Garage Progress - July 18, 2012

    Yesterday I was in the mountains on horseback moving cattle. I'll be back there next Monday to help move them further into the upper pastures. Today I finished the last log on the third round and installed the first log of round four. You can see on the left side of the picture there is a split log on the wall. This will be a window on the south side. It will be 5 feet wide by 4 feet high. There will be two windows on the west side and two on the north side. These four will be 4 feet by 4 feet. I wasn't going to put windows on the north side, but they are good for cross ventilation on hot days. All the windows will be started on this round of logs. This fourth round will bring the walls very close to 5 feet high.

    Anytime I have a split log on the wall (A log unsupported by a corner.) and I start building up on it, by the time I get the third or fourth log installed, the wind here will actually start moving the log wall section back and forth. The shorter the wall section (Width), the worse it gets. When I was doing the house, I screwed 2 X 4's to the decking and then to the wall sections to control the movement until I could cap them with a full length log going from corner to corner. The garage deck (Floor) is cement! This leaves me with a decision to make this year.

    On the right side of the picture you can see the short wall section between the two garage doors. This section is 43 inches wide. I have already decided I will not install any more logs on top of this section until I am ready to run a full length log over the garage doors. I am cutting the 43 inch logs to length and numbering them. When I get ready to put in the top log, I can build this section up in a day, then secure it to the full length log. I will still have to secure the wall to prevent movement, but I will go with a 2 X 4s on a turnbuckle and secure them to the ground with steel pegs.

    I will probably not install more that five or possibly six rounds of logs on the garage this year. With just the windows, I will have three more unsupported log sections. I don't want to have to install any wall supports and leave them up over the winter. there are too many things that could go wrong.

Building again, Garage Progress - July 12, 2012

    My wife, Betsy was here for eight days so I did not do any building. We did  lot of things together. This is a picture of the sunrise we saw one morning as we were heading to Elk Park, just north of Butte to look for elk. We saw over 80 cows and calves feeding in the meadows.

    The next picture shows my garage progress. I started installing the third round of logs today. I'm using very large logs for this round. The big end is close to 17 inches on the one I've already installed. I have a couple more I need to work in that are close to 20 inches in diameter. When you use big logs, there is a lot of cutting required with the chainsaw, but you add height to the wall very quickly. Starting out with a 2 foot stub wall helps too!

    I haven't measured it out yet, but it appears I will start the windows after this round. I have enough logs on site for about three more rounds.

Garage Progress - June 27, 2012

    Today I split a log down the middle to make the first two sill logs. (First picture) I then sawed a slab off the sides of two more logs to make the other two sill logs. I forgot how dusty it gets when you are ripping logs like this. Once I ripped them, I applied an oil based stain to the flat side for protection from moisture. I chalk lined down the middle of the cut face on all the logs so I could set up and drill holes for the J-bolts that were placed in the cement stub walls. When I drilled the holes I had to make sure they were as perfectly straight as possible. If they are crooked, you cannot get the threaded rod to thread into the connector nut on the J-bolts. Some of the logs ended up being 9 inches thick.

    The bottom picture shows the first round of logs installed on the walls. They are not bolted down yet as I do not have all of the connector nuts. I realized on Monday that I should have ordered them as soon as I came to Montana this spring. I'll go to Butte in the morning and pick them up. They are supposed to be in  tomorrow. The next round of logs will go much quicker. The difficulty will be in choosing which four logs will match up for the next round.

Starting Garage - June 26, 2012

    Today I started building the garage. I cut and installed all the 2 X 8 treated sill plates with sill seal between them and the cement stub walls. I was planning to set up and cut the first sill log in half but the wind is blowing so hard right now that I cannot measure the logs or set up the string line. I will hit it the first thing i the morning when it is usually calm. Once I get the sill logs cut, the wind will not bother the building process. (Unless I get blown off a ladder when the walls get high.)

    My cousin, Jim and I hauled the forklift out last evening so I can move the logs around.

Deck Rail Building Completed - June 22, 2012

All the deck railing has been installed. Staining will be the final process in a month or so. Now I will begin on the garage. I have scheduled time with my cousin to transport the lift to our property. On Monday I will pick up the rest of the materials needed to begin laying the sill plates and the sill logs. It's time to break out the big chainsaw to split the sill log in half.

Railing Progress - June 21, 2012

    This morning I peeled the remaining four rails that I cut last night. I also peeled and stained the last 46 spindles. Once they were dry, I assembled and installed the 13th section of railing. Tomorrow I will complete the last two sections, then I'll start on the garage.

    I'll have to put together a list of what I need to get. I'll need about 110 feet of treated 2 X 8s for the sill plate. The wall logs will rest on them. I'll need more sill seal to go between the sill plate and the 2 foot cement wall. I'll need treaded rod, connector nuts and sill plate washers to bolt down the first round of logs.

    Splitting the first log in half and getting the first round of logs on the wall will be time consuming, then the job should go much faster. Before I know it I'll be back in the mountains cutting more logs!

Railing Progress - June 20. 2012

    On Wednesday I finished the 12th section of railing. I ran out of peeled and stained spindles, and I still needed four rails to finish the last two sections. I decided it was time to head for the mountains and get the rest of the rails. I decided I needed to be more critical when I chose the trees to cut down. One rail was so crooked (I had already peeled it) that I tossed it aside. When I was picking the trees to cut this time, I was just about laying on the ground looking up the trunk to see how straight they were. This worked great. I cut 6 trees and cut them into 10 foot lengths so I came out with 12 good straight rails. I have enough for the loft. Coming out of the mountains was very interesting!

     I saw four bull elk crossing the road in front of me before I had even traveled three quarters of a mile. (It is eight miles of dirt road to get back out) About two miles later I spotted the bull elk in the picture below. He watched me as I sat watching him for a couple of minutes, then he took off up the side of the road. There was another bull with him. About a mile and a half before I hit the tar road again, three cow elk crossed the road in front of me. The ride was better than going through Yellowstone park!!!!