We’re continuing a streak of good weather, and so the builders are getting work DONE! We’ve finished up the foundation, including lots of little surprises with the existing foundation, and are now on to framing out the house. This part is VERY exciting, because we’re finally getting the full scale of what the finished home will look like.
The garage-side is going up first, and they’ve already got most of the framing done for the first floor. There will be an additional story on top of this 3-car side-load garage, which I imagine goes up pretty fast this week. You can just about see the foundation for the right-side addition as well.
The double-wide garage door has a MASSIVE header, but considering the span is >18′, I guess that makes sense. A slightly smaller one for the 1 car “bike garage” bay.
Look at that absolute UNIT! Still lots of lumber used for supports, but that will come down as the full framing is put up.
Once the framing is done, we’ll get to see a crane come in to take off the old roof and install all of these trusses!
The crane will also be used for the rear 2-story balloon wall that will make the back of the great room.
And for a little extra build-trauma, check out this picture of a ridiculous installation of a foundation brace done long before we bought the home:
They drove this metal rod through the foundation, attached to a strap on the inside, which they then used to pull out some of the bow in the wall. Bad news though, because not only did it not fix the bow, but it created a major opportunity for water to enter the basement. We ended up having to dig out the entire rear foundation, patch the holes, add significant waterproofing, and backfill. But now that its done right, we’ll have a nice dry basement going forward.