http://s58.photobucket.com/albums/g267/d_roady/DIY Soapstone/

Some teaser images:

Various parts of my story in progress have been posted in other threads, but I'll try to mention some key points here.
We were very interested in keeping cost down, so the DIY option with soapstone was wonderful to discover. A quality granite or Silestone install would have been triple the cost.
We went to M. Teixeira in N.J. and picked our slabs. If I had it to do over I would NOT have chosen two side by side slabs. The vein patterns are too similar and end up repeating each other in our kitchen. Out of 4-5 side by side slabs I'd take the 1st and last, for example.
When planning how the slabs will be cut, I'd suggest the backsplash pieces be taken from exactly the same spot as the counter they will sit on later, so that the veins and everything match.
Black epoxy was best for 99% of the seams in our install, but where it crossed a white vein I had to make some corrections - digging the black out with a Dremel and replacing with "Instant Install 29" epoxy, which cures to a translucent white. The Instant Install 29 is great to work with, 14 minute working time and then it suddenly hardens up, locking things into place. You can sand it 15 minutes later (thus the name, 14+15=29). It can be tinted to match the stone too. 5 minute epoxies are too fast for big seams I think.
Make sure your cabinet tops are a perfectly even plain, 6' long levels help. Shim any and all gaps - none of mine were more than 1/16". Then get a bead of caulk on the cabinet tops before resting the stone on them. This just makes for perfectly even support all around. We used bottle jacks to lift the stone up a few inches, caulk under it, then set it back down gently.
Doing the caulk and a seam at the same time is daunting, but the caulk has a long setup time, so it works out OK. You can slide the stone over an inch to close the seam after buttering on the epoxy. Jam it as tight as possible to make a thin seam. Most important for a good looking seam is to have the two stones perfectly aligned - any height difference will have to be fixed by sanding one down to match the other.
Diamond cutting and shaping tools are great. They cut the harder parts of the stone just as well as the soft parts, which makes for nice straight lines and even surfaces. A diamond grit drum on an angle grinder is great for shaping the edge of a sink cutout, for example. Regular sandpaper drums don't do as well.
The dust from cutting and shaping is amazing, wait till it's warm and do as much outside as possible. If you can't, like me, then get a good fine particle dust filter for your shop-vac and always attach a collection hose to the tool, or have someone hold the hose right at your cut. It makes a huge difference.
When cutting you need to support the stone underneath, so it won't fall away and break off before the cut is done. I had 1/2" thick styrofoam sheets available, but thick rubber mats from Costco would work too. The photo album shows a good example of this in practice.
For final sanding I tried a million things. What worked best on the flat areas (to clean up seams) was a 5" wet sanding pad on a dual action polisher at its lowest speed. I used a Porter-Cable 7336. Sanding pads were 240 and 400 grit. For a backer pad I used a flexible one made for car buffing, rigid pads were too hard to handle. For product specifics, see my other post on this topic. Edges can be sanded with a good hand block and wet sandpaper. The highest grit with any benefit I found to be 400. Others may stop at 220 or 340 - just a matter of preference.
I feel like there's a million things to say but this has rambled on enough. Happy to answer questions and add details in follow up posts. But if you're looking for tips, please do check out the full Photo bucket album. There's 80 images covering every step of the way.

Thanks again everyone and happy Easter!
Don

Looks perfectly yummy!

I'm going to save your tips. With three bathrooms to do still, maybe one of them will be getting soapstone! :>)

I just love soapstone.

- D

http://picasaweb.google.com/CounterStoneCreations/Soapstone/photo#5075 592297174900290

- D

What a fabulous source of info for the DIY set here. You have paid back in spades!

Enjoy your beautiful space, and thanks so much for sharing it with us.

You and your DW should be very, VERY proud of your vision, and your ability to execute it! I think there are pros who would envy you. Congratulations!

Gorgeous job on Piracema and that backsplash takes your breath away - I've never seen anything like it!! Amazing work, not only on the soapstone, but on the documentation of it all as well. Your info is going to be referenced frequently. Thank you for that.

Bravo. Very nice.

Patti

I am totally blown away! Those window sills/backsplashes are amazing! It looks like once the "have to" stuff of the counters was done, and you had extra material, you really began to have fun with the stone.

This is a great example of how a DIY job will include great time and effort to do better than the average "granite guy" would probably do (note: I said "average." I know that granite guys with high standards--like Kevin--can do fabulous soapstone installations.)

You so-called bad seam is every bit as good (or better) as my professional seam.

Such a great job! Jack is very lucky to have a husband like you!!

Now I'm wondering what the timeline is for getting the garage clean again. When my husband tackles a project, it typically takes at least twice as long to do the clean-up as it did to do the actual job.

:-)

Francy

jscout, no problem. I'd insert a joke about DW's cooking and the 'tombstone' look but it would be too far off base - she's really quite talented. Actually we played with many shapes and heights, really agonized over it, and that came out the winner. Part of the problem is that the range opening isn't quite centered under that hood, so going higher, square or closer to the upper cabinets made the misalignment very obvious to the eye. That curve doesn't. Making it shorter would sacrifice too much of that vein. It's all a compromise!

- D

Is it too tacky to ask about the final price tag on a job like this? I'm starting to get some quotes in from fabricators, but I'm just curious to see how it all breaks down compared to a DIY job....except that I can see my DH having a heart attack if I even mentioned this alternative seriously to him.

- D

Your counters are a work of art.

- D

Here is something fun to do with scraps: my little boys LOVE LOVE LOVE to paint on them with water. They can make great designs, and then when it evaporates, they start over. Only problem is the weight of this "paint stone." Mine is about 30lbs. I wish I could get a thinner slab.

Francy

- D

Many, many thanks. And again, well done on a really beautiful job.

- D

Thanks so much for sharing your experience and expertise.

Beatrice

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I've only done two full oilings so far, about 2 weeks apart. The 2nd one is 2 weeks old now too, come to think of it. It has settled in to a nice balance of dark and light. When freshly oiled a lot of the stone's interesting details get lost. A week or more later it looks better. It'll probably be another week before I do it again, more out of convenience than because it's gone too light.
I found bee's oil too difficult to be worth the effort and just use a light butcher's block mineral oil from Williams-Sonoma. The heavy drug store stuff was kinda tough to spread around too but may have more holding power.
So far we have no problems with scratches and have pretty much stopped worrying about it. No suprises or regrets!

I hope your install went well, we were away on vacation so I'm just now getting back to GW.

- D

Enjoy your beautiful countertops and thanks again for your business.

Thanks Roger, and kidding or not, no I don't want a job. I work too slow to make a living at it!

- D

BTW: soapstone makes great baking stones too. If you have a veinless chunk, round it off and use it for baking bread or pizza. You might be able to make enough trivets and pizza stones out of the scrap to pay for the countertops.