Between the Gauntlets

As we've reached each benchmark, we've had to run a hurried gauntlet of tasks to get ready for the contractors. The spray foam guys needed to have all the furring up on the exterior walls and any fire breaks in place. Because we are "part timers" we often would stop partway through a room and then start up again the next day or even several days later. As such, there were all kinds of missed or forgotten spots that needed 2x4's cut and tap-conned into place. Frankly, taking care of that nearly killed us, but we made it and foam got sprayed, as you've seen.

Then came the prep for the arrival dry wall. We still had some flooring issues that needed to be dealt with from the spray foam. We didn't screw down OSB in the living room so those guys could pull it up and spray the sill underneath. But we wanted our OSB down before the drywall went up and that means that we had to have it in before the drywall came. More rushing around with that, but it was more like a rest between gauntlets.

Then, the drywall came. On a BIG truck. I had to rush out (more rushing, of course) with a tall ladder and a saw to make room for the boom to get under a tree in the ally. Fortunately somebody took a blow torch to a metal post that was up back there a couple weeks ago.








It was a lot of gypsum board. 211 sheets, if memory serves. That's a lot of board, when you consider that much of it was 12' long and 54" wide.




Can you guess how many guys it takes to move that much drywall and distribute it on three floors in 5 rooms?




Let me give you a hint. The operator in this picture was inside the house.




































The answer is 2. Two guys. Just two guys.

My job was to keep them from breaking the board or themselves. Now, it was also my responsibility to make sure that I got what I ordered and to make sure that it got placed where it was needed. You DON'T want to have your drywallers moving sheetrock all over the place. Somehow, these two guys got the big wall boards where they needed to be and then stacked the 5/8" boards on top (ceilings go up first).

Then, and I don't know how I did this, but I glanced at the last two piles and saw that I didn't get enough of the 5/8" board. Like 20 sheets shy. It's scary how quickly you can learn to not only differentiate between similar building materials but also develop an eye for quantities. I quickly called the guys over and called the salesman who made sure we got the right material for the order the next day. This is good. It would have been a real hassle to force the drywallers to stop and wit for more ceiling board.

Next up, prepping for the drywallers and seeing them hang.