A frame rises up!

Over one and a bit days (we probably could have sqeezed it into one LONG day) we got the inner ring of posts and the connecting ring beams up, as part of the house frame.  I was determined to not see the year end without having anything up, so we went ahead, despite the forcast for a very hot day today (luckily we finished up by 10:30am!).

Despite the weight of the timbers, and the complexity of the angles involved this first stage went up quite easily.  We used a home made 'lifter' which was built of timber and used a boat winch (all rated to well above the weights in our timber).  This worked quite well, the hardest part about using it was dragging it around the house site (nothing Brad builds is lightweight!!!!). 

The bracket on the post, this connects the post to the ring beam and the main beams, and involves several angles.

first post going up! 

We put up the first post, and found that the slots needed to be cleaned out a little with our electric chainsaw, to get them to sit down far enough on the stirrup to feed the bolts through the pre-drilled holes. 

Cleaning out the slots for a better fit. 

 Most of the other posts were cleaned out before they went up, but a few had to be done whilst hanging there....  After bracing the first post, we put up the second, and then the ring beam that holds together the inner ring of posts. 

The first ring beam in place

the frame taking shape

 The ring beam is structurally one of the most important parts of the our house design, as it stops the weight of the roof from spreading out the posts and collapsing.  From then on it was just a process of putting up a post and then the connecting ring beam, around the circle.  10 posts and 10 ring beams all up.  We were lucky to have my mother down to entertain the kids and a couple of friends helped for the afternoon/evening with actual building.  Thanks so much!

the beauty of natural timbers

the last beam 'slips' into place

This stage was a bit of a test of the design and our accuracy with everything we have done so far.  If any calculations had been done incorrectly, it would not have gone together properly (if at all!).  The stirrups were concreted into the ground and we could not test the fit of the posts on the holes until we actually started to put them up (they were just too heavy to move around too much).  Its a credit to Brad that this part of the frame went together almost perfectly (we had to fiddle around with a few posts/beams to get the bolt through - but nothing serious).

Yep, we are excited!

So the first stage is done, next stage is to get the main beams from these posts to the central collar.  That stage will involve a tower, pullies, and a few other low tech gadgets!

the central collar