As soon as I was done tending to sick kitties, doing my morning rounds and grabbing a quick breakfast (a piece of pie my daughter made using that winter squash we had to harvest early – breakfast of champions!), it was back to work on the isolation shelter.
The horizontal piece that will be supporting the second level floor needed to have its other side painted, plus I needed to cut the horizontal pieces and paint them, too.
Well, I didn’t quite get to start on that right away. I had to clean up a cat mess, first!
Among the things I brought to the garage, just in case I might need them, was a container full of odds and ends that the cats had knocked onto the floor over the winter. When the girls tried to clean it up in the spring, they didn’t have the chance to try and sort through everything. When I brought it to the garage, I dug out the cardboard base that had been under the wood chipper when we unboxed it – a large, flat surface with sides on it that I could use as a tray. I dumped it all into there and took a look, then set the whole thing on top of the stack of scavenged lumber I’d brought over.
Of course, I had to move it while digging for pieces I could use, and set it on top of the lath bundles above.
Then forgot it there.
Some time during the night, some critter – likely a cat – knocked it upside down.
I immediately had a new game to play.
“Find all the nails before my tires do”.
Since I was picking them up anyhow, I brought over a bunch of repurposed sour candy containers (my husband had bought a case of them) I had intended to use for seed and sorted them as best I could. Some odd things ended up back in the cardboard “tray”, some of the screws were the same as what I was using on the isolation shelter build but, mostly, it was finishing nails of various sizes – some ridiculously tiny. I ended up filling three containers of those!
Getting them out of the dirt floor was the worst. Eventually, though, I was able to grab handfuls and just lay them on my work table. Once everything was clear of the lumber, it was much easier on the back to go through the last of them on the table!
I think it took me at least an hour, just to clean up all those nails. When I’m done building the shelter and cleaning up so we can park the truck in the garage again, I’m going to have to make sure to rake the dirt floor towards the walls, and triple check to make sure nothing got missed. The last thing we need is for a nail or screw in one of our tires!
That done, I could finally access the lumber I needed! Specifically, the two pieces of standard size 2x4s.
Unfortunately, both pieces were so dirty, I had to bring the hose over and actually scrub them clean. One of them looked like it was covered with ashes.
I first measured around the bottom half of the shelter, where the verticals will go. Those were all about 18″. I say “about”, because one side is, for some reason, slightly different, and I had to cut one piece about an eighth of an inch longer. Then the top half got measured. It was the same thing; I needed 22″ pieces, except for one, that needed to be just a tiny bit longer.
I was able to cut all the 18″ lengths, but after cutting three 22″ length, I ran out of 2×4 The remaining piece left over was way too short. I did have one piece of true-to-size 2×4 left that I could have cut a 22″ piece out of, but I didn’t want there to be a single piece with different dimensions.
So I went hunting in the barn.
I didn’t find any scrap 2×4’s, but I did find a pair of large baking trays, like the one we found in the basement and are now using under the water bowl shelter for kibble. I figured we might find a use for them, so I brought them out. Then I checked the shed near the barn. Happily, I found a single piece of 2×4 long enough that I could cut a final 22″ length. It needed to be scrubbed clean, too.
Once all the pieces were cut, I set them outside to dry in the sun.
Since painting them was out of the question until they were fully dry, I decided to drag out the leftover boards from when we build the raised bed frame covers, and start cutting floor pieces. For some reason, I had it in my mind that they were 1×6’s, but they were 1×4’s. They’ve been stored against a wall in the side of the garage my mother’s car is parked in. Normally, that would have been fine, but we’ve had such wet weather, the dirt floor got damp, even that far into the garage, so they needed to be brushed clean, too.
At least they weren’t as bad as the 2x4s I had to scrub with water!
I thought I would have to rotate my work table to fit the 12′ lengths, but it turned out I didn’t have to. I was able to move the miter saw to the far end of the table, which gave me just enough space to fit a board. Most of the floor pieces for the back of the shelter needed to be 4′ long. Once the first cut was made, space was no longer an issue.
With the first board I used, though, there was too much damage in one area, so one of the 4′ lengths couldn’t be used. I might still be able to use part of it, though, for something else.
One board needed to be cut shorter, as it will go between the frame pieces. With these being standard 1x4s, while the frame is true-to-size 2x4s, that one board has a bit of wiggle room. I set the others where they will go in the shelter, and found they were about 2″ short of the centre line.
I then had a decision to make. I could leave it as is, and have a slightly larger opening for a cat to access the second level, or I could cut another piece and have a smaller opening.
