Days 49-53 Babystepping

The exterior walls have been up since Day 44.  Tomorrow will be Day 55.  We still don't have a completed roof, and it's easy to get the feeling that not much has been happening on the house.  A closer look shows how much work goes into setting the SIP roof panels.

First the panels are fit together on the ground and screwed.  Then they are lifted into place by the construction lift(For the panels on the back half of the house that's over 40 feet high!).  Once the panel is in place, they have to screw it down and seal the seams to make them air/water tight.  Next, they have to fit the 2x6 joists for the eaves into the panels & screw them in place.  Finally they have to secure the backer board for the fascia to the eaves. 

Here is a quick recap of the progress over the past 10 days:

Day 44

Day 49

Day 53

Day 54

Day 48 A Roof Over Our Heads and a Floor Under Our Feet

Big Man on Campus!

Linus made his first official trip to the construction site today.  Until now, we had always left Linus & Betsy in the car watching movies.  He didn't really care for the loud noises from the panel lift or pneumatic tools.

Eventually there will be a 3 season porch on the left

 All of the panels on the back side of the house have been set except for the dormers.  You can really see things taking shape.  Each roof panel has several 2x6s anchored into it that extend out past the walls.  This will form the eaves and give the soffit & facia something to be mounting on.

Setting the panels has taken ~1.5 weeks longer than anticipated.  According to Josh, our house has been the most complex he's put together.  There are quite a few details that have made setting the panels more challenging.  The new goal is to have the shell finished by next Monday.

Harry just making sure the footing will hold the porch up.

Ron & his sons poured the garage floor & footings for the 3 season porch today.  We though about putting an epoxy coating on the floor, but Ron had already sealed the concrete by the time I mentioned the idea.  Once the sealant has been applied, it needs to dry for 28 days.  Epoxy could be applied later, but we would have to prep the concrete with a grinder and clear it thoroughly first.  Maybe that'll be a project for next summer!

Three Generations of Leachs helping out (Ron, his sons & Nate's daughter).

Day 47 Typical Monday

Not much visible work done today.  Josh spent the day prepping the roof panels to start installing tomorrow.  Nick, the plumber, was able to get the floor drains put in the garage today.  There will drain through the basement foundation & into the sewer drain.  Ron will be coming by tomorrow to prep the garage floor with insulation.  They will be pouring it on Wednesday.  Woohoo!  A garage floor!

Floor drains for the garage.

 By the way, we have a new sponsor at the jobsite:

Sure, the spelling looks cool on THIS sign.  It's not so cool when Google tries to find "Sucks Center" whenever I need help finding my way home!

With all the advertising, it's beginning to feel like a NASCAR race on the job site!

So you don't have to go in order to go!

Yep, they're panels!

You guessed it.  These guys put up the panels!

Harry in a contemplative mood.

Day 45 Sunshine Returns!

Things are looking good

It's Saturday, so no work today.  However, big new on the construction site:  Sunshine & a light breeze!  Hopefully this will dry things out.  I get nervous about all of this OBS getting wet.  It can't be a good thing.  The forecast is supposed to be sunny with highs in the 70's for the rest of the week, so I'm optimistic that we can get quite a bit of work done.  I'll feel much better though once the house is enclosed with shingles, siding, windows & doors.

View of the walkout

Speaking of windows, I decided to weed whip at our current house today.  Very bad decision!  I put a rock through Harry's bedroom window!  Doh!!!  Sorry, but no pic.  I must say that's a first for me in 33 years.  I called up our landlord & told him the news.  Fortunately he was really cool about things.  Now I get to talk with the building center about adding another window to my tab :-)

Days 43 & 44 Rain, Rain Go Away

Why yes, those are thunder clouds forming!

My big fear came true this past week.  Rain!  No rain when we dug the foundation.  No rain with pouring the foundation, and no rain when we back-filled the foundation.  If fact there has been practically no rain all summer.  So what happens when we get all of our wood panels on the job-site?  Rain.  Lots & lots of rain.  Thursday was a complete soaker.  No work on the house that day.  Friday was supposed to be "plenty of sunshine" with a high of 70.  Apparently, "plenty of sunshine" means drizzling rain all morning & mostly cloudy in the afternoon!  Fortunately they were able to get the i-joists above the garage put up.  Ron & his sons were also able to pour the basement floor!

Ron Leech - Master of the power trowel!

 In the picture above Ron is "floating" the concrete with a power trowel or power float.  It's basically a lawnmower engine with 4 blades that spin around really fast making the concrete very flat & smooth.  According to Wikipedia, it's a process called "floating" the concrete.  There is even a 6 minute video set to soft rock on You Tube dedicated to floating.  Highly recommended viewing!

Day 42 The View From Above (and Below!)

This will be the view out our bedroom window

Starting to frame the bearing walls for the 2nd floor

A bit more rain fell this morning with more on the way tomorrow.  Fortunately, things are still progressing.  Jamie & his crew finished all of the walls today.  Tomorrow (if weather permits) they will lay the floor trusses over the garage & start on the bonus room above the garage.

Meanwhile, Nick from Hoffman Plumbing finished with all the rough in plumbing for the basement, and Ron laid down the insulation for the basement floor. We decided to use 4 inches of foam insulation under the floor instead of the standard 2 inches.  I'm also a friend of the Sauk River Watershed District once again thanks to getting the "erosion control" fence put up.  Sarah from the city planning office sent me a friendly reminder on that one!

Erosion fence up?  Check!

Days 36-40 The Devil is in the Details

What's wrong with this picture?

