Thursday August 26, 2021
The view from the outhouse
I woke up about 3:30, just laying in bed making lists of all the things that need to happen to keep the addition to the asylum going. The Shell Hill cell tower is down so there is no phone or internet. It has to be refueled with a helicopter. Seems it runs out near the end of every month. It is 49 degrees and cloudy. Should warm up to about 60 this afternoon. Last week the low temp was 37, a bit cool for August. The river is pretty low right now. I expect it to come up when we remove part of the cabin roof to tie the addition in and the downpour begins. At least the mosquitoes are gone now. Rain is forecast this afternoon so I have a rain plan and a no rain plan when the crew gets here. I’ll pick up on the daily blow by blow to get caught up.
Let me back up a bit. Early June Rogers grandsons Keith and Landon arrived from Ohio to help for the summer. We made a trip to Sterling where our cabin neighbor has a steel fabricating shop. I drew all of the steel plates and brackets in AutoCAD and he cut them out on his plasma table. They were ready to be picked up. We swung by Seward on the way home, well not exactly on the way home but what is another 80 or 100 miles when you are on a road trip. We had something to eat and drove past the Sea Life Center along the bay. There were a lot more cars parked than I have seen before. Everyone was watching orcas doing what orcas do about 100 yards from the shore. No extra charge for the tour boys.
Sometime in here Cory Olson made it up the Alcan with 900 pounds of lag bolts to hold the metal plates and wood together. That’s a lot of screwing even for Kamala.
Wednesday June 23
Today we have a full crew, Roger, Cory, Keith, Landon, Kari, and yours truly. We framed more of the foundation walls and started getting them in place.
Thursday June 24
We finished the foundation walls and got the two beams in for the porch.
Friday June 25
We got the first outside wall up.
Saturday June 26
All 4 walls are up for the first floor
Wednesday June 30
Roger and I started to town for doctors appointments,but only made it as far as Bikini Beach when his boat overheated. We barely got cell service and contacted Kari to come and get us. We towed his boat back to his place where he changed the thermostat. The good news is my new planer arrived in the mail today. It made it to Northwoods Lodge and we picked it up on the dock there.
Thursday July 1
Kari and I set up Steve’s portable shelter to have a dry place to plane all the 1” lumber for the interior of the asylum.
Friday July Tooth
Cory, Kari, and I started cutting the boards to length and planing one side smooth. Then they were stacked and stickered to dry a little more. Roger and his grandsons have a cabin to stain so they won’t be available for a couple weeks.
Saturday July 3
Keep running the planers. There are stacks of boards left to plane.
Sunday July 4
The crew has the day off. Kari and kept working cleaning up around the sawmill and the planing shed. I can’t believe how much dust and chips we make.
Monday July 5
We are back to planing 1” lumber. 2 sometimes 3 machines going. It will take a lot to finish off the inside or the cabin.
Fast forward to
Wednesday July 14
Cory thinks that he, Kari, and I can set the post. I think he is just tired of the noise of the planers. Ok we will give it a try. Most of the posts are 6 x 10s 18 feet long. The corner post are 10 x 10. Might as well start with the big one just to see how tough we are. Cory cut a notch out of the overhang of the existing cabin for the post to fit in. First thing the post needs to be planed. I bought a real mans tool for the job. A Makita 312 twelve and a half inch power planer. It is the heaviest most expensive hand tool that I have ever owned. Let’s try it out to see how it works, it must weigh 60 pounds. We ran it down the post with the chips flying out the discharge chute. The finish is really smooth. Some sides of the post are extra rough and need multiple passes. We only need to plane 2 sides of this post since it is in the corner. The post was already on the Kubota forks so we wiggled as much of it as we could through the front door. I guess there was a reason the project manager didn’t want to build the interior walls yet. This chunk of wood is pretty heavy so we rigged up a way to get it most of the way up with a chain hoist mounted to the existing cabin rafters. It wasn’t too long and we had the first post secured in place. Film at 11. That wasn’t so bad let’s try the other corner. Repeat the above operation.
I think we put up one more 6 x 10 post for the day it is 40 percent smaller so we just lifted it up. I call it the arm strong method. We decided another young strong person would be helpful so Cory lined up a neighbor Liam Brion to help for a few days while Roger and his grandsons were still busy.
Thursday July 15
The work continues. Select a good straight post from the logs that we milled. Square the bottom end. Plane 3 sides now. Move it into place. Stand it up. Secure the post. 10 x 10 beams about 7 1/2 feet long go between the posts to support the second floor. They are almost harder to put up than the post. They are fastened to the post with a 1/4” gusset plate on each side. Each plate takes 14 half inch lag bolts. Probably more than needed but I don’t want it to fall down.
Friday July 16
Same thing today, post, beam, gusset. Repeat.
Saturday July 17
The posts and beams are all up and bolted in place. The bottoms of the post go through the floor and set on a 10 x 10 beam. Each post has a piling directly under the beam thanks to the magic of AutoCAD and Tom Lord. The posts are fastened to the beam with 2 gussets and 2 angle brackets. 32 bolts total for the bottom of each post. Luckily we have a couple battery powered impact wrenches to do the job.
Sunday July 18
Today we replaced the box header and cut the subfloor to fit around the post then glued and nailed it down. The project manager had the 2 outside strips of subfloor and the box header just fastened with screws so we could remove it all to set the posts. The woman decided we needed a 6 x 10 beam across the end of the first floor to tie things together. Don’t tell her but I have to agree it looks good and is stronger. I’m glad we don’t have HGTV. That channel makes men’s lives miserable, adds to honey-do list, and greatly increases costs. Kari found a bag of magic coins somewhere. They are about the size of a silver dollar. And have four letters on them. “Tuit”
Whenever she ask me to do some project. I say, “When I get around to it.” She hands me a coin, so I’m compelled. Hopefully she will run out. But I think she has a lifetime supply, at least my lifetime. In that case I hope she doesn’t run out.
That’s enough chit chat for today, I have logs to drag, rafters to cut, grass to mow. I guess I better get a round tuit.
From Silty Slough, I hope you have a wonderful day, stay safe and healthy.
Thank you Lord for protecting us.
I’ll be in touch.
Blue skies!!
PS. Cell service came back yesterday afternoon
The View from the Outhouse 