August 27 - It Rained and We Poured

Thursday Was Sunny and Bright -
The remaining inside footings were poured Thursday afternoon under bright sunshine. Steve, Dan and Phil guide the concrete into the form and TMITYH follows up with a screed and a trowel.


 The firewall footing also got poured. Here we see Joe adding the
finishing touch.

Watching TMITYH operate with a tool in each hand reminded me of an experience from my youth. The teacher was illustrating the word ambidextrous without using that word. He said there was a ball player who could throw equally well with either hand. One kid jumped right in and said, "He's ambiguous." Another kid popped in to correct saying, "No the word you want is amphibious."
I wonder how it goes with TMITYH. I think he is ambivalent.









Saturday Was Not Sunny and Bright -  

The view out the car window when I arrived at the site in the morning. The concrete pumper was there, the crew was there and the rain was there. The concrete had not yet arrived.

Soon the concrete showed up and the rain eased off. And the big pour, to fill the walls, began. The rain returned a couple of times during the morning but the work continued all the same.

Sam and Brian managed the pipe from the pumper truck. With the aid of a flashlight, they peer down into the foam bricks and decide when to move the hose. The entire wall cannot be filled at one time. The pour was done with three complete laps of the building, filling roughly a third of the wall on each lap. This approach is necessary to prevent the joints between the foam blocks from buckling either to the inside or the outside of the building.
In total, 86 cubic yards of mud were dumped into the walls. One truckload is about 10 yards so there was a steady stream of trucks arriving to feed the pumper.

A new tool was brought into play, a powered vibrator. There were both a corded model and a smaller battery powered model used. Here Randy operates the cordless job. The probe gets dropped into the mud where it vibrates and shakes itself about, to help settle the mud. The long, flexible shaft allows the probe to reach well down in the wall, into the fresh, soft concrete. At the same time, the wall beaters are attacking the walls with boards and hammers. All this effort to eliminate the voids in the final, dried concrete.


The third time around, Sam got tired of just watching the concrete muddle its way through the foam blocks and decided to make mud pies. Well, maybe he was adjusting the very top to make all the top layer of blocks evenly filled.

Work on the High Wall -

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Watching the work on the high wall was fascinating. Naturally, with a peak in the wall, the scaffolding becomes multi-tiered. Pictured here are a vibrator operator, a poker-prodder, and a spectator on the top level. Pete is waiting in the middle level for the concrete hose to come back to fill in the blocks under the window. On the floor level we see a person in transit and Bob, who traded the yellow hat for a yellow slicker, checking the wall for bulges.

All of the bucks that were not resting on concrete from the previous pour, had to have slots cut in the bottom board in order to get concrete into the blocks below the buck. Here Brian and Pete are working the hose into position to fill below the big window in the sanctuary. The corded vibrator (with an orange handle) is visible between the workers. Sam is making his way to the other side to take the hose when they are done with their task. Working the scaffolding on this wall required a little more agility than the other walls. It made for very interesting watching.

Pete descends from on high using the back side of the ladder with an enthralled audience looking on.This is  a non-traditional approach for humans but one that I have seen very effectively used at the Minnesota Zoo. Maybe that is where Pete got his education on these matters.

Battling the Bulges -

Bob went about with a long level, checking the walls for bulges as the concrete was being poured. He checked outside and he checked inside, Around and around the building he went, occasionally changing direction or starting a new course, but never stopping. When the dastardly bulge was encountered, a new brace was immediately put into place. Here we see a long horizontal board with four 2x4 bracing boards applied and we cannot see all of them in the picture.

A bulge is found. Ken applies the board. TIm awaits the word, and then swings mightily into action.

Bob continued his war on bulges as long as the concrete was being poured and probably for a while after the last truck left. And wherever Bob went, the bracing was sure to follow.

As I circled the building I began to feel a little sorry for the bulges.The poor things had no chance against the bulge fighter, who had an abundance of 2x4s and a mighty supply of labor.








A Sign for the Day -

There are perhaps more things to report about the big, wall-filling pour but they will have to wait for another post. I was touched by the sight of the sign out near the road and the building in the background. Our church is becoming a reality.