Deconstruction

Today was spent unbuilding, oddly enough. All the effort which went into boxing up the concrete slab was undone today - so much work, gone in a day.

First up was the propping we installed underneath the coolroom panels. I noticed after we poured the concrete last week that the panels were definitely showing the weight of the concrete above. With their high gloss finish and the props removed, it’s easy to see a slight bowing in their surface:

With the bearers gone, it’s even easier!

The engineering specs clearly state a maximum distance between props of 1000mm, and I wouldn’t have wanted to exceed that even a little bit. Ours were at 900 centres, and you can see what the weight of the concrete has done.

Frankly, I’m actually amazed they only bowed this little; I was so hesitant to even walk on them initially, but they’re clearly much stronger than they appear.

With the vibrator being my responsibility during the pour, I was keen to see what sort of a job I did with the concrete flowing underneath the edges of the panels above the retaining wall. With no further ado, off with the timber!

Bugger! Most of the length is actually beautifully finished, almost perfectly flush with the blockwork and just about good enough to leave visible without hiding it with timber. Sadly however I must have been shooed away in one spot without getting in with the vibe, as there’s about half a metre which hasn’t flowed. A shame, but all this means is I’ll have to hide the joint with a nice piece of timber. It could be worse :)

The rest of the day was spent up on the slab, removing the rebate and edge timbers. With the kids and the dog running around the site I thought it best to denail the timber as I removed it, which slowed down the progress substantially but I’d rather take the extra time than perforate a little foot…

So the plan for tomorrow is to get stuck into the rest of the framing for the pump room and finish off that part of the ground floor, before I start on the perimeter and upper level. This involves making up four separate frame sections - a doorway at the end of the rammed earth, the two pump room walls, and a tricky little section which joins everything together and supports the first roof truss. In keeping with the rest of the framing so far (with the exception of the wall at the container end) this is all 90x45 MGP10 T2 pine, conventionally framed at 450 centres.

Pretty simple stuff, made more so by my new best friend the nail gun! :) If ever there was a “right tool for the job”, this is it…