What do you think of this and can it be fixed?

[CoJ]

Oh yeah we have a ton of pics and plan to take more. I came to the same conclusion you did, these guys just aren't the craftsmen I hoped I was hiring.

And it's true it's not like they wrecked my whole house, for the most part they did an acceptable job, the bathroom actually looks really nice and I'm happy with the rest of the wood. If you just don't consider the fireplace it's at least A- work. But, the wood stove is kind of the visual focal point of the room so it's really important to me that the finish on it looks good.

 

[CoJ]

(That pic was before the wood was put in, obviously.)

 

[Mark Brown]

Hey, at least it doesn't look this bad lol



I did it myself, can you tell

.....ok, it was 5 years ago and I needed a hearth/landing pad for my stove to get certified so I banged that off in about 40 min while they did the chimney. It was temporary.... 5 years temporary... I swear lol
Someday.... someday I'll inset something nice.

 

[C.J.]

How about using some leftover pieces of wood to make a thin profiled piece of trim to cover the unsightly transition. At least it would match the wood. I think I would have picture framed the hearth myself but I suppose it still would have looked just as ugly with a picture frame. Do you really want it all torn out and done over or is there an acceptable bandaid that you would accept that could clean that up.

 

[C.J.]

Hey, at least it doesn't look this bad lol

View attachment 12760

I did it myself, can you tell

.....ok, it was 5 years ago and I needed a hearth/landing pad for my stove to get certified so I banged that off in about 40 min while they did the chimney. It was temporary.... 5 years temporary... I swear lol
Someday.... someday I'll inset something nice.

I put down patio pavers under my pellet stove. Just set them right on top of my hardwoods.

 

[CoJ]

How about using some leftover pieces of wood to make a thin profiled piece of trim to cover the unsightly transition. At least it would match the wood. I think I would have picture framed the hearth myself but I suppose it still would have looked just as ugly with a picture frame. Do you really want it all torn out and done over or is there an acceptable bandaid that you would accept that could clean that up.

Yeah I thought about that. Another thought I had was to take a router with a 1/8” bit and go around the edge so the gap is even and then grout or caulk around it to kind of hide the edge a little.

 

[C.J.]

The idea sounds good but that’s gonna be a bitch to do without gouging into the schluter or wandering off into the wood. How about taking a multi tool and cutting down between the tile and schluter to remove the visible part of the schluter. Now you have your gap that you can caulk. Hot glue some wood strips on top of the tile flush with the edge of the tile and now you have a bearing guide for a router bit to follow. That will then clean up the wood edge but most bits I’ve seen with bearings are gonna be at least 1/4”. That’s a big gap. I suppose you could set the wood strips back and run the edge of the router base against them. Just make sure your bit doesn’t touch the tile anywhere and that could get you a minimal gap. 1/8” but with 1/16” of fluff room for a 3/16” gap.

 

[C.J.]

Come to think of it a slight gap between the wood and tile is prolly a good idea. If you use that wood stove at all you prolly already know that wood will grow and shrink depending on usage and the seasons. A caulked gap can be touched up when movement happens. A T-mold type of something that would just cover that mess would hide any movement and wouldn’t require any touch up when movement does happen. If you have any leftover wood you could rip pieces down to say 1” or 3/4” wide then rip or plane those pieces down to 1/8” thick. It’s a different look than what you’re wanting but it would be trouble free if those pieces were properly adhered to the tile so the hardwood floor could freely move.

 

[CoJ]

Thanks everyone. Really appreciate the input. I'm glad to hear that I'm not just being overly picky, which is what I feel the owner of this company seems to think...

 

[C.J.]

I don’t think you’re being overly picky but I also think what you want is not what the average customer gets. Sadly I would say a T-mold is SOP in that situation unless you went to a high end shop that is capable of producing quality results on a daily basis. Sucks but that’s just how things are now.

