Sunday, September 18, 2011

It's Sunday...

Greetings!

Fred poured the last of the concrete Friday...the slab connecting the existing garage and the new shop.  I'm so ashamed of myself, I didn't get any pictures of the concrete truck.  Sigh.  Or of the process.  But here's the finished product...

Gorgeous!
The little landing on the left was done from extra concrete.
Gotta love the little extras!


Oh...and in case you haven't been able to read the red sign on the shop wall...

Gene's now calling his shop "The Dragons Lair"

Yesterday Chuck and Mike came over and helped with framing the pony walls to raise the height of the existing garage all to get the door height of the garage door up at least a foot for a taller garage door.  Well...this height was totally dependent on the finished height of the new shop.  When Gene designed the new shop there was no way he could get a final measurement.  It was pretty much an educated (crossed fingers behind his back) guess.  We thought we were doing good when he put the laser level on top of the new shop and shot over to the garage and the difference was 13.5", as all he needed was 12".  But, as we leveled all the way around, to our amazement the shop had settled...a lot.  The other back corner was 2.5" lower than this back corner.  (It was built, partially, on fill...word for the wise.)  The front came out 1.5" lower...that's 12".  He had exactly what he needed!  Another 1/2" shorter and he would have been grinding concrete!  Gene walk around going, "I planned it that way!"  Yeh, sure!

Header in place.  As you can see, there's NO extra room above it to the top plate!
Now, if they can only find their hammers!



But...before they started the pony walls....they set the beam spanning the opening from the shop to the garage which carries the trusses over the breezeway.  It's a 6x12x12' beam.  Huge, thus heavy.  It was quite the feat getting it in place.  Especially since it had to fit over a 3/4" rod to secure it.  That meant the beam not only had to be lifted to the height of the wall, but over and then slipped onto the rod.  Try drilling a 3/4" hole through 11.5"...straight.

We did it!  Time to celebrate.


Here's more pics of putting up the pony walls...

First one.

As I mentioned earlier the height differences between the front and the back and side to side...well, that meant that the little short studs between the plates all had to be different lengths.  Because one end of the wall, for example, was 15.5", the other 13.125".  The only way to do it efficiently was...AutoCAD.  I came into the house, fired it up and...the batteries in the keyboard died.  ARGH!  But that's a whole other story.  Eventually though, I drew up each one separately, got them their lengths and off they went! Actually, the front wall was the only one that was level end to end.  YAY!

All four walls up and beam set.
Time to call it a day...and put that blue tarp back over.
It's September, after all.
Now, today, Gene and I frame the back walls in the breezeway.  One is only 2' long, enough to house electrical.  The other is 9' with a 4' opening.  Should be easy...notice that's qualified with "should be"?

Tomorrow...the electricians are back to make the final connection to the shop and switch over to the house and....drum roll please....the trusses are delivered!  Oh happy day!  The next happy day will be when the roofer shows up.  We'd do the roofing, but the shop is a 10/12 pitch and we're too old for that stuff!

So, there will be more exciting pics up tomorrow eve!

And a BIG, HUGE thanks to Mike and Chuck!

Gene and Coleen

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