The Subfloor Chronicles…Part the Last. FINALLY.

The subfloor is done, the subfloor is done!!!!  F   I   N   A   L   L   Y.  And just a shade under a decade.

The last two weeks I was finishing attaching the OSB to the trailer.  All the boards are laid down and glued in place (thanks to my awesome friends), but to finish, I needed to permanently attach the boards.  With metal screws.

The process of figuring out the right combination of screw size and drill bit size was all trial and error.  Sometimes extremely discouraging.  Last weekend wasn’t good.  The screws I had would do one of three things:  go all the way in and then just spin and smell like burning, freeze 1/4″ from “all the way” and refuse to move, or actually do what they’re created to do.  Please note, only 10 or so did that.  The rest were hell bent on testing my faith.

See?  Jerk.

Can’t remember if this one went in for real or if it just spun around and taunted me.  Probably the latter.

To illustrate, here is a list of the methods I went through to attach the OSB to the metal frame:

#10 Self tapping 1 1/4″ metal screws

9/64 Pilot hole with #10 self-tapping 1 1/4″ metal screw

5/32 pilot hole with #10 self-tapping 1 1/4″ metal screw

11/64 pilot hole with #10 self-tapping …blah blah blah

5/32 pilot hole with #10 hex head 1 1/2″ metal screw

11/64 pilot hole with #10 hex head 1 1/2″ metal screw and washer–WINNER!!!

All the methods I used before today caused this:

Broken drill bits (yes, they snapped in half), broken screw driver things, and that little nubbin you see in the picture?  That’s what happens to a drill bit after you’ve drilled 100 or so holes in 1/4″ steel plate…it wears down to almost nothing.  Apparently, it’s still good for drilling in wood though, so I’m saving it.

So this morning my job was to remove all the screws that were not all the way in.  They were completely stripped (of course) so my only option was to twist them out with a wrench thing….

…but that took f.o.r.e.v.e.r.

Then THIS!  Can you believe it?  The Logan Hammer worked like a champ!  A CHAMP I tell you.  All the haters of my “little” hammer, well…. HOW YOU LIKE IT NOW?!

**Side Note – Two weeks ago when my friends were helping me lay all the OSB in place, one friend asked if I had a hammer to which gave an enthusiastic YES and proceeded to hand him the aforementioned tool.  He looked at it, scrunched up his face and said, “Really?  Logan (his 3 year old son) has bigger hammers than this!”  And it stuck.  It will now be forever called the “Logan Hammer.”  In my defense, it still works (obviously…it pulled out all the bad screws!) and it doesn’t hurt my hands.  Also it was a super good deal.**

But I digress…

Then it was on to drilling more holes and countersinking the hex head screws.  Don’t let the big word fool you; I just learned what that meant last Sunday.  For all of you in the same boat as myself, “countersinking” means using a drill paddle thing to make a little indent in the wood.  The indent allows the screw to sit below the surface of the floor so it doesn’t get in the way and the floor is smooth.  Pretty handy!

It turned out my screwdriver wouldn’t get the screws in no matter how much I leaned on the thing.  So I had to tighten them down with a socket and ratchet.  Some of the screws still fought me; I think a good handful of them came apart in the ratchet…as in, the screw heads popped off.  *sigh*

For the ones that worked, I added washers for a little more umph…if you will.

I can’t believe this phase is finished!  I’m actually ready to start framing!  Once I finish watching the framing videos on Youtube 🙂

Bookcase = Retractable Spiral Staircase

It’s amazing to me how this little project has become a real life illustration of how hard it is for me to say those three little words:

“I need help.”

Well, here it is folks – HELP!

All my engineer-type friends who are handy and like powertools and figuring stuff out, I have a puzzle for you.  It involves the stairs up to one of the lofts.

Most everyone in Tiny House Land will go the route of “ladder” when it comes to loft access.  I appreciate the straightforwardness of it all, but I want to be creative!  I want to build that thing that makes you go, “What kind of wizardry is this?!”  with lots of “shock and awe” involved.

So I had an idea.  I want to somehow create a bookcase and drawers that opens up into a spiral staircase.

Is it possible?  I have NO idea.  That’s where you guys come in!  I need your expertise.  How can this be done?  Seeing as how I don’t own any fancy-dancy computer program that will draw for me, I had to break out the old pen and paper.

This is how I see it when fully retracted:

Then when I want to get up to the loft, the bottom drawer pivots 180 degrees and the rest cascade up from there:

Any ideas?  Aaaaaaaand GO!