The $500 barn

[Elyrian1]

Craigslist, freecycle, in my case I got all my 2x4s as "dunnage" from work... There are ways.

 

[yogifink]

Craigslist, freecycle, in my case I got all my 2x4s as "dunnage" from work... There are ways.

LOL, me too, but in the form of skids. I'm guessing we're in the same line of work!

 

[Elyrian1]

Hmm... maybe. At the time that dunnage came from deliveries of steel to the metal recycle yard (I'm a scale operator). The flatbed drivers used it to keep the steel from damaging the trailers. And sometimes the boys in the yard would dig dunnage out of the railcars to clean them up before we shipped them back out. Bunch of free wood in decent shape just lying around. Boss practically begged me to take it and get it out of the way!

Let me add that it is perfectly possible to get an eight foot long piece of just about anything into a Nissan Versa sedan. Haha!

 

[yogifink]

Hmm... maybe. At the time that dunnage came from deliveries of steel to the metal recycle yard (I'm a scale operator). The flatbed drivers used it to keep the steel from damaging the trailers. And sometimes the boys in the yard would dig dunnage out of the railcars to clean them up before we shipped them back out. Bunch of free wood in decent shape just lying around. Boss practically begged me to take it and get it out of the way!

Let me add that it is perfectly possible to get an eight foot long piece of just about anything into a Nissan Versa sedan. Haha!

pretty much. I'm in LTL

 

[Elyrian1]

Ah, got it. Cool!

 

[BirdHead]

Well! I'd like fancy! But your coop is looking rad!

Be cool to see a log cabin coop!

 

[yogifink]

I woke up early this morning and got straight to work. My partner took the kids to New York for the week, so I'm baching it. So to me, this means, start early and finish late .

I had to fell four more trees for rafters. After I had them down and cut to size I started to debark with a draw knife.

For those of you who don t know what a draw knife is, it's a midevile tourcher device made to beat any man into submission.

Using a draw knife on aged tress is enjoyable. These is a pleasure to me in exposing the wood under the bark and seeing it's grain. Fresh cut tress on the other hand is a different ball game. The work is hard on my body and by 830 I'm soaked and putting on my 2nd shirt of the day.

After getting one log cleaned up, I decide to skip skinning the other three! I'll get them in place and then peel the bark in a few weeks after it loosens up.

 

[yogifink]

After another shirt change, and a gallon of water I set the last of the rafters on the beams.

Contradictory to what my baby girl belives, I'm not superman. So I use bobcat to get them up there.

I can't really take a picture of myself when I'm running the machine, so I did what I could do you could imigain how it gets done.

 

[yogifink]

I have a limited supply of wood and cannot afford to be that choosy. Yes 16 wood acres has a lot of wood on it but I can't get to all of it to pull it out. So, for these last few rafters I work in an area we will eventually build a shop as to not waste the timber later.

So, they're a little crooked (alot), and different sizes.

On being crooked the log will sit how it wants to comsidering its natural curve. There no getting around this. When building you want to put bowed wood a specific way so that it flattens. With 300 lbs cants, it's a different story.

After I get one in place I rock from side to side to get the log to settle into its natural position. Once there, and this is the hard part I rotate the log 180 degrees, upside down from the way it wants to settle. If the log is curved, which all of them are, this takes some luck, wedges and the bobcat to hold them in place, upside down.

Once I've got the bleeping log upside down and finally held in place from shifting around, I can cut the kerfs or notches to accept the beam they sit on.

They're not pretty, I'll admit. But I'm not trying to build the tajh mahal here, or however you spell it. I'm using a hatchet to cut these out and make sure to give myself wiggle room to get them in.

On the size difference of the logs and their natural taper; the kerf cuts should mitigate difference between logs if I do it right. Cut one deep or shallow depending on the rafters on either side and the beam it rests on.

After I get a notch cut for each beam, three in my case, I can roll it back over and set the rafters in place.

 

[yogifink]

At this point all of the rafters are just resting in place. With the low pitch of the roof, the notches cut into the rafters keep them from sliding off.