10.17.2014

Yesterday was forecast to be a 100% rain day.  But in typical mountain style, it had rained overnight and a little in the morning but then was just cloudy and dry the rest of the day.  However, because Jim had been driving the Bobcat over and over inside the site, it was pretty muddy from the overnight rain.  So it turned into an errand and project management day.  In the evening, we went to a special Carhartt sale they were having at a nearby store and got Jim stocked up with some inclement weather gear.  He had a pair of off-brand insulated coveralls that got him through the building of the last house, but they had more holes in them than not - they had definitely served their purpose.  So as much as I hope he won't be working in too much cold weather, at least he will be warm if he does!

When I got to the land today, Jim had cut the remaining pieces for the decking section we had been working on and had lifted those pieces up onto the deck.

 

That meant that it was welding time again.  Here's Jim welding the last section of decking.

The last two pieces had to be fastened down to the wall so he had to drill holes into the cement and then put the anchors in.

After that section was all finished, Jim decided to do the smaller section.  These pieces are shorter but they are heavier gauge steel so they are heavier and make punching the holes harder.  Plus this is the stairwell - so the decking only goes over part of the area.  Making sure that everything was in the right place was critical so Jim spent time going over everything and deciding the best way to do it.

Only Jim could look so calm kneeling on the edge of a wall ten feet into the air and trying to punch holes in thick metal!

Back to cutting the next pieces...

This piece had to be cut lengthwise in order to have the decking end up to be the right size for the stairwell.

Grinding the beam and getting everything ready for installing.

More drilling into the wall for these sections.

It was getting to be late - dark falls a little quicker now and we have to make sure we have enough light to clean everything up, which takes awhile.  However, we only had this last piece to go and since the welder and everything was in place, we decided to go ahead and put it up.

 

 

The last touches on the last piece on this section!  That is a big area that we have decking on now - looks really amazing!