Week_06
Blog Post Week 6: 470 Groundbreaking and Exterior and Interior Work on Units 9&10
This day started off on a different note than usual as we met at another site where we ceremoniously broke ground for another Habitat home (Jörg’s other project at 470 S 1000 W) and memorialized a longtime Habitat volunteer that had passed away.
9/25/2018 - Day 9
While we didn’t get to grab hold of one of the golden shovels, it was nevertheless good to see many of the people involved with Habitat for Humanity and the level of personal investment that they put into it. Of course, our project manager, Brandon, couldn’t resist pulling us aside afterward to impress upon our minds the level of heart and soul that people put into Habitat homes and the overwhelming amount of hope and opportunity each home offers its eventual owner.
After the groundbreaking, we headed to the jobsite to get back to it. While Mitch, Zach and Joe looked at revamping the foundation layout and formwork for the next two home units, Chris and Scot hoped to fix the gyp board in the east unit entry and powder room areas where it was still not patched and plastered flush. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the right thickness of sheetrock on site, so we tapped Brandon to get us what we needed before coming back from lunch. Not wanting to wait for Brandon, Chris lifted Scot up in the forklift basket to continue with installing the furring strips and cement board paneling on the front exterior. Bennett then assisted in the effort, and we were able to make some decent progress towards completing the exterior cladding.
- Scot Clark
9/27/2018 - Day 10
With dedication and groundbreaking events in the rearview mirror, the D+B SLC crew returned to the Field of Dream project ready to work. Our efforts are now focused on interior and exterior finish work so that the tenants can move in next month.
Most efforts on this day were focused on interior projects. Andy worked with Bennett from Habitat fixing drywall in the East Unit’s main floor bathroom. They were tasked with making the drywall attached to the exterior SIP panels lineup with the drywall on the interior, framed wall. Since both structural systems are not the same width, they had to place multiple layers of drywall to make it work.
Scot, Chris and myself (Daniel) began the task of trying to install bi-fold doors for the laundry rooms in both units. This required some creative thinking and problem solving, since the doors were too tall to fit in the opening. After trimming the doors to fit and carefully gluing the filler pieces back in, we moved on to installing the skirt boards for the stairs in the West Unit while waiting for the glue to dry. The skirt boards proved to be a bit of a challenge at first due to varying stair tread widths, but it was nothing a Sawzall couldn’t fix! Following some careful cutting, we were able to get the skirt boards in just before quitting time.
Wrapping up work on the interior, Mitch spent the majority of the day doing touch-up painting on the second level of the East Unit. While this was happening, Joseph tackled the chore of grouting the tile in the upstairs bathroom of the West Unit.
Moving to the exterior, David and Zach began work finishing off the skirting on the face of the decks for both units. They ran into some minor issues with warped boards, but with a little ingenuity and elbow grease, they were able to muscle the skirting into place on the West Unit.
Overall, it was a fairly productive day of work and problem solving as we continue to move forward at the Field of Dreams!
- Daniel Guthrie
