Gate project completed

The last thing we needed to finish was painting and fixing the gaps on the sides where the support posts were attached to the walls. The paint chosen was turquoise and it didn't take months to decide, surprise, surprise, surprise!

The other major item that needed to be addressed was the gaps between the support posts and the walls.  The gaps ranged from 1/8" to over 3/8". I had shims of all shapes and widths, some can be seen in the previous posts. We decided to use a thin strip of wood (basically moulding) that would cover the support posts and the gaps in the wall. It needed to be about 1/4" thick otherwise it would be to bulky and it needed to be around 2 1/2" wide to cover the support post and the gap. I would still have to trim it to various widths due to the wall variation. We looked at Home Depot and found what we needed but it would cost around $30 because of the total length needed, around 24'.

So I tapped my enormous brain power (remember that part) and decided to cut the leftover gate board, a 1"x6" cedar board, to 2 1/2" wide then I would rip in down the middle to get the desired thickness. That went well!!!!

Next step was to figure out how to cut the varying widths due to the wall variation. I made 17 points along the wall and matched it up to the board. Then I measured the distance from the wall to the end of the support posts. I then placed a dot at the length on the moulding and connected the dots, genius (remember that part).
I took out my trusty jigsaw and made the proper cuts.All total this took about 2+ hours to complete.

When I placed the board up to the wall it was pretty darn close but there were some minor gaps. I then told "A" don't worry about the gaps because I can fill them in with my stucco patch.....WAIT WHAT DID I JUST SAY??? STUCCO PATCH??? I COULD HAVE JUST FILLED IN THE GAPS WITH STUCCO PATCH AND NOT HAD TO CUT THE DAMN BOARDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I did use the stucco patch that I already had and it took me about 20 minutes to complete. It looks really good.

Bonus photo. Tonight's sunset.

Gate Project Part 1

Since the house on the north side is so close w decided to add a gate to the north side of the house where there is an existing doorway.  Last weekend I added the support posts to the wall.  Since I could not place a 4x4 post into the ground due to the concrete I did what I thought was the only other option. I added a 6x2 bolted to the wall with lag bolts. I had a good idea of how to do it but "A" did her research and found that it was a good idea to add epoxy to the anchor sleeve placed in the wall. I used 4 1/2 in. lag bolts in metal sheaths with JB Weld epoxy.

Today was the actual build of the gate. We used 1x6 cedar planks and framed it with 2x3 Douglas Firs. To put it all together I used 2" and 3" deck screws.  I also got to use my pneumatic nail gun to affix the top and bottom border with 18ga 1" staples.

Overall from dragging the tools out to complete cleanup too about 5 hours. the actual gate took about 4 hours to build and hang. Since this was my first time building a gate from scratch I think we did pretty good.

The only part left is to paint it. "A" picked out a beautiful turquoise color. Since everything is brown and white we wanted some color. I will post once it is completed.

SDSU Home Opener

We went to today's home opener for SDSU. "A" was able to get comp tickets through the senior staff. It was pretty cool we got the season ticket holders parking area, right in the main entrance to Qualcomm Stadium and not have to pay!!! They also had a skybox with free food and drinks (aka beer). I felt really special...sniff.

SDSU played Nicholls State (yeah I never heard of them either). They totally annihilated them 47-0. Below are two photos of the game taken on my high speed, low drag, 4 year old cell phone. I forgot my camera, bummer.

It does not look like that many people but the attendance was over 25,000. Not bad for the Aztecs.

SDSU Kickoff (no f-stop on the phone)

Halftime Aztec Marching Band