Hauling in the Logs from the Woodlot

After the logs were peels they were left to dry off the ground by leaning on trees etc. for about a month. They were quite a bit lighter afterwards. The heaviest being  the furthest purlin beam still weighed 66 kg. (~145 lbs.)

Selecting and Peeling Logs

 The next step is to select, fell, cut and peel the logs for the pergola. During the months of May and June, the layer under the bark called the vascular cambium grows rapidly and is very tender. During this time the bark peels off the wood very easily and it is simply a matter of pulling off the bark in full length strips.

There are many overcrowded cedar groves in our woodlot that need thinning. This provided an ample supply of cedar logs to choose from for this project.

The eastern white cedar [Thuja occidentalis] is a tree species of choice for this build. While it is not a strong wood, it is very resistant to rot and insects and it weathers well. It is also called northern white-cedar, arborvitae and swamp-cedar. Arborvitae means "tree of life" a reference back to the 16th century when the French explorer Jacques Cartier learned from the Indians how to use the tree's foliage to treat scurvy.
Ref  http://www.borealforest.org/trees/tree14.htm

I attempted to peel the bark early -- at the end of April and also later -- in mid July and the peeling was very hard in both circumstances, pulling off only little strips of bark each time.

In all, 22 logs had to be selected and prepared in this manner and this was accomplished on schedule, before we went on a trip to the Maritimes. This also gave the logs time to dry somewhat which made them much lighter to carry.

Beginning the Pergola - Planning with a Scale Model

These photos are of a scale model 1:10 in metric or about 1:12 imperial (1 inch equals one foot.), of the pergola made from buckthorn weed tree sticks.

This was a useful exercise for getting an idea of the relative proportions of the pergola, namely of the height, depth and width as well as the desired diameters of the logs. It is also an excellent communication tool share ideas with others.

The perspective view here gives a better feel for its true appearance from the eye level at scale. (This fooled some of our FB friends into believing that this was a finished  final product. lol.)

Using a couple of Playmobil figures and plastic animals we had a little bit of fun with that. The figures were not even close to scale of the model though.

Phase 1: The Patio is Complete

We soon made good use of the patio, celebrating birthdays among other things.

Walkway to the Patio

The walkway from the house to the patio was built the same way, with a much narrower box, a layer of landscape cloth, screeded, tamped and leveled stone dust, a layer of cloth and then the patio stones. This time however I selected 2ft x 2ft patio stones to make a wider walkway. These stones were awkwardly heavy weighing over 80 pounds each. Thankfully there were only five to place.

The soil here is very fertile making for excellent topsoil but being of glacial till it is full of rocks of all sizes which is awkward to rake and smooth, so I created a sieve fashioned from wood and ½ inch hardware cloth that can be seen here installed on the ATV trailer. I reused the quality soil to do the finish landscaping.

Levelling the Stone Dust and Laying the Patio Stones

Using two pieces of 1x4 strapping I made a screed board, screwing one to the other so that from the end it looks like a 'T'. This makes for a fairly rigid while light enough board to manipulate.  I then turned it upside down and slide it along the upper and lower box boards.

It was a tedious process of screeding and then tamping and then adding some more stone dust and repeating the screeding and tamping etc. but it was worth it.Once it was complete the rest was easier because of the attention to detail at this stage.

I decided that as soon as a row of about 3½ feet was done, to roll down a row of landscape cloth which is 3 feet wide, and the first row of patio stones very carefully aligned with the starting edge of the box. I managed to get the patio stones to pack very closely together by placing a stone on its edge on an adjacent stone that is already laid. I would then slowly lower the stone ensuring that as the stone tilted away that it would slide down very tightly to the first stone. Worked like a charm.

The purpose of the landscape cloth is to inhibit weeds from growing between the tiles.

Laying down the Stone Dust

The load of stone dust has arrived. It was placed onto a tarp to keep it from mixing with the grass, and facilitate the clean up.

The next step after leveling the earth, was to lay down a layer of landscape cloth and then place the stone dust on it. The cloth will keep the subsoil earth from mixing with the stone dust which will happen over time.

