I'm happy for you!
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Prime is key. When your in a drought, gotta do what ya gotta do.Comment
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Hey Jimbo, it’s been a while, but we gettin any pics today?
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Well, PJ, I just picked up the fake logs and stuck them in the fireplace. They look and work great. Right now it’s just plugged into the wall for testing. Wednesday my guy can work his magic and feed the plug into the built in outlet for a seamless look.
Outside, they mainly did soffit. Not really worth a picture. Roof of main house will get redone this week, probably starting Wednesday, so tomorrow is likely to be pretty quiet, tooComment
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Can't wait to see the progress again soon!Comment
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Okay, I know the natives are restless for more entertaining pictures.
I had failed to note the new sliding glass doors and French doors that replaced and updated the old ones. These are wonderful.
And as I had mentioned above, when PJ was complaining, much work recently has gone into soffits. These are Hardie Board, so they will outlast the next ice age. Here's an artistic soffit shot:
And the Hardie Board is going on most of the vertical surfaces, inside and out, where there isn't screen. Here's some of the trim around the roof and the tie-in to the existing roof on the end of the house:
Finally, much time was spent in the last couple of days deciphering something in the engineering requirements to meet the wind load calculations. It turns out that the small bit of wall that will be behind the refrigerator is a shear wall, so it needed to have a beam made up of a double layer of LVL. It's just to the left of the window opening in this picture if you look closely. Somehow, that 6 by 6 post on the other end of the wall just wasn't seen as strong enough...
Tomorrow the re-roofing of the main house begins. Also, we may well have electricians and/or plumbers getting started. Should be a wild day.
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Hahahaha Alan Brice, you gotta be quick when you're a pirate!! -
In the Ohio River Valley, the politicians have head faked a redue/new bridge that carries two to three times what it was orig. built to support. Been waiting since 1975
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I think it looks great Jim. I would surely ignore any PJ complaints if I were you…Comment
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Holy cow! These roofers don't mess around. Tremendous progress in just the first two hours.
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Man! That is a rough ass job! Good thing it is not the heat of summer. One bad step n yer ten feet to the ground, and if yer lucky, on the way to the horsepistol. -
When I was a young buck I worked for a roofing company for about a year and a half and it was the physically hardest job I've ever had. The crusty old boss would say that if you fall you're fired, you're not getting paid for the the time you're falling, and you'll be arrested for trespassing when you hit the ground!
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Shingles are all on, just a bit of detail work left for the roofers. I'm assuming that will get done this afternoon/evening, as they are gone but all of their equipment (including hats, gloves and even some boots) are still here.
And the electricians were here:
Starting to look real. Ceiling and wall insulation starts next week. Plumbers are either Monday or Wednesday, but my guy John gets to help with that and bring his tractor to dig the last of of the trench for hooking the sink to the septic.
And the ceiling wood will arrive next week, along with the painter. It's tongue and groove pine, and the painter will put a couple of coats of light, natural stain on it before it goes up and then gets the clear coat. It's a LOT of wood, so this will take him and his crew a while.
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Here's an update on my learning curve cooking with the LSG Adjustable. In the brisket cook last weekend, I struggled to maintain the 275 cooking temperature. The fan on the UltraQ ran virtually nonstop and I had to add extra lump charcoal twice.
I did note that the fan was very loose in the fitting where it was inserted into the cooker, but that probably wasn't the main problem. It turns out that I most likely wasn't loading enough lump charcoal into the fuel tray since it has very short walls.
Today, while setting up for the Bonsey Memorial Cook, I added the fuel basket.
This thing has enormous capacity (note that the fuel tray can't be lifted above the middle setting without the basket getting in the way of the grill insert.
Here it is loaded with over ten pounds of lump, a Tumbleweed and lots of hickory chunks. The Tumbleweed is slightly off-center because there's a huge log in the dead center that I wanted to be the main fuel source for the cook.
This cook went much easier. It came right up to temperature with the aid of the fan and then the fan didn't have to work any more for pretty much the rest of the cook. I don't want to show the tremendous result on the ribs before getting plated pictures, but the cook also went really fast. I put boiling water into the drip pan below the ribs and yet the ribs finished in just over two and a half hours at 275. (I'll try to remember to get a picture of how much fuel is left when I wheel the cooker back into the garage tomorrow.)
Here's the ShareMyCook plot of the cook:
I opened the lid many more times than I usually do. I had the meat probe in the thickest part I could find in the pork loin back ribs, but, as usual with ribs, didn't trust that as an indicator and pulled the meat probe out once it hit 190. I just wanted to be really sure they were cooking as fast as it appeared. Also, I put some corn on the upper shelf for the last 25 minutes or so.
Cooking to probe tenderness and the bend test is definitely the way to go on ribs, just as Meathead teaches us. And that gave me the best ribs I've ever cooked: great bark, incredibly moist and perfect bite yet really tender.Comment
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Time for another update. The electricians took several days, but are now finished. Also, my guy John got a chance to get involved yesterday, using his tractor to dig the trench for the sink drain connection to the septic tank. There were a LOT of big tree roots to cut through.
Check out this stump he got out! It was from a longleaf pine that had been planted less than five feet from the edge of the roof. We had the tree taken out probably15 years ago and I forgot about it until he keep struggling in that spot with the tractor. That's about a six foot tap root he took out with it! (Bonus Bean appearance #1).
And the plumbers are installing the connection as I type this.
Because the electricians finished, the insulation guys were able to do their thing this morning. I just had to snap this picture of the stilts they use to apply the insulation to the ceiling. I would so kill myself if I tried this.
They made fast work of it, and things are really starting to get a more finished look.
If you look closely, you can see the junction box where the TV will be hooked up in the middle of the protruding brick area. The electricians had to make a quick trip at the beginning of the day to make an adjustment. I hadn't figured out until yesterday that they had wired for one of the light fixtures to be immediately above the TV spot. That just wouldn't work, so we changed that to two lights, one on either edge of where the brick sticks out. If the ceiling were just sheetrock, that would be an easy fix after the fact, but the ceiling is going to be tongue and groove pine, so we get one shot at cutting each hole. Glad we found the problem in time.
And here is Bean bonus appearance number 2.
I think tomorrow the framers are coming back and will put up the Hardie board on all the inside walls. They will finish the insulation job where the plumbers are still running the line to the fridge while they are at it.
The ceiling wood gets delivered Monday and the painter will get to work with the first couple of coats of stain before the wood goes up to get its final clear coat.
I believe tile delivery is set for the next Monday. Things are really moving along!
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You're in Richard Chrz together we can repell Panhead John. We won't even ask Jim, we'll just show up for breakfast -
klflowers Don’t worry, I ain’t stayin with you no more! Last time at the MeatUp you kept fartin and pulling the covers over my head.
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This is really exciting! I wish I had a friend with a backhoe!Comment
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Looking real good Jim. What an exciting time.Comment
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Looking really good Jim. Keep the updates coming. I'm happy you are getting along with the LSG Adjustable.Comment
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I love it! Only three cooks in but they've all been a success and great eating. Hoping to do some lamb Sunday.
Have you found a nice size drip pan to use when cooking with the meat on the side away from the fire? I'm thinking about buying some of these as the best fit I've found for the 16 by 16 fire tray: https://www.amazon.com/Handi-Foil-Ob.../dp/B01JH4HDDG
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