7.7.2015 - No More Shoring!

On and off rain was forecast for the day and unfortunately Jim kept getting his work interrupted.  He said he moved his tools in and out of the truck 3 different times because of showers this morning!  It's always a scramble and the saw he is using to cut the steel is kind of heavy.

But he managed to get some work done and finished another corner with nailer.  Check out the accuracy of this corner - a perfect 90 degrees!

He finally decided to just work downstairs - of course, that's when the sun came out!  But we worked on taking apart more shoring.  This is the last tower being lowered from the deck.

Then the only thing holding up the deck was the shoring posts.  He had to loosen the plywood wall by the auto bay to get one out.  Then the middle ones required beating with a hammer to loosen them.  He did it very methodically as to keep the same load - so he moved one a little bit, went to the next, and so on for all 4 posts.

This was really a workout!

But finally the posts are all loosened up and are starting to come down!

The first...

Second....

Third...

And the final one!

After all this time - no posts!  Jim was so relieved that everything seemed stable and didn't sag after the post removal.  Quite the time for celebrating!  The area looks so big now with everything gone.

It started to rain again so we figured this was a good time to return the posts.  So Jim loaded them into the car and we headed down to Albany.

 

High 79/Low 68

 

7.6.2015

Today Jim worked on window frames.  As I said, unfortunately this isn't as easy as it would be with wood.  If you look closely at this picture, you can see that Jim made a track at the bottom of the header with a piece that goes across the studs to provide structural support.  Then he had to install a track and a stud back to back to form a box structure.

We figured out where we wanted the window to go - we definitely wanted to be able to look out onto our gorgeous woods!  Then Jim had to come up with a plan for the bottom support for the window...

 

...as well as the top support.

 



 

Fastening everything together.  I told Jim that it looks like a piece of art - Jim said it's constructed almost like a piece of furniture!  The first one is always the hardest - this is all new territory and everything has to be figured out before it can be built.

 



 

We also worked in the ground floor taking down more shoring.  This is the last stringer to come down for this tower.

 



Three towers are completely down!  Two others are almost ready to come down and we started on the last one.  It's amazing how big the space looks with shoring out of the way!

 

Jim figured out what cold-formed steel he needed to do the rest of the windows now that he has a plan.  We also needed more studs because we need to finish our last adjustments because of the concrete - there are a few that Jim decided would be best fixed by putting in new studs cut to the right size.  So that order is placed and should be in tomorrow or Wednesday.

 

We also got a call that our garage doors are in and will be delivered Thursday!  There's so much going on right now - Jim keeps saying he could go in so many different directions right now.  It's all exciting!

High 82/Low 64

 

 

 

7.5.2015

Jim worked for quite a while coming up with a header for the windows that he liked.  This is one of those circumstances that would be much easier doing with wood! 

Installing the header...

All three window headers are in place!

Then it's time to work on the door opening...

Meanwhile, I was working on taking apart more shoring pieces.  Here Jim is taking the middle shoring pieces out from the scaffolding.

These two middle scaffolding towers are pretty empty now and Jim has loosened them from the beams on top.

 

High 80/Low 58

 

7.4.2015 - Happy Independence Day!

Happy 4th of July to everyone!  Hope your weather was good for parades, cookouts, or whatever you decided to do!  We decided to do what we love - work on the carriage house!

It drizzled rain most of the day so we worked in the ground floor taking apart shoring.  It's so nice - now when it rains, we still have a dry space to work!

The first shoring post is coming down!

Good thing Jim has two drills - we kept them both busy taking apart shoring.  Jim has to do it in very specific orders.  Then I also worked on taking apart some of the cold-formed steel pieces while Jim was doing the bulk of the removal.

The last piece of scaffolding is taken down and the first tower is gone!  The deck is now supporting itself!

We got two scaffolding towers completely down and the third one about half done!  The space looks so big and open - very exciting!

 

High 68/Low 56

 

7.3.2015

Jim designed and then had Bryan make these brackets to be used for the trusses - Jim painted one side of them this morning.  Thanks, Bryan!

