funny you mention that!every now and then some dumb ass will come into the pit when the ride is over and twice the car port has been nailed! the second time was with a double seat car. yeah they not only bought a go kart ride but a pole too.

So do you own an amusement park or something?

nah my good friend and flying buddy does. i started working for him year ago last september when i quit working at the flight school/charter biz. i'm trying to get back into engineering or aviation but the economy sucks balls still so....
here is a link to our web page Houston Grand Prix if you'd like to check it out.

Pretty cool. Thanks.

i was rereading. so let me ask you this. when the bearings wear out then the shaft walks longitudinally? and if so then does that mean that the seals leak as a result of that? or could the seals just be old and leaky?

It could be either or neither, I was trying to figure out why the cam would be walking. But, after seeing the set up for that cam sensor, a walking cam wouldn't cause that problem. The rear main might have taken a beating from the trans problem too. Just keep an eye on the leak and see how bad it gets, it may just leak a little bit, for a long time.

My house and garage here in Texas were built in the late 70's and at that time built under county codes which are less strict the City of Houston ones which we now fall under. My garage is 22' wide and 20' deep and the ceiling joists and rafters are all 2 x 6's!!! Most were showing signs of sagging only made worse by knots that had all but dried out and were cracking.

My man cave/ wood working shop conversion began by insulating and drywalling the walls followed by a major re-engineering of the ceiling. Replacing the sagging rafters was not an option and even if we had, the code would call for something like a 2 x 10 or 2 x 12 or some kind of laminated beam. So I used an idea from an article I read several years ago in Fine Homebuilding. We jacked up the joists as much as possible to straighten out the sag, as much as 1 1/2 inches in the center of the room in some places. Using 1/2 cdx plywood ripped into 6 inch strips my son and I heavily coated one side with wood glue, clamped in place and used drywall screws about every 8 inches in a zig zag pattern to create a sister side board, then we did the other side of the 2 x 6. After every joist was engineered with the glued plywood we attached 2 x 4's to the rafters in a truss pattern to spread the load to the roof which is a 4 sided pyramid shape.

Then we added R19 insulation and 5/8 inch drywall, damn that stuff is heavy! My son is out there now starting to tape it and float it. He was a dry waller in California before relocating here.

This is the ceiling from Wednesday top today, Saturday!

Finishing the hanging of the drywall and starting to tape the seams. My son will do 2 passes of hot mud which drys with in an hour and then a final skimming with topping mud. It can be sanded the next day and painted!

Well done, a lot of work but, worth it. Does it have hurricane clips?
5/8 Drywall, yikes! You must have a lot of faith in your new lam-beams. :haha:

No we didn't add clips to the existing garage but did to a shed addition I added at the back wall of the building. The garage is low and we are in a heavily wooded area of Houston so if hurricane force wind gusts ever got down to 8 ft off the ground we would be in serious trouble with our 2 story home and our neighbor's before it effected the garage.

My son recommended 5/8 as it is fire coded and is only about 18lbs heavier per sheet than a sheet of 1/2 would be and would be better for our uneven ceiling joists. We don't have snow to worry about for extra roof weight and I only plan on storing some light things in the small attic space. I thought the 5/8 4 x 8s were heavy and my son said I should try hanging 5/8 4 x 12's instead!

Drywall jacks are cheap to rent, and a wondrous thing to use. I had always thought they would be more trouble than they would be worth, and used the grunt & swear method. Then I was helping a guy last spring that insisted on using one, and I was very impressed... and kicking myself for the money I'd wasted on Tylenol all these years. :o

My man cave/ wood working shop conversion

Yeah Right , Until yer Wife sees How AWESOME it turns out , then it'll be a Yoga / Sewing / Gurl Cave !!!

Good Job so far !!

But 5/8 Sheet rock OVER FREAKEN HEAD ????!!!!
Dude do you have STOCK In Tylenol or sum such ??

very very nice chris!! major :thumb: which part of houston? conroe, woodlands, kingwood? did you by chance put down some decking in your storage area there?

:D

We live in Kingwood and yes, the shed I attached to my garage has a raised floor built on treated 2 x 8's sitting on concrete blocks just above the ground.

We actually got shut down on this project for 2 weeks after my home owners association found out. They wanted to see plans including paint swatches and shingle samples and measurements to my property lines to show I was not on the utility easement at the back of my property. They eventually gave me permission and the storage shed is done!

