6.4.2015

The day started off with a call from the concrete contractor.  The forecast for tomorrow shows the possibility of a shower in the afternoon or evening - still too much of a risk.  It's still a bit cooler than normal which, combined with pouring on a steel deck, will allow the concrete to cure slower so an evening shower could still cause damage.  Thankfully, the contractor called and was hesitant so it's not just Jim canceling each time.  He'll call Monday and see when the pumper truck is available and how the forecast looks for next week.  Sigh....

Meanwhile, Jim is pressing forward getting ready for masonry - which is very exciting!  So much of the work done lately has been shoring - which will have to be taken apart.  Nice to be doing things that will be permanently part of the building!

He first started with the laser level, making sure everything is straight and marking lines.  If you look closely at the bottom brick ledge, you'll see there is a 2" line.  This is because the ICFs are 18" tall, so that's the height of each step.  However, the bricks are 4".  Jim will be able to get a much nicer look by using 2" of block at the bottom and then using brick.

That means that he has to cut some of the blocks he cut yesterday in half.

He just put the bricks on the ledge to dry and to see how many he needs.  While Jim was doing the cutting, I was working around the side, scraping the bottoms of the brick ledges, getting rid of the cement droppings from pours and making them flat.

Jim was thrilled that he was able to lift a cube of bricks with the forks on the Bobcat!  He thought it was going to be too much weight and we would have to do a lot of hand moving, but it worked perfectly.

He moved the cube around to the back of the building to wait to be used!

We covered up not only the saw, but the stacks of block too to keep too much moisture out of them.

Then Jim went up to the top and brought down the mortar mixer.  He was debating on whether to use this or the pumpkin on the Bobcat - he said this works a bit better but it is harder to clean when you're done.

Although Jim started it occasionally, it hasn't been ran or used in quite awhile.  I ran up and got some new gas and after a few pulls, it started right up.  That's good news!

Now that we don't have a firm date to pour concrete, Jim is starting to get a little concerned about the Pex being exposed to the sunlight.  We decided to grab our bags of plastic that covered the ICFs (yes, we save everything - and it's a good thing!) and see if we could cover up the Pex.  Jim decided to use cable ties to tie the plastic to the wire to hold it in place.

We got about a third done.  We're going to explore some other wrap options too but at least we got the first Pex that we installed all covered up.

 

High 70/Low 53