Lots of things happened this past week on the house construction project. We completed the concrete foundation work, so now the framing can continue. We received a bunch of materials including all the lumber for the floor, walls and blocking, LVLs for the larger window and door headers, brackets, concrete anchors... and the roof trusses arrived right on schedule! Most expensive week for us in decades. As this post is composed we are sitting in a three day Memorial Holiday rain event. After the past week this break is very welcomed. We can get reorganized after a hectic week, get some rest for next week, which we expect to be full on framing, and receive some much needed moisture in this area. All in all an outstanding situation for us. Praise the Lord!
Before the work begins, let's remember the fun that we squeezed in.... The Hansen Guest Ranch invited us over to their Crawfish Boil. We can thank Michelle & Jim working there for that invitation. The Chamber of Commerce put it on and had 150 lbs of crawfish, nice sized critters from Louisiana. Plus they served pulled pork and all the other goodies added into the boil.
Crawfish, corn, sausage, garlic, onion, celery all ready to eat!
I see Gari sitting with Scott and Cindy.
We also worked in a couple of rides up into the mountains. On this trip up Rainey Creek, Gari drove us as far as the trail would allow. This is where we stopped and got out and walked.
Even though we got the smallest Razor, it wouldn't go up that path!
We walked ahead and when we came to the clearing this is what we saw. It is hard to tell in a picture, but this hill is at about a 35-40 degree incline straight up! We scrambled our way up to the rocks. There are three classes of hiking; Class 1 is just walking along, Class 2 is when you have to touch the ground to keep your balance, Class 3 is when you have to bear weight on your hands to stay on the trail. This was definitely a Class 3 scramble! Coming back down was even more interesting.
When we reached the rocks, this is what we saw.
On our way out we flushed up a nice Whitetail specimen. And away it darted!
We shared a few meals with Michelle and Jim this past month. This particular celebration event was an afternoon 7-layer bean and chicken Tex-Mex dip party. It is always a good time as evidenced below!
A report on the Wacker-Neusone plate vibrator small engine was suggested in a previous post. So here is a brief account. We have been using our friends compacter, but the small engine, the Honda GX-160, just didn't have any appreciable compression, and just stopped running one day. We were determined to get it running again, since it was lent to us and it was running. The fine dust these things kick up while they are vibrating and compacting gravel beds gets into everything. When we took off the air filter it was full of that fine dust. It was like pouring pancake mix out of the air filter. It even got past the filter and down into the carburetor. We literally dug mud out of the intake path. Our theory was that the rock dust wore down the piston rings, and presto no compression, no run no more. Below we removed the engine from the vibrator plate. We put all the bolts back into the holes they came out of so it would be easier to reassemble.
We took a picture of the carburetor to aid in reassembling all the springs, linkages, and various parts in the correct locations and order.
Below is the single piston out of the engine.
Upon closer inspection, we learned that there are 5 piston rings. The top ring is the Compression Ring, pretty obvious what that one must do. The second ring is the Wiper Ring, it must wipe oil off of the cylinder wall. The third ring is actually three rings in that groove. This is called the Oil Carrier Ring set. Anyway, we swapped out the old rings with the new set and prepared ourselves for what may happen next.
We should have captured a picture inside the crankcase, the crankshaft and cam shafts were fascinating. We took everything out and cleaned it off real good, then re-oiled and reassembled. Below the engine is mostly reassembled, the piston is back in. We found out that a special tool was required to reinsert the piston back into the cylinder, a piston ring compression tool. Well, we got one from Amazon and it worked! The piston is back in, in the picture below. We still need to reinstall the cylinder head and adjust the valves. We even lapped the valve seats for good measure. That is grind them down for a better fit after many years of wear.
After all that rework and assembly, we took it outside, replaced the oil and gas.... She started on the first pull! Honda just makes good stuff.
So there you have it, the Wacker is fully reassembled and running better than ever now. One thing we do now is wet the gravel before vibrating to prevent the clouds of dust from entering into the engine.
Now the house construction content of the post.... We had three concrete pours to finish before we could go full in on the framing. The house design has a wrap porch that is covered by the roof. The roof trusses will be supported by the porch columns holding up Glulam beams. The columns sit on top of the porch slab, which is supported by a frost wall and footing underneath. So the concrete porches had to go in before the columns and roof can go on. Below, the first mud coming down the chute on the first porch pour.
We elected to color the porch concrete, San Diego Buff, to blend in with the darker wainscot that will go onto the house. Same color as that on the Shop in the back ground. Since our two man finishing crew could not complete the Sweat finish on the entire 130 ft of porch in one go, they split the porch construction it into two even sized pours and used the same tint recipe for each concrete batch in order to match the color as closely as possible. Rob puts on the sweat finish and Troy works the edging.
What started out as a sunny day suddenly turned threatening by the end of the first pour. Luckily we didn't suffer any damage to the finish. First pour successful!
Next day, second porch pour below. Rob and Troy work the mud, Steve's job was to tap the forms with the hammer to settle the concrete and prevent any voids at the edges.
Unannounced, the lumber materials for the floor and walls arrived. Gari directs the driver where to place the load.
Third and last pour the next day, this is the garage slab. This pour took two trucks.
Troy and Rob screed in the mud with their California technique. They install stakes, install hangers on the stakes and then place a 2x4 on the hangers. That becomes their screed rails on each side of the pour. Once the screeding is complete, they just pull the slakes out and let the mud fill in the holes. Voila!
The picture below is right at the end of the garage slab pour. The form at the end is for the overhead door seat. No one seems to know what a door seat is in Idaho. What it does is keep wind driven rain from intruding underneath of the garage overhead door. There is a half inch ledge rising up behind the door seal, and that is what prevents the water from coming in. We asked for that on the Shop, didn't get it and now water intrudes when rain comes out of the north or south. We made sure to get it on the house. Rob and Troy did an excellent job on it.
Finished garage slab. It's a long one, 48ft long.
Roof trusses arrived right on time, with coordination calls. Good job Teton Truss!
Rob came by the next day and cut relief lines into the garage slab. He was rewarded with the final payment and a Twisted Tea!
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