Pink? Is that an insect treatment, or should I say anti-insect treatment?

That's what I wondered but it is actually just to designate these as pre-cut stud length which is 92 5/8 inch in length.

again, nice work! here at the track when we built the deck on our outside party area i wanted to use concrete blocks but we wound up driving treated steaks into the ground. yeah it's gonna rot only in a matter of time but that's what i was told to do so i did it *shrug*. i work just down the freeway from you at 59 and lauder. drive up from friendswood. :smack: at least until i can get back into engineering or aviation.

I am thinking about building a cabin and putting it on concrete pilings, there are some prefabs you can buy that have a cone shaped bottom that is under the ground. Do you think that would work well and last a long time? I was thinking if I put some rebarb in them and used some 25k pressure treated concrete they should hold up.

And this guy is da bomb.

http://www.askthebuilder.com/

Killer !!!
Got the Kidos SCREAMING !!!
Or was that YOU ??

now that sounds like a fun project!

Jim, love the vid man! kudos!

Love Spencer's facemask. That's awesome. Looks like a fun ride. I have a friend on the ski patrol over there, and another friend used to be the Assistant Manager.

yeah, i love that mask. Ippy got it for him for xmas. he got her the cookie monster hat....and they also exchanged snuggies.

I want to take them skiing(learning) there. That's where I learned how when I was appx spencer's age. not that I ever was any good at it....

Got the drywall painted and the new lighting up. Then we moved most of the tools and tool chests back in. Doing a big sorting of stuff on the workbenches so excuse the mess! This a totally major change from the old unfinished garage!

helluva job man! looks great!!

Wow! That looks great, and you did it so fast.

I wanted a big flat screen TV but my wife only let me have the little 13 inch one that no one ever watches in our guest room...:(

Great clip Jim. Nice drywall Chris.

You don't want a flat screen in the garage. What if you were watching the ball game while using the saw or something?

I don't know. Just I'm trying to make you feel better. :)

but wait! use the Pomegranate Phone shown on this page and your set. all you need are those gloves butchers and fishermen use so they don't cut their hands!

well we started another special project at work today. what this job calls for is to put in another car port aka party area. rather than do what we did with the last time where concrete footings were an afterthought...this time we are doing it right. first we of course measured everything out. the carport is 20' x 30'. the slab we formed today is 5" x 30'. tomorrow after the cement has cured we will remove the form and make the other slab. once that is complete, in about 10 days or so, the carport will be installed then it will be time to deck it. once we framed up the form and put 2 expansion joints in we then put one run of rebar in. should have really put two but one will suffice for this job. rebar re-enforces the concrete. 8 bags total. talk about a pain in the ass! mixing concrete with a shovel in a wheelbarrow sucks. trust me.

.

Visiting Paris and spent several hours at the Louvre wondering around with my wife who has never been there before. This is about my 6th trip so I decided to try to capture it in a different way than most of the tourists do.

I would caption these as:

1. Lovely garden statue but my home owner's association would never allow it!
2. If an erection lasts for more then 3 hours call a doctor or you will look this for the rest of your life!
3. Everyone has to take a picture of the Mona Lisa but I rather enjoyed taking pictures of everyone doing it.
4. Who needs to get up close when you can just view it on someone else's camera!

Finished the day and headed back to the Hilton. We told them it was our anniversary when we checked in so today they gave us fresh flowers, champagne and some kind of chocolate decadence!


Captions:

5. "Dad! Mom's going to be really pissed when she gets home and sees how drunk you are!"
6.. "Psssst! Did you just let a really stinky one fly?"
7. Our surprise.
8. Even though it was close to freezing we went out on the 7th floor balcony and set up a picture with the Eiffel Tower in the background.

Cool !!!