With any endeavor, it's the little things that matter.  One month into this project I know very intimately how true this saying is!

We picked a fantastic group of contractors to build our house.  They have all been easy to work with, extremely professional, and very skilled at what they do.  However with 10 different contractors, things are bound to fall between the cracks as the project rolls along.  The important thing is to catch little issues before they become BIG issues.  The picture above is a perfect example.  That is a picture of the ventilation system exhaust going through the concrete foundation.  As you can see, the floor truss just happens to perfectly block the opening.  When I saw this over the weekend, I got pretty anxious & started having visions of hacking apart the floor truss in order to get the ventilation in.  I called Tom, our general contractor, & Brian, our HVAC guy, on Monday morning.  They came right out to check out what needed to be done.  It turns out there was a mistake on the floor truss drawings that lead to the exhaust being put in the wrong spot.  The drawing showed the truss resting on top of the foundation, but the trusses actually hangs inside the foundation.  Oops!  Fortunately, there is just enough room between the wall & the truss to fit our exhaust piping.

There were two other minor hiccups last week.  The second issue involved our pantry.  It's the room framed-in on the right in the picture below.  See any major problems?  I'll give you a hint, it's what's not there that's the problem.

Holy no door Batman!

That’s right, NO DOOR!!!  Jamie agreed that it’s rather difficult to use a pantry with no door, so he very kindly offered to frame one in for me at no extra cost!

Standing proudly next to my door

 The third mistake involves a door that was put in (just in the wrong place).  When Extreme Panel converted our house plans to SIPs, they asked me if we could move the doorway you see on my right 6 inches to the side (to line up with the panels).  I said, "Sure.  no problem."  And it wasn't a problem, except that I forgot to tell Ron Leech before he laid the foundation block.  Fortunately, Ron came back out the next day and moved the block, so the garage walls could be put up on time.  For those keeping score at home, it's now Ron 2, Joel 1.  Thanks Ron!

FYI - Over the weekend, it rained for the first time since construction began. All the local farmers were very thankful. I’ll be honest though, I had been dreading this day from the moment we started building. There’s just something about your new house exposed to the elements that makes a person nervous.  Oh well, the sun came our & things dried out nicely.  More rain on the way later this week though!  :-(

Window well or Fox hole?  You decide!

Days 36-41 Things are Beginning to Take Shape

Wall panels have been going up very quickly over the past few days.  Jamie & his crew have finished the main floor of the house & have started on the 2^nd floor.  Next up will be the garage walls & then the roof.

Main floor coming together

Taping the seams to prevent moisture leakage is very important.

Looking good!  Nice house too :-)

View from the walkout

Take cover!

Second Floor

Looking a bit tall.  That's where the landscaping comes in!

View of the front door

Day 35 - The Panels are Coming, The Panels are Coming!

This was the first of 3 semi trailer loads full of panels to arrive.

When our house is finished, it will look just like every other house on the block.  However, the "bones" of our house will be completely different.

Instead of using standard 2x6 lumber to frame the exterior walls & roof, we are using Structural Insulated Panels or SIPS.  They are basically 2 layers of OSB with a layer of foam sandwiched in the middle.  It's kind of like an Oreo cookie.  The wall panels have a 6" foam core, and the roof panels have 12" thick foam.  The combination of OSB & foam provide the structure & insulation all in one package.  The interior walls of our house will be standard 2x4 construction.

Each panel is numbered to according to where it goes.

Factory Direct from Extreme Panel in Cottonwood, MN.

I first learned about SIPs during my family practice residency in Sioux Falls.  A fellow resident, Jessica Horn, and her husband, Craig, built their house in Sioux Falls using SIPs.  They liked it so much, when they moved away after residency, they built another house using SIPs.

Why SIPs?

SIPs offer several significant advantages over a traditionally framed "stick built" house.

1. Energy Efficiency
• SIP homes are extremely air tight
• This makes them much more efficient to heat & cool
2. Faster Construction Time
• The exterior of our house is scheduled to be framed in 12 days by 3 guys
• This includes the entire exterior of the house being ready for shingles, siding, windows & doors
3.  Less Waste
• Panels have all window & door frames precut at the factory
• This leaves only minor trimming needed on the job site

Jamie setting the 1st panel

End of the first day setting panels.

Day 34 - Floor Trusses Arrive

The floor trusses arrived today, but the panels for the walk out haven't arrived yet.  Here is what things looked like at the beginning of the day.

Box without a top

Fortunately the walkout panels arrived.  Jamie Aho and his crew from Aspen Building & Design began to put up the walkout & bearing walls.  Harry was very excited about the latest piece of heavy equipement to show up on the job site, the lift!

Walkout wall being set up.

Harry driving the lift.  A scary moment for all involved!

Yeah, I'm not sure what's going on here either!

Once the walls were up, the trusses were ready to be set.  They are 18" top cord bearing trusses.  The top of the truss sits on the foundation wall, and the rest of the truss hangs down inside the foundation.

Trusses set in place.

Day 30 - Driveway or Raceway?

Our lot sits up significantly higher than the street or either of our neighbors (That was the trade off in order to have a walkout basement).  Good for providing a view.  Bad for putting in a driveway.

With 3 small kids racing around on various wheeled toys Emily & I though it would be best to avoid a straight, steep driveway out the road.  It would be like having Brainerd International Raceway in our from yard with kids racing out into the street on a regular basis (Not to mention the ski slope it would become in the winter)!

The solution was to make a longer, "S curved" driveway.  At least this way, the kids have to make left & right hand turns to find the street!  Here is what the rough grading looks like:

View from the street

View from the garage