Back in full swing after a bit of a break

After a long break, due to a dose of man-flue, a Holyday and Joshua's 21st birthday party, I'm finally back to working on the barn. My head is getting better with the measurements again too. Only had to measure tree times to get the lenght of this beam right. 

I love making big joins. This one is connecting the two wall plates of the main roof and will also serve as upper wall plate for the lean to roof over the stage. 

Planing them by hand is a bit of a job but my stationary planer wouldn't handle beams that size. Plenty more to do tomorrow. Good work out thow. 

Cutting the Rafters

plaining the edges

cleaning the bark off

beveling the ends

Cutting The birds-mouth special branch style

And now the fun starts

After all that time getting the barn ready for the renovation it felt soooo good today to get cracking with the actual timber work. I had enough of emptying the place, moving all the stuff out and finding sensible places where to store what. Even all the foundation work didn't feel like getting any closer to what we set out to do. But now we broke the ice. It has seriously started. I am really enjoying the timber work. Especially the finishing touches to each beam with the hand tools, like cleaning off the bark or plaining sawn surfaces nice and clean. I hope we can keep up the standard. 

Some joins needed re tightening after all that lifting

Pulling the join together with a tractor driven hydraulic ram

Home Made Boards & Beams

One of the new wallplate sections on the mill 

Dominik working at the mill

The Barn's roof will be raised by 10 inches with a set of new additional wallplates. Some serious waight in these, specially when they are still only freshly cut.

From Tree to Timber

Cutting the trees in the own forrest

cutting the logs into rafters, boards and joists

Home Made Beams for the Job

Its a blessing to have the timber on the farm, and "all" we need to do is cut them inside the forrest, drag them out and shape them into beams. It needed one hell of a lot of logs. Soon enough a big pile of rafters was cut and stacked to dry. 

Underpinning the Post and Beam Structure

Corner post on sole plates don't look so bad on first sight

Had to come off

     

The barn is still on its original legs

Steel post in place

ready for poring concrete 

First Things First, The structure is still on some very weak legs 

We used the Tractor hydraulic and ram to lift the corner to rectify the level as good as possible. All the post ends and sole plate timber was rotten beyond repair and had to be removed. We dug foundation trenches and made sure the new steel uprights reached solid clay bottom. There was still 4 feet of bog below the old foundation. no surprise the barn had sunk so far at the front.

The beginning of the project

Picture of he barn when it was newly built 1995

New Year's Resolution

The old Post and beam Barn is now over 20 years old and in despaired need of repair.We have set out on a three year venture to bring back the beauty and pride to the old building. Plans are to rectify the skew angles after the barn sank a foot out of plum,  replace the roof, walls, windows and floors. change the extension and transform it into a multi purpose function hall to host barn dances, classes, parties, and facilitate the indoor parts of our farm tours with large groups and schools.
Its a mighty project and we've put it on the long finger for far to long. Now that work has started there is no turning back no matter how scary it seems. There will still be plenty changes to the new plans as ideas and options grow as we go along.

We'd be delighted if you like to follow this blog, to observe the progress, share the excitement, or even get inspired by it.
Please feel free to comment or make suggestions!
Sigi