I would like to tear the drywall off and do a box-in style newel post with red oak to match my stairs. Any feedback is appreciated.

I’m a little familiar with the shallow, monolithic insulated footers which can be installed to alleviate having to dig so deep to get below a frost plane. However, someone which lives or works in the area of the upper northwest, please educate me on whether or not that is a feasible pathway for most inspections’ depts across that region? Is this approach common? What is the cutoff, -minimum or max- square footage where this particular arrangement is or is not utilized? thanks

I’m wondering the best way to insulate and heat/cool it enough to work out there. It’s a sloped roof with no soffits.
I did a little research, so I feel pretty confident that the walls aren’t too hard. I would just put 2×4 framing right up on the cinder block, roll out fiberglass between the studs, and nail on drywall, OSB, or plywood.

I’m more confused about how to handle the roof. I see two or 3 possible options:
1) Treat it exactly like the walls: roll out fiberglass, and cover it up. pros: I keep the wood storage in the rafters, high ceilings are nice cons: requires more sq. ft of insulation, I have no idea how to handle ventilation.
2) Build a ceiling, and insulate that from above pros: less insulation needed. cons: I lose the wood storage space and the ceiling is lowered.
3) Build a mini-ceiling about halfway up the roofline so I have a trapezoid shaped ceiling. pros: I keep some storage space, maybe ventilation is easier, it takes slightly less insulation material. cons: ?

With respect to heating and cooling, I don’t need it to be 70F year round, just bearable. Like between 40 and 80. This makes me think that insulating the ceiling is probably enough, and then adding a window unit and space heater would probably do it.

From the small amount of research I’ve done and just general knowledge, I understand that ventilation is super important when it comes to the roof, but I don’t really know the best way to approach this since there aren’t any soffits to place vents in.

Can someone with more experience point me in the right direction? Especially when it comes to how to correctly provide air flow for the roof. I’m leaning towards option 3 right now, as keeping the wood storage is pretty important to me, and it seems like it might make ventilation easier.

I uploaded some pictures here

Would a 3/4” plywood base with some weatherproof cover be a proper subfloor? Plywood feels like a bad decision since the underside would be fully exposed.

A new (old) house we purchased has pine wainscotting in the kitchen. It was finished in some unknown clear coat that has yellowed and darkened slightly over time. My first choice is to keep it since I really like the look of it, but not the colour and finish. Ideally, I’d like to refinish it with a semi-transparent white wash finish of some sort to keep the knotty pine look while brightening it up.

Does anyone have suggestions for how to proceed simply without stripping down to bare wood? I was wondering if I could just sand it with 220 grit, wipe it down and then go directly over it with a thinned down good-quality latex paint? My concern is that if the clear coat is oil then my latex paint will flake eventually and be a disaster. From what I know the wainscotting was put in about 20 years ago, so it could be finished in either oil or water based finish.

Is there a way to tell if the finish is oil versus water? If it is oil based, what then? If water based will my plan work?

Thanks

I am in escrow on our dream home – the house is what my wife wants and the 40×40 uninsulated steel shop is what I am drooling over.

We live in the desert where it regularly gets above 115F, and sometimes over 120F. My plan is to convert about half of the shop into an insulated woodshop (20×40 or maybe 17×40) that I can cool with an efficient mini split a/c. Additionally, I am thinking that I will use the space above the shop ceiling for storage and eventually put a smaller 10×10 clean room above the woodshop to do 3D printing and computer design (I mention this only so that weight bearing is a consideration).

So, for phase 1, the base 20×40’ shop, I am looking for advice on framing and construction. If I am doing 10’ tall walls, will it be worth it to use 2×6” framing or even 2×8” framing rather than 2×4s? The price difference from 2×4 to 2×6 is about 70% more. It is only about 6% more to go to 2×8 from 2×6s. The factors I want to consider are sturdiness, insulation capacity, and cost.

Finally, I was thinking that I would use OSB to do the interior walls and just drywall outside. Anything wrong with that idea?

Would a 3/4” plywood base with some weatherproof cover be a proper subfloor? Plywood feels like a bad decision since the underside would be fully exposed.

I’d like to re-route the vent however I have a few concerns.

1. I’m assuming vents can only go “up” in the output path (heat rises). Is there any condition where I could bend the vent to point down for any stretch?

2. Is there a maximum distance a vent can run before it hits the exhaust?

3. Are there any solutions that would help force the air further or through a different route that a default dryer’s output won’t be strong enough for.

Any help on any of these would be great. I probably need to get the duct to run another 10 feet, and ideally, downward.