Concrete counter…sill?

10/1/19

(Above: An image of the freshly placed window sill. I took some ‘chiselling’ along the postern edges to make it fit… a cringe-evoking yet successful endeavor.)

Building Summary: This morning’s container house activities consisted of two primary tasks: creating a concrete window sill and framing the remainder of Jacobhouse’s front interior with PVC board. I will begin with the former task:

To create a concrete window sill, I had to start by making a form (32″ x 8″ x 1.75″). This included finding the lumber, cutting it, and fastening it all together. After that, I located some bag plastic, cut a  2′ by 4′ swathe, and laid it over the form. Next, I mixed up the concrete from the half-bag that remained of the utility-hole seal, and simply poured it onto the plastic. I then proceeded to reach into the form and ensure that the plastic was pressed all the way into the corners*. After that, I simply watered the concrete and did not bother it for an hour**.

During that hour, I fetched a 3.5″ PVC trim board and the various supplies required for cutting it. I proceeded to ‘rip’ that trim board in half along its entire span and then was able to cut the resultant 1.75″ wide trim pieces to the appropriate lengths before fastening all three of them into their respective locations within Jacobhouse (below the sill, below the kitchen light switches, and to the left of the electrical panel box).

The morning was concluded after I pulled the sill from its form, dried it off, and set it in place (more in TIL).

(7:54 PM Update): It was another easy farm afternoon for me today, so I put together the stainless steel kitchen table Padre found for me a while back. It was an easy process, and the table looks like it will work very well. I originally thought that the wheels may pose a slight problem of instability (rolling around), but when locked, the table doesn’t budge an inch. Impressive!

 TIL: I stated above that the morning was concluded after I set the concrete windowsill in place, but the task was actually something more than it sounds. The first time I attempted the set the slab in its intended location, I found that it was a hair too large. This is due to concrete being prone to pushing the frame-form to its limits (i.e. weight sometimes makes even the most properly-measured forms bulge outward ever so slightly). So, lesson #1 for today was to make the concrete form slightly smaller than the intended location.

The second lesson I learned came when I rectified the error. To do this, I used the claw end of a hammer (much as I had seen performed in a video on Youtube) and chipped away at the south edge of the mini-slab. It was surprisingly durable. I thought for sure I was going to crack the entire sill with some of my more forceful blows, but sometimes those forceful blows did not even chip away any of the concrete! It really was incredible, considering that the concrete had only been poured an hour previously.

Commentary: There are two primary highlights for today, both of which have something to do with my little concrete project. The first was already described in the paragraph just about this one. The freshly-fabricated sill really was remarkably strong, and there were indeed a few points – especially as I pounded it into place with a rubber mallet – that I falsely believed it was going to break to pieces.

The second highlight is the simple fact that I was able to form, pour, modify, and place that sill in a single morning. There was no way I would have been able to do that a year ago, let alone even a few months ago. Some days I’m just struck by how much my building skills have improved, and needless to say, this was one of those days.

Final Note: Tomorrow I actually don’t know what I will do. I got quite a lot done today, and to add to that, I discovered that the brown door will not work as a sliding barn door for in front of the spice-cupboard (it is about 5-6″ too wide and ~ 1′ too short). Perhaps I will work on planning another door for that area… that, and putting together a list of living supplies***.

* I don’t think this step would be needed for larger projects, because the concrete would push the plastic into the corners. Today’s project, however, was so small that it did not bear enough weight to do so.

** Not entirely true.

*** Madre gave me a checklist that is frighteningly in-depth, but I believe it will help me out quite a lot in knowing whether or not my own list is missing anything.