Video Slideshow of our Vertical Log Cabin Project

[Ernest T. Bass]

Hey all- I threw together a bunch of pics from our cabin project now that we are nearly done w/ it..

http://www.vimeo.com/4399176

Have a great day!

[jbos333]

Wow! That is awesome! Do you have any building code to follow where you built that? I'd love to do one of those but I don't think I'd get approval from the inspector......

[Ernest T. Bass]

Yeah, we applied for a permit and everything. Our inspector is lazy and lenient; it's the health department that is a real pain in the rear... The deal is we're supposed to have an expensive big fancy outhouse built to their specs before anyone can step foot in the cabin. Not sure if we're going to be able to afford it any time soon though...

[MountainDon]

   Andrew!  The cabin's alright, too!   

[Don_P]

Cool!
Google Greensted Church sometime if you've not seen it. It's about 1200 years old IIRC.

[glenn kangiser]

That was an outstanding video and cabin, Andrew.  Great work.

[glenn kangiser]

Cool church w/ vertical logs, Don_P.

http://www.beenthere-donethat.org.uk/greensted05big.html

[Sassy]

I'm impressed!  Looks really nice & you did a great job on the video as usual 

[Ernest T. Bass]

Couldn't have done it without your guys' help! Awesome church.. Wouldn't take long to build a wall with logs like that.

[poppy]

Neat cabin.  I like the way you dried it in before insulating the floor.  I may try to do that for my cabin project.

[Ernest T. Bass]

We did that for cost reasons; the t&g makes a nice subfloor and finish floor for now.. However, a trip to the hospital to set a broken leg would have quickly negated the cost advantage. I would recommend more scraps of plywood or something to temporarily give you a safer working surface.

[pagan]

Very nice. Thanks for sharing.

[Windpower]

That was awesome !

very nice cabin too

I liked the way you showed the morticed joints popping together

[MountainDon]

.... I like the way you dried it in before insulating the floor.  I may try to do that for my cabin project.

When building a conventional raised platform floor the subflooring is nailed to the rim joists as well as the cross joists. Maybe I'm being too conservative with my own approach than need be. 

[Ernest T. Bass]

Basically our "rim joist" is a 6x10 beam that the walls sit on, since vertical logs don't disperse their weight to the piers very effectively. I also aligned the 2x6 joists to the bottom of the perimeter beam so that the flooring doesn't have to be scribed to the logs... In hindsight, I think I would have just used deeper joists and eliminated the center floor girder. Because of the different settling rate compared to the perimeter piers, the floor has a slight bow over the center of the cabin. I was kind of expecting this; not sure it it'll even out in time once there's weight in the house (walls, furniture, etc).

[NM_Shooter]

Well, holy cow.  I don't know what I was expecting, but that far exceeds it.  I don't even know you but I am proud of your work!  Your dad must be beside himself. 

Very, very nice work. 

-f-

[glenn kangiser]

Showed your video to a friend, Andrew.  Got him thinking about copying you.

[Ernest T. Bass]

How flattering. There isn't too much about the system that I'd do differently... It would certainly be faster if straight logs like spruce were used. Also, if time was a factor (and money wasn't), or if you didn't have much help on hand, I think that built up dimensional trusses would look handsome enough and would be a lot easier than all the log notching. You could probably just use a double 2x plate on top of the log walls instead of the big log bonding beam like we have.

We just had the logs and I wanted to learn how to do the different notches and waste a bunch of time.

[speedfunk]

Great looking cabin...thanks for sharing.

[NM_Shooter]

How can you possibly consider learning those skills a waste of time? 

I bet 1 in 10,000 folks can't do that.

[Ernest T. Bass]

How can you possibly consider learning those skills a waste of time? 

I bet 1 in 10,000 folks can't do that.

Well, there's an awful lot of folks out there who couldn't physically do it, so you might be right, but it really isn't as hard as it might seem as long as one takes it slow and doesn't take too much off.. The pics are really forgiving; not all of the joints make it look like I knew what I was doing..

Yes, the time was definitely not wasted and I hope to be able to do a similar project again asap. Some people can't stand the thought of spending a half-hour carving a blind double-scribe square notch on a rafter, and I'll admit that it tried my patience at times, but I figure it's more important to forget about the time it takes to do a good job and that the speed will increase on it's own with practice.. At least that's what I kept telling myself.

[glenn kangiser]

It wouldn't have half the character if you did it the easy way.