06' HOME BASE

And It comes to a close

2006-05-31T17:59:00.000-07:00

It is May 31st, and I think it is the perfect time to reflect a bit. I just recently looked back through this entire blog, start to finish. Needless to say, I was amazed.

I remember coming to class the first day, vividly in fact, and seeing all of these new people who would be my classmates for the next year. I didn't 'know' a lot of them; I say this and laugh now since we are all such good friends. I attribute much of that to this class. Working with these people, through bad weather but great times, Government and Composition classes, soon graduation, and of course, helping end poverty housing in Ohio, I cant help but smile. It has been a great ride and I am thankful I was granted the opportunity to participate.

Now that my reflection is finished (When one volunteers to write the blog for the whole class, one gets to write about himself a little bit), I can show everyone what all of our hard work has done for some great people.

At the dedication of the house...

All smiles

Tears of happiness

Giving of the keys!

Of course we had to pose for a picture!

And so, it comes to a close, but not without gradification, happiness, or laughter.

A subtle line has been painted by our class, one that others shall follow and find fulfillment. To next year's class: I say enjoy. It will be a time to remember.

1st week of may

2006-05-19T09:45:00.000-07:00

We stayed at school this week... the house is almost done!

By the way

2006-04-30T19:07:00.000-07:00

We had a ceremonial "Signing of the Site" where we left our mark for all time. It was pretty cool.
Of course we had to pose for a picture!

That is a mighty green door. It's that color both outside and inside. None of us know why.

Week of April 24th

2006-04-30T18:44:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos of the job site at the beginning of the week...

Now that everyone is caught up with the progress of the house visually, I can tell you what is going on.

The front and back porches are finished, as is the siding of the house. (Because of siding complications, siding of the garage could not be completed)

The dry wall is completely painted! We had started to paint the dry wall last week, and it was finished over the course of the week.
Now all that is really left is the installation of the kitchen cabinets (as seen above), door placement (most are in place already actually, molding (again, pretty much finished), and carpet (not finished at all).

Good times.

Week of April 10, 2006

2006-04-19T17:14:00.000-07:00

Good day. This week on site was fairly productive considering most of the house is "finished".

Our class returned from spring break to see that the dry wall, and the siding was already in place. The front and back porches were also in nice shape, just needing a little paint. Overall, it looked pretty solid.

Most of the class painted the front and back porches, while some sided the house and garage.

Justin, doing his stuff

Paint crew, word

Don't fall JJ!

April 8th, 06

2006-04-09T20:00:00.000-07:00

Andrea and I went out on site today with the help of my dog, Bailee. We worked alongside Mel and Mike. There were quite a few college kids who came out from OSU to help, along with the family. We finished most of the siding on the garage, we would have done more, but we ran out of siding. The drywall inside the house was finished up by a group of the college kids. In the end, the house is turning out to look pretty good.

Heather Meena

Week of April 3, 2006

2006-04-07T17:12:00.000-07:00

Not on site this week because of spring break.

The Saturday crews, Tuesday and Thursday crews hung the drywall.

Week of March 27, 2006

2006-03-30T17:00:00.000-08:00

We worked on siding the garage and the site was graded with earth moving machines.

Andrea operates a skid steer loader with scoop bucket.

Week of March 13, 2006

2006-03-17T15:51:00.000-08:00

Ohio Graduation Tests this week which meant that our classes were shortened so we could not go to site.

Saturday, March 11, 2006

2006-03-13T16:04:00.000-08:00

No work on site today - rain.

Week of February 27, 2006

2006-03-13T15:46:00.000-08:00

The garage siding was started and the sheathing on the roof was finished. The back porch trusses were cut apart and fixed on our truss day by the females and the entire back porch roof is now theirs to build.

Saturday, February 25, 2006

2006-03-13T15:39:00.000-08:00

The rest of the trusses were installed today and the garage was prepped for starting the siding.

Week of February 20, 2006

2006-02-27T17:11:00.000-08:00

The first truss goes up.

