will take care of the vast majority but it’s always nice to have a reciprocating saw on hand to cut piping and countertops to size as needed and yes in this instance I will say luckily we have laminate countertops because it makes it extremely easy to remove as you can see after the countertops removed the base cabinets are only installed with two screws because they’re only fasinating at stud locations and as a side note for any demolition project you should know exactly where your emergency water shut off valve is you never know what’s going to happen and hopefully you never have to use it but if you do have to use it you want to know exactly where it is.
Project Updates and Layout Changes
And as a quick side note for the byot family I highly suggest watching the tail end of this video because I’m announcing a new video series that I’m going to be posting on this channel starting next week I cannot wait on this project we had a small kitchen pantry that was actually more of an isore and didn’t flow with the space therefore we’re going to be removing the kitchen pantry and actually installing a large upper cabinet next to the fridge in order to accommodate the space that we’re losing here the flow of the space is important because we’re trying to make room for a growing family.
Wall Removal and Dumpster Rental
I pre-cut the drywall to make it easier to remove in large chunks and then take the reciprocating saw to our framework but remember the most important thing is to make sure that you’re not cutting into loadbearing walls which we did check ahead of time and this was not a structurally necessary wall which is why we were easily able to remove it for a sizable demolition project like this I do suggest renting a dumpster you’re easily able to rent this for a few hundred bucks and it saves a tremendous amount of time especially if you consider multiple trips to the dump in my little truck I do love my truck but it is little.
Tile and Subfloor Demolition
We’re removing all of the tile on this project and for that we need some heavyduty equipment which is why we picked up one of these this is a demolition hammer and it’s basically a mini Jackhammer which can get into really tightened areas as well as completely remove old tile very quickly with a bit like this makes a lot easier you can rent these but I picked this one up for a couple 100 bucks and it’s worth its weight in gold since
I do a lot of Demolition and as you can see firsthand this really does remove tile extremely quickly and efficiently it’s a huge timesaver on a project like this and all I have to do is get that bit underneath the tile and it does the work for me it’s also a manageable size and you can get it into small tightened areas like a small hallway this is also another good reason why you have a dumpster on hand because all I have to do is load it into a couple buckets and throw it in.
Tile Preservation and Grout Removal
As we make our way to the bathroom we do have a small caveat because we do want to keep the tile in the bathroom and not have to replace all of that flooring which is why I’m taking my grinder with a diamond wheel and removing all the grout from that doorway luckily for us that grout line was perfectly in line with the door itself and therefore it’s a perfect stopping point for our tile I removed the grout first before
I remove the tile adjacent to the ones that we’re keeping because it’s much more manageable doing it this way and avoiding the tiles that we don’t want to damage speaking of things that we don’t want to damage this is the tile that’s right next to our sliding glass door and we obviously don’t want to damage those which is why I placed a large piece of rigid insulation right next to it if there’s any Maps it’s going to hit the rigid foam and not our glass door.
Backer Board Removal Challenges
After we clean up all the tile and place it in the dumpster it’s now time to get to the subfloor the original tile was installed properly on a/4 in cement backer board but the problem is is that we’re installing engineered hardwood flooring which doesn’t require a backer board therefore
we have to remove all of this backer board and unfortunately for us they installed this backerboard extremely well which means every 3×5 ft sheet has approximately 30 to 40 screws in it which I do have to remove the thin set out of the head of each screw and then remove the screw that takes some time and energy as well as the fact that they put some thinset underneath the backer board
which isn’t desired normally because it’s brittle and therefore you should be applying a subfloor adhesive which actually stretches but in this case its thin set makes it more difficult to remove and hopefully you don’t have to deal with this on your project but on mine it was the case this backerboard removal and cleanup literally took me over 6 hours to do so I won’t bore you for the whole process but just know this is a timec consuming effort
but it is vital for this entire project because we are going to be replacing all the flooring in this downstairs area not just the kitchen a large crowbar and Sledgehammer were my preferred tools but if you have any suggestions on how to get it out even faster please let me know in the comment section because I am interested to know if there’s any better Alternatives than what I did.
Final Demolition Steps Near Bathroom
As we get closer to the bathroom I do take my angle grinder and grind a seam into the cement board right underneath our tile I have my shop vac turned on to try and suck up as much of the dust as possible because you do not want to be breathing this stuff in either in order to get into these tight-knit Corners
I do take my multi-tool to cut the cement board in these locations and with the Crowbar in my trusty Sledge I was able to remove the cement board without a single piece of tile cracking in the bathroom I do one final clean up and sweep of this entire space and once we have that taken care of we can now finally move on to cabinets.
