New cottage/retirement home near Lake Michigan

ededic · Apr 14, 2018

June 8-9, 2016

Saying good bye to the Hudsonville house after 15 years of blood, sweat, tears, laughter and joy.

ededic · Apr 14, 2018

June 10-11, 2016

Back at it. After work, starting on the plates for the 2nd level and lining up heights for interior walls to support the upper level. You can see the sunlight gleaming through the trees from the west as the sun goes down in all the pictures during the week as I work from 7AM until 4 or 5PM and then start my day on the build. Without lights, I am able to work until 9 or so this time of year.

I have about one week to get the interior support walls up before my little brother comes to help with the trusses and second floor decking. Need to start cranking!

June 14, 2016

Our neighbors work on their timber frame home from Vermont Homes. They will also use SIP type panels however they won't be structural.

ededic · Apr 14, 2018

June 19-20, 2016

Ok, So we have owned a summer cottage up here since 2010, we would move into the cottage in May and head home to Hudsonville in Sept. My wife has always taken the clothes home to wash when we needed to go home to Hudsonville and mow the lawn once a week. Well Hudsonville is not available to us any longer and we no longer own any lawn to mow so I must take a break and install a washer and dryer in the summer cottage. Easy, peasy right? Riiiigghht...

Took a while but all setup in the front porch and now we can wash clothes daily after a hard day of work. Should have done this a while ago... We all say that.

ededic · Apr 14, 2018

Building the interior support walls for the second floor. If I had to do over again, I would have done them in SIP. They would be measured, numbered and it would be going a lot faster.

My wife is always helping and doing more than she ever thought she could. We both are actually, since this is our first build and we are the General Contractors and the builders. Some of our neighbors think we are crazy, others have gained a real respect for what we are able to do.

We had a contractor come in and build the stairs. I have done stairs before but not this height. I felt like paying someone who builds 20 stairs a year vs me, I'll take the 20 or so stairs a year. Money well spent.

ededic · Apr 14, 2018

June 22, 2016

Interior walls are up and we are ahead of schedule for my brother's arrival. We have the trusses on site and we just need to get the tractor into place and get the process started on how the system will work to get them up and into place.

Scaffold is in place and we have some guys around, let's do it.

Doh! The trusses are heavy. Not sure but must be over 200lbs! We can get them up there one end at a time but not good on the back and just too dangerous. My brother will be here tonight and need to have something in place to help us maximize the help. Time to get a Skytrack in here.

Since I had Skytrack rented to get the floor decking up there and also unload the 2nd floor walls on Friday, I called and asked to pick it up early. My luck, it was just sitting there anyway until my rental. Was the same cost as I was now paying the week rate.

Starting to come together. We are able to get 3-4 up at the same time with a bit of wrangling on each end. A lot easier than with my tractor and brute force. Next time will hire a crane for $600 per day.

ededic · Apr 14, 2018

June 23, 2016

Working on the trusses.

Adding support (4 trusses deep) to support the Superior Concrete wall for backfilling.

Starting the decking on the second floor.

ededic · Apr 15, 2018

ededic said:
May 1, 2016
House is under contract. 36 hours after listing and 2 days of open house. Seven offers all over asking price with personal hand written letters from each family asking us to choose them.

Time to move. Whew, this is moving fast.

Got the truck and trailer in loaded every run northbound. This one has the car, or as my wife calls it "That Car". The word "Sell" is normally in there somewhere. It is a 1986 1/2 Pontiac 2+2 Aero Coupe. Richard Petty helped GM push this through as a production vehicle so they could race it on the NASCAR circuit. Petty and others were getting clobbered by the Ford Thunderbird and still wanted to race Pontiac. Needless to say, back in 87 I was a huge NASCAR fan and fell in love with it on the showroom floor. There were only 1200 built and all were the same with a few anomalies for GM Executives. I still have it, it has about 41,000 miles on it and the motor has been fogged for about the past 15 years. It has been on the track at MIS in Jackson prior to three races in parade laps.

Fixed the photos... Not sure what happened.

TSO · Apr 16, 2018

ededic said:
Fixed the photos... Not sure what happened.

Great looking car. I was a big Nascar fan of that era as well. Those were good days for NASCAR. I had a similar Olds Cutlass back in the day, and still wouldn't mind picking up a clean Monte Carlo if I ever get around to it. We actually also have a 1988 Thunderbird Turbo Coupe that we still keep around as a summer driver, Mom (a Big Bill Elliott fan) bought that new from Jerome Duncan Ford Back in 88.

ededic · Apr 20, 2018

July 1, 2016

Starting on second floor exterior walls. Tricky doing this alone. Thankfully always have neighbor willing to lend a helping hand.

View attachment 549861

SIP Panels go up fast once you get your order of operations and a system down. By the time we get to the last panel we will be experts. Isn't that how it always works out?

Again, My bride is right in the middle of it all helping me never forget a step. With SIP Panels, forgetting to drill a raceway in a jack or king stud causes lots of problems down the road when pulling wire.

View attachment 549871

ededic · Apr 20, 2018

July 2, 2016

Uh Oh, Looks like we have a measurement off. The north wall is 4 3/8" higher than the other walls. Good news. The entire North wall measures the same and we can keep on track. We will need to contact the truss company and have the end truss adjusted for this.