At Home In The Woods

[jinman]

Good luck Obed! Keep your head down. Those tornados sure have surprised a lot of folks. In my experience, hail can be up to quarter size and not do a lot of damage, especially on newer composition roofs. Older roofs seem to be more brittle and crack easier. A roof that looks fine to the untrained eye can still be damaged. Adjusters are trained to spot problems and will lift shingles to look under them for telltale cracks. I hope all your vehicles (especially your little green buddy) are okay.:thumbsup:

 

[Obed]

Our cars seem to be mostly ok from the hail. Our Honda has 4 new dents; our Olds didn't appear rented. The tractor didn't appear to have damage. I haven't yet inspected the house gutters ot the F-350.

The larger pieces of hail were about the size of a quarter. I'll be curious to see if any of our neighbors file any insurance claims.

 

[Obed]

I'm feeling much better today. I've been fighting a sinus infection that turned into bronchitis. During the past 2 weeks I've had about 3 good nights of sleep so last nights full night's rest was wonderful.

This morning we went to a local farm implements consignment auction. We were hoping to see a 3PH tiller but no such luck. But it was a beautiful day and we had fun watching our 2 yr old girl run all over the place. I had to go get her out of the men's restroom once.

I took a long nice nap this afternoon. Thanks all for the well-wishes.

 

[Diamondpilot]

Glad all is ok.

Chris

 

[Obed]

The dryer exhaust duct came apart in the basement as a result of shoddy installation. The ductwork at that point was only supported by the aluminum tape used where the two pieces of ductwork jointed. I removed the old aluminum tape, cleaned the duct surface with a damp rag, then reattached the ducts together. I then added support to that duct by attaching an aluminum duct strap to the truss. Lastly, I put some more aluminum tape around the duct joint.

This ductwork was installed by the HVAC sub with whom we were not happy. He is the one that we fought with toward the end of the HVAC job as described here. We ended up not paying the HVAC guy for his final invoice and instead used that money to pay another HVAC company to finish the job the way we wanted it done.

I guess I was not surprised when the dryer vent ductwork fell apart.

 

[Obed]

Today was a gorgeous day, high of 60 and clear blue skies. I spent most of the day in bed. My cold is much better but I took advantage of the day off by getting lots of rest.

Later this afternoon I got in some seat time. First I added some gravel beside our back porch where some steps will eventually reside.

 

[Obed]

Then I did some badly needed maintenance on the driveway. A spot recently appeared where the water started crossing the driveway. That part needed fixing immediately before it became a big rut.

I borrowed a scraper blade from my dad many months ago but never used it until today. After attaching the blade to the 3PH, I forgot to put the pins in the sway bars. When I realized the blade was swinging too much, I noticed that one of my sway bar pins was missing. I spent 5 minutes looking on the ground for the pin but it was hopeless. I expect that replacing the pin will be a bit of a headache.

Fixing that newly forming rut across the driveway took almost no time. So next I started working on the swell on the uphill side of the driveway. The water path along the uphill side of the driveway had started encroaching on the driveway and needed to be filled in and reshaped.

I have never fine tuned the driveway grading since it was installed. When the gravel was laid down, the gravel truck poured gravel in our swell on the uphill side of the driveway. So we had gravel on the bank on the uphill side of the driveway. I've needed to scrape the gravel off the bank and put it on the driveway where it belongs.

I was curious how well the scraper blade would work for reshaping the swell on the uphill side of the driveway. I debated using the box blade but thought I would try the scraper blade first. Like any tool, it took some experimenting to figure out a technique that worked well. I got better with the blade as I used it. The winter is the wet season here so conditions were ideal for doing this job. The ground was soft from the winter rains but it wasn't muddy.

I was able to reshape the swell rather well with the scraper blade. It seemed to be the right tool for the job today. If the ground had been harder, I might have had to use the backhoe. After I reshaped the uphill swell, I graded the driveway by back-dragging with both the blade and the FEL. That method worked rather well.

Being able to get outdoors and accomplish something did wonders for my spirits. I have more work to do on the driveway. The success of this afternoon's work is encouraging me to get going on the rest of the driveway.

 

[scoutcub]

Then I did some badly needed maintenance on the driveway. A spot recently appeared where the water started crossing the driveway. That part needed fixing immediately before it became a big rut.

I borrowed a scraper blade from my dad many months ago but never used it until today. After attaching the blade to the 3PH, I forgot to put the pins in the sway bars. When I realized the blade was swinging too much, I noticed that one of my sway bar pins was missing. I spent 5 minutes looking on the ground for the pin but it was hopeless. I expect that replacing the pin will be a bit of a headache.

Fixing that newly forming rut across the driveway took almost no time. So next I started working on the swell on the uphill side of the driveway. The water path along the uphill side of the driveway had started encroaching on the driveway and needed to be filled in and reshaped.

I have never fine tuned the driveway grading since it was installed. When the gravel was laid down, the gravel truck poured gravel in our swell on the uphill side of the driveway. So we had gravel on the bank on the uphill side of the driveway. I've needed to scrape the gravel off the bank and put it on the driveway where it belongs.

I was curious how well the scraper blade would work for reshaping the swell on the uphill side of the driveway. I debated using the box blade but thought I would try the scraper blade first. Like any tool, it took some experimenting to figure out a technique that worked well. I got better with the blade as I used it. The winter is the wet season here so conditions were ideal for doing this job. The ground was soft from the winter rains but it wasn't muddy.

I was able to reshape the swell rather well with the scraper blade. It seemed to be the right tool for the job today. If the ground had been harder, I might have had to use the backhoe. After I reshaped the uphill swell, I graded the driveway by back-dragging with both the blade and the FEL. That method worked rather well.

Being able to get outdoors and accomplish something did wonders for my spirits. I have more work to do on the driveway. The success of this afternoon's work is encouraging me to get going on the rest of the driveway.

Looking great Obed! I'm very jealous, I'm stuck overseas for another 4 weeks, before I can get back home, and get some quality outdoor and seat time.
That picture with your green lawn in the background (middle of the woods) is great!

Frank

 

[Obed]

Looking great Obed! I'm very jealous, I'm stuck overseas for another 4 weeks, before I can get back home, and get some quality outdoor and seat time.
That picture with your green lawn in the background (middle of the woods) is great!

Frank

Thanks Frank. I don't know how you manage things around the homesite with all the traveling you do.
Obed

 

[Obed]

I finally bought a dehumidifier for the basement. I paid $320 including shipping for this Winix dehumidifier. I started looking for dehumidiers over a year ago but couldn't find anything that seemed worth buying. The reviews were really bad for most dehumidifiers. I got the impression that often they don't last much more than 2 or 3 years so I couldn't justify paying a lot of money for one. Finally I saw that Winix dehumidifiers got really good reviews by buyers online, something quite unusual for dehumidifiers.

My unit arrived 3 days ago. This unit is almost filling up its bucket twice a day. I estimate it is removing about 3 gallons of water a day from our 2100 SF unfinished basement. I will soon hook up a hose in order to gravity drain the water into our one of our basement floor drains so I don't have to empty the bucket twice a day. However, I wanted to use the built in bucket for a few days so I could see how much water it collects.

So far I'm happy with the dehumidifier assuming it keeps working. My wife has expressed that the dehumidifier is making the basement feel colder; she's not thrilled about aspect.