Smart Cabinet Planning and Cost Savings
Before the demolition process even started we went into detail as to finding a good quality cabinet manufacturer locally as well as making sure that we had proper renders made up and of course some architectural drawings we ordered the cabinets and let’s just say that
this is exactly where the majority of our cost savings was because the custom cabinets that this client wanted in the first place were quoted out at over $40,000 just for Cabinetry and install ours was under 10 but now that we have our cabinets I started moving them into the kitchen mainly the uppers and a couple of the base cabinets now these are our cabinets specifically our upper cabinets and the nice thing about these cabinets is that they have a plywood core so they’re much sturdier than a particle board.
Laser Leveling and Wall Measurements
Now that we have all of our uppers accounted for I need to figure out the actual layout of the space as far as the upper cabinets they are 40 in tall but we do have to add 2 in for crown molding and now that we have that specific layout we can determine the rest of the cabinets all the way across the kitchen with a laser level my favorite a laser level comes in extremely handy in numerous instances on this project which you’ll see shortly the first way we’re using it is to determine exactly where our high spot is on the floor as
I go around the lowest number on my tape measure is going to actually be the high spot for our floor measurement I can then use the same laser level setup for my uppers and it determine where my low spot is in the ceiling you want to make sure this is accounted for before you start installing cabinets because we’re going to be installing crown molding and if all of a sudden there’s a ceiling variant change that you didn’t account for it might screw up your trim at the very end of this project.
Cabinet Installation and Alignment
This corner is the low spot for our uppers which is why I’m measuring at this point at 41 and 3/4 in I then place my laser level on that line and that way I’m able to pinpoint exactly where I want the base of our upper cabinets placed in order to make this install as easy as possible I place a 2×4 at the very bottom of this laser line make sure it’s level and fasten it in place I can also stretch this 2×4 onto the adjacent wall because I know all these cabinets need to line up accordingly it’s now finally time to install our very first cabinet and it’s this corner cabinet that we place first because this affects both sides of our Cabinetry I make sure the cabinet is properly level and if there needs to be slight adjustments you can always use a shim at the very bottom once it’s level I then drill 2in long cabinet screws on both the top and bottom portion of the cabinet and that thing is fully secured and not going anywhere.
Using Fillers and Fasteners
We place our second cabinet right adjacent to our first cabinet and I actually use these cabinet clamps that are specifically designed to make it easy to line up the faces of our Cabinetry this way the sides and the face all line up appropriately which makes for quick and accurate fastening whether it’s fastening to the wall or from cabinet to Cabinet as you can see right here just make sure you’re not using too long of screws and you pre-drill your holes first I scoot in our Corner base cabinet to the appropriate location and I align my laser level with the edge of my base cabinet which then provides me with the exact measurement needed in order for the upper cabinet to match up with the lower cabinet and this is where our cabinet filler is comeing into play any good Cabinet Shop should provide the fillers for you and by running it through the table saw provides me a really nice crisp line all the way down at the correct depth I then secure this filler piece on the side of the cabinet with a couple clamps pre-drill my holes and fasten it in place with a couple cabinet screws.
Appliance Cabinet Install and Final Adjustments
Once our filler is properly attached I then bring the cabinet over to our other cabinets are installed and butt our filler up against the first cabinet that we installed I clamp both cabinets together to guarantee proper alignment and once that’s taken care of we can then fasten the cabinet in into the wall as well as on the back side of our filler which guarantees that these cabinets won’t be coming apart anytime soon the next cabinet that we’ll be installing is our 30in cabinet that’s right above our oven which is also right above our microwave this is why we have electrical coming out of the wall which we do have to account for and pre-drill a hole so we can accommodate the electrical wire through the cabinet and then place an outlet in the cabinet you can definitely get all these units installed by yourself but it does help greatly if you have a second hand on site to make sure that you can lift these cabinets and place them with ease they’re not that heavy but they can be cumbersome if you’re the only one trying to manage this alignment I obviously couldn’t rest this cabinet on the 2×4 which is why I just lined up the very top of the cabinet with the adjacent cabinet and that obviously works out perfectly with our last cabinet that we place at the very end of this run.
Base Cabinet Prep and Plywood Installation
Now that we have this row of upper is taken care of I then bring in a secondary base cabinet to make sure our 30-in space needed for our range is accommodated I then double check just to make sure that our upper cabinets align properly with our base cabinets and as long as they are you might as well outline exactly where those base cabinets are located and start cutting some plywood we’re using 1/2 in plywood and we’re placing this at the very base of each base cabinet we do this for a number of reasons and number one of course is to make sure that we can guarantee we have a structurally sound surface that is perfectly flat not always the case in every single kitchen remodel but on this kitchen.