Box Frame Installed

Once the area was excavated, I built a box to act as a guide and reference for depth of the soil and later to screed, level and contain the stone dust. I selected the straightest pieces of SPF strapping which are 16' long 1" x 4". In each corner I hammered down a peg and carefully leveled the strapping before screwing them to the pegs using basic 1¼ in. floor screws. I then cut off the tops of the pegs level with the boards. I chose to cover the patio with 18"x18" patio stones since they are manageable enough to manipulate at about 19 kg or 42 pounds each. Also these larger stones would be much faster to place and easier to level than interlocking brick.

To use whole patio stones I chose the patio dimensions of 12 feet by 13½ feet as multiples of the 18" stones.  For drainage, I provided a slight slope following the contour of the land and the edge away from the house is 5 cm or 2 inches lower than the upper side near the house.

I decided to leave the box frame permanently in place afterwards and covered it during landscaping since the patio stones sit above it. SPF lumber will rot over time and disappear I figure.

A Rocky Surprize

 In the digging process, we never know what we may run into. The soil here is mainly glacial till subsoil with a topsoil overburden and all of it is rocky from pea sized stones to huge bolders. Since the soil is permeable it is susceptible to frost heaving or pushing up of any rocks by the spring frost. Hence if we ever detected even the tip of a rock we would remove it, but the size would be unknown and a surprize. In this photo a good sized and well lodged rock surfaced and took some major effort to remove. Pry-bars were basically ineffective.

Finally we dug around the rock and wrapped a chain around it and with the ATV were able to pull it out.

Clay and sand are not permeable soils thus they are not susceptible to frost heaving, and are preferred soils to use under structures. The holes created by the rocks here were back filled with sand and tamped down.

Next Project -- Patio and Pergola

Our project for 2012 was to build a patio and a pergola where we could enjoy the scenery, the air, and the sun. In the early planning stage, we took a tarp and laid it down on the ground and moved it around until we felt we had the right place for it.

I then put down stakes and lines to roughly determine the area where to dig. I need to dig down 10 cm (4 inches) to put down a base of stone dust also called limestone screenings.
These stakes and lines helped me locate the digging area without interfering with the digging itself.

All ladders, work horses, and boards have been cleaned up.

Just wrapping it up.

The final Product

A few more rafters and some more rustic latticework and then we'll call it a day.

End rafters installed. Getting easier all the time.

The rear of the structure is stable enough with the cross bracing however the front was a little floppy so to prevent racking, I stiffened up the front with a couple of braces as well. I was lucky to find a couple of nicely arched branches, again thanks to '98 Ice Storm damaged trees, which made nice decorative braces, although straight poles would have been much stronger and would withstand bending much better.

Each slat had an identical mirror image pair, so I positioned them opposite each other on each side. I also put the curvier slats further outward with the concave side facing out. It adds to the fan look.

Must say this felt very fruitful. Now it is back to the easy stuff again of drilling, sawing and screwing. I want to add a rafters for the vines and fill in the sides so that the Virginia creeper and wild grape have more to climb on. I chose these two plants since they are indigenous to the area and grow easily and quick and both become a showy red in the fall.

I figure another day or work and it should be done.

BTW, the seat is very comfortable.

I had to reposition the slats a couple of times. I did it completely by eye at first and 'tilt' they all sloped to one side. Back to the drawing board.

I then accurately positioned the centre slats, end slats and two slates in the middle of each side, and then eye balled the remaining. I had to saw 7 logs in half to make 14 boards.

Today was more interesting than past days. After all the sawing I got to assemble all the back boards or slats. I tacked them on with nails and then sat back on my foldable chair and stared at it a while. Eventually this fan pattern emerged. I then fitted the three seat boards. So the chair is done.

I put the seat boards in place to get a feel for it. Looks like I'll need a third board to make a wider seat.
This is design on-the-fly.

