Another barn build

[hayden]

Awesome project and thanks for sharing!

Would another option be to allow yourself to raise the grade of the new building by 12-18" to get the excavation done sooner? shouldn't be that awful to have a gentle ramp up into the building for your equipment storage, no?

It's definitely an option, in fact it's the first thing on the list of things to change, if needed. I'm just not quite ready to give up yet.

Today I pulled out about 8-10 yds more material. I removed two dump trailer loads, plus 4-5 large rocks. I'm definitely making progress, but it's slow.

The dump trailer is probably worth a few words... It's a 14' Iron Bull with a GVW of 14,000 lbs. Struck capacity is 7 yds, but I'm only filling it to about 1/2 capacity. So two loads is 6-7 yds. The trailer could hold a bit more, but it's a serious overload for my tractor. My tongue weight limit is 1600 lbs. and I'm definitely over that. So much so that I've bent the draw bar a couple of times, and periodically turn it over to bend it back. This is one of the smaller examples of why I bought a much bigger tractor. I really don't want to break the kubota, but worry about it every time I move around such a heavy load.

 

[hayden]

Just make sure the chisel is well clamped down before you try it.

For sure, but I'm still struggling with how/why a carbide saw blade will cut the material where a mill that presumably also has a carbide blade can not. Is there something different between the two? I don't want to just trash a $150-$200 saw blade.

 

[dodge man]

Just use a file to repoint it, a coarse one of course, it might take a few minutes.

 

[pmsmechanic]

For sure, but I'm still struggling with how/why a carbide saw blade will cut the material where a mill that presumably also has a carbide blade can not. Is there something different between the two? I don't want to just trash a $150-$200 saw blade.

Well I'm not saying it will for sure cut the bit but I think it's worth a try.

A machinist will look at it from the point of view of making money on the job. By the time he builds something to hold the chisel securely he can't charge you enough to make it pay for his business. Especially if it's only a one time job. You on the other hand are looking to stretch out your $700.

What I would do is take the chisel that you showed us a picture of and try to slice a little bit off the tip with an old blade. Then you'll have an idea if it's worth your while to proceed further.

Now I don't know where you are buying your blades. I pay roughly $35 to $55 in USD ($50-$80 CAD) at Princess Auto if I catch a sale. I believe $80 is their regular price but I haven't bought one for a few month's. I usually keep 1 or 2 blades in stock depending on how old/worn my current blade is. This is a 14" blade.

If I'm careful with the blades I can usually get the same amount of cuts as if I was using the equivalent $ worth of 12" abrasive blades. And carbide tipped blades just cut so much nicer.

I mostly use my abrasive saw for hand held work. Stuff that I can't hold in a vice and I use the carbide tip for everything else. If I get a rare good setup I can cut right down the edge of a piece of steel with the carbide and just skim the paint.

 

[hayden]

I hauled out another 3 trailer loads, so about 10-12 yds. Plus one giant rock that the excavator could just unweight enough to skid across the ground. That's about 6000 lbs, so another 2+ yds. At this point there are only 2-3 areas left that are too high. I'm almost there.

I also talked to a neighbor who is going to loan me a boom lift in exchange for digging the muck out of his pond with my excavator. He's also going to do the roof sheathing and standing seam on this building. That's one more part of the puzzle coming together...

 

[hayden]

Now I don't know where you are buying your blades. I pay roughly $35 to $55 in USD ($50-$80 CAD) at Princess Auto if I catch a sale. I believe $80 is their regular price but I haven't bought one for a few month's. I usually keep 1 or 2 blades in stock depending on how old/worn my current blade is. This is a 14" blade.

I'll have to check around, but the 14" carbide blades for cutting metal that I have seen are in the $150 +/- range. $50 would be great.

 

[EddieWalker]

Where are you putting all that material?

 

[ning]

Looks like pretty decent dirt if you get rid of the rocks... kinda jealous, our red clay around here is pretty miserable and has its share of rocks as well :/

 

[hayden]

Where are you putting all that material?

There is a steep drop off of about 10' along one side of by barn yard. Along that side, my barn yard is now 15-20' wider than it used to be. So I'm very fortunate that I don't have to move the material more than 100-150', and that I'm gaining useful space from it.

 

[hayden]

I removed another 3 dump trailers worth of material the other day, and spent yesterday hammering more rock. First thing this morning I'll check my grade again, but I think I'm there except for one corner. In that corner, I'll see how hard it is to remove the rock, and might just shift the building location instead. But it's worth some effort to get the building where planned since it lines up with another building, and doesn't encroach on other useful space.