Halfway done.

Our mentor, Jim on the roof with the class.

Putting up the porch roof.

We spent the week getting ready to put the roof on which included putting cap plates on and laying out where all of the trusses will go on the beams. Friday we spent the entire day out at site for an all-day field trip.

There were plenty of problems with the trusses, but with Greg and Jim on site to help us, we got things pretty much in hand.

Chris did the directing of the large crane which hoisted not only our trusses but also our bathtub/shower unit into the second floor bathroom.

We had to rebuild the trusses on the back porch but in the end the work turned out extremely well done.

Our house should be dry very soon as soon as we get the rest of the sheathing down on the roof and put waterproof building felt (tar paper) on.

Saturday February 18, 2006

2006-02-19T05:51:00.000-08:00

We found out today that we are the first single family dwelling built in Franklinton in 43 years. From a 50 degree school week, the bottom feel out of the thermometer and we worked in 14 degree winter weather today. Ben, Jorday, and Mr. Beck were members of the no-gloves club while Andrea and Heather are getting close to being members of the forty hour club. It was partly sunny today and it was amazing just how nice it felt to have some sun on us. Everyone followed the Home B.A.S.E. rules for working in the cold. 1) We are tough and don't complain. 2)We remember rule one.

With great progress today in such cold, it is wonderful say that all of the walls of the house are now built! We worked well in teams and the walls are very plumb and straight. Level means parallel to horizon while plumb means perpendicular to horizon. It was nice working upstairs because the exterior walls acted as a windbreak. If the roof trusses arrive this week, we will be ready to put on the roof and dry in the house.

The special aspect of the day was working with our future homeowner and her daughter who is a senior is high school just like our class. We got together with our homeowner and all of the Habitat staff members to have an emotional event in which everyone re-dedicated themselves to the starting and finishing of our house.

Compare the picture above to the picture on our post for Saturday, January 28 to see how much progress we've made in less than a month.

Week of February 13, 2006

2006-02-19T05:30:00.000-08:00

The exterior walls of the second floor were all finished and the front and back porch beams were built, stood up and squared. A new system of connecting the bottom of the porch posts to the concrete was tried and it seems to work pretty well. We are also using regular dimensional framing lumber with an OSB sandwich for the posts instead of treated 4 x 4's. With the help from the Tuesday and Thursdy groups, we are making lots of progress and we are moving very fast for such a late start in the winter.

Our Home B.A.S.E. Government techer, Mr. Vincent was on site with us on Friday and helped us build the exterior walls.

Putting up the second front of our house on the second floor.

Saturday, February 11, 2006

2006-02-12T17:16:00.000-08:00

A lot of progress today. Three 2nd floor walls were built and two were stood up. The garage was cleaned out for preparation for the concrete to be placed on the floors of both the garage and the basement. The site was straightened up and the lumber re-stacked.

Week of January 30,2006

2006-02-12T17:01:00.000-08:00

The joists for the second floor were put in and the shething for the second floor was installed allowing for the second floor walls to be built. The large beams for the front porch were also started.

Mrs. Smith and Wynne graciously provided lunch for us one day this week.

Mr. Dew came out and provided the materials and labor and fixed the outlets on our solar powered construction container.

This picture above shows us after we set and nailed down the first sheet of the second floor which is always a good feeling.

Here we are at the end of the day with the second floor sheathing installed. Behind and to the left you'll see a piece of sheathing that looks like it is too long and that's correct. Sometimes, we will just run our sheathing long and cut it off in a straight line when we are finished.

Saturday, February 4, 2006

2006-02-05T15:16:00.000-08:00

Home B.A.S.E. Haiku

Rain.
Blustery.
Changing to snow.
Bitter.
No work on site today.

Week of January 30, 2006

2006-02-03T15:21:00.000-08:00

With the help of Dave, Jim, and the Thursday crew, we framed most of the exterior walls this week. A crew of students finished the roof of the garage when they cut an opening in the shingles and installed the ridge cap shingles and ridge vent. On Tuesday, the beam pockets were cut in for the front porch. We'll have to cut in the beam pockets for the back porch in the coming week. On Thursday, we worked in the rain for about half of the class but we still got a lot done.

