Hatch Door SUN
Sunday, September 3rd, 2023 02:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Welcome to Queen of Clubs week... 12th week of summer, and it's goddam 90 outside this afternoon. Thankfully it's not very humid [knocks wood]... the app says it feels like 90, meaning there's no heat index.
I'm working on the porch right now to get the hardware on the new door.
I've gotten the eye bolts tightened in, with teflon paste on both sides of the washers... which has been a bit messy.
But the bolts themselves are pretty long, so I was just attempting to shorten one with a hack saw and.... NOPE!.. instantly drenched in sweat! So I'm gonna try my dremel on them.
After that, will be the hinges and the handle, and then I have to create my two counterweights.
Despite the heat, it looks a bit fallish outside. The hackberry's been dropping enough leaves that the front lawn is crunchy, and I saw a few random leaves flying through the air out in back.
I also noticed yesterday, walking Yvette, that the sun is already setting noticeably earlier, and it's getting dark faster.
So... the Queen is gonna be kind of a bitch to us with the highs all week, but hopefully the King will be nicer.
So, here is HD2.0 tonight... Boat House blue, with it's victorian hinges & handle... and it's double eye bolts.
It took too much time out on the porch today, to get all this together... with it being 93F at the peak of the afternoon.
It was a slow process of measuring out hinge holes, and treating them with preservative... before tightening those nine hinge bolts in... with a nut driver on the underside, and a fat screwdriver up top.
The handle installation also took a lot of measuring.
I had to center it over the 1X4, and drill my bolt holes. But then I flipped the 1X4 over and countersunk into those holes for the underside washers and nuts... then had to treat all that with preservative.
Then I had to center the 1X4 over the edge of the door to drill holes through the door.
And then the 1X4 went underneath, and I bolted the handle through, to hold it in place.
Then I drove in some wood screws from the top to further stabilize the 1X4.
After all that I had to bust out the dremel to cut the excess of the eye bolts and the handle bolts.
Then I had to hit the wood screws up top with wood putty and paint over them, and around the eye bolts... and paint the 1X4.
There was a cigarette run in there... followed by a long walk with Yvette.
So getting this far, really consumed the whole afternoon and evening.
But, like yesterday, I powered through the heat to get as far as I could.
Eyebolt, as cut with the dremel and painted.
I had to wear a full face shield to cut these, because the sparks were flying straight at my face, and it took a good minute or two to get through this thick-ass, forged steel.
This is where the handle bolts through. I trimmed these bolts with the dremel as well.
You can't even see the washers under the shoulders of the eye bolts, because there's so much teflon paste blobbed on... which is now covered with paint.
It all feels like a pretty great barrier to rainwater, but a commenter on my TikTok asked why I didn't use gutter sealant, instead of TFE paste.
The answer is... I did not know gutter sealant existed!
More TFE for the hinge screws.
There was no issues on HD1.0 at the site of the hinges, so this probably wasn't necessary, but... it can't hurt.
I reused the bolts and nuts from HD1.0, but those are new washers underneath... which are a larger diameter than the originals... for what that's worth.
I never got around to the counterweights today, but there's still time to knock them out tomorrow.
However, getting this door bolted to the house, is the first priority.
I should be able to get the whole project done tomorrow, but if I don't, I at least want the hatch covered before another work week begins.
It will be over 90F tomorrow, so things will go slow.
But even if it's not 100% functional, by the end of the day, I'll still be glad that I forced myself to suffer the heat, and make as much progress as I could over this three day weekend.
I'm gonna have to take four full days off in October for the funeral/reunion... as confirmed last night on the sibling conference call.
And I don't have a ton of PTO, so to get those days off means it's gonna be five day work weeks from now until then... with the exception of Columbus Day, which is a paid holiday for me.
So, making the most of this three day weekend is critical.
The storm window project, which will follow immediately on the heels of this hatch door project... will be a little less intense.
I'll be working on those storms down in the basement... where all my stuff IS... so I won't have to be running back and forth, like I've been this weekend... bringing stuff up from the basement, and taking it back down again.
And I won't have to be suffering the heat or cold or whatever it's gonna be... out on the porch, or outside in the yard.
And... the storms also aren't gigantic, heavy sheets of plywood that need tons of special treatments.
But yeah... Dad's memorial/reunion will go from WED OCT 18, through MON OCT 23.
Still over a month away, but it's closing in fast!
I want those storms done and installed before it happens.
But God only knows if there will be time for other things I wanted done, like the breaker box update, or the cutting down of trees on the west fence line.
But that's all part of the fall adventure.
I'm sure it'll all work itself out one way or another... but I WILL be a lot happier once the goddam 90sF are a bad memory.
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