As we expected, not much happened on the house since last Monday’s post. Between the general contractor being out of town all week and the two inches of much needed rain that we got on Thursday, only Avi, who does concrete work, and one of his assistants was here at all. The main new thing that they did was to dig the hole for the foundation for the far end of the bridge from the house to the backyard. Picture 1 shows the door from the second floor that will lead to this bridge. Picture 2 shows the depth of the hole itself. (One of Ted’s friends once described him as someone who always wants to look into holes.)
Picture 1 – Opening for the door from the hallway on the second floor to what will be the bridge to the upper backyard.Picture 2 – Hole for the footing for the far end of the bridge.
Before leaving on Wednesday, Avi covered the second floor with plastic, in anticipation of the rain.
Picture 3 – Plastic sheeting to protect the second floor from the rain.Picture 4 – Our chickens observe the progress on the house with their usual interest.
It looks like this will be a slow week since our contractor and his brother, who is the onsite project manager, are away in London for a family event. They did take off the forms of the new concrete that was poured last Wednesday. Picture 1 shows the lost wall and Picture 2 shows the other walls on the second floor.
Picture 1 – The top and bottom of the lost wall. The stairway to the second floor will come up here.Picture 2 – The walls on the east and south sides of the the second floor.
Picture 3 below shows the east and south sides of the house from the stairs from the lower level of the property that leads to the main entrance.
More happened at the condo today than on the house construction because the builders wanted a long weekend. I guess the painters are hungrier, since today they began the process of prepping to repaint the inside of the condo. This is not to say that nothing happened at the house. The picture below shows the new load of lumber that was delivered ready for the framers to begin work on the second floor and roof on Monday.
Happy Thanksgiving! We have been blessed with construction work happening at both the house and our new condo in Irvine. Wednesday, at the condo, one group of workers finished putting down new flooring and we had electricians in for the day to add wiring for lights and ceiling fans and remove switches that were controlling wall plugs. (Does someone like these? Please tell us why.)
The workers have also been busy at the house. They removed the forms from the outside of the west wall. Although the scaffolding is still up you can see that there are not a lot of windows on this side mostly because the afternoon sun in the summer here can be brutal and there are not many trees shading this side of the house. You can see the steel posts that will support the gabion wall that will help break up the facade on this side, making it look less like a bunker. There will be a window into the great room at the right edge of this picture. The overhang will help shade it. There is also a window into the dining room behind the rightmost three steel posts. This will be sitting behind the gabion wall with the idea that there will be light filtering through the large rocks that make up the gabion wall. There will also be a low, horizontal window into the kitchen where you can see standing sheets of plywood and no posts. This window will have an opening through the gabion wall.
Picture 1 – West wall of the house with the forms removed.
Picture 2 shows a place where the weight of the concrete caused the form on the side of this window to give way so that the concrete bulged out at the bottom. Every vertical foot of wet concrete adds 150 pounds per square foot of hydrostatic pressure. The vertical form at the bottom of this window was about 7 feet below the top of the wall, so there was almost 1000 pounds per square foot of pressure at this point. It’s a wonder that these problems are not more frequent. Although a nuisance, fortunately the fix is simple — they will simply have to cut out the concrete to the pencil line.
The framers were able to finish the decking for all of the second floor. This had to be done by noon on Wednesday, so they could pass an inspection that was needed so that they could start doing the second floor framing next Monday. Picture 3 shows the completed decking for the green roof on the south side of the house. This covers part of the great room and then is cantilevered over the deck. The steel post in the middle of the picture is at the southwest corner of the great room. There will be a floor-to-ceiling window on the west side of the house running from it to the left to the concrete wall. There will be a window and sliding door combination running back from it to the concrete wall by the red ladder that will be on the south side of the great room.
Picture 3 – The part of the green roof that is cantilevered over the deck on the south side of the house.
Picture 4 was taken from the top of the overhang in Picture 3 to show the east side of the house. The opening on the left side of the picture is for the stairway to the first floor ending by the front door. The roof above the east side of the house will be a deck over the master bedroom. You can see the deep overhangs that will shade the windows on the south and east side.
Picture 4 – Deck above the eats side of the house.
So, lots of progress. However, best of all, at noon they began the last pour of concrete for the house proper. This was the ninth pour. By my rough estimate there are at least 200 cubic yards of concrete in the house and the garage apartment; that’s 20 concrete trucks full. Picture 5 shows them pouring part of the east wall on the second floor — the wall that sits on a steel beam.
They are on schedule to do the final pour on Wednesday. Today they made progress on the rebar for the final two walls. Picture 1 is the top to the missing wall. Picture 2 is the wall on the steel beam.
Picture 1 – Rebar is almost complete for the second floor section of the missing wall.Picture 2 – The wall above the steel beam. Both sides of the forms are complete on the north end (right side) of this wall. The rebar is complete for the rest of the wall.
Picture 3 – Is one that I should have included yesterday. It shows the bottom of the missing wall. The shorter opening on the right is for a door from the hallway behind this wall into a storage space under the stairway. The opening on the left is the passage between the great room and the hallway. It is cutoff on its right side because this passage goes under the stairway to the second floor.
Picture 3 – The 1st floor of the missing wall without plywood forms.
After the concrete pour on Thursday, the workmen were busy taking down the forms on Friday and beginning the rebar and the forms for the last two second floor walls that will be poured this week. Once these two walls are done, the concrete work on the house proper will be finished! This work took a lot longer and cost our contractor much more than he anticipated when he bid the job, but the result is wonderful.
Picture 1 shows the second floor taken from the southern edge of the cantilevered overhang over the deck on the south side of the house. On the right, you can see the new second floor wall by the front door. Just behind it is the initial rebar for the two walls still to be done. On the left edge of the photo is the western wall of the second floor. They have taken the forms off the inside of this wall, but not the outside yet. At the back is the northern wall of the second floor with all of the forms removed. In the back-left corner you can see the opening for the window in the guest bedroom. Just to the right of that is the opening for the door that will lead to a bridge to the lower part of the backyard.
Picture 1 – The second floor from its southern edge.
Picture 2 shows the rebar extending out from the top of what we have been fondly calling the “missing” first-floor wall, since it was missed on the plans for awhile. The second floor of this wall is one of the two that still needs to be done. The gap between the far end of this wall and the rebar sticking up to the left of it, is where a door will go out onto a deck over the east side of the house.
Picture 2 – The rebar in the center will be the beginning of the second floor of the no-longer-missing wall.
Picture 3 continues on to the left from where Picture 2 stopped. This shows the vertical rebar that will support the eastern wall on the second floor of the house. Most of this wall sits on a steel beam. The rebar here was welded to that beam. On the other side of this wall there will be a deck over the master bedroom.
Picture 3 – The vertical rebar of the wall that will be built on top of a steel beam on the eastern side of the second floor of the house.
Picture 4 was taken from the deck above the eastern side of the house. This shows the northern section of the east wall, which is almost done, the rebar is complete and the inside plywood form is in place. The gap to the left of this section of wall is for a window into the guest bathroom.
Picture 4 – Taken from the deck above the eastern side of the house, this shows the almost completed north section of the east wall.
A final note: Saturday morning we took possession of the condo in University Hills, for which we traded our house there.
Our structural engineer made a visit to the site this morning. Although he had recommendations for minor repairs to cement work in the apartment, he was content with the way the cement construction had been broken into pieces and the preparations for the walls about to be poured tomorrow and next week. Tomorrow, along with the first-floor, missing wall, they will pour the concrete for the second-floor walls on the west and north sides and by the front door. Next week, possibly Wednesday but perhaps Friday, should be the last pour of concrete for the house! They will pour the second floor of the missing wall and the east wall of the second floor that sits on the steel beam.
Yesterday and today (Monday was Veterans Day), they worked on finishing the framing of the missing wall and making sure all the framing was plumb and the correct height for the second floor pours.
As Picture 1 shows, the framers made great progress on the sub-floor plywood for the second floor. Picture 2 shows the floor from the southeast corner of the green roof.
Picture 1 – The house from above showing the new sub-floor plywood for the second floor.Picture 2 – Second floor from the southeast corner of the green roof over the deck.
The concrete guys also finished the forms for the next pour. Picture 3 shows the lost wall, Picture 4, the top of the wall where the steel beam supporting the second floor concrete wall is attached, and Picture 5 the board-formed wall by the front door. Unfortunately, this concrete will not be poured on Tuesday. A friend of Nina’s has worried her about some aspects of the concrete structure and so has halted this work until our structural engineer can come out and evaluate everything.
Picture 3 – The lost wall.Picture 4 – The top of the wall where the steel beam supporting the second floor concrete wall is attached.Picture 5 – The board-formed wall by the front door.
The framers and the concrete guys both made progress today. The concrete guys did the forms for the second side of the board-form wall by the front door. Picture 2 shows the rebar for the missed first floor wall. The large opening in this wall is a passage from the great room to the hallway that leads to our bedroom. It passes under the stairway to the second floor which limits its height, so we were in many discussions about the shape for the top of the opening.
Picture 1 – Framing of the missed wall. The diagonal piece of rebar in the open area follows the line of the stairway.
They also did the rebar for the extra section of the south wall into which the steel beam connects. This is shown in Picture 2.
Picture 2 – New rebar in the added section of this wall that will support the steel beam with a concrete wall on it.
The framers were busy putting in wood beams to form the parts of the roof that cantilever out from the house to create overhangs shading the windows. Picture 3 shows a segment on the east side of the house over the front door. Picture 4 shows the overhang on the south side of the house taken from the deck.
Picture 3 – Part of the cantilevered roof on the east side of the house. The completed section is over the front door. The part to the left of that is still to be done. On the right side of the picture, the scaffolding is for the board form wall that the concrete guys just completed.Picture 4 – This is a view from the deck looking toward the south side of the house.
Picture 5 shows the second floor from the edge of the overhang shown in
Picture 4. The part that is closest (at the bottom of the photo) will be
a green roof. The next section, with joists running toward the back is a
small deck. Everything beyond that will be inside the house on the
second floor.
Picture 5 – A view of the second floor taken from the edge of the overhang shown in Picture 4. The part that is closest (at the bottom of the photo) will be a green roof. The next section, with joists running toward the back is a small deck. Everything beyond that will be inside the house on the second floor.
The framers did lots of prep work — putting up hangers, cutting beams — so that today they can finish the first floor framing and put down the plywood that will be the subfloor of the second floor.
New framing for the overhang off our bedroom.
The concrete workers finished the board form lining for the wall by the door. They also began work on the lost concrete wall between the great room and the hallway to the bedroom. This is shown in the picture below.
Form for one side of the lost concrete wall that will separate the great room from the hallway to the bedroom.
