May 24th - I made a start on the
intermediate floor joists which continued the following day. It was a
long and slow process, cutting each piece to length, painting them and
screwing them in place.
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By the end of the 25th, all the
intermediate joists were fitted and painted. On the 26th, it started
raining, so rather than trying to work on the observatory, I decided to
jet-wash the algae off the shed, so it could be painted. What I expected
to be a couple of hours work, turned out to be six and a half hours
spraying. I painted the shed the next day.
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The trailer was also moved to
its new home on the 27th. At some point, I'll be building a lean-to
trailerport over the top to keep the worst of the weather off it.
On May 28th, I began to box
in the plinth of the observatory. I started at the top and worked down,
with the lower planks needing trimming to match the fall of the ground.
I got the front and most of the right end covered in by early evening. I
also painted the remaining planks in shed paint on the outside and
bitumen on the inside.
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On the 29th, I continued planking, getting the rear and left side
completed. While there was less to do, it took longer due to a number of
breaks due to passing rain showers. The 30th saw the planking completed,
with the right end finished after a bit of earth works.
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In addition to the plinth, I edged the concrete next to the shed to hide
the shuttering for the concrete. The builders assembled it with the
screws on the concrete side, so once poured, I couldn't get to the
screws to dismantle it. Covering it over gave a nice edge and it will be
back filled with slates around the vegetable planter. Where the concrete
ramp extends down onto the lawn, the edge was also covered in. It was
another day interrupted by rain showers. By mid afternoon, I got several
of the floor panels out to mark out the pier locations so the holes
could be cut. Everything was packed away fairly quickly as the storm
clouds were gathering once again.
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May 31st - The holes for the piers were finally cut. The deep sky pier
fell completely within one floor panel. The other pier was across the
joint between four panels. I also cut two small inspection hatches in
the floor at the front, so that in the future, I can spray weed killer
under the floor should anything start growing under there.
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