Want to lose 7 pounds in four days? Set posts! After checking and re-checking my batter board string dimensions and watching a few YooToob videos, I tackled the first post this past Tuesday afternoon.
I made a little more progress on Wednesday and got all four corners set, plus two endwall posts. Plus, I had to pull the post back out from Tuesday because I misread the directions and installed it 90* wrong. Another corner post took five attempts (in and out of the hole) to finally get the right combination of depth, plumb and alignment correct. I didn’t used to make these kinds of mistakes! (well not as frequently, anyway.)
I hit the jobsite early on Thursday and cranked away all day and into the evening hours, finally stopping around 9pm so as not to annoy the neighbors too much with my banging around. Managed to get all but the last three sidewall posts done (including more rework, but less than Wednesday).
Got up early again today (Friday) and finished the back wall posts (again, with more rework on each one – I kept forgetting to position my bracing so it wasn’t touching the string and didn’t discover my error until all three were set).
I had estimated I’d need about 3 yards of concrete, but then had to widen some holes due to the auger going off center a bit. So I requested 4 yards. Probably only needed about 3.5, but had the guy go back around and we topped off all the holes again which worked out just right.
The driver was really good at threading his chute through all my bracing, and only bumped a post once. After he had left, I went back around with the level and discovered the whole side was now slightly out of plumb, so I put the Boomer 8N in creeper range and gently nudged it back into plumb, confirmed with the level.
We’re getting the remnants of Hurricane Delta over the next few days, so I’m just going to leave everything to sit until the weather clears.
Next up: the bracing comes down and skirt boards go on, followed by roof trusses.