Fourth Wall Up

May 30, 2020

Today we got the forth wall up.

I’ve been using perpendicular 2x4s along door openings to make them very stiff without increasing thermal bridging.

Most of the wall was already framed except the 16 ft. 2x6s I just picked up that morning.

I have no good reason to believe that the face nailing was actually insufficient. Only paranoia.

This time I decided to put some screws into the face-nailed rafter to help keep it tight through all the twisting that happens during the lifting process.

Though it seemed easier to do it this way, hoping the markings were correct did feel a little risky.

We then sheathed the wall and cut out the doorway.

I provided critical micromanagement while Ryan stapled at each red mark on the Tyvek.

This is the only wall which vapor barrier could be applied after it was up, but it actually turns out to be much easier to install on the ground.

This angle somehow looked steeper in person than in the model I began to have doubts.

Peter anchored the D-rings while Ryan and I attached the hoists to the steel rafter.

The door made a perfect location to operate the hoist from. At least until it started to bind up.

We started pulling and one of the hoists was binding up because of the angle we were pulling at.

Working with these heavy hoists on an extension ladder is a young man’s game.

We tired rotating the hoist, since the other side wasn’t giving us any trouble. This did not help.

Though the scaffolding was just being stored in the corner, it turned out the be the perfect platform from which to pull from.

Finally we realized that pulling from a higher angle on the opposite side of the wall would work, so I sat on the scaffolding and pulled from there.

Hearing each other through the wall and over the sound of chains clanking quickly became challenging.

This got the wall almost all the way so it was pretty easy to push into place.

The sawhorses were to prevent anyone from being crushed in case the wall fell.

We were very careful about bracing and took safety measures on both sides.

The workshop suddenly felt much smaller, but I’m still happy with the size.

We replaced the chain hoists with some ratchet straps to keep the wall from swaying away from the rafter until the ridge beam is in place.

This time we used the powder-actuated nailer to anchor the brace. This uses what are essentially .22 blank bullets to drive hardened nails into concrete.

Finally simplified the bracing to make room for the side walls.

Fourth Wall Started
Wall Adjustments