The first week of March has been a busy one for the House-Build Class. Blessed with a few days of sunshine, our students and staff have been hard at work with the next major phases of our house: pouring and finishing our concrete slab; and attaching our trim, siding, and vinyl soffit.By the end of last week the ground floor of our home had been leveled, layered with 2” of foam insulation, covered with a grid of steel re-enforcing bar, and lined with heat tubes. Leaving it prepared to have nearly four inches of concrete poured on top of it to form the slab of our first floor.
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| The ground floor after being levelled. |
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| Ground floor covered with plastic weather-barrier, 2" foam insulation, grid of 3/8" steel re-enforcing bar, and heat tubes |
Therefore, at 10:30 am on Monday morning we welcomed, shovels in hand and wheelbarrows ready, the mammoth concrete-mixing truck to our site. To get the concrete into our house with a minimal amount of effort we placed the chutes from the truck through our doorways, where the students from JDHS’ Basic Construction Class waited with wheelbarrows to transport and unload the concrete where needed. The process of unloading the concrete into place and smoothing the surface took approximately three hours and the finishing of the surface another few hours as well.
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| JDHS students observing as we set up for the pour |
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| Slab after being smoothed and finished |
By Tuesday, the only work left to be done on the concrete slab was to wait for it to cure and try to minimize traffic and activity on its surface. So, we turned our attention to the outside of our home, which was ready to have siding and trim attached to its surface.
Before attaching our siding, the students were introduced to the tools we will be using and the methods we will be practicing for the processes of emplacing siding, trim, and vinyl soffit. At the end of this introductory lesson the students used the time left in class to put the techniques they had just learned into practice.
For Wednesday’s class period, the students were split into two groups. One group began attaching fiber-cement siding on the rear wall of our home, while the other finished installing vinyl soffit at the front of our house. |
| JDHS student, Kyle, attaches vinyl soffit. |
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| JDHS students, Jon (near left) and Zach, cut a piece of fiber-cement siding. |
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| JDHS students, Sylvester (near left) and Logan, measure and cut vinyl soffit |
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| JDHS House-Build teacher, Andy Bullick (kneeling), showing students how to attach fiber-cement siding |
The entire siding process should occupy a few weeks our class and work, so the students and staff will be glad to take a break from that stage for our spring break field trip to Martin County, Florida where we will be working with Habitat for Humanity. In other news, taking place this weekend is the Juneau Home Show. The Home Show will have a wine tasting event on Friday night, and other events throughout the day on Saturday and Sunday. The Home Show will be held at Centennial Hall.
