Fort Dedication

This Christmas morning, the boys each received a large golden nail as a memento to their hard work which were mounted to the underside of the fort platform. The fort is not complete, necessarily, but let's face it: once Christmas vacation is over, time to tinker will be scarce again..

And on the Fourth Day there was a Ladder!

All hands were on deck for the construction of this 60° pitch ladder. 18" rungs of 2x4s, stringers of 2x6s.

O Good Fortuna!

Deck complete! Boys helped in all ways they could:

With a solid, stable fort structure under us, we got started on the ladder. I got a little ambitious and am making a 60° ladder with 2x6 stringers and 2x4 rungs:

Who needs a pickup truck in Texas?

Planning to work on the ladder again in the morning. Miracle of miracles, the daily forecast threat of storms was sufficient to motivate me to spend just enough time on this construction but has always been pushed back. Tstorms "expected" tomorrow evening only.

Oh Fort Heaven's Sake!

So. After last night's debacle, I surveyed the damaged: both main lag screws were bent and would need to be replaced. On good advice, I also flipped the joists so I was boring new wood instead of trying to reuse the old one:

With great help from Dominic, instructional assistance from Jonas, and with critical help from Milo (the kind of help that can't be photographed because all our hands are busy and both our lives are on the line like Julia would never approve), this came out:

Ready to start flooring with decking, right? Right?? Well... Not without one more trip to the hardware store for an additional ledger to make up for my incorrect measurement:

Shown above: flush on one side, the plank doesn't quite reach the other :( so close...

By the way, all the forecast tstorms have been wrong! But tonight.. Expecting storms.. :D

Forty days and forty nights. New heights, new low.

Well ain't this just something of beauty!

My friend Eric (who has been advising and teaching me all along) came by today and helped me put together the frame you see there. My homework after he left was to run to the hardware store and bring back some more lag screws, add a couple braces, etc.

But.. I thought I'd juuuust add the one more joist hang first. Turns out the nails don't have much grip when nailed straight:

So tonight I returned in the dark to fix my flub but ended up far worse!

Expecting thinderstorms tomorrow. What a sad state in which to leave this humble project for a couple days :(

Fort - gathering materials

Our ten year old has taken a special interest in this project, and our first trip out to the hardware store was so focused, he didn't even ask to see the Christmas decorations there!

Fort Knocks: first nails and screws

Today we started in on lag screws for the ledger board, the part that attaches to the tree. And I lacked a deep enough bit to bore a hole to accommodate my lag screws... So short pause to visit hardware store again and return tomorrow to drill again!

I used some scrap wood to help align the ledger horizontally. The angle of the trunk behind it is so steep, I'll need to tuck in a big shim.

Kids' fort - Sketches and notes

Who ever knew building a fort would take several years? Well, that's how long I've been sitting on the idea. But, a few evenings out daydreaming in the backyard and a little time sketching and researching later, and I finally got the gumption to just do it!

Here are some preliminary sketches of the build site and platform. Shows my (lack of) ambition and confidence: I have put off any further planning (commitment to style of railing, trapdoor, ladder even, shelter..) to see how far I get with just the platform :)

The design is really basic:

There's the tree pictured: This live oak has got a fat trunk which splits off into 14" and a 12" diameter vertical limbs. This will hold one end of the fort platform via a 6 ft 2x12" ledger.

The platform will be made up the aforementioned ledger, three, 8 ft  2x6" joists, and another 2x12" piece at the far end.  The far end is held up by two 8 ft 4x4" vertical posts either sunk into the ground or resting atop a pair of cement pads I happen to have.  8 ft is overgenerous, because the slope of the terrain should bring that end only 5 ft off the ground, but I want to have some stubs up there to work with.

I've got a bunch of 6ft 5/8x6" deck boards to provide a very strong decking.

Once the platform is assembled, then I can see about adding access (probably a ladder), maybe a trapdoor, and definitely some form of railing.

Working in the winter time has advantages of cooler weather, longer work breaks, and no foliage with which to content.  Come Spring, we will have good covering around some parts making this structure a real hideaway for the boys!