After the flurry, a slog

Here's the reference deckboard, as straight as we can make it. Once that was secure, I could use ½-inch spacers and a board-bender to keep everything parallel. I secure the boards with enough screws, and leave the rest til later--one evening I listened to an entire Giants game (from Colorado) until it became too dark to see....


Prefabricating the support assemblies made for nice bursts of progress.


Tom and Lindsey got their system down for mounting the supports, bolting them to the joist ends and blocking the bottoms to the beams for added security.



Alex helped me with some milling this past Saturday, and proved to be a good little worker.


Alex entertained the world with some excellent practice on his new instrument, thereby becoming the first person to "use" the deck.


Here's the scene as I left this past Sunday morning--still some cuts to make, but the layout mostly complete to within 4' of the edge.

Sunday, shorter but still very productive

After a great meal (!) and unexpected birthday cake for me (woo hoo) a bunch of folks hobbled off to bed and reconvened for more fun in the morning.


The bay tree limb that had been quasi-supporting the west side of the deck did have to be chainsawed out of there, revealing a spectacular rot-cavity that has no doubt weakened the entire tree. Yikes!


After a few odds and ends and some last milling, a small group began the jigsaw / sudoku task of cutting ranks of deck boards (verifying true straight line to start, making nottches for sills and downspouts, avoiding seam conflicts, and dealing with bowed boards).


This was taken from the balcony just before I left with Alex at 6 PM, and shows a bunch of deck boards not yet spaced and secured.

First day of the big weekend

Got up to Inverness after a brutally busy day of graduate student orientation / dog and pony show, and hitched a ride with Keith via his son's soccer game in Napa. Arrived to find that Muggs and John Liu had had a huge day milling, and my former student Bryan Jaeger had put in 4 hours after his schoolday had finished, demo'ing like a demon.

I'm too tired to add captions. Must sleep. [I added a few later]


Happy man and his Sawzall.


We arose Saturday to light drizzle or heavy mist, and still some old supports that had to go.


With the old joists cut away, the old posts could be levered down and put aside for salvaging.


Meanwhile all the usable deck boards had to be de-nailed and have the rotted cut blocks cut out, without damaging the surface too badly.


Bryan J was an absolute monster working on the ledger, sistering in boards where the Graveson crew had left gaps six years ago (when they had done some patching of joists too) and then securing the special joist hangers for the pressure-treated lumber.


The guy on the left is my old friend and workout buddy Keith, who traded in his usual fine cabinetmaking (Summit Woodworks) for a kick-ass day of framing.


Heaving the joists onto the frame was more good core work worthy of Pilates...


... and this shot from the third floor balcony shows the progress.


All the joists and blocks had to be nailed and toe-nailed, but Keith was in the flow for several hours....


as was the table saw team up on the badminton court, taking care not to overdrive the saw nor have the 18-foot boards bind up. Bravo Jim, Bryan M, Jeff Sharp, John Liu and later Will Stringfellow!


The last few blocks we did in tandem, which was kind of fun.


Meanwhile Tom and his wife Lindsey had been busy on the west side of the deck getting ready for the rail supports, which Tom had pre-fabbed earlier in the week.


This design is way stronger than the original, and keeps the same 15-degree angle that is so characteristic of this deck while adding much more structural integrity below.


After the rot had been cut out of both edges of each board, the planer peeled off the top face to reveal often gorgeous tight-grained redwood that you can't buy anymore.


When I saw this at the end of the day I got a little choked up.


When Bryan J had to leave I insisted on a group photo; Jacquie took this so she's not in it.