… I conquered my fear. What a great feeling.
I read the manual one more time and watched more YouTube videos of circular sawing and cutting down pre-fab countertops. I made a phone call when I needed help to attach the blade. I had bought a scrap length of countertop for practice, and after a couple of cuts on plain boards I measured off 2 inches on the underside of the dummy countertop and marked the line with a square. I drew a parallel line 1 inch from the first line and half-nailed a straight board along that line to use as a guide, being careful not to nail too deeply and pierce the surface of the material.
On the front side I ran a strip of masking tape along the saw line as I saw on YouTube.
I set the depth adjustment to 1 inch for the 3/4 inch countertop plus 1/4. I put on safety glasses. Then I made the cut.
Not perfect — I snagged up a bit on the thicker area — but it’s pretty good.
An unexpected hazard was the slippery sawdust on the shiny tile floor.
Then I cut off an 18-inch section from the practice countertop and covered the single cabinet that I had removed from the row to make room for a dishwasher. I’ll place that cabinet as a standalone next to the frig.
Even having made that successful cut, I’m not fully confidant I can do my own countertops — I still haven’t tried to cut out a hole for the sink, still haven’t applied an end cap to the raw edge — but I’ve opened a huge log jam.
Difference in cost between doing my own countertop compared with ordering a pre-made and having it installed:
– I paid $80 for the first piece of countertop I plan to install, from a countertop manufacturer that went out of business near my home. They’re selling off inventory at $5-$10 per linear foot. A similar piece of unfinished countertop at Lowes is about $120 – $200, plus $20 delivery. I paid a kid about $10 to deliver it as part of an all-day delivery job that involved lots of items.
– A contractor would have charged at least $100, maybe more, to unhook the sink, make the cuts and install the counter.
– In either case I have to buy an end cap, about $19 at Lowes, which bring my countertop to $104 compared with at least $259 retail.
– By further comparison, the wonderful local lumber yard in my town would have built me a custom counter with end cap and cut the sink hole for $25- $27 per linear foot plus $5 delivery, or about $243, not including installation but that would have been pretty easy with the whole thing built. I plan to pay a plumber to reattach the sink in any case. I would have preferred to give the business to my lumber yard and I’d have no doubts about the quality and durability, but unfortunately I’m not in a position right now to support anyone but myself. That’s one of the many ways Walmart and Lowe’s continue to kill local businesses — customers are so concerned about their own survival they can’t consider the real cost of buying the cheapest thing.