I think you will like solar - it's interesting and feels good too.

 Redoverfarmer

Please forgive me for asking but what color is your steel roofing. I went back thru your post to see if you mention it but I didn't catch it.

Mark

2zwudz (Mark) the color is Burnished Slate.  Some companies also refer to it as Antique Brown.  It is darker than the convientional brown roof. 

Redoverfarm...what you have accomplished is so beautiful. Congratulations and Happy Thanksgiving.
Dog

Finished out the week with the installation of the last ceiling fan.  It was the one in the master bedroom.  I was limited to the size because of the ceiling beams and the 7' headroom.  So this is what I ended up with. It is a 24" dia fan/light combo. I could have gone with a 30" fan but when shopping at Lowes and Home Depot your selection is limited.   I also made the wooden wire chases for the kitchen and bedroom lights and got them installed.





Earlier this week I installed the medicine cabinet, lights and bathroom towel racks, toilet paper holder.





Still waiting for the propane company to set my tank.  So hopefully this week he will call and I can put some serious heat into the cabin.  If not I will start on the staircase which will take some time.

I've never seen a 24" ceiling fan before.    Fine looking bathroom ensemble too.

Sort of odd looking Don.  With the fan center demensions the blade only measure approximately 8"-10" in length.  But if it moves the air then it has done it's job.  I just hate paying more for a 24" than what I paid for a 42".  Doesn't make sense to me but anyway.  I did find a 30" but it only came in white and wasn't very appealing.

It's one of those art things, John.  Nice.

Good Morning, what size propane heater(s) are you using for the place?  I'm still playing around with the BTU calculations for mine, just curious.

CF I posted this on 11/3 after your inquiry but you might have missed it.  If you are going with a ventless some insurance companies will not allow anything larger than a 10,000 in the bedrooms.  

What I got was Eskabe.  3-20,000 and 1-10,000.  I am not sure exactly how they will work as I haven't gotten them hooked up to the gas yet. BTW I did finally get all the leaks discovered and it is holding 80# of air pressure.  I called the gas company and they are 5-6 tanks installations behind so it may be a while before mine.

Just in case you miss it again I PM the same info.

John

Another first.  I started a fire in the fireplace this morning.  I built it small and will do the same tomarrow as well to season the liners.  I will progressively increase the size each day.  By the weekend it sould be able to be burnt as the normal fire size.



Picked up a few pieces of furnishings ( Sportsmans Guide) for the kitchen.  I had priced bar stools and they were priced in the $100 - $150 range.  These were actually a 29" seat and were too high but a few minutes with the saw and they were just right and at a price that was more accommodating @ $52 each.  I realized that I probably would not find a finish that would match so I thought variety is good.

Starting to look like home. 

Build a ire in that cookstove, put a pizza in the oven, let me know when and I'm coming!   

Quote from: Redoverfarm on November 28, 2009, 11:15:01 AM
CF I posted this on 11/3 after your inquiry but you might have missed it.  If you are going with a ventless some insurance companies will not allow anything larger than a 10,000 in the bedrooms.  

What I got was Eskabe.  3-20,000 and 1-10,000.  

For the curious...

http://www.eskabeusa.com/

you ready for the 6 of us to visit yet?  I could help out with some finishing touches to earn our keep.  Looking good.

looks freakin' awesome!  Good work!!

Thanks for the comments

Jens you will have to hold off until I get the water in the cabin and septic unless you can find a tree that hasn't already been used 

Don I have had several fires in the cookstove already.  No pizza but I have warmed up lunch and cooked small things for lunch. I just cooked a large pot of Northern Beans tonight so that will be lunch at the cabin tomarrow.   I am not sure whether I will have enough wood to keep both the fireplace and the cookstove both going at the same time.   .  I will try to the pizza though.  Sounds like a winning idea.

I am also not sure about the Eskabe stoves whether that pertains to vented or unvented on the size restrictions. 

Water and septic?  Sounds pretty pampered to me.  We may take a trip up to NH this winter, could just stop on in.

John, I don't remember the dimensions of your fireplace and whether it is Rumford inspired or not.  Too lazy to look it up.

If it has a Rumford shape there are a couple of recommended ways of building a fire and neither uses a grate.

One is to build a TeePee out of the wood directly on the floor.

The other and more interesting to me is the "upside down" method.  Again built on the floor but with the big stuff on the bottom progressing to the tinder on the top.

Both methods are supposed to burn hot with little smoke.

I think the upside down method is related to a design I saw on the web called Rumford Renaisance.

Poppy I really didn't measure the firebox but the width on the outside is 34" and the back width is 24".  I have a ash dump in the firebox to the basement hence the grate to make easy cleaning.  So far I am not overly impressed with the masons design. I am getting a little too much smoke toward the face which is attributed to a couple different things.  One being there was no apron dropped below the damper in the front.  Secondly the damper IMO was placed too far to the rear not allowing enough of a smoke shelf.  Thirdly the sloping back making the climb to the damper was not gradual and has a step of about 4-5" to make up around to the damper opening.  I have some ideas for a remedy on a portion of the problems shy of tearing it out which I think will solve the majority of the problem.

