Part VII - Bringing the logs to the site

February, 2009

After disassembling the cabin, we got our caravan of two trailers and three pickups and headed out to the farm, eight miles away. We unloaded the logs right next to the site where the cabin is to be constructed.

The site of the cabin above. You can almost make out the orange marker flags I've got set down. The piled up dirt is roughly in the position where the log portion of the cabin will be placed. The two sand pits are for horseshoes, which will be displaced.

This is looking to the East, and the cabin will face to the North. A discriminating eye will notice that the cabin, when rebuilt, will be flip-flopped. The log section (Sec. 1) will be on the right, as you look at the cabin, and the board section (Sec. 2) will be on the left. This is a reverse of the way it was originally built. This is done for a number of reasons, primarily aesthetics. What this means is that certain liberties must be taken with the final floorplan. Essentially the left and right walls will be swapped out, so that the door remains to the inside of the cabin's dog run.




My logs, arranged in several piles at the construction site.

These are the "short logs." These were arranged around doors and windows, and are only notched on one side. In the middle, at the door or window, they simply hang in the air. The builders made hand-carved wooden pins, which were inserted into hand-cut holes on top and bottom of each log, to allow them to be joined to the logs around them and not move.

Above is a typical notch. These were done, of course, with axe and adz.

This is one of the hand-cut holes, likely bored out with some sort of hand drill. The pegs fit in them very snugly. All were in excellent shape, except one, which broke when removed.

Here is an example of a peg. This one is actually within a notch. This was done on the two top logs of the entire structure, as you can see on the previous post.

The original cabin was built on top of a series of large stones, some weighing about 200 lbs. This was a substitute for a foundation. I moved all of the original stones to my rebuild site Trust me, lifting a stone that big onto your truck by yourself is not fun. The smaller ones - 100-160 lbs. I could lift. The bigger ones, I had to improvise. I built several steps out of the lighter stones, and walked the heavy stones up that. Then I just picked up the lighter stones. And by lighter, I mean, I could still lift them, even though it was immensely painful.

These stones, however, were not moved to the rebuild site just for decoration, for the new foundation will incorporate them into it, allowing them to keep their important connection to the cabin. But more on that next time.

The view from my soon-to-be front porch, complete with our family home, oak trees and swimming pool: