Crux of the matter

We have had an anxious few days since discovering the rib beams for the cruck frame had been made incorrectly. Several phone calls and emails were exchanged between Vision and ourselves on Tuesday and Wednesday. We noticed that the distance between the two end points of the rib flange was incorrect. Apparently this was caused by the figure being entered onto the CAD drawing incorrectly. At Vision's request Mark and I hauled and lifted the beams into various arrangements, measuring overlaps and providing photographs to try and aid Vision in determining how to correct the problem caused by the transposition error and to cater for the fall over the two leaves of the plinth wall.

Late on Wednesday afternoon Vision advised that they would send their two best people to help us. The guys arrived at 8am this morning and spent the first couple of hours identifying the problem and determining how best to trim the beams to fit whilst minimising the negative impact on the height of the building. By around 11 the first two beams had been successfully trimmed with a slice being taken out at the ridge to correct the error and another being taken out at the foot to create the fall. Templates were made from one of these beams to replicate the cutting angles on the remainder of the beams. It took until 3pm for the rest of the beams to be trimmed.

The next step will be to join pairs of rib beams into crucks which will be raised onto the plinth walls - something I fear will be easier to say than do!

Mark has done the brunt of the heavy work and now has a bad back. This is particularly unfortunate as he has taken the next couple of weeks off to concentrate on the build.

#strawbalehouse #Woodlands #cruckframe #visiondevelopment