Saturday, January 28, 2006

2006-01-28T15:14:00.000-08:00

The front wall was made and put up along with one portion of the south wall. Other walls were framed and are on site along with most of our door and window openings. The garage was shingled and is waiting for the ridge vent and ridge caps.

Week of January 23, 2006

2006-01-28T15:07:00.000-08:00

This week was really muddy and everyone had "mushroom shoes". For the first floor, the big center steel I-beam and the floor joists were installed. The floor sheathing was put down and nailed.

Friday, January 20, 2006

2006-01-21T02:02:00.000-08:00

Mentors Dave, Jeff (a former Home B.A.S.E. student), Jim, and Ken were on site along with Ryan D., Brandon, Andy, and Ben with Andy and Ben going coast to coast (an entire day). We now have six students who have done that. Brandon leads the class with the most hours worked. With rain projected today, we had a really good break in the weather with temperaures in the mid 50's and even some sun. We had another great day of working and we felt really good about the accuracy of our work. Our efforts last week of spending a long time squaring up the foundation and today of being accurate in everything we did payed off. When we started putting on the roof, none of the parts had to be cut at an angle to be able to fit in place and everything was square from the sill plates to the roof sheathing. Luckily enough, since we didn't have enough 1 x 6 material for the facia, we found a board stretcher in our tool box.

2006-01-16T17:36:00.000-08:00

¡Hola from Ameca, Mexico!
That's me on the right with one of the locals. I arrived early Friday afternoon with our crew of 11. We are here as a Columbus´Habit for Humanity Global Village Team to expand our mission and provide housing for communities around the world. (for more information, our team´s website is www.columbusgvteam.com)
We are actually working on two houses here simultaniously. One is almost complete, lacking only the cement floor in the living room and roofing (roofing is done by local craftsmen). Right next to it is the other house, which had about 7 rows of brick when we arrived and is now up to about 9. The owners are sisters - Gabby and Imelda. Gabby´s family consists of Gabby, her husband Concho (also the house lead, he works for the local Habitat affiliate), and their 7 kids. Imelda is also married, I am unsure of how many children they have. Both families are muy amable, for lack of an english description. The construction is work - brick laying, cement and mortar mixing (by hand, of course). It is quite an experience. The food is also INCREDIBLE. Gabby and Imelda cook breakfast and lunch for us (with pay from our team leader). The fruit could not be more fresh. Today we had papaya and cantelope for breakfast with sugary pastries and fresh-squeezed orange juice. Later we also had fresh-squeezed guava juice and lemonade. I could go on for weeks about the food.. but we´ll move on.
The landscape here is BEAUTIFUL. It has been bright and sunny every day we´ve been here, and in the distance are two volcanoes - Ixta and Popo. (their names are a lot longer than that, but I can´t pronounce them for the life of me, let alone spell them. Those are the nicknames.) There are other mountains too, and muchos arboles. Yesterday one family we´ve met invited us over to their land. We rode horses through the mountains. It was an incredible experience, and it is absolutely georgous. I spoke with the mother (Harim) for quite a bit. According to her, the average worker here earns about 500 pesos ($50 U.S.) per week. That´s hardly enough to feed yourself and your family. She pointed out that it turns into a cycle, with no chance to better your situation. They can´t send their kids to college to make a better career, so they won´t make any more money and won´t be able to send their kids to college, etc.
We visited a few churches yesterday to spread the word of Habitat. After one visit, a man approached our group and told us that we weren´t as bad as he thought from what he has seen on tv and in the news. Harim explained to us that most people in Mexico have a poor opinion of the U.S. because of the current government actions. She said we are helping people see us in a different way.
Anyway, I´m at an internet cafe and it´s about to close, so adios for now.
-Kia

