Covering the Support Beam

So after the carpet was installed in the basement, we took a bit of a break from working on it. We have taken care of some of the more minor tasks—like putting a cover on each of the new vents, finally filling in the nail holes on the baseboards, moving things into the closet and out of the utility room, and hanging up the dart board in the utility room. Now it’s time to get moving on the finishing projects again—covering up the support beam and the two meters. This entire basement needs to be done in a mere four months. Which sounds totally do-able, but with sailing season in full swing, Tim doesn’t have his dad and/or some tools around to help get the outstanding jobs done.

But we are making progress on the support beam! Here’s what it’s looked like up until last week (before the walls were painted and carpet was installed)…Tim put 2×4’s  on two sides of the beam to even out the surface area.

And here’s what it now looks like. Tim and his dad created two 90-degree angles from some solid pine wood boards (almost imagine two L’s), and then put them together around the beam. They matched up the edges, used some wood glue, and clamped the two pieces together. They left the clamps on for a long weekend to be sure they stuck in place.

You can also see that there’s about an inch or so of space at the top where the wood does not meet the ceiling. That’s mainly because there weren’t long enough boards available for purchase, but there’s also the same spacing at the bottom that you can’t see due to the drop cloth around it. After the nail holes are filled in, the seams are smoothed out, and the pine is painted, we’ll be adding molding around the top and bottom of the beam to finish it off. The cabinets around the meters will be finished the same way—I think. Things are always changing last minute!

UPDATE ON BEAM: Have a look at the finished beam with it painted and molding added to the top and bottom right here.

—m.

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