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14 October, 2016

Oh Boy! It's Friday Again.

It's amazing how fast the week has gone. Especially since I've been paying attention to each day. Usually, that would make the week drag, but not this time.

Endher Showing the Space
This Friday morning (15 October, 2016) the concentration is on the west ramp. Adding a bit more to the block work, adding fill, and getting column forms up.

Here, Endher is showing that, when the fill is in and the columns are in place, there will still be approximately forty-inches clearance for Dianna's machine. From her perspective in the kitchen this morning, she thought it was significantly less. I had to agree with her. From up there it really was an optacular collusion (with apologies to Norm Crosby, the Master of Malaprop).

Fill Going Into Pad Box
This project has generated a huge amount of debris from previous structures, deck wall, curbings, patio pieces, chunks of old block, marl, and rocks.

Luckily, the project is tailor-made to hide almost all of that debris. It gets turned into fill,as in this photo, and gets added back in as usable material. We've actually only had to move a small amount of marl down near our street-side fence where we have several low spots.

Unloading and Smoothing Marl
Speaking of that very thing, I realized I didn't have a photo of the marl dump out by the front fence, so I grabbed my camera and went to shoot it. Luckily Daniel was there unloading another wheelbarrow of marl and smoothing some of it out, so I was able to snap him at work.




Fence Column Forms Going Up
Just like with the Mennonite house steps, the fence columns are going up. They make it look finished already, don't they?







More of the Column Forms
Here's another view of one of the forms and the steel waiting for forms to encase them.







Tight Fit to Palapa
Only one form presented a slightly dicey problem. This one. It is close to the parking palapa, but I think it's going to work out alright and so problem averted.






Looking Up the Ramp
Here we are looking up the lower part of the ramp. It's probably easier to see if you click and expand the photo - which you can do with any of the photos.






From A Distance
This is a bit of an overall shot of the ramp. I think it will improve the way the place looks, kinda 'classin' up the joint.' Y'know?







Stairs - Bottom View
I don't think I've included a photo of the circular stairs before. Well, maybe when I first brought it home from Eric Burson's place out in Progesso. Anyway, here the stairs are in all their blue glory.

One thing it doesn't have yet is treads for the stairs themselves. I'm thinking of maybe getting some mahogany or something and having pieces cut to drop into each stair. maybe Varathane them or something else to protect them. Should look cool when done.

Pouring the Ramp Fence Columns
Back to the columns. They've started pouring the columns. They'll do half today, remove the forms and set them up on the remaining ones, and probably pour those, who knows, maybe tomorrow?






Smoothing the Column Cap
Part of the pour is running a stick down the length of the column to shake out air pockets and then smooth out the column cap. After the form is removed, then there will still be a bit more work putting an angled cap on top of the current cap. Gives it that truly finished look.




View of the Whole Project
Lastly, I didn't add this photo till the morning of the 15th. The reason is I spied the shot yesterday evening after I let Nelson out of his daytime hideaway in the basement of the Mennonite house.

I thought it gave a nice overall view of the whole project. Maybe it helps to integrate the separate images with the whole.

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