As the weather has improved progress has begun on the cabin again. Work will be a bit haphazard and not nearly as intense as last year. As a result the posts will likely be fairly random. This post covers three trips up to Skookum.
Wylie and I took down the frames for the wall-tent floors and I built a crude set of steps into the cellar. These are small things, but every little bit helps.
Getting supplies up to Skookum is always an issue. Last year a Kenyon Noble truck made a partial delivery and then would not deliver again — he described the road as a “4-wheeler track.” So this year I gave Simkins a try. The day was not good, raining slightly, but we got a nice load up and Darrel (shown in the picture) got a kick out of the road and the project. Having a big stack of supplies is a HUGE bonus!
The supplies include: (1) Treated 2 by 6’s and treated 2 by 4’s for the flooring frame; (2) OSB under-flooring; (3) Insulation; (4) A sono tube (for the posts that will hold up the porch); (5) Pre-mix gravel for the concrete pads (stove and post) and the sono tubes; and (5) A big batch of tongue and groove pine for covering the ceiling and lower walls.
Tim Fry generously offered to help me work on the floor, a project I was quite worried about. We started by laying out a vapor barrier (left photo), then we used a laser level to install a frame (2nd photo from left). We used 2-inch rigid foam for the first layer of insulation (3rd photon from left) and then put rock-wool insulation over that (right-most photo). I’m hoping this will provide a stable and warm floor.
By the end of the day we had two sheet of under-flooring installed and much of the framework for two more sheets. You can see the metal pan-decking that covers the cellar in the foreground, and sorting out how to install the framework over this will be the next challenge. I suspect a seasoned carpenter would scoff at how little we got done, but I thought our progress was just fine and I was pleased with how the laser level helped us keep the floor quite level.