Since we updated the blog site last time there has happend quite a lot. Now, I try to take some time for documenting the work steps and progresses we did.

1. The bearing construction for the metal roof is in place. Andrea and Kaj have done a great job on the roof to fit all the wooden parts in a way that an eventual leak will drain without harming the inner roof.
   
   
2. One side of the roof is already covered with the metal roof. We left one side of the roof uncovered to ease up for the chimney installation team. We expect the installation of the chimney for the open fire place in the near future.
   
   
3. We constructed a two step stairway in massive tree for the entrance. the lower stair is not yet in place and all the wooden parts just stick together due to their weight.
   
   
4. We even have installed all the power lines, but as we did not purchase any lamps or wallplugs yet, the power lines remain disconnected. Anyhow, we are happy to have them in place as this was a whole lot of job.
   

Thanks to all helping hands! It was great work and the house seems to take shape more and more. We already long for the moment that we consider it to be finished (if this ever happens with a house).

After some time resting from the heavy construction work we have continued with the building works. Especially the low temperatures around -20 degrees make the work unpossible and around the house we have a snow depth from ~1m.

You can already see that the door has been installed, an old fashioned dalecarlia style door of massive wood, also called Allmoge dörr  in Swedish language.

Inside the house, the floor construction is ready. We have choosen a massive 25 mm thick pine wood floor. It took us around a week to install the floor panels and fit them around the bearing construction. So the whole floor construction took almost 3 weeks. We have put a 20 cm insulation below the floor so we hopefully can stand the cold days inside the house in the future.

Now that the floor construction is ready we have put out some protection paper. Now, this enables us to put the machines inside the house and to start with the roof insulation and  roof panels. This is a lot of work over head and every evening we feel our arms and shoulders aching. But it is a good training for back and spine.

There is only one thirdth of the roof panel installation left, but the temperatures outside are already around -20 degrees again and the small gas stove does not warm as much as we have expected.

Anyhow, we will continue as much as we can and hope tto have the house construction ready until june. 

Windows and floor construction

Time seems to run and the first snow has fallen. Some other projects have come in between so we had to "park" the building project. (You can even check out our news section for more information).

Luckily the windows are in place and the springs covered with halfs of trees. Now we get a first impression about the future feeling we will have while spending our time in the house.

The floor construction has started and most of the bearings are in place. The progress is slow as the outside temperature has dropped below zero and working in the cold is not comfortable. Especially the precise alignment of the floor bearings forces us to take off the gloves

The roof has been installed

The latest work effort on the house was to attach the roof. We used 810 meter of wood weighing alltogether ~860 kg. The wooden roof construction is kept on the spot with alltogether more than 1700 nails. Now that the roof is put in place we can start with making it waterproof (sealing) and starting with the installation of the windows and finally the floor construction. Now the progress will be slower as some helping hands have left and other projects need attention, too. As you can see on the picture below, the temperature drops below 0 degrees at night and we need to defrost the roof for security reasons each morning and wait for it to dry completly. But the roof construction gives us the opportunity to store the construction material for the remaining building works under roof what eases up a lot. The construction of the floor will enhance additionally for the remaining construction works in the inside of the house. When roof and floor are in place, the house can be warmed up and building during winter time is not a matter any more.

Here you can see Bengt Arne defrosting the roof so it dries better. Due to the high elevation of Kvarnberg it is a little bit windy all the time what speeds up the drying process. 

The use of naturally grown materials gives a very special atmosphere in the "big room". Here you can see how the roof will look like in our conference house.

Roof bearing construction

The rainy days of the last week enabled a high degree of planning and lots of preparation works for the roof construction and finishing the wall construction. Due to many helping hands we have come ahead many steps:

The bearing wood parts need to be lifted up to the roof level of the house and the weakest parts of the wall have to be enforced.

Floor bearing construction is also done in tree:

The fittings for the long timber trees need to be shaped and levelled:

And finally all the bearings are in place:

Now the roof construction for holding the roof itself need to be fitted into the construction:

Soon we will start with the roof itself so we are prepared for winter.

But all in all our "big puzzle work" now starts to look like a real house: