Another busy day!

Through the years I have employed both men and ladies on my crews. I have no bias - a strong work ethic and happy attitude are far more important than mere strength and size. On the current project two young ladies are working with me. Sarah has worked part time for us for a number of years. Becky is new, just starting on this job. Both are university students. Both are new to the construction industry. 

Whenever I bring my crews onto a work site there are always a few raised eyebrows. Ladies are not common it seems. As we start our project all eyes are watching. The things we do are unconventional to say the least. We don't often use a level or tape measure but build instead to a visual standard. On this project we are purposely bending and warping everything in site. Square 6" x 6" posts rapidly become thick hewn timbers and giant trees. Faux beams sag under the imaginary weight of the roof. My job was to lay things out, guide the look of the project. Sarah and Becky cut the plywood and fastened the many pieces into place. Today the ladies used air staplers to fasten the diamond lath to the plywood. each piece of lath is cut, bent and fit before being stapled firmly in place. It is noisy, tough, demanding work, mostly done from ladders.

Thanks for a great job!

-grampa dan

Welding an armature

One of the things we will cover in our Sculpting Magic Workshop which is to be held this fall is how we weld up our armatures for our sculptures. This is the stage we are at on the tree entrances for the Fox & Hounds Pub. The heavy steel structure for the hostess station was done in my shop on the bench. It was fashioned out of square tubing as it is easy and quick to cut and fit. We had decided to mount it to the wall instead of off the floor as I had drawn it. We will be fashioning a place to hold the menus. We'll still keep the bird's nest in place, but the fox in the knothole will move to one of the entrance trees. I bolted the frame to the wall onto some backing the carpenters had put in place for us. Then I hand shaped and welded the 1/4" mild steel pencil rod to form the skeleton of the tree.

The trees on each side of the restaurant entrance were formed the same way but there was no heavy welded steel square tubing framework. Instead I screwed in some heavy duty lag bolts as anchor points and welded the pencil rod frame to them. The exception was the branch that will hold up the restaurant sign. It had a heavy duty steel plate that was anchored to the 6" x 6" wood posts. The branch is strong enough to handle someone doing a chin up if they suddenly get the urge. On the bottom I formed and welded some rocks and a twisted root structure. It looks a lot like a wire frame on a computer screen, and is difficult to photograph.

On the restaurant side of the wall space will be at a premium so I kept the depth of the trees as as thin as possible.

Now we are ready to start attaching the lath. Once that is done the armature will be ready for the sculpting process.

-dan

Great crew - great progress!

On this project I have two helpers. Sarah has worked with us for four years. Becky is new to our crew and doing exceptionally well. The woodworking part is a new skill to both ladies but they are learning fast and keeping me scrambling to keep up. The contractor and his crew are working hard to keep ahead. It makes me smile as they use levels, tape measures and lasers to get everything perfectly level and plumb. We come along after and spend lots of energy making it bent and wiggly.

We are busy building a plywood armature, then covering it with a galvanized metal lath in preparation for the sculpted fiberglass-reinforced-concrete. After only three days on the job it is looking pretty fine! I am very pleased with the progress.

Tomorrow we spend in the shop doing prefabrication. Saturday I begin the onsite welding of the tree armatures.

-grampa dan