After my earlier post I found a little motivations and continued on the house project for a bit. Got probably 90% of the linoleum cut out between the kitchen and utility room. So far I've only found a few spots that I need to cut out and replace. Can probably do it all with a couple sheets of 3/4" plywood and some boards cut to reinforce the seams from the bottom.
I've got an island mounted range in the middle of the kitchen, so disconnecting that and moving the island is probably the next big step. Fortunately it looks like not other cabinetry will need to be moved (so far). Still need to move the washer and dryer so I can remove linoleum and check the floor under them. I know there is one spot in front of dryer by back door that is bad, but I think that is all. May have to go into the wall there to repair, but shouldn't be much and I wanted to replace the mobile home style door with a house style anyway. I should probably pull the linoleum in the the bathroom too, it's on the other side of the wall from the water heater, in the opposite direction of the kitchen. I'm in no hurry to find issues there, but maybe I should be?
Still up in the air on how I'm going to handle the water heater closet. It is sized for the smallest diameter water heater manufactured (that's locally available) which limits capacity, and it had a nailed on sheetrock access cover. Was probably screwed on at one point, but that's still not easy access to check up on it. Either the closet it going to go away and the water heater opened to the rest of the utility room, or it's going to get cut and framed for a closet door. What other damage I find will largely be responsible for making that decision.
Assuming that I don't find more damage, the repair shouldn't be too terrible. First step is let the subfloor plywood dry out for a bit. Cut out the rotted spots and patch in new. I'm going to level the few sagging spots, and do a 1/4 inch underlayment before going back with new flooring. Going to take some time and I won't get in a rush, but I should be able to handle all of it.
Once the repairs are made and a new water heater goes in, the next step will be new plumbing. The house was built in 1994/1995 before polybutalyene pipe was discontinued for new construction. I've already repaired several small leaks over the last 17 years around crimps at valves, and leaking valve stems. Usually a quick fix amounting to cutting off the old valve and installing a new one with sharkbite fittings. If I'm doing all of this work to the floor the leak prone poly is getting replaced before it has a chance to mess it up again. I'd like to not spend the money since I hope not to be here much longer, but it may still be a few years, and getting rid of the poly will be strong positive a selling point.
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