Monday March 30, 2009

More pumping. I am not going to explain it since I'm sure its a bit redundant by now. It was a nice day though. I also shoveled a lot of dirt off from the footings on either side of two of the curtain walls. The mud was so heavy since it was still really saturated. I also went around the outside of the footings to shovel down about 12 inches so that the exterior drain will have a place to settle.

Thursday and Friday, March 26 and 27

So both days we were in the wood shop. Thursday most of the tools that we wanted to use were not working the way we wanted them. Things were not as productive as we would have liked. Also I volunteered to stay later so that I could help with building the shelving for the coat and bag rack. We went exploring in GURP and found some shelving already being used. We know that we could use it for the bag and coat rack. We unscrewed and customized it so that we could use it the way we needed in the woodshop near the entrance. This way things are more organized for our personal items.

Wednesday, March 25 2009

GTTC did a great job in putting up the roofing system. I couldnt believe how fast they actually went up! We started getting rafters put in place and trying to fix the ones that was cut too long or not long enough. There was also a bit of sanding to make sure that the exposed part of the rafters would look really nice. I swallowed enough sawdust for a week. I hear we are in the woodshop tomorrow if it rains. I also shoveled a ton to help get the ground flat in the main room.

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Today was more of taking down scaffolding. There were four levels of it in the atrium and it was really crammed in there so it was interested trying to get it all out. I will be glad to not see scaffolding for a while. There was also some tricky scaffolding in the far back room which involved tons of walkboards screwed into 2 by 12s. The screws for the most part were all stripped and the wood had layers and layers connected so that they would be the same level as the walkboard. To make matters even more difficult there was concrete that dried on top of this from the concrete pour. So Caroline and I were tackling the boards one by one. The worst was when I had to hold up the really heavy layered section all by myself until we could figure out just how to lift it off the metal crossbars. Lets just say that today I really felt the hours I put in!

Monday March 23 2009

My ankle seems to still be bothering me from last week. Maybe it was not a good idea to go running 6 miles on it this past Sunday. Today we are concentrating on leveling out the grade the best we can. We have a digger thing (not sure the name of it) that has been making it a bit easier to break up the harder soil. Mainly we had some backbreaking shoveling to do today.

Friday March 20 2009

Today we finished getting off the scabbing and we started on more of the scaffolding. We organized the walkboards so that they could be picked up on Tuesday. The cross bracing for the scaffolding was somewhat difficult to take apart since there was concrete all over them from the concrete pour. Nothing that a little hammer, wrench, ratchet, and brute force couldn't fix though. I have a swim meet this weekend (saturday and sunday) at UNC so I will not be able to come to work on saturday. More Monday.

Thursday March 19 2009

We have started to take down some of the scaffolding that we do not need anymore. This pretty much took the whole day. In addition we set up more scaffolding in the center of the building because we have a large tree branch that needed to come down. Otherwise it would be in the way of the roof and it would make it very difficult to move around it. Adrian chopped down the branch a little at a time and there was sawdust everywhere! Also we started cutting lumber for the roofing joists. It started raining so we decided to get out of there early today.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Today I went to give blood and I passed out so I did not go to the job site today. No sense in falling off some scaffolding because I am really lightheaded. More tomorrow!

Tuesday, March 17 2009

Still more water pumping!!! Surprise surprise! We also went around site to get more scabbing down. The walk boards have dried up so it's safer to move around on them. This job was not as easy as expected since a lot of the screws have been stripped and we had to get creative to remove the scabs. I noticed that there is a lot of concrete that had fallen onto the footings form the concrete pour. I wonder if we will have to chip that off later on. That doesnt sound like a fun job to do.

Monday March 16 2009

First day back from break and we are meeting in the conference room. Once i got done with class I met with everyone and we continued on some administration work. Some other people went to the site to pump more water since it rained a bunch the last few days and other people went to the shop. Administration work consisted of figuring out how much more materials we need as far as ordering more wood for roof joists and roofing structure. Also I worked on paperwork that dealt with the receipts from materials we already bought and keeping track of the money spent. Other people worked on our budget.

Monday, March 9-13 2009

This week is Spring Break! Finally a chance to get caught up on work and maybe relax a bit!

Friday, March 6 2009

Today was still some water pumping but we mostly got all of it. The site is still a huge mudpit thought. I turned my ankle trying to jump from one puddle island to the next closest puddle island and my foot slipped. At least we have the weekend for me to heal a bit. As you can see... we get really messy. Good thing these jeans are old ones because there is no coming back for them after today.

Thursday, March 5 2009

The water pumping continued. It seems like we do this about every week! We also started taking down some of the scabbing from the ICF. Mostly just the ones that we could reach because the walkboards were still somewhat slippery and not safe to walk around on.

Wednesday, March 4th

Today we had a lot of water pumping to do. The weather had gotten a bit nicer but there was still ice and snow everywhere. People where chipping up the ice to put in wheel barrels and throw it off site. We also were pumping water from all around the site. I was shoveling snow off of the walkboards which was a little terrifying since it was so slippery.

Monday and Tuesday, 2 -3 March, 2009

Monday and Tuesday, 2 -3 March, 2009
Both days were canceled due to snow. Back on Wednesday!

Friday, February 27, 2006

Today was canceled because we have to wait for the concrete to dry.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

The long awaited day of the cement pour! It seemed like it would never get here. And it was raining buckets all day. The were at least two cement trucks that I saw and something that resembled a crane. The cement rain through a large hose that was hoisted up and the hose was then moved around to the areas in the ICF that we needed. First we went all the way around starting at the north wall and went up about half way with the cement. We filled in the window bucks as we went along. Once we made our way all the way around we started again at the beginning to top it off. Once it was poured to the top we went around and flattened the cement with trows and placed large bolt screws inside to stick out from the tops of the walls. I assume this is something that will be used to help us with the roof later on. There was not much trouble as the cement was being poured. I kept imagining the wall bursting and cement going everywhere. Luckily, we were lucky! Just a few more scabs here and a few more braces there, and we were good to go. And interesting and exciting experience today! Off to celebrate this weekend!

Monday - Wed, February 23 -25, 2009

Monday - Wednesday, February 23 - 25, 2009
We finally have the cement pour scheduled for this thursday. It has been pushed back for the last two weeks it seems because we keep running into snags. The joys of construction I guess. You can never really plan for things. At least have a tentative schedule but then again that can always go to the wayside. Mainly from today until thursday morning we will be scabbing the gapped ICFs, securing vertical rebar, bracing walls, gluing/foaming the gaps, and plumming the walls so edges are straight and correct with the plans.