1.  Welding a 3"X6" angle to the existing lintel to drop the apron. Tack weld  lath wire to the open portion of the angle(front) and then I will lay another course of stone over it.

2.  Also adding a 8" flat steel plate on the back portion directly under the damper and smoke shelf to eliminate that abrupt angle for the smoke to exit the firebox at the damper opening. I can utilize the firebrick joint to secure one edge of the 24" wide 8" plate and the other can be welded to the damper frame.

Not real happy with the results thusfar but I think I can modify and improve it considerably.  I had experimented by placing a wooden apron of that demension and I greatly reduced the exhaust. The masons of which I will never hire again for this and other reason also tapered from the flue liner to the smoke shelf which should have been a straight wall but there is not much I can do about that now.  I had met a retired mason a couple years ago (old school) and we have gotten to be friends.  He looked at it and said that it was a crappy job.  He said he would have wished I would have known him when I was having it built that he would have done it and done it right. He is the one that had given me the suggestions.  He also said that it is a job but he could fix it by rebuilding.  It's hard to beat an older experienced mason.  The work he has done for me in comparison to what I had done before is 10X better craftsmanship.  

Jens anytime.  

John, I was afraid that there was something wrong with the firebox dimensions (too deep, for one thing), so I'm not surprised there are some problems.

I would strongly suggest that you study up on the Rumford design, but don't get married to his original plan.

There are some modern improvements to the original Rumford configuration and they do not include a smoke shelf.

I don't have time right now to put together the results of my research and report here (have a funeral to go to).

But I promise to followup later with more detailed recommendations.

Well I have taken all that my back and knees will stand for a day.  I started working on the stair stringers this morning.  They are too heavy to be supported by horses so I am working on the floor of the garage/shop.  I did manage to smooth the flat surface which will face the treads.  I used a 3" planer followed by a 3"X21" belt sander.  They are not smooth enough for finish work but it will allow the step layout better.  Once the Mortise is cut I will final sand them before finishing.  I started on the outside surface with a draw knife and I will follow-up with a belt & palm sander.  Ran out of belts so a call to my DW at work who will pick some up on her way home at the hardware store.  I had plenty but they were old.  I had order several in bulk but apparently the glue joint went bad and after about 2 minutes they come apart.  As an experiment I am gluing a couple back together and see what happens. 

Anyway there is always a silver lining.  The installer for the propane tank came by the house today and we went to the cabin to see exactly what was needed for installation.  It is scheduled for next Thursday.  The generator had complicated matter somewhat but he has a plan. I was unaware that the regulators had a breather on them and they expell some gas.  He was concerned about mounting the regulator near the air intake of the generator which is also the location that the gas hook-up is at.  So he will mount the regulator on the other side of the dividing wall and then run a single line to the generator.  He will "T" the line before that regulator and run high pressure to the house and put an additional regulator to it.  Sounds like fun.

Anyway here are the stringers.  They basicly average 15" in width and 8" in thickness at the center.  The finished length will be approximately 13'6".  But to get the steps to evening work out I will have to make a "birds mouth" at the bottom landing.  Given the demensions I have to work with that shouldn't be a problem.

Here is a couple pictures of the stringers.

I'm sure they'll look beautiful when you're done!

John, here is some more fireplace info. relative to Rumford type.



This is from the renaissancefireplaces.com web site showing some of the differences of conventional fireboxes to a Rumford design.

Your fireplace is likely more like the conventional design.  If your firebox is more than 13 or 14" deep then it's too deep.

It should not be a major problem to reshape your fire box, but making a smoother transition to the flue could pose some challenges.

Reducing the opening by extending the lintel down might help, but then the flue size may be too large.

The ratio of the flue cross-section area to the fireplace opening area should be between 1 to 10 to 1 to 12.

So if your fireplace opening is say, 36"x36" then the flue should be between 130 to 108 sq. in. which is about 13" ID to 12" ID for a round flue or about 12"x12" inside to 10"x10" inside for a square flue.  So for instance if your flue is say 12"x18" then it's probably too large.

If you reduce the fireplace opening say by 4" making it 36"x32" then the flue size requirement becomes even smaller or your current flue is that much more too large.

Confused yet?  If so, you are not alone.  Proper fireplace design was lost 50 to 75 years ago when fireplaces began to be an archtitectural feature rather than a heat source and got larger for proper proportion, not efficient operation.

I have a ton more info. but it is not organized.  You can glean some good info. from these web sites.

rumford.com
hart-pagosa.com,

Quote from: Redoverfarm on December 02, 2009, 05:04:52 PMAs an experiment I am gluing a couple back together and see what happens. 

It might work?    Don't try to staple them, though.