Up goes the siding

Here's the siding going up on the North side of the house outside the bedroom window. Wow does it look good. This is the siding we had sawn from logs out of the woods. Also shown is the window and corner trim from Maibec (white). Maibec is wood treated with paint that's supposed to last 20 years. The effect of the white trim will be to offset the hemlock siding (which we will let go grey like an old barn). The hemlock tends to crack, but there doesn't seem to be more than 10% wasted for now.

Also shown is the white flashing covering the foundation insulation. Hold have put this on a long time ago. Better late than never.

Filling in the foundation

This is Eric with the big loader filling in the foundation, covering the drainage pipes with 1/2'' clear stone. Fortunately, Normand is working a larger project very nearby and these machines just have to rumble over for these little jobs as they come up.

I was careful to remove the wooden supports gingerly and shovel the crushed stone around the drains manually so that they stayed at the level that the plumber installed. The ones seen here are actually the drains for the kichen and the adjacent walk-in pantry.

Finished foundation

Here are a couple of pictures of the insulated foundation. It gives a good idea of how we did it. It's about $2000 of stryrofoam SM, but it will pay for itself over our lifetimes in heat savings. The aluminum coating on the interior is very visible, held in place by tape. This may be overkill, of course, but the stuff is cheap. It's also effective. Lisa said it really heated up on the inside as she was finishing the job.

In the first picture, Kitty inspects her new catwalk. It will not be one for long.

The second picture shows the sunset over Spruce Hill, with the access for the septic tank in the foreground.

Foundation insulation continues

Lisa points with pride to the fine job she's done insulating the foundation (not to the post anchor). In this photo, the outside is finished and the inside is in progress. She has since finished the inside.

Today, she insulates the pilasters and I line the inside with aluminum foil vapor barrier. Aluminum foil vapour barrier reflects the heat radiation emitted by the crushed stone into the space between the crushed stone.

Did I mention that she's very handy with a knife?

Insulating the foundation

Here's a picture of my lovely wife and assistant cutting 2'' Styrofoam SM boards for the foundation. She's very crafty with a knife. We are installing 4'' on the outside and 2'' on the inside. Today we nailed it to the sill on the outside. We'll need to nail into the concrete on the inside. Hello power drill.

This gives us R-30 insulation value. Overkill? Not with a radiant slab. The temperature of the slab will be maintained at 75 C (22 C) whereas the temperature of the air will be closer to 65 F ( 18 C) (for very toasty toes). If you want to keep the heat in, you need to insulate the slab. Moreover, with a solar system you want to store solar heat from the day and summer through the night and winter. You need to insulate below the slab as well.

The naked foundation

Here it is folks: the foundation, "tous nu"! We're about to install the weeping tile around the footings tomorrow, and will backfill some tomorrow, so I figured I better get a few pictures. Normand the excavator was in the neighborhood with the backhoe and bulldozer, so he kept it at our place over the weekend. He'll be installing the septic tank The electrician will be installing the buried power line and private pole on Tuesday. Hopefully Bell will show up to put in the hydro pole (they were supposed to do it last Thursday).

Here's a detail of the anchor system. These anchors will hold the posts in place with bolts. Should be good for up to F2 tornadoes.Looks like the frost took a toll on the corner of the foundation. Other than this, the foundation is straight and smooth.

I've posted a panorama of the house site. Not only is the house progressing, the seasons are too. Hope the snow holds out.

Setting up foundation forms

One of the fun things about hiring contractors and being on site is that you get to watch people do the stuff they really know how to do. The tools of the trade arrived on flatbed trucks. These racks of wooden concrete forms were hoisted onto the site using a crane. Because this foundation has pilasters, it required a lot of pieces not used on most building sites.

When I saw them, I realized why a lot of foundation contractors prefer these to styrofoam forms. These are 1 inch thick plywood with cast iron links. That's a little more sturdy than styrofoam and less likely to collapse when you climb over them or during a pour.

I caught Roger Laroche looking at the camera as he assembled them. This was the only time. He's in and out pretty quickly with his team, and watching what he's doing during that time. He came yesterday with one worker to set up the forms. Either the plans I gave him had a miscalculation, or I had given him an older version of the plans. With all the wonky post positions and the calculations for styrofoam forms, something just didn't add up. Instead of trying to figure it out, we went back to the timber framers plans and wall system to figure out the positioning of the pilasters and that the exterior of the foundation wall needed to be 5 inches out from the posts.

Lessons 1 - Burn all old versions of your plans
Lesson 2 - Make sure your contractors know what they're building.

This morning I checked the measurements and it all checked out, but the interior post footings were off; fixed it. Roger and I double checked the post positions together before the pour: measuring tape was flying everywhere. Roger used string wrapped to nails on top of the forms to line up the post positions to make sure they'd be resting on pilasters. Roger then used them to position the post anchors into the concrete. Double checked these after. One was half an inch off.

No pictures of finished pour today. Camera was out of batteries, and I was too busy measuring to take pictures.

Forms for footings

We went with 2 foot footings directly on the rock. I'm glad we did. A 2-foot barrier bonded to the rock should divert away any runoff moving along the top ot the rock.
The plans for the foundation are outlined here.

The foundation contractor (Laroche et fils) showed up with a flat bed and crane that deposited and a nice portable tool shed on the site (see previous post). The excavation had actually left the site more even than anticipated, despite some undulating crevices and depression that caused the water to pool. All in all, the footing ended up having only three steps, and the final height varies by no more than a foot.

This image shows where the footing is at its thickest at the corner of the "shed" extension. The footing actually dips into a crevice in the rock that will act as a natural drain for the north side of the house.

Busy worksite

We were expecting the well people from Puisatiers Exprets from Granby this morning. I hear action at the site, grab my well permit, and rush up to the site only to find the people from Laroche et fils getting ready to build the footings for my foundation. So I rush down to finish my foundation plans.

It was a busy worksite, but manageable. The contractors seemed to know how to stay out of each others way. Good thing, because there was a lot of coming and going. I managed to get some work in myself, although I was not nearly as busy as I appear to be here. Here I am moving the leftover concrete from the pump truck. I'm using it to block the runoff from a small spring in the driveway. This should help divert the water from a natural crevice under the house to a natural crevice running BEHIND the house.

Roger Laroche inspects his footing pour at far right, and the well guys drill for water in the background.