Saturday, January 14, 2006

2006-01-14T15:30:00.000-08:00

From a morning that was very drab and dreary with wet snow (typical Columbus), the day turned out to be partly sunny which made for a wonderful build. While our mentor Dave M. did fine, quick, and accurate work of laying out the sill plates on the house, the crew on the garage struggled with laying out the sill plates on the unsquare and bowed walls of the garage. (we needed Dave). However, the garage crew did a fine job of adusting their layout lines and making everything straight and true. The problem of the incorrect placement of the anchor bolts was also overcome with the aid of Mr. Riffe, Pat, and Jordan who by hand, chisled out all of the bottom plate locations for all of the anchor bolts. This picture shows the last of the crew at the end of the day with the completed work. The braces you see are not to hold the walls up. We anchored these braces in the dirt using nail stakes and with devices normally used in the concrete construction trades, we pushed and pulled the tops of the walls straight.

The walls of the garage were completely framed sood up, plumbed and straightened.
The cap plates were put on.
The truss layout was done on the cap plates.
Di, John P., John B., and Brandon sheathed the gable end trusses and put on the rake boards.

One of the best things to happen was our homeowner-to-be, Belay(bee-lie) and her brother worked with us the entire day. This is Belay on the left and her brother.

It was great to have Mr. Allen, Mr. and Mrs. Meena, and Mr. Riffe on site with their sons and daughters.

The temperature when we arrived at 8 AM was 32 degrees. The temperature when we left site at 5:00 PM was 32 degrees. The wind was blowing at 20 mph+ almost all day. Those of us who stayed all day were a little windburnt on our faces.

Week of January 9, 2006

2006-01-12T17:16:00.000-08:00

We have the basement walls up on our house and garage.

The top and bottom plates were cut an laid out. On site, the foundation walls were chalked for the placement of sill plates.

Week of January 3, 2006

2006-01-06T19:42:00.000-08:00

Progress! The forms for the footers were formed and the concrete was placed in them. Our construction container was moved to site along with our walls which we moved with a truck courtesy of Brad Nardolson and the Righter Construction Company . That's Tim and Waldo of the Righter Company who drove the truck.

Moving the walls provided the first trip to our site for the class.

Week of December 27, 2005

2005-12-29T11:00:00.000-08:00

Still have a hole in the ground. Looking for concrete.

Mr. Beck

Week of December 19, 2005

2005-12-19T10:37:00.000-08:00

This week is the start of our winter break. The concrete work that will get us out of the ground so that we can start attaching the wood to our house and garage has been delayed becuase of the extreme early cold which arrived before Thanksgiving and has stayed. This is the picture of our "house to be" waiting for concrete work.

The construction department at Greater Columbus Habitat for Humanity has thought of our every need as they have even provided us with a porta potty next to our site. I believe there is even a sink next to the toilet in which we can wash up. Thank you Erik!

Mr. Beck

Week of December 12, 2005

2005-12-16T16:27:00.000-08:00

Monday 12/12; Wednesday 12/14; and Friday 12/16 were spent inside our school framing the garage that will be on our site. The framing materials were delivered from Contract Lumber on time Monday and the class split into groups to build the walls. We decided not to break up the walls in to smaller pieces for transportation since we were were able to obtain the services of a truck with a 20' foot capacity. The wall sections are really heavy. We also made provisions to be able to change door openings when on site if the concrete company does not place the openings in the correct locations.

Mr. Beck

Supplies for the detached garage

2005-12-09T10:36:00.000-08:00

On Thursday, Dec. 8, a few of the students from our HomeBase class were selected from the rest of the class and assigned the task of figuring up the materials needed for our house's detached garage. Most of the class watched a movie while Kia A., Chris B., Scott M., Max W., Rachel B., and I counted, recounted, and re-recounted the number of precuts we would need, the estimated length of the braces we would need, and tried to guess the amount of other lumber that would be required. Scott originally designed the actual garage for the house, and he was a really big help in figuring out the plans that he had made 2 years ago. After about an hour, we realized that we were making the entire project way to complicated, and from then on it was fairly easy to make our list.