Jim got me started on taking apart a little bit of the shoring this morning because he needed some of the trusses - very exciting!  But it's a crazy puzzle to take down even.  Everything has to be taken down in a certain order because all of the shoring is under load from the concrete right now. 



Jim loosened up the side piece a little so that we could work on some of the middle shoring pieces.

One of the big vertical pieces coming down!

While I was up on the scaffolding working on unscrewing, Jim had me try to actually screw on in.  As hard as I tried, I couldn't screw even one in!  Certainly gave me even a greater appreciation for all the work Jim did on the shoring as well as all he is doing on the framing - not an easy task!  Unscrewing them is much easier!

Which led to my next task - taking apart some of the shoring pieces so that Jim could reuse the studs in the framing.

The afternoon was spent working on getting the studs all to the right height - such a tedious and time consuming task.  One that shouldn't have had to be done if the concrete job had been done better.  But we have to move on.

Here Jim is cutting shims to add height to those studs that need it. 

Of course, adding shims requires taking the top apart again, measuring and then putting everything back together again.

We got almost all of the redo work accomplished - just a few more to work on tomorrow.  Since Jim had been working in this corner, he decided to put the nailer piece in.  This piece of steel basically brings the corner to the same plane so that there is something to attach the drywall to when it's time for that.

Nailer all in - kind of hard to tell but now the back wall is all on the same plane.

At the end of the day, Jim wanted to see how the strapping would work out.  These pieces will be attached to gusset plates and provide stabilization.  The sheathing will go on the outside of the strapping.  For now, Jim just put it up temporarily.  He will probably want to actually put it together from the outside which will require scaffolding.

 

High 75/Low 53

 

 

 

7.2.2025

Yesterday was another on/off rainy day.  I ran errands in the morning and Jim did some planning and cutting pieces of steel that he will use later on.  Just a few of the pieces he cut...

This is a piece of blocking he made from cold-formed steel that will go in between the trusses to get everything at the same level.



Then this morning, Jim's Nudura rep came from New Hampshire to bring Jim a sample of the foam that we will use for the ground floor concrete and radiant heat system.  This is basically like the Lego boards that the kids used to build their Lego creations.  Obviously, the Nudura system was designed by men who loved their Legos!

But this will be a great system - we will get the floor ready with gravel and then these foam boards (they come in 4' x 4' pieces) lay on top of the gravel and the Pex tubing winds around the little knobs.  So no tying! 

 

But the rep stayed and talked for quite awhile.  Then, for the first time ever, our apartment landlord stopped by to see the building.  It actually worked out nice - he was very impressed and told Jim to let him know if he needed a hand.  Jim will need another man to help with the truss installation so he might help out with that.

So, even though the morning was valuable, we weren't really able to do any work.  So while we ate lunch, we drove to the cold-formed steel place to pick up a few more pieces and some strapping that Jim had ordered at the beginning of the week.

After we got back, our first task was to finish fastening the bottom plates to the concrete all the way around. 

Then, it was time to figure out what we needed to do to fix the unevenness of the concrete.  First, Jim set up the laser level on the work table.  I took the hand-held laser and marked that location on every one of the studs so that we had a level reference all the way around the building.  Then we measured down from the top track to the mark that I made and made a different colored line - that way we knew how high/low the concrete was at every stud point.  We marked each stud either with a check mark that it was okay, an S for too low and needs a shim, or an X and how much we needed to cut off that stud because it was too high.  While this was a very daunting task, once we got going, we came up with what needed to be done and how to fix it.

Jim taking down a stud to trim the top.

Even figuring out the best way to trim just a tiny piece of steel off wasn't real easy.  Jim finally got his abrasive saw blade instead of the actual cutting one and was able to go slow and get a good cut.

Then installing the stud back into place. 

 

I had to run to Lowe's to pick up another couple of saw blades. While I was gone, Jim cut some of the steel strapping to make shims for the areas that were a little low and that worked well.  We will be ready to hit this project full speed tomorrow morning. 

 

We had promised ourselves that once the concrete was poured, we would celebrate with a beer and nachos.  We did go out to eat and celebrate when Kyle and Julia were here, but tonight was nacho night.  It was fun to sit and talk about all we've accomplished and the next steps to come!

 

High 76/Low 50