Help! Our granite was installed on Friday are the seams do not line up as on the template, there is a chip in the island, and then tonight we notice a crack. Our kitchen designer was defensive ,and the granite fabricator has not responded yet. They are supposed to be here tomorrow to template the bathroom. Everything was paid for in advance. My husband is flipping out. I don’t think there is much to be done for the seam as I think replacing the slab will just be worse, but I’m super concerned about the crack in the island slab. It doesn’t seem to go all the way through so maybe it’s superficial and can be fixed? My big fear is that we’ll damage the cabinets if we try to replace the slab but I also don’t want to risk the whole slab cracking. Any suggestions???
Wow, pre-paying everything in advance would be a huuuge red flag to me! We have done a fair number of projects, and every time the final payment (35% to 50%) was due upon the completion. That said, try to work with the designer first. A crack and a chip is not acceptable IMO. Be polite, don’t sound panicked,
be persistent and firm. You need this fixed. And the seams not aligning. Ugh. I would ask for that fixed, do. Cabinets are not going to be damaged if the top is replaced. People do it all the time.
Granite can be repaired but flaws in the first few days are not acceptable. This all seems like installer issues.
I hope you paid by credit card. That way at least you’ll have a little leverage on payment.
There is always small claims court… as the last resort. Photos of cracked and terribly installed granite are not going to impress any judge… judges have kitchens, too. 
How bad is the seam placement? Do you mean the seams aren’t where you expected on the counter (based on the template) or the pattern doesn’t line up?
Is the material granite? Granite should not have natural cracks. But other natural stones, such as quartzite or marble, does come with natural small long fissures that look like cracks but are an expected part of the natural stone. If you have a fancy granite with quartz in the natural material you might have fissures that look like cracks.
Granite guys usually put seams wherever they want, no matter what you ask. They do this because they have to work with the amount of material they have. If you prepaid for granite for the kitchen ( meaning you just said I want X granite and you didn’t select the slab yourself), AND you were standing there when they measured AND you specified where you wanted the seam, then you have a case. If you went to a slab yard and picked out your own slab, it might be an issue that the slab had broken corners, etc and they had to get it cut the best they could.
If the issue is that the pattern doesn’t match across the seam and the seam is really obvious because the two pieces don’t match, this is pretty common. Especially with a busy pattern.
Is the chip in the bullnose? In the cut seam, at a cut end? That would be an issue with the fabricator workmanship. Chip in the middle of a run of countertop was either already in the slab (issue if you picked the slab yourself) or got dinged in transit.
First off, thank you for all of your replies!
The granite fabricator is supposed to be a high end company that often works with our kitchen designer. We did pick our actually slab at the stone yard, stayed for templating, and approved said template.
I don’t mind the location of the seam, but the pattern was supposed to align better. (We weren’t expecting perfect because of the movement). Very possible that that they had to trim along that edge for some reason but I would have liked a heads up since it isn’t what we approved.
I did hear from our sales person first thing this morning and she thinks the crack is a natural fissure as well as it’s a quartzite stone but they are going to come out and check. The chip in the middle of a slab and is very shallow so should be easily buffed out. They are coming this morning.
And finally, yes, we did pay with a credit card. 1/2 was due when ordering and the other 1/2 when they cut the stone. In retrospect, we should have asked to hold some back until after install but hopefully they’ll make it right.
I will give a report back! Thanks again.
Update - the granite fabricator was awesome. Much better than our kitchen designer! They are sending their restoration specialist out tomorrow and the “crack” is indeed a natural fissure that will be re-buffed out and sealed, as will the small surface chip. No issue with stone integrity/strength at all and both are easy “fixes”. The seam is a different story and they agree that it doesn’t match the template. He took a bunch of pictures and they are going to see what other slabs they have in the stone yard that may better align. They can possibly remove and reinstall the smaller section of stone but it depends on what they have in the stone yard. I definitely don’t want to make it any worse.
I wish our kitchen designer would have stayed out of the middle and had us deal directly with the granite fabricator because they were much, much more professional. The designer did an amazing job with the cabinets, layout, design but his customer service skills are very much lacking.
Happy for you problems appear to be solved satisfactory.
We never ever pay balance until all work is done and punch list is completed.
It’s also one of the reason everything is purchased through our contractor. Also, our project manager is the person who deals directly with all the suppliers if there is any issue.
Even when a seal on a 10 year old window failed last year - my contractor contacted the manufacturer, arranged for new window and took care of replacing the window with no cost to us.
Our contractor is definitely not as “hands on” as we’d like. Live and learn. Hopefully it will all look great and be correct when it’s finally done. We don’t make our last payment to him until the punch list is totally completed. He just wanted us to work directly with some of the vendors. Would have been better/easier to just have him as the point person for everyone.
How these things happen, eh? After almost four months, they finished painting, nice job and I’m past obsessing. Thurs, the hot water heater got installed, Fri the gas co installed the meter and turned on the WH. Today, the asbestos wrapping was removed fro the basement pipes and the boiler removed. (More cute guys.)