The new (to me) tractor is a much better match for the dump trailer, and no longer feels like it's going to break at any moment.

I also received the preliminary plans for the building late yesterday and will review and hopefully approve them today. My goal is to have the building done by the end of the year, but I'm having to patch together a variety of people and things, not all of which can commit at the moment. But I'll just keep pushing forward and get as far as I can, as fast as I can.

One open question has been decided, and that's to sheath the roof rather than just run the metal roofing over the purlins. With our snow loads, I'm told the roof will otherwise look like crap after a few years. Plus it's easier to walk on and word on if sheathed. So that adds some cost. I have also decided to use a local roofer to install crimped standing seam rather than the snap-together stuff the Worldwide offers. Once again, with local climate causing freeze/thaw and icing on roofs, I'm told that water tends to get pushed up through the snap-together seams where it doesn't with crimped seams. Again, it's more cost, but not significantly more than purchising and shipping the snap-together stuff where 35% of the cost is trucking.

 

[yanmars]

The wood might stop condensation drips inside also.

 

[EddieWalker]

The big advantage to not sheeting a roof when doing metal is being able to spread your trusses out farther. If you use OSB or plywood, you have to have your trusses every 2 feet on center, or closer. I've never seen or heard of anybody putting sheeting on purlins. I guess it's possible, but from what I understand, sheeting goes directly on the truss.

Positive reason to having sheeting is less sound when it rains. It also gives you that second layer of protection if there is a leak on the metal. I had a client with a metal roof that the screws were failing, but the tar paper on the sheeting caught the water and carried it down to the gutters. The only reason we knew there was a leak is that it rained after I had removed the gutters and we saw the water running out under the metal.

 

[civilian]

Another second layer that I did on my roofs was to run ice and water shield all the way up to the peak. My roof was shingle because of weak cell phone signals arounf here. Metal roofs and siding effect the signl. Jon

 

[pmsmechanic]

Positive reason to having sheeting is less sound when it rains.

On most things Eddie I agree with you. Not all but on most. This is one where I disagree. I thoroughly enjoy the sound of rain on a tin roof. It's such a welcome sound in an area of low rainfall.

 

[hayden]

The big advantage to not sheeting a roof when doing metal is being able to spread your trusses out farther. If you use OSB or plywood, you have to have your trusses every 2 feet on center, or closer. I've never seen or heard of anybody putting sheeting on purlins. I guess it's possible, but from what I understand, sheeting goes directly on the truss.

I'm not quite following... With the steel building, trusses are only every 13'. Then there are 6" purlins that run between them the length of the building on 24" centers. Without sheathing, the metal roof pans attach directly to the purlins. With sheathing, the sheathing goes over the purlins, then the roof pans screw to the wood. From what I've seen this is pretty common with steel building, but my experience is very limited.

 

[hayden]

Progress continues....

I finally finished getting all the rock out, and of course the last part was by far the hardest, quite literally. I then located all the corners and drilled holes to mark them, and stuck rebar in the holes. These points aren't super accurate, but close enough for me to now backfill and compact around all the remaining ledge.

I had pushed rubble and tailing into the dips and valleys to make it possible to move my excavator around in the foundation site. Now I got to dig it all back out, and fill with compacted granular fill. It's been an interesting exercise in filling in sections to gain access to fill in other sections. But sure enough, one lift at a time, it's slowly coming up to grade.

Here we are just getting started filling the first valley.

Then expanding around the ledge....

And further to access an adjacent valley. It's like a glacier working it's way down a valley, and progresses at about the same speed :-(

Then on to start filling other valleys...

At the end of day 3, 2/5ths of the site is within a few inches of grade. The remaining 3/5ths still needs to come up an average of 12-18". I'm almost through the last of 4 loads of fill at 14 yds each, and have 4 more coming tomorrow. I think I only need 3, but would rather have too much and can always use leftovers around the driveway.

 

[EddieWalker]

Are you going to have concrete walls so you can backfill up to them?

 

[hayden]

Yes, around the whole back wall, most of the left wall, and 1/3rd of the right wall. Below is a draft of the foundation plan, with final details awaiting engineering. The building is dug into a slope, hence the need to excavate out so much rock. The truss columns will sit on the pilasters, so uneven height columns for all the spans. The foundation work, excluding all my excavation work, will cost as much as the basic structure that I'm getting from Worldwide Steel. It's painful to have to build it this way, but there just isn't any flat ground anywhere suitable.

 

[civilian]

When I first saw the compactor, I thought it was a kid's excavator helping out daddy move the fill into place. Haha on me. Jon

 

[thclimer]

What is your plan for drainage where your walls are near the hillside?