Then I remembered, I has some old 1×3 boards we found in a shed some years ago. Was one of those long enough to cut 4′ off of it?
Why yes. Yes it was!
So now the floor will extend just an inch past the centre mark.
Once those were all cut, I painted them, along with the second half of the 2×4 that will run across the centre, to support the floor boards. The floor boards only need to have their tops and ends painted, except for the two boards that will be at the ends, which needed to have one of their edges painted, too.
At that point, since the verticals were still drying, I was pretty much done for the day – but I was then left with a conundrum.
I was expecting to use triangle blocks to attach the vertical pieces, but I would need 32 of those. I had a few from earlier cuts I’d set aside, and cut as many as I could out of some of the other scrap ends I had left. I ended up with 16 triangle blocks in the true-to-size 2×4 scraps, and only 4 in the regular 2×4 scraps. The vertical pieces are all regular 2×4, so if I used those 16 pieces, they’d all be wider than the pieces I was using them to join.
Plus, I’d have to cut gaps in floor board pieces to fit around the verticals. If I were to use the triangle blocks, I’d have to cut much larger gaps, and I am not about to try and go all journeyman on things, to cut them to fit over the angles on the blocks.
There was an alternative, though.
Inside I went, did some searching, then made a call to the local hardware store, for a pocket hole jig.
Then had one small kit in stock! Plus, it was only about $20, so quite affordable.
I asked them to set it aside for me, then headed into town.
Once I had the kit, I just had to use it right away!
I did a few test drills on some scrap wood, then drilled pocket holes on all the vertical pieces. They’ll be joined from the narrow sides.
Tomorrow, they’ll be painted, including inside the pocket holes.
That done, I checked on the boards painted earlier. They were pretty much dry!
So I set the horizontal piece that will support the floor in place at the centre marks. Unfortunately, it turned out to have just the slightest twist to the board, but not enough for it to be a problem. It’s still a nice, tight fit, so I didn’t need to add wood glue, or even anything to hold it until I could screw it in place.
I then laid the floor boards on top. They won’t be permanently attached for a while yet, but I’ll be able to measure things and see how many boards will be needed to cover one side of the remaining space.
While working on all this, I decided to make some major changes to the inside of the shelter.
My original plan was to have an insulated shelter box, with an access door, on one side of the back half, while the other side, with an access door, would have a litter box. The front would be open screen, except for the front door, which would swing down to form a ramp when open.
Then I decided to make a separate insulated box that can be taken in and out of the shelter for cleaning. That way, it could be smaller and more cozy.
The top half was going to be open, with spaces for cat beds, food and water bowls and whatever. It would also have an access door to reach the food and water bowls.
Altogether, that would have made for three access doors on the bottom level, and one for the top level.
As I was setting the floor boards and seeing how things fit, it occurred to me.
There’s really no specific reason to have the shelter box on the bottom, other than I happened to draw it that way.
Building all this on the bottom level would be rather more difficult than on the top level.
Instead, the bottom level can be screened in on all sides, except for the door/ramp. The litter box can still be kept in the bottom level. Any spilled litter can just be swept through the gaps in the pallet base. If I want, I can still add a shelf or two between some of the vertical supports for a cat to lie on, but nothing that would need more than reaching with a brush to sweep off through the doorway.
The top level can have the solid back wall, plus an access panels on each side. One to take the shelter box in and out. We can even make two of them. One, an insulated winter one, and the other a more airy summer one. A second access panel would be to reach the food and water bowls. I’m still trying to work out how to make these as sliding doors, rather than swinging doors. I still don’t know what I have available to make the doors out of.
I wonder if we have some small pieces of half inch plywood hiding in one of the sheds somewhere? I’ve gone through them so often, looking for specific things, I would not necessarily have noticed other things.
All that, and I’m still not 100% decided on how to do the roof of this. Ideally, it would be hinged for access, too.
That can wait, though. Gotta do the interior stuff, first!
In the end, I had to force myself to stop and leave painting the verticals for tomorrow. I’d been out there for most of the day and was getting really tired and hungry, but I wanted to keep on going! I want to get this thing ready as quickly as possible.
Oh, that reminds me. While at the hardware store, I looked at their supply of hardware cloth (welded wire mesh). They only had quarter inch size. I am looking for half inch. That will be the one thing we have no choice but to buy, as there is nothing suitable that we can scavenge here. I think I do have a small amount left in the sun room, but not enough for the entire shelter, that’s for sure. We probably won’t have a budget for until the end of the month. Still, that’s one of the last things that will need to be done, so that’s okay.
I’m rather pleased with today’s progress – and with my new “toy”!
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 