Waking up from hibernation

Our cabin project slept through the winter under a metal roof, wearing its "Tyvek Pajamas". But the winter didn't sleep. Here were a some visitors.

Are these wolves or coyotes? I can't tell them apart.

And our first shot of the cougar!

First thing we did was hang construction lights through the cabin so we could see things in our still-windowless building. Much better!

Then we ventured into the crawlspace to clean up a bit of mold that had grown from water that ran down through the floor before the roof got put on in the fall.

Oh boy were we in for a nasty surprise. In the fall we had only cut in two foundation vents, and those ended up getting covered by the housewrap, so we had no venting. And we hadn't yet put down plastic over the dirt, because how moist could it be in there? Turns out, with thermal cycles and nowhere to go, there was so much moisture that some of the exterior-facing rim boards were damp! Lots of mold. Aaargh.

We hosed the mold down with TSP substitute, then uncovered and cut in the foundation vents.

After too much time underground, we cleaned up the great room and organized our tools.

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Appliances and mirrors

In pursuit of being ready for final, I came up and installed the fridge and dishwasher with Jeff. We hung mirrors in the bathrooms.

It is DONE!

The final inspection was today. This guy is Levi, the county inspector, and as you can see, we passed! He only had two questions for me. One was about the energy efficiency credits and the blower door test, for which I had the compensating paperwork for the low-flow faucets already prepared. The second was asking for a smoke detector outside the bedroom; I pointed up and he saw that we already had one tucked into the alcove. And that was that! I got up at 5am to be certain I'd be here before the inspector, and I was ... by about five hours. In that time, I took another truckload of tool buckets down to the storage container, then picked up all the floor protection in the great room and vacuumed and mopped. It's glowing! Then I went back down to the storage container to get a hammer so I could glue in 32 wood plugs to cover the screws for the french doors. I fought with installing the screens, but the frames are too big! The manufacturer said "yeah we don't even make th...

Closer to final

Jeff reminded me that one of the things we'll need for final is a "blower door test" which determines how much air leaks out of the house. It's required to be under a certain level to encourage efficient use of heating energy. I got a hold of a contractor who could do the test, and Christina and I met him today. Before he arrived, I called the county to be sure I understood the rules. Along the way, I discovered that our on-demand electric water heater (which uses zero energy during times we're not there) doesn't qualify for the necessary energy "credits" required by our permit, so it looks like we'll be installing a heat pump water heater. And then, when Brian got here, he pointed out several places where we were going to have vigorous leaks, mainly the 18 places where the collar ties pass through the ceiling into the rafter cavity. He refused to take our money for a test, saying we should seal up those leaks and he'd come back later. Dang! ...

Howell Cabin

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