After two weeks of rain delays and out of town work, your humble correspondent returns to the scene of the crime-in-progress. As you can see from this photo taken from the top of the wall, the summer sun is already dropping the water level in the ol' moat, meaning we've got to get this roof finished up before it *really* gets hot. Fortunately, we've still got just enough water for the sharks, gators and lawyers to swim in...
While we're snapping pictures of drying water, take a look over here to your right and you'll see a section of the roof. Note the changing roof pitch to funnel water through the drain blocks (you can see the edge of one along the parapet wall). The roof design employs multiple drainage points using a fairly low pitch to work with the house architecture.
Now that we're back in the proverbial saddle again, today's task list includes pouring a bond beam. The top course of blocks in our West-facing wall (the direction our weather comes from) contains a U-shaped channel. Rebar is set inside and concrete is poured into the channel to form a continuous, reinforced concrete beam all along the top of this wall. The weight of the bond beam provides reinforcement against wind loading in the middle of the wall, as well as a place to tie the roof joists down.
Shaken but never stirred in our bond beam construction (yes, that was a pun with a license to kill), we will eventually continue construction of the bond beam on the other side of the barrel vault. The vertical columns of reinforced concrete in the walls tie in to this bond beam and provide superior structural integrity. Safe from everything but global warming and the IRS is a benefit of dry stack block and ferrocement construction.
As we pour the concrete for the bond beam, we space our trusty J-bolts 16" apart. Eventually, we will tie the roof joists to these. We conclude with the thought that one more week of progress without disaster is a small victory for gracefully aging but fiscally-challenged DIY homebuilders everywhere. Peace, y'all.
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Next week's installment: Workin' My Way Back To You Click HERE

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