HalfWall v2.0
I finished building the new half wall yesterday. Half wall version 2.0 is better than ever. I used 3" Deck-Mate deck screws to put it all together so I won't have any nails wiggling out. Gregory Gannon's ingenious idea to put in a brace that ran along side the floor joist is what really made it work, though. Greg has big ideas! Before I put that in, the wall didn't seem all that much sturdier than the last one and I was almost regretting taking all the time to redo it. But now everything is really tight. And no squeaking either... the old wall had started to squeak when you wiggled it. Now I'm completely confident that when I add the drywall it's going to be rock solid.
Greg also has other big ideas for making loft style modern row homes. I was telling Greg last night that I almost don't want to refinish my floors upstairs because they already look really good. When you clean up a spot, you can see that the finish on the floor is beautiful. The only problem is that there are 8 million little nail holes, some really big gashes (from the previous owner's and from me using a crowbar to rip up the old linoleum tile), and the unfinished spot in the floor where the old walls used to be. Greg was telling me about how he saw once that a guy just lightly sanded the wood and then polyurethaned it leaving shadows of old walls and things in the floor. It's an interesting alternative but I'm not sure I could pull it off. I don't know if I could get away with something so post-modern without making the rest of the house just as industrial.