Having come to terms with the water damage done to our waiting to be assembled flat pack kitchen fitments and various pieces of furniture in the flood and mud debacle it was time to move on.
The first stage was to asses the level of the damage involved. This meant unwrapping every single mud covered package and assessing the contents for irreplaceable damage.
As is the nature of flat pack units all the major components were made from chipboard or hardboard. I have always wondered at the wisdom of this considering a kitchen can easily be subject to water spillage and that both chipboard and hardboard react by "blowing" wherever cut edges are exposed to damp.
When all the flat packs were delivered I carefully sorted and arranged them in like with like groupings and, given the vast number of packages, arranged then in "vertical" groups. In the case of the 8 x 2.4m lengths on work surface, because of their weight, I left them where the delivery men had put them. i.e. leaning on a long edge against the wall. It is obvious where this going.
Yes, correct, all the worktops and cabinet/drawer components were "blown" and unusable. A new order was put into IKEA.
With all these damaged flat pack components taking up valuable space I set about sawing off all the damaged material and now have an excellent supply of chipboard in many varied sizes. The work surfaces still remain to be dealt with as I need some help to set them up for sawing. They should make an excellent set of shelves somewhere.
Slowly the kitchen and scullery are taking shape. The gas hob is installed and connected to the gas cylinder that, due to planning regulations is housed in the adjoining store room. A gas detector is installed to automatically shut off gas in case of leakage. The washing machine, which I temporally plumbed in previously (to meet demand!!) is now fully integrated.
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| View from local recycling bin!! |
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| The first set of kitchen units assembled and in place. |
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| Progress on the scullery units with priority given to installing the gas cooking hob and the washing machine! |
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| View of scullery units from main room. |
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| The island units roughly positioned to check how work out in practice before finally fixing. Note polythene sheeting used to protect cabinets from any water ingress until vents proven to be watertight. Once bitten twice shy!! |
