All Decked Out

This week has been a productive one (at last).

Monday saw the end of the installation/adjustment of the final four floor trusses, the last 50% of the truss strong-backs (stiffens truss packs and prevents vibration), and some of the perimeter blocking (placed where ever trusses are parallel to rim boards and provides lateral support every 4ft).  Tuesday finished off the perimeter blocking and all of the parallel wall blocking (supports top floor walls parallel to the truss pack).

Tuesday also was delivery day for the floor sheathing (I just love when they send their big hiab and lift the load into place all the way from the road).  I got right to work placing the sheathing and by end of day had a healthy 1/3 done.  Decking continued throughout the week and was completed with a just a half day in today.

I also managed to burn the late hours this week and on Monday drew up the metal post that will support a major beam flanking the stairway and then the centre edges of both the north and south upper roofs.  I had been looking for a shop able to fabricate this for some time without a lot of luck (most want to fabricate and supply/install, or the job was too small for their interest).  But I had three hopefuls so sent of the quote request with a drawing. Of the three, one did not respond and the other two referred me to two more metal work shops. Today, I finally received two quotes and went with Select Steel Limited based on their competitive bid.  It will be ready for pickup on the 8th.  I have left off sheathing on the first storey exterior walls off the garage so that I can route this column into the middle of the house and stand up beside the stairwell, as I have had to frame all around its location and support the beam by the stairs with a temporary wall, so I could continue my progress without having this key element in place.

Last night, I was able to stay up past my bedtime :-), and put together the bill of material for the second storey wall framing.  If all goes well, it will be delivered on Tuesday AM after the stat.  All told, I put in 50 hours this week, which is pretty good since Wednesday was an early day to allow for my early evening medical appointments, and today I only put in a half day because I was done the task. This is a much higher hourly average work week for me and I hope to keep it up for the rest of the summer to try and catch up for all the lost time and maybe, just maybe, get the roof membrane on by middle to end of September.

I will spend the next few days confirming the deck measurements and doing some final updates to the AutoCad model and then confirming the roof design and releasing the roof truss order.  Once I have the south and west walls up, I will also confirm my window order and get that moving along.

Still not speedy construction, but certainly much better than the last two years has been.

Thanks for visiting.

“The real test of good manners is to be able to put up with bad manners pleasantly.”
—Kahlil Gilbran (1883-1931) Artist, Poet, And Writer

“The sign of a beautiful person is that they always see beauty in others.”
—Omar Suleiman (1936-2012) Former Vice President Of Egypt