The following morning, I was ready to get the laundry room back into place. Unfortunately, we had some visitors, and it delayed my chance to finish up. As our visitors were here, I kept saying to myself, “I have plenty of time, I have plenty of time.” Once they left, Efiwym, my wife asked if I had enough time. I told her I have today and maybe tomorrow morning before she needed to start the wash.
I retrieved my air compressor and nailer from the basement. Getting the baseboards back on should go smoothly. I laid out the baseboards to their past locations and made sure the heat vent would fit back in place. Once that was done, I quickly attached the baseboard with the nailer. The investment in the nailer was worth it. I can remember the frustrating times I slammed my fingers with the hammer trying to nail in baseboards. I reattached the 220-volt electrical box, screwed down the gas shutoff valve and heat vent. The room was starting to take place.
The laundry tub cabinet was next. I struggled to get the back of the cabinet past the wall waste pipe. Looking at the cabinet from the side and using a little more muscle, the cabinet slipped by. Time to shut off the water. I removed the caps from the water pipes to reconnect the water lines. In no time, the water was turned back on and I had no leaks. I reinstalled the waste pipe to the tub and I was done.
Since I needed the room to install the dryer vent, the dryer followed. I wheeled the dryer into the room, and I figured out how to let it down without dropping it. I started working on the vent. I pulled out the vent pipe that was attached to the outside vent. In essence, I just broke it. The pipe was part of the outside vent, but no longer. It worked out as I was able to attach the pipe to the new flat vent.
Before I attached the vent pipe, I needed to find the aluminum foil tape I used to install the dryer vent for my daughter. I found it buried in a box in the basement. Let’s do it right this time. I also needed to trim down the flat vent because it was too long. I had a tin snips in my tool box that I used for about the second time. Aligning the old vent to the new one to determine the size. I marked it and trimmed both parts of the vent. I was excited about this new dryer vent. This part of the job might go smoothly. I attached the pipe, screwed it down and taped it up. Now it was time to get this thing installed.
I put the vent pipe into the outside vent. I went outside to make sure the pipe was securely into the outside vent. I moved the dryer to line up with the vent. The moment of truth… As hard as I tried, I could not get the vent to go over the outlet of the dryer. I pushed and I pulled on the vent. I found out the gas line coming out of the dryer would not allow the vent to get lower to line up with the dryer outlet. I pondered just a little about removing the gas line from the dryer, but that was not going to happen. I did not need much to align the dryer outlet to the dryer vent.
Using the tin snips as a wedge, I raised the side of the dryer just enough to slide the vent into the dryer outlet. I slowly pulled the tin snips out and the vent was connected. I wrapped the vent with foil tape. Now I needed to make sure that the other end of the vent was all the way into the outside opening. Check. Next, I made sure I had the 28 inches for the washer. Check. Finally, I swung the back door to make sure it cleared the dryer. Check. The dryer was officially in place and hopefully as long as possible until it no longer works.
I turned on the dryer to check the air flow. I went outside and ran my hand over the dryer vent. Good flow. I then put the vent slats back on. I was happy with the results, but I was not done yet…