New Shed in the Works

[WV Sawmiller]

  I was up on this rickety ladder with a running chainsaw. It was windy and there was snow and ice on the steps. I turned around to saw off a limb and ... Oops. I think I'm in the wrong thread here.

 I got a call my metal had come in. I told the lady I had covid and got the amount for the check and she said pull up beside the window and she'd send the guy out to load it and collect. I went over and did that. 18' of metal and a box of 250 screws were just under $86 so I now have about $260 invested in this extension.

 I picked up my roofing, went and picked up my Covid medicine (Pavloxid Paxlovid), came home, fed the horse to keep him out of the way and put up the rest  of the roofing. This new stuff was really slick and on the steepest angle of the build so I had to tie a rope to a sturdy fence post to lower myself down to put the screws into the nailers.

  I cut off the extra metal angles off the back, trimmed off the extra length on the nailers and top plates and installed the last couple of feet of drip edge. I did have to get on a step ladder with a small chain saw to do this but it was secure and I stayed off the top step.  


 
I am now all dried in except for one more trip up to patch a few nail holes in the used metal. It is a hodge-podge of colors but it is dry and it was cheap.

 I did slice the inside of my R thumb at the end of the job when I tossed a cut-off piece under the shed to go in the scrap metal bin. Gloves would probably have prevented that but it was so sharp it would have cut them too - just not as deep in the thumb if so.

[ljohnsaw]

Looking at it from this angle with the creek running by...Good thing you're not out here on the Left Coast.  You get sited for water running off a material know to the state to cause cancer right into a waterway!  Actually, cutting wood is known to cause cancer in this state - the sticker on a piece of red oak closet rod said so!

Nice to be done, looking great!

[fluidpowerpro]

Thats why I dont live in California. Everything there causes cancer!

[Old Greenhorn]

 I was up on this rickety ladder with a running chainsaw. It was windy and there was snow and ice on the steps. I turned around to saw off a limb and ... 

Howard, that's not funny! (ok well it's a little funny, OK, actually it was really funny but...) I put a lot of effort into clearing your record over on that other thread and you go an flaunt my efforts. Geez man! Do I have to drive down there and give you a counseling session out on the porch consuming a pot of coffee in the process. Geez man, just say "hey, I got a lot done, some of it was tough and I got a couple of bumps and cuts, but it's done and nobody died." How are we going to run your for office or something if you keep dissing on your reputation?

[WV Sawmiller]

   Yes it is about 20' from Madam's Creek. (So named because near the town of Hinton where the creek runs into the New River there was a popular house of horizontal refreshment that extended out over the creek, hence the people called it "The Madam's Creek.") In fact, in some of the pictures you can see an old green pitcher pump about 2' from the front end/corner pole I had mounted on a fence post with a flexible pipe with a foot valve in a deep hole in the creek below a big boulder. I used to pump to provide water to cows or calves temporarily penned in a lot there. We got rid of our cows and the lot fence has been down for many years so the pump no longer serves a purpose.

  I suspect the normal WV organic material from the overhead trees and such that stick to the roofing serve as a natural purifier and water running off the roof of my shed into Madam's Creek is much cleaner than rain falling through the California smog. In fact I think I read where in blind studies normal rainwater in LA were determined to fail all known California EPA regs for carcinogenic compounds.

[WV Sawmiller]

Tom,

   Since my Covid test came back positive and I am in quarantine I will have to delay the porch conference or we will have to do it on line to protect all attendees. Besides, I do not drink or even know how to make coffee so if your coming give me plenty of notice so I can study U-tube videos on how to make a pot of coffee.

[Old Greenhorn]

Well I know you don't drink alcohol, but I was unaware you did not drink coffee. I will ignore my concern at this and just say, if the porch session becomes necessary, I will bring a pot and take care of it. It takes too many years to get it right and I have been the subject of folks who knew I drank coffee and did their best to figure out how it is made, bless their hearts. We don't need to add that kind of stress.

[DonW]

Excuses for the digression from the milestone of the completed roof, ( that  must feel good standing in there ), but I wonder if you'd consider your floor a puncheon floor? I think it fits the definition.

[WV Sawmiller]

Tom,

  My wife drinks enough coffee for 2-3 families so we might con her into making an extra pot if we catch her in a good mood. (Come to think of it you might better just bring a thermos. )

  For clarification I have no religious or other prohibitions against caffeine or alcohol or such and get my caffeine fixes from Mt. Dew and quarts of unsweetened ice tea with lots of ice. (I know - most southerners love sweet tea but I drifted away from that track in my late teens.)