I stayed after school, with Kia keeping me company, and wrote out the fax for the lumber order. I had to put the list of materials in order by size (smallest to largest) and also ordered the 150# of nails that we will need. After some serious contemplation of how to word the directions ("turn into the school, turn right at the big multi-colored rock") the fax was ready to be sent.

Hopefully we will get the materials by 1p.m. on Monday, and we will be able to build the garage inside the homebase room on the floordeck. Thanks to Scott's brilliance, the garage will be built in sections that we can make at the school, transport to the site, and fit the sections back together.

Andrea

Week of December 5, 2005

2005-12-08T09:15:00.000-08:00

Monday, 12/6 We met at the main branch of the Columbus Public Library so that students could start to gather information sources for their research paper.

Thursday, 12/8 We were at school and viewed the videotape by Larry Haun on framing floors which we will be doing after Winter Break. Some students also prepared and faxed an order for the materials take-off for our gargage.

Learning How To Build A Roof

2005-12-01T14:59:00.000-08:00

Week of 11/28, Mon., Tues., Fri.

To be able to build a roof, the class learned how to layout cap plates, install trusses, and to apply O.S.B. (oriented strand board) to the trusses to make a roof deck. Our lab is great because it is big enough to build a 24' x 24' house while being inside and warm. The students learned how put up a roof while standing on the floor instead of being eight to twenty feet in the air. The class did very well and they had some very smart "fixes" for some problems that always seem to pop up. The roof was up and down in three double class periods.

Mr. Beck

Squaring, Sheathing, Straightening, and Standing Up Walls Workshop

2005-11-26T15:18:00.000-08:00

Saturday:
Andrea, Max, Ryan D. and Ryan W. came to school today to learn the skills needed to be site leaders for the process of getting a framed and sheathed wall standing up, plumb and straight using concrete form aligners. They learned a large amount lot of very detailed technical knowledge and the skills needed to put a very well built wall.

During the process of instruction, I realized how many little things had to be learned for this group of students to be successful in being able to exercise real leadership when we are working on our house. Certain students are gaining my respect for going above the minimum. Having a controlled classroom environment in which to teach today was invaluable, especially since it was cold and blustery outside.

On the house we will build, we have the advantage of framing two floors of walls which should give these students ample time to become very comfortable with the craftsmanship so that they can enjoy the teamwork and building parts of what we do. I think their experience will be like riding a bicycle. One doesn't really enjoy riding a bike when that skill is being learned. It is only when the rider can ride without thinking of staying upright that one truly can enjoy the experience of bicycling.

Two students have gone through the complete wall framing workshops, Andrea and Max, both of whom I believe can lead an entire cycle of wall bulding and raising. It should be fun to see to see if our class can be self-actualized learners or will they, through years of being told exactly what to do in school, be looking for me to be the leader. I hope they can and want to lead.

After the students were done, they deconstructed the walls, stored the parts and got the floor deck ready for our class sessions this week on standing up trusses and sheathing a roof deck.

Mr. Beck

Team Building / Site Rubric

2005-11-21T15:12:00.000-08:00

In our Advance Composition class, we anaylized the Poem by Marge Piercy entitled "To Be Of Use"". The poem is about work can not only be joyous, but a work of art. During the next class period, we then created a site performance rubric based upon the poem.

Mr. Beck

Dry Wall

2005-11-09T07:06:00.000-08:00

Today was a very fun and productive day. Ben, C-Jay, and I put up dry wall in house number one of the Hilltop. It was cool learning how to put it up and and i felt like I was making a big difference because the workers who had put in the dry wall previously had done it wrong. It was cool being able to help out with the dry wall because when that was done it meant that the house was very close to completion. The only thing that prevented us from finishing all of the dry wall was that we did not have enough screws to finish putting it all up.