 

[CoJ]

This place advertises themselves as a high end shop. That's why I'm so ticked off!

 

[C.J.]

This place advertises themselves as a high end shop. That's why I'm so ticked off!

Fair enough. I used to work for a guy who was a certified master Forbo mechanic and had multiple write ups in the paper over the years. He ended up doing Home Depot work and had a 1 star, maybe 2 but not likely, rating because he subbed work out to crappy subs. Things can certainly change over time.

You got money and he wants it. Chances are he will come around. Don’t know if that’s worth $500 but that’s certainly a good place to start from especially when you take into consideration things like grout on the ceiling and anything else. Make a nice presentable file with facts and pictures n such and give it to him when he comes around asking for the final payment. Then let the negotiations begin.

 

[CoJ]

Yeah, that's the plan. I called him the other day and told him I wasn't happy. Now, he has not even seen the final work and I didn't even show him the pictures yet and he already immediately got defensive and said he thinks we probably just have a difference of opinion.

One of his employees, the field manager, told me on the phone that "we do have guys that we work with that would give you the kind of craftsmanship that you're talking about but we don't really use them on these small jobs. If you were doing a million dollar job it would be a different story."

I mean, I get it, I don't live in Beverly Hills and my house ain't a mansion but damn. I am willing to pay for quality!

 

[C.J.]

Thing is you don’t have to live in a mansion in Beverly Hills to have a million dollar house these days. Small jobs definitely get looked at differently. They’re often seen as an inconvenience that doesn’t pay much so they don’t get treated with the same respect that a big job in a fancy house would.

 

[Mark Brown]

Thing is you don’t have to live in a mansion in Beverly Hills to have a million dollar house these days. Small jobs definitely get looked at differently. They’re often seen as an inconvenience that doesn’t pay much so they don’t get treated with the same respect that a big job in a fancy house would.

Can't stand that mentality. Everything you touch should be the best you can do, even of the best you can do is still shabby given what you have to work with

 

[Mark Brown]

Just for clarity sake... I dont think your post refers to you at all Chris and neither does mine

 

[C.J.]

I got what you meant. Sadly many installers don’t care. The fact that this job was broken up to smaller bits with multiple crews didn’t help either. If the tile guys were the same guys doing the hardwood they likely would have taken more care because they would know that they would be the ones having to match up the wood to the tile.

I got a big job I’m starting next week that I went and looked at Friday. It’s all ready to go I’m told. Somebody else has already prepped it but something happened and they had to bail. Should be a slam dunk. Go get em. Guess what? It ain’t ready and it’s certainly not prepped. This is what other guys are doing these days and they’re getting paid for it

 

[Mark Brown]

Well that sure is something to see.

Makes those fire place cuts look amazing lol

 

[C.J.]

Well that sure is something to see.

Makes those fire place cuts look amazing lol

Yeah. I got all the time in the world though. Cabinets aren’t being installed until November and the house is empty cus the ladies that own it are currently up in Canada by you. You know them, Mark. I’ll start prepping it Monday and lay what I can while leaving the kitchen undone. Prolly be there a couple weeks.

 

[zannej]

CoJ, I hope you have documented *everything*. Pics of glue spots, Kept receipts for the paint, sandpaper, and everything you had to use to clean up the mess. If you have a reddit account, I would out them there (if you're allowed to). Post about how sloppy they are and how dismissive they are about their shoddy work. I would be very unhappy with the way they are acting. I don't care if it's not a million dollar job- it was still 10s of thousands of dollars in reno. Tiles should not be cracking from a candlestick falling. Something is very wrong there. The suggestion of bouncing a golf ball made me worry more tiles would crack.
I would not be happy if I was being charged that much for a reno and got that quality-- or lack thereof- of work. The fact that you had to clean up their messes and repaint is a big red flag.
This sounds like something that would wind up on one of those court programs on TV.
I wish you the best of luck on getting this resolved and hope to hear updates.