Putting up the rafters

Friday
I started by pulling the tarps off the roof.  It was nice working in the sun but the wind was chilly.  Next, I notched the birds eye for the loft rafters and started the living room rafters.  I wound down the day with a shopping trip!  I haven't yet nailed the walls to the floor.  Because the rim boards are pressure treated I didn't want to use regular nails and wasn't sure what kind to get.  After asking a couple of Home Depot employees who had no clue I turned to the internet and sure enough you have to use a Hot Dipped Galvanized nail.


Sat
Once again I had a helper, my friend has been kind enough to come into town again.  We started by marking the location of the rafters on the ridge boards and top plates.  This greatly simplified the installation.  Next we nailed and screwed the rafter ties in place.  These do leave a gap between the ridge board and rafter so if you do use them makes sure you take this into account.  I didn't and so the rafters stick out a little extra.  We managed to get all the loft rafters in place and the first living room rafter in.

Sun
I finished cutting all the birds eyes and then my helper showed up.  I had her start on cutting some of the missing wall sheathing while I installed the remaining rafters.  I used a couple of 2x4s and some plywood to make a platform to sit on top of the walls so I could have somewhere to stand.  To keep it from falling off the walls I nailed a couple of wood blocks to act as guides, it worked great.  After the rafters where up we realized there was not enough sheathing to finish the walls so we knocked off early and did a Home Depot run.  While we where there we picked up the roof sheathing too.  When we got back the sun was going down so we just unloaded and put the tarps up.

Expenses to date: $8,932

Reflections

Just over a month ago I was just finishing the floor.  Now as I'm preparing to put on the roof I think it's amazing how fast it has gone up.  This brings me to the reason why I'm keeping this blog.  While I'm working on the house progress always seems so slow but going back and reading my old posts constantly reminds me how much progress I have made.  If you do build your own tiny house I highly recommend it.

I also managed a to nail the loft walls in place, finally attach the bay window wall to the side walls and clean up.

Finally some sunshine

Last Saturday a classmate lent a hand, we put up some more wall sheathing.  That are just a couple of pieces left to put in but they will have to wait until the roof is done.  I also put up the typar on the bathroom wall to help protect the OSB from water.

I've been using the compressor and saws fairly heavily the last few weeks and combined with the cloudy weather the batteries have been hovering around 50% charge.  Today finally provided a full days sunshine bring them up to almost 100%.  The best part is sun is in the forecast until at least Sunday.  I better make hay while the sun shines!

It may be sunny but it's cold! 

Today I put the two loft walls in place!  They are not nailed down yet but now the tarps are at the final height of the interior ceiling.  The loft feels like it's a good height, even with all the extra wood up there.  I was so pleased with the space I just sat for a few minutes and chilled

As you can see it is a bit of a mess.  I'll have to make some time to clean it up before the weekend push.

Expenses to date: $8,244 (I returned some screws)

Sawdust and Loft walls

Today and yesterday where busy days.  Between classes on Wednesday I picked up the wood for the rafters and ridge boards.  In the evening I went over to my brother's and cut all the rafters.  He has a very fancy siding compound miter saw that I needed to cut the 10" rafters for over the living room.  I decided to go with 24" O.C. over the living room with 5/8" TG plywood.  This will save about $80 and 100 lbs.  The loft will be 16 O.C. for two reasons; it only has a 15 degree pitch and I'm only using 8" rafters.

I started today putting the vapour barrier between the loft floor and bathroom wall.  It was an interesting job because I had to put the acoustic sealant between the studs and vapour barrier.  In hind sight I should have done this before I put the loft floor in. Next I put the subfloor back down after letting it dry out for the last week.  I spent the evening putting together the two loft walls.

Expenses to date: $8,294

Loft floor is done.

The loft floor is 8'1" by 8'4" so I didn't have anywhere big enough to build it.  This was my solution and it worked like a charm.

The loft floor in place.  I nailed it to the walls once I had it square.  In hind sight I should have waited until the walls where squared and plumb.

The tarps sag down more then the roof will but it gives a rough idea of the space and the view out the window.

The messy view from the loft over the living room.

The seams in the subfloor are still wet after last weeks leaky tarp so I knew there was some water sitting underneath.  I pulled up the one piece of subfloor that didn't have a wall sitting on it and this is what I found.  I wedged the neighboring pieces up, vacuumed up all the water I could get at and left them to dry up.

Small walls

I swear I saw a man building an ark today.

4 hours later and a little help from a friend the last two walls are up!  You can't tell from theses  pictures but it feels way roomier now that the tarps are at ceiling height .

I still have to square and sheath them.  The bay window wall looks lopsided but it actually is almost square.  We spent most of our time fixing this wall and wrestling with the tarps.

Expenses to date: $7,879

Framing the last walls

 What a busy day!

My friend came over again today and I replaced the fuel pump on her truck.  After a quick break we got right to work on the house.  We place the two shear panels at the bathroom end (glued and nailed).  Next we cut all the lumber for the bay window wall, no mistakes this time, I'm almost getting good at this!  We laid everything out and nailed most of it in place before calling it a night.


 Here you can see the two end walls.  The bathroom wall is the bottom one.

Since starting the walls the deck has been pretty messy.  I'm looking forward to having the loft floor so I can store the extra materials.

The tarps are held in place with 2x4s on the ends.  They weigh down the tarps and slowly pull them tighter.  This system works better then using ropes because it doesn't allow any water to collect on the roof even on the flat section.  A second benefit is it creates an overhang so the water clears the floor.