The Rafters

We made good progress this weekend, but not all of it was the "put it up" kind of progress. We finished the last three bents on the loft, then built, assembled, and installed a post and a rafter on the NE corner of the house. The joinery on the top of the post was a lot of fun to do, and we'll enjoy seeing the rest of them go together.

Working this weekend were Andy and his three boys (Benson, Ethan, and Eli), Chris, Hannah (Andy and Chris' sister) and her husband Matt, and their daughter Rebecca. We don't mind exploiting the help, so yes, Rebecca had a hammer for a bit. She thought it was pretty heavy, but she could hit the nail pretty well when we slid her around the floor to match her natural swing. That's Chris behind her, then Hannah at the far end of the photo. We're assembling posts for the East wall.

Close-up of the joinery where the post and rafter meet. The middle 2x6 of the post matches the profile of the rafter. There is a 2x4 between the two 2x8s in the rafter that butts up against the edge of the tenon of the post. It all goes together beautifully, though the rafter is a bit heavy. We'll take a scale out next weekend to weigh one, just for curiosity's sake.

By the time we left on Saturday evening, we had 2-3" of snow on everything. Very pretty, but it made everything too slippery to do much assembly work outside. We cut and assembled all of the posts, and have cut about half the material for the rafters. Weather permitting, next week should show good progress.