A fenceman can fence anything, almost....

[Renze]

I've seen them cutting hillsides in Austria, with a tractor on the road with a winch on the side. It winched a cart with 4 caster wheels, a mower and an engine, up and down the hillside. I suppose this lawn needs something similar...

 

[rox]

Harv,

your pipe secrets are safe with me

Do you put the 5ft puller pipe inside the rail, or is the rail inside the puller pipe?

Another question, i wasn't going to ask becasue the project moved forward and past thei point but i have been wondering about how you drill through the stone into the iron frame.

Do you lay the stone down then drill through the stone and into the iron frame, all one drilling operation? I don't see how you could do that becasue i would think you need different drill bits for stone and for iron.

Do you pre drill the hole in the iron frame first, then lay down the stone slab and try and drill throught he slab and exactly hit the pre-drilled hole in the frame? And are you drilling from the top down, or are you under the frame and drilling up, which i don't think is the right answer but if you did it that way you would get a good line up on where the hole in the frame ends up.

You must have really good drill bits and a powerful drill, is it an air driven drill or electric? What kind of drill and drill bits do you use? Do you sharpen your drill bits (is that even possible) or just buy new ones?

Harv, if you want to rest a while between anwsering my lotsa quesitons that's okay many thanks for the education you provide for all fo us...

 

[dbdartman]

Another question, i wasn't going to ask becasue the project moved forward and past thei point but i have been wondering about how you drill through the stone into the iron frame.

Do you lay the stone down then drill through the stone and into the iron frame, all one drilling operation? I don't see how you could do that becasue i would think you need different drill bits for stone and for iron.

Do you pre drill the hole in the iron frame first, then lay down the stone slab and try and drill throught he slab and exactly hit the pre-drilled hole in the frame? And are you drilling from the top down, or are you under the frame and drilling up, which i don't think is the right answer but if you did it that way you would get a good line up on where the hole in the frame ends up.

You must have really good drill bits and a powerful drill, is it an air driven drill or electric? What kind of drill and drill bits do you use? Do you sharpen your drill bits (is that even possible) or just buy new ones?

Harv, if you want to rest a while between anwsering my lotsa quesitons that's okay many thanks for the education you provide for all fo us...

Not trying to step in Harv's toes here, but having a little experience in light & heavy fabrications, plus a couple years in commercial door & window installations, here's how I would do it:

Drill a hole in each angle frame, then set the stone in place, then drill into the steps from below. The holes in the stone would not go all the way through to the face. In those holes I would hammer fasteners specially designed for stone/concrete that expand in the stone when nuts are tightened on the exposed end, thus bolting the stone to the steel frame. Looked like 5/8" or 3/4" fasteners in the earlier pics.

Drilling the stone would be done with a hammer-drill, most likely electric, with a carbide-tipped drill bit. Such bits can be sharpened, but require equipment not usually found in the shop (I was doing work in a 100+ year old commercial building some years ago made of red brick, we were wearing out a bit every 2-3 days on the hard brick & were having a machine shop resharpen the bits weekly).

Harv, I've been following this thread for a few weeks now & must say I'm impressed. Nice work!

Attached is a couple pics of a car I did some chassis work on about 20 years ago (narrowed frame, installed 4-link & coil-overs, made wheel tubs, moved steering column, re-wired, & a few other little jobs).

 

[wroughtn_harv]

Rox we got the stones in place.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

It was a hot day yesterday. The time, temperature, and quote or notice of the day sign at the bank in town said "107". The rest of us said, well, "heck".

The day started out with me discovering Iris had developed a diesel leak. This was at six a.m. and I was supposed to meet Tom with the stone at seven an hour's drive away.

So we made do.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

Due to the problem with the stone guys at the quarry not delivering and conflicts in schedules I lost the laborers for bringing down the stone from the road.

But I have a son, a son in law, and an adopted son.

Here's adopted son and son in law putting the cart before the, well, uh, horse.

 

[wroughtn_harv]

We had a good day. It tore all of us a new one because of the heat. But we survived it. Well, except for son in law, a stone split unexpectedly and he smashed a finger and almost removed the nail.

That happened about ten or so in the morning. Last night my daughter called to let me know the emergency room said he'd broken two fingers and they'd sewed the nail back down.

Being who and what he is and having to work with the kinds of guys he does he didn't go to the doctor until the day was done. Until then he pulled his share of the load. Kid's gottem'.

All I've got left to do now is the handrail and lighting.

 

[rox]

You and your kin worked in 107 degree temperatures? You worked the whole day, not jsut in the morning and the evening?

The stairs look awsome, simply awsome. What kind of work was the son in law able to do during the day with 2 broken fingers?

 

[MF1455v]

The project is looking great Harvey. Sorry to here about the son-in-law.

James

 

[wroughtn_harv]

You and your kin worked in 107 degree temperatures? You worked the whole day, not jsut in the morning and the evening?

The stairs look awsome, simply awsome. What kind of work was the son in law able to do during the day with 2 broken fingers?

Actually he was able to do everything we were doing except he did it with a little more sensitivity. ; > )

I haven't called him this morning but I imagine it's a tough one. The morning after the day before is a bear under a lot of different circumstances.

But he's tough enough. He has to be working in our testosterone dominated world.

I'm the only one that's given a break. And that's because I'm old enough to remember when we had water and we had dirt. No one had even considered we could have mud.