"Snow in the upper elevations" caught my ear on the morning radio.
Dang. I am so close. Trying to get the roof done, I have one more day cutting boards and then still need to get 30# roofing felt down to keep things dry thru the winter. We'll see.
Setting the principal rafters--eight of them coming to a point at a 12/12 (45 degree angle) pitch took quite a bit of head scratching. The rafters themselves are 2 1/2" by 5", 10 ft. long, sawn old-growth dough fir and are heavy as all get out. And to make matters worse, they all come up to a center metal bracket that I fashioned out of a 3 ft long chunk of 12" well casing. I welded sixteen 1/4 steel brackets with double thru holes for 1/2" grade 5 bolts around the circumference of the pipe to hold the rafter ends securely. The goal here was not to have to have any collar ties messing with the upwards view of the roof in my room.
But, how to get all this heavy stuff 12 ft. up in the air? I decided to use a 16 ft. long piece of 2" pipe with a pulley up top and a rope coming back down. My buddy Terry (all dicey projects of mine must involve Terry) and I pulled the 70 lb bracket assembly up the pipe like raising a flag on a flag pole. Once we got it up and suspended, then we began lifting up the rafters and bolting them into place.
Dang. I am so close. Trying to get the roof done, I have one more day cutting boards and then still need to get 30# roofing felt down to keep things dry thru the winter. We'll see.
Millie, the crane is shut down for the season, but she doesn't mind me using her boom to set up an old-fashioned block and tackle to hoist building materials up top.
Setting the principal rafters--eight of them coming to a point at a 12/12 (45 degree angle) pitch took quite a bit of head scratching. The rafters themselves are 2 1/2" by 5", 10 ft. long, sawn old-growth dough fir and are heavy as all get out. And to make matters worse, they all come up to a center metal bracket that I fashioned out of a 3 ft long chunk of 12" well casing. I welded sixteen 1/4 steel brackets with double thru holes for 1/2" grade 5 bolts around the circumference of the pipe to hold the rafter ends securely. The goal here was not to have to have any collar ties messing with the upwards view of the roof in my room.
But, how to get all this heavy stuff 12 ft. up in the air? I decided to use a 16 ft. long piece of 2" pipe with a pulley up top and a rope coming back down. My buddy Terry (all dicey projects of mine must involve Terry) and I pulled the 70 lb bracket assembly up the pipe like raising a flag on a flag pole. Once we got it up and suspended, then we began lifting up the rafters and bolting them into place.
As all of this is happening, the welding, the hammering and sawing, the figuring, and chance-taking and dreaming, I realize that this project is what I am supposed to be doing right now. There's this dead-on rightness that I can feel if I stop and become aware of it. This feeling that I am doing just what I am supposed to be doing. 
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