To determine the size of the seat I went around to our various lawn chairs and patio chairs to determine what size was the most comfortable.
I figured that the front edge of the seat had to be about 45 cm off the ground, the seat should go back (width) about 45 cm with a slope of 10 to 1 going down so it goes back 45 cm and drops 4.5 cm. The back height should be 60 cm and slope back 10 to 4. So If I go up 50 cm it slopes back 20 cm. In the end we'll only know how comfortable it is by sitting on it.

I used the same technique to rip smaller logs for the back rest and it worked like a charm. I didn't need the board on top to guide the log from dropping as in the earlier cut. The log is much lighter so I was easily able to keep the log up and the guide-board flat against the fence while feeding the log.

The spots in the photo turn out to be back scatter from the camera flash reflecting against floating airborne sawdust particles.

Worked like a charm. Being rough on the outside all measurements were by eye for example when trying to find the center of the log. A center-finder would not have been of much use in this case since the end is not exactly round. It might estimate the center of the end butt, but the since the logs are not straight in the middle of the length of the log it could be cutting to one side.

The log is fastened to the guide board. Blocks were nailed to the log such that the front edge of the block is exactly centered with the desired cutting plane. The fence was adjusted so that the saw blade lined up also with the intended cutting plane.

Quite honestly I was worried that this jury rigged setup might jam and cause the saw to bind but it actually worked quite well.

The log is now ready for ripping. I'll rip one side and then flip it over and rip the other side always keeping the base up against the fence.

I decided to use a piece of scrap lumber as a guide-board which I made sure was very straight to feed the log into the table saw while holding the guide-board against the fence. I fastened the log butt ends to two small perfectly square plywood blocks so that the front edge lined up with the middle of the log, and fastened it with a hinge to the guide board. The width of the two blocks from guide-board to front edge were exactly identical and I set the fence on the table saw so that the blade lined up exactly with the fronts of the blocks. I screwed a board on top of the log to keep the log from dropping in case it was too heavy to safely hold the guide-board against the fence.

Yesterday grandsons and I pulled this larger trunk out of the bush and cut it to length to make the seat boards. The challenge for today is to try to split this log in half and then use the flat side up to make the seat. If I had a saw mill this would be easy enough but all I have is a table saw and it only cuts 7.5 cm deep.

The log is not perfectly straight, nor perfectly round and is tapered, so there is no way that you can just throw it onto a tablesaw to cut it down the middle.

To find the plane of the curve of the log I laid the log on the floor and let it roll until it settled. This way I found a rough determination of the plane. I then pencilled a line on each end of the log parallel to the floor. I had to make sure the knots were smoothed right down to let it roll freely.

Sun stream through the clouds viewed over the field.

I finally found some help. There is nothing like good enthusiastic grandsons to help out.

As a result of the 1998 Ice Storm quite a number of trees in the woodlot were damaged. 13 years later some of the broken trees survived and grew these interesting arched branches which make up the top of the arbour.

Frames are now braced together. Front view.

The Arbour frames are up -- still a little tottery -- as viewed from up the trail looking out towards the field.

Trail Entrance Near Chosen Arbour Location

View of the entrance to the trail leaving the field at sunset. The arbour will be just to the right of this photo.

A very late Snake.

This is a small (full grown) red bellied snake found by and rescued from our cat, near the arbour. It preys mainly on slugs so it is a welcome tenant. This time of year this would be quite rare but since it is so warm I guess the snakes are not inclined to go to hibernation yet.

Setting up the Frame

Round logs, even though they look straight really aren't. That makes it challenging to make a square, true and plumb structure. I used these boards as reference points. They were cut to exact length and fastened squarely on the logs.

To ensure that the two boards are square I measured the diagonals to the outside corners of the boards and kept adjusting the shape until they were equal.I then fastened a diagonal brace to keep the shape.

An Initial Sketch

Lots of ideas emerge at the most inopportune times like at three in the morning. This sketch is the result of one such inspiration when the arbour concept emerged.

Building an Arbour from Rough Logs

The first project will be the building of an arbour. This arbour will be made totally of eastern white cedar found in the local forest. The cedars are cut where the trees are too crowded and thus stunting each other's growth. It's called thinning in the vernacular.