 Back on my shed track my next step is to start on the floor. I think I will lay a long sheet (or two) of used roofing down as a square guide for that and start on the long end using up my stock lumber especially my slow movers like a stack of maple. That should go real fast.

  I hate to admit it but in many cases I don't have a clear process in mind when I start these projects. If I waited till I did, I 'd never get them started. In other cases changes in mid build force me to come up with other ideas - like the floor in this case which went from a dirt floor to a 3' pad to a full floor.

  To tell the truth that may be a personality trait (Defect?). For many years while working overseas I would meet my wife on my R&Rs in another foreign country. (For tax incentives I needed to stay out of the USA for set amounts of time so I called these subsidized vacations. I could either come home and pay the IRS or go see a new and exciting country - I'll send you a post card!) On those trips we would hire a private guide and hire a car/driver, some times a boat in the Amazon, and start out with a very loose itinerary and we'd drive/motor along and stop when we saw something unique and interesting and stay as long as it was safe. We'd find local guides that that got us local access. My free lance photographer wife bought a portable printer and we'd give pictures to remote tribesmen in Africa, Mongolia and the Amazon and that got us more access to unique places and events.

[Don P]

Excuses for the digression from the milestone of the completed roof, ( that  must feel good standing in there ), but I wonder if you'd consider your floor a puncheon floor? I think it fits the definition.

To me a puncheon floor is very widely spaced sleepers... like middle and ends across a cabin, and half logs hewn and notched over the sleeper logs and adzed smooth on the top.
The lime is not a bad idea. I did that under a very low farmhouse porch replacement not too long ago, hmm, ok 5 or 6 years flies by. Termites were active, the well was right there, hopefully it'll scorch anything crawling over it.

We had 2 local metal companies, the one with better dies also oiled the mess out of them and the metal. The company that ran old worn out dies and the fit wasn't as good, well you could also stay on your feet up there. 

We bought a new coffeemaker, it was mislabelled, I don't know what its intended use was.

[WV Sawmiller]

Don,

 I would not consider my floor a "puncheon" floor if that is your question. If the sleepers were squared on one side (the top) and tightly fitted I think that would be a puncheon floor.

 I think puncheon floors were made from split logs that were smoothed with an adze or such that were tightly fitted for a floor. I don't know how they steadied them unless they laid a bed of soft sand or loose gravel or such and pounded flush. Maybe a plank was nailed to each end to level them till they settled a bit.

 Maybe others here with more experience in such can speak up.

[DonW]

I'll take the word of you and Don P since I think that flooring is heavily associated with your region and one definition I saw - omitting the  material description -only loosely fits the floor as you've shown it till now. Thanks

[WV Sawmiller]

   Don't take my word for it as I don't know that I have ever seen one and never knew of anyone building one. I had read about them in old westerns and such but never the description. It did seem like the old novels would have a comment about "We'll add a puncheon floor in the future" so it seems they'd build a log cabin with a dirt floor just to get shelter and add improvements like a puncheon floor and glass windows and such later on when times got better.

[Wlmedley]

Looks good Howard,anxiously waiting for pictures of finished floor.May be something I could use up here.

[WV Sawmiller]

 

 
First I tried @Tom King suggestion from 3 years ago on patching used roofing with a pop rivet. My 2 regrets are that I did not have and use a rivet gun back then and that I did not patch the holes before I put the roofing up as it would have been much easier to patch on the ground before installation. The few wasted rivets in what I cut off would have been pretty insignificant. I did this test on a piece of scrap (the one that bit me yesterday) then got on the roof and fixed the rest. Great tip. Thanks Tom even if belated use.


 
Next I got 2 pieces of used roofing to use as a 4'X10' square to start my first floor board, a 1X8, so it was square with my outside 2x2 "floor joist". I lined the roofing up then measured from both ends and nailed it in place as my base of operation here.


 
After that is was just grab a board off the stack, square up the best end on the RAS, put it in place and cut the other end off with my cordless 6-1/4" circle saw using the 2X4 outside wall framing as a guide. I cut them so they will butt up against the 2X4 and even ripped a 1X4 and screwed the 1X2 strip up against the bottom after I had several for a guide. This makes a shelf to brace that little short overhang. I put 38" of flooring down before this Covid kicked me in the butt. I was soaking wet with sweat and feverish and light-headed so I called it a day. I have about 10' more flooring and after 1 more 12' 1X6 then I should be able to start using my 10' stock. If I were any count I'd have finished this floor this afternoon as it is going up really good!


 
This is my little 1X2 strip I installed to brace the approximately 1' overhang. It is simple but effective.

