The house was built in 1975, so there are two implications as far as electrical goes: there is aluminum wiring, and there is a fuse box.

Not too much I can do about the aluminum, and in fact, so long as it’s done properly, aluminum is quite safe. It’s still often used for service entrance wiring (eg, from the pole to your panel), and it’s still used extensively throughout the electricity distribution system. The only real problem happens when you connect devices (switches, receptacles) that aren’t rated for aluminum. There are special wire connectors to use (#63) when connecting aluminum wires, so that is something else to pay attention to.

As far as the fuse panel, there were a few reasons I wanted to replace it, even though it wasn’t absolutely essential. I wanted to insulate behind it, and it was mounted on a piece of plywood, directly on the cement wall. This meant that I’d have to completely take it off anyways to insulate, or just deal with a big uninsulated portion of the wall (seemed dumb, when I’m putting a lot of effort into insulating). I also don’t really like working with old boxes, and I do need to add a few circuits. Thought I had some space to expand, starting from scratch is easier. There is also the convenience factor, as breakers are simple easier to deal with than fuses.

I had an electrician do the upgrade, since to move the panel out from the wall, the wires coming from the meter needed to be extended a few inches. I didn’t really want to do that myself, or have to deal with Hydro One and the inspectors, so it was just simpler to pay someone else to do it.

Before the electrician showed up, I framed around the panel, and built a piece that would fit in easily.

If you look closely in the first picture below, you can see the gray conduit sticking out of the header, which goes directly to the gray pull box on the outside of the house in the next picture.

I put in the framing, and filled it with fiberglass insulation, 1 1/2 pieces thick, so it should be rated about R-20. A few hours after installation, I took some temperature readings: the outside temperature was ~1° Celsius; the cement wall right beside the panel was ~2° Celsius; and the plywood the panel is mounted on was ~18° Celsius.

I’m going to be putting in closed-cell spray foam insulation. The big advantage here is the minimal space required - 3″ is over R-20, and it can fit in a 2×4 framed wall.

To start with , here’s a couple shots of what I ripped out.

Half of the basement had some old insulation that had an R-value of maybe R-7. It also had an integrated paper vapour barrier, which is not very effective. Not that it really mattered, the other half of the basement had no insulation at all, as you can see here.

I took out all the old insulation, and disassembled the framing, which was made of 2×3’s with 1×2s in a grid pattern. This took an amazingly long time to take apart, since it was comprised of so many separate pieces of wood.

I left a ~1″ gap between the new framing and the cement wall, which will get filled with insulation. This minimizes the amount of heat transferred through the studs themselves. All the walls are anchored into the ground with concrete nails and/or tapcons, and anchored to the joists above using extra sections. I had to leave a gap at the top of some of the walls to allow access to the headers for spraying insulation, but it’s high enough that when I put the suspended ceiling in, it will not be visible.

There were a couple of annoyances during this process. The hot water heater was only about 2″ away from the cement wall. This meant I couldn’t frame or insulate behind it, which of course would be bad. I cut the pipes above it, drained it about half way, and moved it over so it’s now about 5″ from the wall. I also moved it back towards the furnace more, which allows me to move a 5′ wall about 6″ back in the laundry room.

Luckily, the tank is connected via a flexible copper gas line, so I was able to safely move it by myself. Note that I did turn the gas off to this line just to be safe.


I also noticed that the furnace filter was on the back of the furnace, where I was going to be putting a wall. I didn’t really want to put a dumb-looking access door on the wall, so I figured I’d give turning it around a shot. I was able to pull the return vent off, and then remove a couple of screws inside and turn the filter housing around. It now is accessible from the front of the furnace, which will be inside a utility closet in the laundry room.

I also put framing up in the crawlspace, so that if I want to put shelves up or whatever, it will be easy. Once the insulation is on the walls, it’s hard to build anything in front of it, since the surface is fairly uneven. Having the framing up now gives a nice flat surface to work with later. While most of the basement is 16″ studs, the crawlspace is 24″, which makes it a bit cheaper to build. Since it’s only a 4′ high wall, there probably won’t be any reduction in the strength of the drywall, not that it needs it there anyways.

Since the house has only one bathroom, we decided adding a second half-bath to the basement would be a good investment, as well as a useful addition to us right now.

When we moved in, there was an existing sink in the laundry room, which I’m pretty sure was the old kitchen sink and cabinets. I took this picture after I had taken down several cabinets (I unfortunately did not take very many ‘before’ photos), but there were two big cabinets mounted right above the sink before.


Underneath, the drain line branches towards the wall as you can see, then went out on an angle, for some reason, over to the laundry sink (which is just to the left of the countertop - don’t ask me!), so that by the time it got there, it was probably 6″ away from the wall.

I cut both the drain line and vent line off, leaving enough room to hook into later.

In preparation, I framed in the bathroom wall that will be used for plumbing, as well as the front wall with the door (partly because it was convenient to do at the time, partly because it adds some support). So how do you put a drain for a toilet in a floor that has no drain for a toilet? Make a hole.

I actually had a plumber do this part. I’m sure I could have done it myself, and smashing up my floor would have been fun, but my thought was smashing a hole through my main sewer line would have been the exact opposite of fun. You can see the main sewer line running at a 45-degree angle off to the corner of the house, and you can also see a smaller branch line which goes to a floor drain in the laundry room. The top left arm of the hole is for the sink drain. Fortunately there was just enough room above the small line in the picture that the new drain can go over top, and still be a bit more than 1″ below the floor.

The next day, the plumber came back and finished running all the pipes. I was actually going to do the supply lines myself (in PEX) but since I don’t own a PEX crimper, I figured it was easier to have the plumber do those lines as well, and it really didn’t cost that much more. My cousin came over a few days later to help cement in the hole. I forgot to take a picture, but we added in a couple ~3′ pieces of rebar to add some strength to the cement and help prevent it from cracking. It’s not the prettiest thing ever, but it is quite flat, and that’s what’s important, since I’m putting a subfloor over it later.

You can also see the new plumbing for the laundry room, including the washer box which is recessed inside the wall, and the hookup for a sink in the laundry room. I’m actually going to be putting in a cabinet and counter-top with a drop-in sink — sort of like what was there before, but.. less ugly. The laundry room is a bit of a weird shape, but the main area is about 10′ x 7′, so space is at a premium and the cabinet/sink combo seems to make more sense than a regular laundry tub.