My friend & local neighbor put up this 50' x 40' building over the last six or so months.
He owns a water and septic business, and recently acquired a used well drilling machine.
The well drilling machine is actually a well pounding machine, not rotary.
So now he is good for ground to glass water systems.
Like me he's cheap with his money. Frugal or cautious is likely a better word choice.
When I need assistance with heating/water/septic systems, I call him.
When he needs assistance with machinery, or needs some custom machine shop work done, he calls me.
I have even gone out on some of his well system job sites and helped pull inoperative well pumps from 400 feet below ground. One hand washes the other... Several years ago we redid my septic leach field at the house using the Arch-Chamber system.
He did my water system at the recreational property/cabin.
This thread here, post # 47:
https://www.orangetractortalks.com/...bota-tractor-and-building-a-camp.39559/page-3
For his new building, he called in many favors, and did all the construction himself with friends.
He had a local engineer spec out the trusses.
A local lumber yard built the trusses and delivered them to the job site.
Each truss is slightly more than 650 pounds. Truss length is 46 feet, 40' span, 3' overhang on each end.
He rented the boom lift, and borrowed a supremely skilled operator. I don't remember the truss height.
He started with 25 tri-axle dump trucks of asphalt road millings, and filled in the area for the new building. Then rolling & vibratory tamping between layers of fill.
Approximately one million pounds of asphalt millings. (nearby mill & fill road work taking place)
Delivered by the town & county to the job site at zero cost to my neighbor as they needed a dump site.
Next was the concrete pad, zero rebar, high PSI rated concrete with long/cut fibers in the mix.
Eight bodies for the concrete work, excluding the concrete truck drivers.
IMG_20241029_162626354_HDR by
cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr
Then he and friends built/erected the walls and skinned them.
We brought about half of the trusses inside the building through the large center garage door
opening and lifted them up into place. Five/six bodies for the truss install job.
After about half of the trusses were installed, we no longer had the truss length clearance
for lifting them into place from inside the building.
IMG_20241207_124043799_HDR by
cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr
Then we started hoisting trusses and doing the install from the front of the building.
It is sketchy doing them in that manner, as we had to "hook" them so they balanced "level" and
were very cumbersome with the rotational ability for placing them not in play due to the hook point and anchored point (short/front leg of the truss against the forks lower support platform for stability.
In this hoisting manner, the trusses are not hanging freely from the strap.
Finally, the two very most left trusses were hoisted from the extreme left side of the new building.
They had to be hoisted up and over existing buildings (sheds) and was very time consuming due to obstacles. But we did get all the trusses hoisted and installed without anything being damaged or any injuries.
IMG_20241208_152150093_HDR by
cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr
Last week I stopped over for a visit, the building is materially complete.
The metal roof is on now, it's insulated, skinned inside and out including the ceiling, the garage doors and garage door openers are in, some rudimentary electrical system/breaker box/some receptacles in boxes.
The best part, a monster sized wood stove was in the corner and operating.
The building is ~ 16' to the ceiling, and will have a 13,500 pound asymmetrical vehicle hoist installed at some time in the future.
My buddy runs Ford F 450 4 x 4 trucks with work boxes on the back for his business. A pair.
He, and I have figured out that good mechanical work/vehicle/machinery repairs is somewhat hard to find. The vehicle hoist will allow him to do most mechanical work himself.
I did ask him what he had invested in the new building, the answer was $46k. (USA)
Winter is his slow business time, so he had time for the new building job during the "off season" but
I can tell you, it certainly was not very much fun due to the cold/snow/ice.
For hoisting trusses, a boom lift and skilled operator will make the job much easier and safer.
I plan on starting out with a 40'x50' barn with the option to add on 10ft at a time. This is purely a structure to keep equipment out of the sun, rain and snow. Snow load up here is based on the 100 year worst case scenario, and the angle, material, insulation, shop heat etc., all factors in.