- Ryan Dew

Helping To End Poverty Housing

2005-11-08T21:06:00.000-08:00

Today we were doing all sorts of things. Rachel and Heather were putting up siding on one of the houses across the street, while Brandon put up starter strips and corner posts, and Katie, Crystal, Andrea and I worked on getting j-channels on the back. Some other classmates continued painting the porches of several houses, and Justin put up a k-brace in the attic of one house. We all stayed pretty busy, even though me and the crew I was working with ran into a number of problems and unfortunately didn't get very far. (Always remember to measure things over and over!) . At the end of the day we saw some dry wall being brought in on this huge crane-like machine. It's nice every day to be able to see all of the progress that's been made on these houses, knowing we are making an important difference in so many people's lives. One man today even came up to the house we were working on and wanted to help out. It was hard to tell if he was drunk or just enthusiastic, but either way I was a little dissappointed when Jim turned him down. I know there had to be some kind of work he could do to help, even if it was just oddjobs. Maybe giving him something helpful to do would inspire him to stay clean and sober? (that is, if he wasn't already. Like I said, it was hard to tell). Who knows, though. Maybe I just have too much faith in people, but somehow I would have liked to have him help out.
-Kia

Building The Back Porch

2005-11-04T08:05:00.000-08:00

Today was a very frustrating day. We spit into teams to build the back porch of houses one and two. It was tough getting anything done because the cordless drill batteries kept dying on us. We didn't accomplish much but will hopefully finish next class.

Ryan Dew

Painting!!!

2005-11-04T07:49:00.000-08:00

Today Mr. Beck had me construct a team to paint the front porch of house 2. Danny, Ciara, Kristen, Katie, and me searched out the paint brushes and went to work. We almost finished the whole porch but we had a few touch ups that we finished the next class.Ryan Dew

New Siding

2005-11-02T12:37:00.000-08:00

Rachel, Crystal, and I were extremely aggrivated with the siding on the back of the third house for two class days straight, due in large part to a different crew, who put the sideing up incorrectly. We had took down 4 or 5 sheets of it on one side of the door. It wasn't a difficult task, it just wasn't necessary work for us to do. We finally fixed it this afternoon and I must say that it looks really good.

Heather Meena

2005-10-30T17:51:00.000-08:00

Aloha todos this is Max. I have the photo albums all set and ready to go, so take a look .
This is the link: http://photobucket.com/albums/c236/06homebase/

p.s. congrats to the guys waterpolo team on winning the gold, state champs 06

Ceiling Stomping

2005-10-27T18:23:00.000-07:00

October, 14 While working hard to finish nailing the shingles onto the roof of the garage, Mr. Beck asked me a question, "How is your Spanish Danny?". I thought that was quite an odd question because it was so out of the blue. I told him that my Spanish was understandable but not amazing and then he asked me to follow him. So I followed him down the roof and up to the upstairs of the house that was being built. Up there were three
men covered from head to toe in what looked like white paint from stomping inthe ceiling texture. Mr. Beck then asked me to talk to them. I felt very awkward at first but when they realized that I could speak Spanish they warmed up to us. I had already put my Spanish to use last summer when I helped build homes in Mexico.
Before long, one of the guys had shown me and some other students what he was doing and how to do it. Then he handed me his stamping pole and told me try it. So I grabbed the pole and rammed the sponge end of it up at the ceiling like he had shown me, however I rammed it way to hard and a ton of the white paint stuff splattered down all over my face, hair, and shoulders. It was pretty funny and as I did a few rows I began to get the hang of it. By the time I was finished, I had white paint all over me. I thought that it was really cool to be able to have the opportunity to learn a skill as fun as this and it felt good to connect with people like those guys that I otherwise would never have met.

Danny Mack

First Day On Site

2005-10-18T06:56:00.000-07:00

The first day on site was exciting. First we all got out toolbelts and checked out all of our new cool toys. Then we learned how to roof and got into 2 groups. One group was working on the roof and the other on the siding. It was a lot of fun and great to finally start working.

Ryan Dew

Our HOME BASE Team

2005-10-18T06:48:00.000-07:00

Our HOME BASE Team. After our first day on site.