Oculus Spirit [81607]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 47091
Joined: 3/18/07
|
Welcome to da UP, eh!
Jun 6, 2014, 11:26 AM
|
| View Original Thread |
|
As many of y'all may have noticed whether because you genuinely missed me or because of the sudden lack of [1]'s everywhere, but I've been absent from the Tigernets.
I was making our annual trip to the UP of Michigan. Went up earlier than normal this year because we were also burying wifekrzy's grandfather. Grandfather passed away over Christmas, but you have to wait this long for the ground to thaw to bury someone up in the UP.
Timeline...
Drove the 18 hour drive leaving Saturday (24th..happy belated birthday Jimbeam, you old fart) around 3ish. I drove the first leg until about 3 in the morning, we were somewhere in Michigan on I-75. Wifekrzy took over for about 3 hours of driving. I then woke up enough to continue the drive.
This picture was after the first 18 hour drive back, the bugs were horribad, and worse coming home, imagine about 4 times the amount of bugs on this was the end of the trip, forgot to take a picture before I started scrubbing with a window washing device from a gas station
If y'all remember, there is an old cabin on the lake that wifekrzy's grandfather & great-grandfather built from scratch. This old cabin is where wifekrzy's family always did their summer trips, it has no running water, no power except for a generator that they run for a couple hours at night only if necessary, and is very nice. The new cabin we're building is on a 40-acre plot next to the old cabin, still on the lake, you can see the old cabin's dock from the new cabin's point.
Lake Superior...Cole's like a honey badger, he don't care about the cold
Cole posing for the camera
Drove all the way back to Marquette. So for the rest of Sunday and for first half of Monday, we stayed in Marquette and hung out with family. Cole had to stay with wifekrzy's brother for the night. Wifekrzy's brother & his g/f have an 18 month old, so both aunts got to hang out with their niece. It was a good time. Monday night we drove out to the cabin and had a cookout with most of the family that was in town for the burial. Had a solid night with family...then drove back to Marquette. This time we left Cole at the cabin with FIL & g/f, apparently he did great.
Tuesday was the burial, the girls were happy we were in Marquette and had a running shower and power for them to get ready. The ceremony was very good minus the gnats, which were EVERYFUCKINGWHERE. Grandfather was Lt. Col USMC (ret) and the local group of Veterans were there for the flag, gun salute, & taps, which was very emotional.
Burial about to start, Veteran group in background, concrete you see is the casing the casket goes inside
After the burial, we all had a luncheon with all the family. Was a long day, FIL drove g/f and SIL to the airport and they flew home. Wifekrzy and I drove back to the cabin and hung out with Cole for the afternoon.
FINALLY! We get to stay out at camp and work on the new cabin. We have three days to crank out as much work as possible. FIL didn't get very far with the electrical after I had left it last year, he only installed a couple switches and put in a few exterior light fixtures and that was it. So I had three days to finish all the wiring devices, and wire up the knee wall whenever it got install (you'll see a picture, on the loft).
So we worked three long days. By we, I mean me and FIL, wifekrzy wasn't too much help on the construction side beyond a go-getter. Love her to death, but I need to teach her how to drill a screw (*snicker*). She was helpful in constructing the knee wall so I didn't have to help FIL on that and could continue wiring.
Wednesday: 13 hour day
Thursday: 12 hour day
Friday: 15 hour day
Saturday morning had a slow morning, slept in, cooked up eggs, bacon, and pancakes, then got on the road around 11:00. Drove through the night again and made it home Sunday around 7am.
TL;DR: Look below at pictures...
Panned to the right a little bit of the cabin (it's left of the image), there's the pole barn/garage & propane tank
6kW propane generator in corner of pole barn
Battery bank that powers the house & inverter
Top left black box is generator starter, white box is inverter and charger, right black box is solar dc to dc converter (takes ~80V from solar output and converts to ~54V which is a charging voltage of the 48V battery bank
Northwest corner of the cabin
Outdoor receptacle, inspector required us to put it in per code...
LED motion flood
Northeast corner of the cabin
LED porch light above porch entrance
On porch looking south
On porch looking into cabin
Just stepped in, standing where dining room will be looking at kitchen then bedrooms in the in the back with a laundry room where the back of the power panel is
Panned more right, outlet in floor is where wood stove will go that has an electrical fan to blow heat, scaffolding is where the living room will be
Picture in bedroom of electrical panel, blue quadplex box was a spare breaker energized so we could use the inverter system to power construction
Standing at bathroom door looking in
Standing in middle of dining & living room looking up at loft, black box in top right is chimney stack
Standing in living room looking towards loft/bathroom, that is going to be a stair landing and FIL wants to put some unique artwork there special to the cabin
On the loft, can see the electrical junction boxes required to make wiring a cabin work since you can't go from device to device, will be enclosed in the knee wall
Panned right now looking north
Panned more right looking north and showing other side of loft
Turned around looking south from the loft
Looking down to where living room will be
Headed down into the crawl space
White box is the hot water heater and the blue tank is the booster tank to keep pressure in the house, the hose going into the floor is water from the well pump and power to the well pump
View in between floor joists, some electrical boxes in view along with the service from the inverter going up into the panel
Another view from the crawl space oriented standing in the bedroom where the panel is and looking towards kitchen and dining room. I totally wish I had the lighting installed first and energized while working, with the light it was completely visible and easy to work...
Standing on deck looking southeast, ramp down to where we'll have a dock slightly visible
Panning left, looking south now and have a view of the island on the lake
Panning more left, looking southwestish, can barely see the old cabin's dock immediately left of the second tree trunk
Panning even more left, looking mostly south now, old cabin dock is between the right two tree trunks in the distance
South face of the cabin
Recessed exterior outlet in a log wall, turned out very well and is well sealed from weather
Southwest of the cabin
Panned to the right a little
So it was 10:10 at night on Friday night whenever wifekrzy took this pic (got fully dark up there around 10:30. But we finally had everything finished and turned on all the lights and called wifekrzy to take a picture from the old dock looking at the cabin...
New cabin all lit up
Wifekrzy zoomed in digitally on her iphone...lol
Looks pretty awesome, anyone staying at the old cabin gonna be jelly
And this is the total damage of the driving. If you recalled in the text above, there were a whole bunch of bouncing back and forth from Marquette and the cabin which added to it...but lotta driving for a week's time...
Holy driving batman
Way too fucking long, didn't fucking read: Just shut up and give me a point then...
|
|
50
