Spray foam and subfloor

James and I masked off the plumbing:

Then we got suited up, and set up the spray foam, after eating a delicious lunch (not shown):

We didn't take any pictures while doing the spraying, because it was really complicated, but here we are, halfway done, moving the tanks:

You see, we had to spray a layer of foam in, and then quick, while it was soft, set the rigid foam on top, and then weight it down with a board, and if necessary, stand on it. We also had two boards that we were moving before each spray, to protect the tops of the joists from overspray. And I couldn't stop spraying for more than 30 seconds, or the foam in the nozzle would harden. It seemed like it was going to be really hard, and we rehearsed it to figure out how to do it. And we prayed about it. And, Praise God! it worked really well! We could see God at work, making possible a task that seemed too hard for us.

When the foam was done, we started on the decking.

 James and I cut and screwed down much of the decking today. It was hard to get all the screws in, but it worked out. We used battery drills, and a corded drill. The corded drill worked well to drill the self-drilling screw into the steel joists, but the battery impact driver finished them off better, with its incredible torque:

We glued down the subfloor to the joists. At the edges, we put sill seal, with glue on both sides. Here I am, putting down glue before placing a sheet:

Beth filled some left over gaps in the insulation, using Great Stuff:

 Using a scraper to clean off the excess, and put it where it was needed:

Then she sealed the decking with caulk. Hopefully this will help keep out the rain until we put on a roof.

It was a full day of foam and decking. Thank you James, for your help!

Insulating and decking the floor

We removed a sheet of flashing, and put in the plumbing, here we are getting the flashing back in place:

Here is most of the foam, sitting on the trailer after Dad cut it all to shape:

Here is Dad, cutting the foam:

Here Dad is fitting the foam into the trailer channels. This is the second layer of foam (or third, once the spray foam is in place. The first layer is the foil-faced foam under the trailer floor joists.

We are working on the flashing. You can see the drains we put in the floor. We needed more vertical room, so we are going to close in the area between the trailer tongue beams. But outside the tongue beams, we need the flashing at its original location. That's what I'm holding.

Getting the flashing in place:

Here is some cool sky, and people working:

There is a fire behind Jake's head. Or the sun has set the prairie on fire:

Cutting some flashing to make a place for the trailer wiring:

We worked late into the evening:

It was really good to have my Dad and Mom here, and they helped on the tiny house, too! And a shout-out to Jake: the plumbing is much better because you were here.

Belle Plaine Eco-Fest 2015

We went to the second annual Eco-Festival at the Bartlett Arboretum over the weekend. Kyle and Denae had brought their tiny house (nearly completed). They gave a talk--but we missed about half of the talk because I took a wrong turn and got stuck on the turnpike for an extra 13 miles on my way there.
It was good to see a tiny house--we got to spend more time walking around in it than we had spent in most of the tiny houses we saw at the Jamboree. Maybe a galley kitchen would work, and not feel too cramped. (it felt cramped at the Jamboree with all these people climbing in and out).
I also talked to some people who are planning to build--and also picked Kyle's brain about how he built it, and why he chose different options. One thing that he did was use spray foam over rigid board insulation, for a good, tight seal. It got me interested, so I looked it up when I got home.

There was also a folk music concert going on, and the PA system was bike powered. I helped pedal for the last 10 minutes (but this video is way shorter than that):

Foam-It Green was the insulation that Kyle used, and after looking it up, and looking at the options, I decided to at least put a layer in the floor. But to do the whole house looked prohibitively expensive. After a while I figured out that I was probably wrong on my estimates, and figured I'd call the company in the morning, and see if they could talk me into it.

On Monday, I called the foam company, and they were able to answer my questions: I would have to change the nozzle if I stopped spraying for 30 seconds. I could shut the system down after I did the floor, and then do the walls in a couple weeks or months. And I only needed two, large foam kits. They were about $700 each, shipped. So I ordered them. I'm having a work day Saturday, so I'm trying to get everything ready by then.

I have also ordered screws for the decking, and found that I could only get the 19/32" Advantech if I bought 45 sheets--so I will get the 8 sheets of 23/32" Advantech, of which they have plenty in stock.
I hope that the European drain and trap (a bottle trap) arrives in time. If not, I think I can construct something out of street Ells that should fit under the floor.

Leveling Trailer

This morning I went to work early, and stopped by the Surplus Store and bought a load of lumber for 25$. In the evening, I took it home and cut some of it up to make blocks to level the trailer with:

Well, Beth cut some of them, but since she was running the camera, most of the pictures are of Tobias. But here is one of her cranking the jack to get the trailer level:

We jacked up the trailer and put jack stands and blocks of wood under it in several places:

 We had to adjust it little bits to get it all level and flat. (but the back end of the trailer was bowed upward, and we couldn't make it go down, so we will relevel it after we have some weight on it.)

Checking the level across the trailer:

Since I can't get this picture to rotate, you can tip your screen on it's side:

Now our trailer is pretty level, and is nice and sturdy. It is sitting on hard supports every 8 feet or so.

Weights and Balances

We had a floor plan, but then I ran the numbers on the weight and balance--how much tongue weight our trailer would have. And they came up bad---almost no tongue weight. I found some errors in my calculations, but it wasn't enough: we moved almost everything we could, to the front. Still, barely any tongue weight.

We finally found our error--I was gathering the numbers to make a "free body diagram"---you draw a picture, and put all the forces on the picture, like so many fingers poking at a box, and they all have to balance. But, in gathering numbers, I found I had used the wrong distance for all the big things ---walls, ceiling, roof, floor. I had used the distance on my coffee-table-sized scale layout, instead of the actual full-sized numbers. Here is a picture of me replacing the bad numbers with the new numbers:

After I updated the numbers, we had more than enough tongue weight--but now we are using real numbers, so I can try and fix it by moving things around.