I have FINALLY! gotten really good @ doing proportional drawings!

Up till now we have been "stick building", kind of taking general measurements on site and cutting to fit as we go...drawing in chalk to size on concrete driveways and parking lots... because I am not very good at working in 2-D. I can't really paint or draw, or make architectural drawings. But FINALLY now that I have been working on designing the roof trusses for months, and not that we are ready to build the roof trusses.. I have finally got the hang of designing things ahead of time, making sure everything will fit, and all the measurements are correct....so. onto th3e roof trusses! I had a dream a few nights ago of two sueful design considerations: one is of the way to make beautiful embroidered curatins, and the otehr is to use wood for the lower cords of the trussed, so they can be exposed, and metal cords above that, to attach, first 18 gauge furring channel, then the roofing material and the interiour paneling on the inside. Anyways, here are the hand drawings for the bathroom/bedroom floor platform, the four different roof trusses we will be making, and the two interior walls that will enclose the master bedroom. The drawings are on a scale of 2":1'


Scott found a program that will design roof trusses for you, and you know how much it costs? $7,000. I asked an architect for help, and they wanted $1,500. YIKES! No wonder I have been working on these drawings for months!

These two drawings/charts are first for the amount of materailw e will need to finish ALL framing, some 1'x 3 5/8 18gauage C-track, 18 gauge studs, 1"x 1 5/8" c-track, and hard wood beams, 1" x 2". The second drawings is a a little sketch od how we are going to attach the trsusses to the tops of the walls. We will enclose the C-track that the wall studs are fastened into with another piece of c-track to make a box, and the on all four sides of the truss and stud we will use 14 gauage angle stock, through bolted across through the truss and the wall stud, and also through the c-track. At four locations, denotedf by spirlas in the last image aboove, the through bolts will be tubular, hollow through the center, and through the bolts we will thread a piece of steel wire, which will be fastened diagonally across the 2' span between the wall studs, fatened at the floor. This will provide diagonal stability for the roof, to with-stand wind sheer and also to diagonally brace the walls.

Building the bay window back wall of the TRLR

Since I am kind-a not able to hold anything with my hands ( I tried to assemble the horizontal sills, holding the drill with my injured hand, and it slipped and I drilled into the top of my right foot) I did all the cutting for the assembly pieces, and then I got to play farkie to Scott while he assembled the back wall. It's almost done! I'll post more pictures when we get the windows in.
Scott is happy lately.

Bathroom walls

Well, I am standing where the toilet will be.
The bathroom walls will support the bedroom loft platform, which will etxend to about where my blue shoulder is. The walls are 74", and the room is 48" X 75".
TEE HEE!
Straight and true.
bathroom and bedroom coming together
curve and ladder infrastructure. The curve is to make it easier to get into the bedroom, closet area, and to the ladder that will go up into the loft.
the bath tub will fit into the curve.. 30" by 48"

Blood on steel

This really isn't that big of a deal, except that these are the first injuries that even remotely affect daily life sustained while build le TRLR. I had gotten all the parts of the bathrom walls onto the floor joist deck inside the trailer, and I was man handling them into a position where I could join them with the flexi C-track. I was holding one of the wall studs when I missed my footing on a joist and fell through the floor, and the flange of the stud gave me a deep cut to my middle finger and gouged out some flesh on my right finger. I almost fainted while I was pouring the hydrogen peroxide on. So I cleaned myself up, bandaged my fingers and took a juice break before coming back to work... and then I raked my thumb over an edge of steel while hanging over the top of the wall, having just clamped the stud into the c-track and reaching for the drill. I dribbled blood all over the trailer as I slunk away... ready to come home and feed myself a brownie. It's a good thing I am making a red coat right now, so I can spend the rest of the afternoon sewing.TRLR: 2! G:0

Pictures of the bedroom floor platform, and the three knee walls

Next up goes the bathroom walls along that flat strapping you see anchored to the floor joists there. It is for the sub flooring to rest on as it runs around the walls. Normally one would put the sub floor down and then build the walls on top right? Well, for this trailer the total skeleton being anchored together adds greater wracking stability.. and we also don't have the sub floor materiel yet. We are going to use plastic honey comb paneling, super light weight and super strong, it's the kind of thing they use in airplane structures.
Here is a shot of the bathroom wall components laid out and ready to be assembled!
Ahh tomorrow!

Lady Gaga dance party (in my head) helps me dance/build our bedroom!

OHHH BOY!!!! It's been a while since I made a construction post, and since Scott is out of town with the camera I can't post recent trailer pictures just yet. Maybe there has not been much building going on these past months, but there has been a lot of planning and a whole lot else!

From June to August Julian was here in Georgia. We did many many things:
Motor-cycle riding,

camping,
kayaking,

went to the Salvador Dali exhibit,

he and Scott went to the aquarium

the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial,

and Six Flags theme park, we watched the entire series of TWIN PEAKS!!!, and we went hunting for the giant mutant crickets that live in the historic neighborhood of town. They were an freak entomology project gone wacky from years past, let loose in the "wild" and still thriving today. We caught one, named it Henry, and brought it home for a few days.

I quit my Waffle House job to go back to sewing full time, and I started a new blog about my work, and also selling on eBay, search EGRETION. I sold three pop-up books to a collector in Ohio, and with part of that money we bought more steel to build the bedroom!

I went to pick it up two days ago, and have been out on the site building the knee walls and bedroom floor platform, singing Lady Gaga songs and taking dance breaks. Her music isn't all that much to write about, but it's so catchy, and the basic idea of it is only 12 seconds long, so singing it over and over again makes you feel like you have only been working for about... 12 seconds.. and look how much I got done!!! Her style can be so barely nude, and it's been so hot I have been working al fresco... it seems fitting... no pun intended;-)

The main walls are much more stable now, and tomorrow I am going to incorporate that flexible c-track into the bathroom walls, and then start building the bay window exterior walls at the very back of the trailer. Scott bought the clear-story awning windows and the bay casement windows, a special order from Lowe's... a weird size: 17.5" x 36". Once I finish these interior walls it will be time to build the infamous off-set scissors trusses and gang them together!!! I will post pictures tomorrow!