Finished painting

Here's a look at the upstairs following the drywall, mudding, and painting. It pretty much sums up all the nice work and contributions: the timber frame from Willy Lemaitre from Sutton, Alex Courvoisier (from Dunham) assembly job, the ceiling planks from Nicholas Hamel in the Beauce, the windows from Elite courtesy of the Liptak family near Ottawa, the flooring planks sawn up by Martial Marois in Granby, and finally the mudding and painting by Luc Tremblay in Frelighsburg to bring out the colours in grains in all this wood.

With the afternoon sun provided by mother natures, it makes for a really nice picture from the staircase.

Tongue and groove flooring

The flooring is almost done upstairs. This shows the 2'' tongue and groove hemlock planks on the timber rafters. They double as the floor upstairs and the ceiling for the first floor. This wood was kiln dried in Cowansville then planed and dried in Granby. Not drying it would have meant cracks opening up between planks as the wood dried.

The 2'' thickness (okay 1 13/16'' after planing) makes for a solid floor. It also reinforces the frame. When the big bad wolf blew down the wooden house, it was not a timber frame.

Siding

Here is another load of wood from the sawyer in Granby. This time it is hemlock siding. It's been drying in the woods for a year and a half now, so it is semi dry. This is ideal because it won't split when nailed to the house like dry hemlock, but won't shrink like green wood. Most pieces are longer than Alex's trailer, which makes the trailer fish tail if you go too fast, especially down hill whe the full load pushes the truck. We take it very slow.

We actually had to make two trips to get this rabbeted beveled siding. Each 6'' x 1 1/2" board was cut diagonally into a wedge and then contoured to make a ship lapped wedge. We're storing it in the woodshed to keep the elements of it until it is ready to be nailed to the house. The plan is to keep the hemlock natural and let it go grey. Hemlock lasts forever as siding. All the old barns you see in the Townships are made of hemlock. The old timers knew their wood.

Insulation goes in

The insulation comes in bails that are emptied into a large blower. The guys had a bit of trouble unclogging the hose and getting the pressure high enough to blow the insulation properly. It then leaves the back of the truck and into a long plastic hose that leads to the wall cavities.

A second worker is in the house going up and down the scaffolding and filling the wall cavity defined by the wall trusses. The cellulose really blows everywhere. It's easy to sweep up, though. I guess the cathedral part was a little tricky to insulate. They had to climb pretty high up and get the hose above the rafters.

Insulation arrives

Okay, we're reaching back to June for updates here. The project has slowly been running its course here. Outside, nothing much has changed since the porch. Most of the changes have been inside so we can get moved in. The first big change was the insulation. The truck arived hauling the trailer at the same time the tile bed was done.

We used high density blown cellulose. Cellulose is recycled newspapers shredded into tiny bits. It is treated with boric acid to keep out vermin (boric acid is non toxic and acts as a dessicant to dry out any bugs that may enter, and also soaks up any moisture that may enter the walls). They also treat he product with fire retardant.

Insulation: before and after

Here's a good sequence of the insulation going into the bedroom wall. The horizontal furring is nailed to the wall trusses and holds the plastic vapor barrier in place. Red tape seals the different flaps of vapor barrier. The insulation is then blown in between the vapor barrier and outside sheathing.