[Tom King]

Just as a reminder, I use closed end stainless rivets, but I already had a heavy duty rivet gun capable of pulling a stainless rivet.  They take a LOT more force to pop than other rivets, so you can't pop one without at least damaging a regular gun.

https://www.amazon.com/Closed-Sealed-Rivets-Stainless-0-188-0-250/dp/B07JR2ZNXM/ref=sr_1_3?crid=1ABQHVP8XHHOX&keywords=closed+end+3%2F16%22+stainless+steel+pop+rivet&qid=1675948116&sprefix=closed+end+3%2F16+stainless+steel+pop+rivet%2Caps%2C95&sr=8-3

I also use those rivets in a stainless gasketed roofing washer.

https://www.amazon.com/Stainless-Bonded-Sealing-Neoprene-Washers/dp/B07L5T569J/ref=sr_1_3?crid=Z0TAG0L3D1TR&keywords=stainless+steel+roofing+washers&qid=1675948248&sprefix=stainless+steel+roofing+washers%2Caps%2C99&sr=8-3

Some of those still holding here for more than 20 years on recycled roofing metal on sheds.

A regular pop rivet is probably still better than just caulking a hole.  I never found any kind of caulking that would last more than a few years on a dark roof in the Sun.

[Old Greenhorn]

Tom, what kind/model/brand gun did you use? Just curious becuase I worked in that industry for a manufacturer making the tools for 16 years or so. We sold a huge variety of rivets that could be puled in our guns, even one with decorative snap on cover caps to use in truck upholstery. We sold deck rivets for tractor trailer decks, blind rivets for trailer bodies, and then the bigger lines for truck frame assembly and axle mounts. You need some good pull when you get over a 3/16 aluminum rivet. We had hand tools that would pull up to 1/4" without assist, then we had air over hydraulic tools (we called then pnuedraulic) that would got higher. The the bigger boys all the way to up 180,000# of straight pull force. Used those for RR track switching sections and fastening the fuel tanks on diesel locomotives IIRC.
 Just wondered what you are using.

[Tom King]

 A  Marson Big M for 3/16 rivets, and a Big D for 1/4" stainless rivets.   I had a sailboat business in the mid '80's and they were leftover tools from that.

I don't even know if those guns are even still made now, but I expect they are.  The Big D is like a pair of bolt cutters with a Beefy rivet gun head.  The Big M is a long accordion type thing, so you push it about 18" to pull a 1/2" long rivet.

They're still made:    

https://www.amazon.com/Marson-Unified-T-Rivet-Klik-Split-Nosepiece/dp/B014VGVW2S/ref=sr_1_2?gclid=CjwKCAiA0JKfBhBIEiwAPhZXD9wCLAvyWGBT22xoZ_Rin6TElohAESrY0nkEZcYmNMAh2jR-OITiaBoCPTcQAvD_BwE&hvadid=177779756565&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9009793&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=11117514434372985222&hvtargid=kwd-1604432081&hydadcr=8461_9883282&keywords=Marson+BIG+DADDY+Riveter&qid=1675952342&s=hi&sr=1-2

Looks like the Big M is off the market now.  I expect it was a danger to fingers, but I'm used to it.

[Old Greenhorn]

Yup! I know those tools. I may even have a Big M on the shelf in my shop not sure if it is straight air, or also uses oil, haven't looked at it in a few years. Just before I retired we cleaned out our engineering lab and we filled a steel skid cage  with all the (brand new) tools we had that our competitors made, so I grabbed a couple before they went in the scrap haulers truck.

 Marson was a very big competitor for our lower end line (small products) and they would take our designs and find ways to make them cheaper with very good success. They made good tools, but they had a life and were tough to service when they wore out. Ours were pretty much fully rebuildable, but that came at an increased cost which only big commercial users would pay for high production. The Marson tools will last a very very long time and work well with occasional use, maybe a couple hundred pulls a month on average. Some of our clients pulled 15-20,000 rivets a day by comparison.

 That big D tool you have is identical to the one we made and sold. I am not sure if it was our or Marson's design first, no matter, it works very well. But if you have to pull a few hundred 1/4" rivets with it, you will either have rubber arms or Popeye arms.  For repair type work, it is a go-to tool.

[Tom King]

Here is what I bought sold as a Marson Big M back then.  It still works fine, and is the one I use on a roof.  This one has pulled more than a few hundreds of stainless steel rivets.  I had a Hobie Cat sailboat dealership in the 1980's, and a repair shop.  I have spare jaws for them somewhere, but have never changed them.

The only 1/4" rivets I used were for replacing the 3/16's ones in corner castings that had wallowed the holes out, so the Big D hasn't done multiple hundreds, but still pulls strong when I need it.