Awwww....happy belated anniversary! Paris, what a nice vacation. :) And that's a very lovely surprise! I'd love me some of that yummy piece of chocolate!

i love paris. been many times. i could spend a month at the louvre. beautiful place! used to have a pic almost like the one you took of everyone taking a pic of the mona lisa. i lost over half my pictures in the bs from 5 years ago. enjoy your trip! oh and happy belated as well!

well we got the second form completed yesterday. when i arrived at work bobby, my boss and pilot bud, had already started working on dismantling the first form to reuse and make the second. you have to be careful with concrete. make sure you have given it enough time to "cure" before removing the form. otherwise you run the risk of chipping/breaking the concrete. i'm new to concrete work so i'm learning these lessons as i go. all i know for sure is this: mixing concrete with a shovel in a wheelbarrow sucks. really really sucks. it took 8 80lb bags for each form. we ordered the new carport yesterday and should arrive in 7 to 10 days. long enough for the concrete to thoroughly set. well i'm off to get ready for work. 14 hour day ahead.

ok so the car port was put in today. errr sunday morning. tuesday we will start decking it. pics of that to come. i'm rather proud of our concrete work here. here is how that part turned out.....

why am I not in paris like chris??????

must remedy this...

Paris is a wonderful city!

ok new project started at home today with OMG status already achieved. TERMITE DAMAGE FOUND!!!!! ugh...what was supposed to be a new shower now is looking like new walls too. and god knows what else. pics of the demo so far.....

Cool Now give it a good Spray of Bug spray ( Prolly dont Need it ,But Hey its Open ) and seal it up

Rember this ????

Man you need professionally bonded treatment for Termites or you will never sell the place in the future. Just saying....

yeah we will be treating it. actually come to think of it i believe the house was already treated. 6 to one half dozen the other. i'll check on that and see. well here is how far we got today at work with the deck. we went to lowes in Humble, Tx and bought 2 2x4x16's 63 2x4x10's to bring back to the track but also bought but will pick up later 63 2x6x12's (i think) for the decking. anyway we made alright progress today. we laid out the 2x4's for runners then cut up other 2x4's into 4 16" stakes and 2 12" to drive into the ground for anchor support on the runners. we got 6 of the 9 runners in today and weather permitting will finish the other 3 tomorrow and start decking to hopefully be finished by the weekend. we also still have to finish the electrical too.

your input/ideas wanted:

ok while i was at work building the deck, paul was demoing the bathroom at home. the window framing has to be redone due to t-damage so it will be taken out and replaced. here's the latest....

oh the dead area behind the shower is going to be utilized. we will make the shower bigger (longer) and re plumb up the shower pipes.

Furdowns are a HANDY Place to run wires , Plumbing , Speaker wires for the Next room , etc ,,,,,

Pain in the ASS to sheetrock or tile But they Are Usefull

true true. in this case however, that fluorescent light sucks. same fixture is in all three bathrooms. we don't like them so it's going bye bye.

Throw throw bulbs In the trash First , then the Fixture on top !!!

so leave the FD and mount new light there and not on the wall? that's an idea....

In My Opinion if the Furdown could be Potentially use full Leave it ,
if Not TRASH the Fucker !!

We Have a Furdown that runs down 2 wall of our Kitchen ,
1 of these walls backs up to the liveing room ( where the Tv and the such is )
it is SOOOOOO Easy to drop a wire ANY Where down that wall !!!
None of that Drill a Hole and HOPE its in the right spot , Hell I have a 12x12 ( Ish ) Cavity to work with ( SHUT UP YA Pervs !!!)

lol i'll leave that one alone zip! no in this case the FD has no potential. so yeah we're scrapping it. here are pics of a 2x4 removed. the little bastards were hungry i tell ya!!

that aint wood , its saw dust held together by sap !!

If things are THAT Bad you guys May want to Start Looking at Structural intgererty All to gather !!
as in Whats a Load bearing wall , where , and what is it Holding up !!!

oh hell. check this shit out.....lemme go grab a pic

or four. it may be hard to tell but check out the twist in this 2x4. there are foundation problems here too. a nightmare. but i do what i can do. do what i'm asked of. make recommendations and if they are taken they are. usually $ dictates what is done. budgets. too bad we don't have an oil company's budget.

today the wx was bad so i didn't go to work to work on the new deck. so instead i worked in the bathroom downstairs. the deeper we dug in the more t-damage we found. pic #4 below shows it best. in the upper right back corner i had to remove a section of 2x4 that was eaten away using the "duct tape" of electrical power tools. yep. a sawzall. we reframed the window and replaced the eaten studs as well as put up most but not all insulation. the temp is dropping here tonight to the mid to upper 20's so that made it a little more important to get up.

.

Fun fun fun !!