So I smelled oil and figured it was some little drip, a sniffle of sorts. Residual. Tonight, after putting out the dog, I decided to check. Yup, the feeder hose from the tank to the former boiler has been dripping oil for 12 hours. The asbestos guys either didn’t shut the valve off or not completely. Nice slick on the concrete floor, not that big, but hey. I turned the valve to the right, put the end piece in a bucket and texted the plumber. Midnight.
She answered. Coming tomorrow. But she says some valves turn off left, not right, check again. Luckily, there’s only a teeny ribbon of oil in the bucket. Sent her a pic. She thinks we’re ok for tonight.
But, Hey! Dang! After this home improvement, I need some improvement.
Fits and stops. If you look at my posting history you’ll see we missed our mark again. The marble counters were supposed to be installed last Wednesday (and the gas range was to be connected the same day). Nope. The marble cracked near the sink hole. A second attempt did the same. Today I’m visiting the fabricator, with the designer, to come up with something that will work.
I’m trying not to “vent” at the designer, but I reminded her that from the beginning I said that I didn’t want a farm sink, but I would accept one if it minimized seams. She assured me an under mount sink wouldn’t be a problem, but it is.
I’ve asked her to come up with info this morning on converting to a farmhouse sink, including what we’d need to do to modify the sink base. I really don’t want to spend more money and feel this one should land on her, but somehow it won’t.
Paint: the contractor painted the kitchen and dining room and “my” painter arrived yesterday, on schedule. He should be done tomorrow.
Kitchen, dining room, and living room: BM Seapearl OC-19
Hall, upstairs hall. Family room: Milky Way OC-110
Curved Stairway Wall: Guilford Green HC-116
All trim: Simply White
We are adding all new door hardware as the painter finishes.
Tomorrow we also meet with the faux painter to consider whether she will strie one wall in the water closet. More importantly, we need her to change the finish on the Hinkley Fulton light fixture
The bronze is too dark, we need more of a champagne tone in the middle of this fixture.
Aiming for optimism and results… til next posting!
Goodness. Hugs, it is no fun to live amongst construction mess! Hope it will be over soon.
After hearing your countertop stories, I am kind of glad we went with quartz. Install was a breeze.
I have quartz for our bathroom. I’m glad too!
We are 3 months into a reno that should have been over 2 weeks ago and easily has another month + left. I would never recommend to anyone living in a house that is being renovated. It was a terrible decision on our part!
Update: Our island scratch and fissure have been corrected and look great. The VP of the granite company was in touch todayl and they are going to try to replace the smaller piece of stone to better align the pattern at the seam or they will be giving us a credit. Tomorrow they will go through their stone inventory and try to see if they have something that will work or we’ll talk about the monetary compensation. The granite company has been much more reasonable and professional than the designer.
Glad to hear it is working out to your satisfaction!
Lol, one of the reasons I find BB’s posts interesting is they seem to go from (tough) DIY project to project with equanimity. (You go, girl!)
But the reality for many of us is, the longer these projects go, the more tense we become. Timelines slip, some prices go up, some things aren’t exactly as we envisioned, more final decisions fall on us. It feels like the big master vision is the hard part, but these delays and little things nickle and dime our fading energies. (My contractor asked me how high I wanted the towel bars placed. I said, what’s standard? He said, whatever you want. Like, WTH do I know? Do I have to google? The he asked how high I wanted the electrical sockets and it started all over.)
So we hit a wall. And one of momofsenior1’s walls was that dang countertop. So glad this worked out.
Toward the end of any project, I ask myself if some issue is a showstopper. A counter chip sure would be, for me. The towel bar height, not so much. It can always be moved, later. I don’t think the casing aroud the front door is a perfect paint job. But if we sell, I can have that part fixed (or do it myself.) If we stay, no one will notice. But it took me a lot time to get to this calmer point.
@lookingforward, an architect could tell you what is standard, and put it on the drawings, but there is a range. If you have big beach sized towels you might want them higher than normal. Or if you want two towel racks the upper one might be a bit on the high side so there is room for the lower one. There’s a book called Architectural Graphic Standards that has most of the normal standards. (Not sure if it has switch heights which is generally about 4 feet above the floor. Sockets tend to be a few inches above the baseboard, except in the kitchen or for special purposes (wall hung TVs and the like).
Project fatigue is definitely an issue. We are starting to feel it on our Cape House renovation. So many decisions to be made!
We have done major renovations before though, and expect things to take 50% or more longer and cost 50% more than the original budget. So it doesn’t come as a shock.
I always thought the “standard” (it’s not a code issue) was 48", but people put them where they like based on their height, what they’re used to, whether they want to stack two bars above each other, ceiling height, how it meshes with everything else in the room, etc.
There’s no code standard for height above the floor AFAIK. 16-18" is common, but I’ve seen houses with 12", and old houses (built before electricity and retro-fitted) with the outlets cut into the baseboard or even on the floor.
The best answer is usually “the same height as all the other outlets in the house”. The old-timers used to use their hammer as a ruler and install them at the top of one hammer height above the floor.