Tearing out old countertops before the new ones go in

Two people and a long morning clear most kitchen runs, and the order of the morning matters more than the strength of the people, as the notes at countertop installation austin tns media group describe. Tear-out is the first half of any countertop job in Austin, TX, and a careless start leaves gouged drywall and cracked cabinet frames that the new top then has to hide.

Water off before anything else

The first move is under the sink. The angle stops get closed, the supply lines are cracked loose over a bucket, and the drain trap comes off. In the older bungalows of Hyde Park and Clarksville the stops are often original and seized, and a crew that forces one can snap the supply pipe inside the wall. A stop that will not turn gets a plumber's visit before the day goes any further.

Cutting the top loose

Every top is held three ways: caulk at the wall, adhesive or screws to the cabinets, and its own weight. A utility knife opens the caulk line along the backsplash. Then the crew goes under the cabinet frames and looks for the screws that run up through the corner blocks. Laminate and solid surface tops usually come off once those are out. A granite slab or a quartz slab needs the same screws removed, plus a thin pry bar and wood wedges worked along the seam so the slab lifts evenly and does not snap at the sink cutout.

Heavy stone comes out in pieces or not at all

An old granite top over an undermount sink is the hard case. The sink is glued to the underside, and the stone around the opening is the thinnest, weakest part of the whole top. Crews score it, support it from below, and lift with two or three people. Marble and soapstone chip at the edge profile if they are dragged, so they are carried, never slid.

What the cabinets look like underneath

The cabinet tops are the surface the new slab will sit on, and the removal exposes every old problem. A butcher block top that stayed damp around the faucet leaves swollen particleboard in the sink base. Houses near Zilker and Barton Springs sometimes show sagging runs where a cabinet has dropped a quarter inch from its neighbour. All of that is easier to find on tear-out day than on install day.

Walls, backsplash and the template

Removing the old top often pulls the paper face off the drywall behind it. A crew marks that damage before the new template is cut, because a digital template reads the wall as it stands, and a patched wall reads differently from the one the first measure saw. A scrap remnant of the old laminate or tile is useful for one thing only: checking the height of the old top against the new one, since a thicker slab changes where the dishwasher sits.