Builder ordered the wrong size logs for living room ceiling, guessing wrong. They are too large for the small area and way too heavy. He is ordering 7″ ones, or about that.
Logs in ceiling were supposed to look like www.santafekiva.com
Company will not take them back because they were a special order.
Builder suggested making planters off them. I suggested firewood.
Any other ideas out there?
Replies
Sounds like a for sale or trade routine. Now if you were in northeast ohio...
Edited 3/19/2004 5:48 pm ET by rez
A couple of swing sets?
Log cabin playhouse?
Tower for a really long cable ride.
The builder should be deciding what do with them, as it was his incorrect order. Also from your post it sounds like there is a question as to whether 7 in. is even right. Having lived in the SW I know these logs are not cheap and yes this is an expensive mistake. Hopefully the builder will find a spot for them at his house, after he credits your account.
MES
Thanks for the suggestions.
---"The builder should be deciding what do with them, as it was his incorrect order. Also from your post it sounds like there is a question as to whether 7 in. is even right. Having lived in the SW I know these logs are not cheap and yes this is an expensive mistake..."---
I too think that he should do something with those logs, somewhere else. We are copying the living room of the house I am living in now and all he had to do is to measure what is here or call and ask me to, not "guess".
I am more worried about the weight of those monster logs than the look, even if the one side they will butt against is only a bare 11" before the opening into the dining room/kitchen. I suggested cutting them in two lengthwise and putting them up in halves, but that would be hard to do here without a mill setting and may not look good anyway.
I don't think the framers were counting on that size log and when I questioned it he said that he too was thinking to add more framing for them "up there". I asked for smaller logs, that he is trying to get now.
They are very nice wood, pretty and straight. A shame. Can't think where else to use them at all. Don't want planter boxes because of the rattlers, will have a minimalist yard with little around and any features there will be the kind that you can see under easily. A swing set is a good idea, even if it would be a giant sized one. Those logs are monsters.
The builder and his subs are doing an excellent job but mistakes keep creeping in. Makes for a nervous HO.
They finished the sheetrock texturing today, is now ready for the painter/trim/cabinet men (whatever goes next).
Now, about some fine BIG logs that need a new job...
Had not read thru before previous post. Expensive??
My DF fir bigg'uns were the stuff I felled to clear a road in.
do you have one of those traditional 'gates' that you enter your property thu? - - stand 'em up, tie 'em together, lay one across the top, hang a set of longhorns from it, drive thru...."there's enough for everyone"
---"do you have one of those traditional 'gates' that you enter your property thu? - - stand 'em up, tie 'em together, lay one across the top, hang a set of longhorns from it, drive thru...."---
Yes, that would be a good way to use them.
All our cattleguards are pipe and no overheads because of the cattle and hay trucks, that are 14' high. We could stand them up to clear 15' or 16' and make an entrance out of 5 of them.
Good ideas!
You need something different - eclectic.
Maybe an east meets west type of grand entryway to the house.
You'll need a few more big logs.<G>
.
Edited 3/19/2004 11:55 pm ET by Ralph Wicklund
We would have to hire a chinese character expert for a pergola type entrance like that.
The posts we have are larger than those in the picture yet. They are too large for anything here, really, out of proportion.
I will insist that he take them back, even at my cost. No sense wasting such nice lumber around here. Surely someone else can use them properly.
Mostly I am dissappointed that the builder is trying to wiggle out of yet one more mistake. While admitting that he is doing 98% of the job very well, something I understand is better than the average of GC's around here can do, I lose trust in people when they don't do what is right all the time, not only when convenient. (Sigh!)
They are too large for anything here, really, out of proportion.
Got a lathe? <G>PAHS Designer/Builder- Bury it!
While reading through your post I was wondering about a "Ponderosa" kind of gateway too. What about the lay of the land? Do you need or care to do any terracing? If you've got rattlers, you might befriend some roadrunners;) One other thought would be to structure in a log gazebo or outbuilding in style with the house. If you have to eat these logs, you might as well use them. If all else fails, look in the phone book for a guy who does onsite cutting with a portable saw mill. Just some food for thought... Good luck.
The new logs must be arriving via truck.........put the old ones on the truck and send em back for credit?
Eric
The builder made a costly mistake.
The builder.
It is not your resposibility. Nor your financial obligation.
If you eat this guys major financial mistake, I will personally come out there and lash your hide with a wet noodle !! Understood ?
If I survive, I have survived.
But if I have enriched someone else's life, I have succeeded.
quittintime
ruby... i don't understand how a "mistake " like this was made... what did the plans call for ?... these things are not supposed to be "guessed " at..
beams are elementary components... who drew the plans ?Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Ruby,
I'm like my liberal brother Mike here, wondering where the plans were when he was guessing what to order. The cost should be his to eat.
But if I owned some logs like that, I would either keep them under wraps until time I could resell, or I might think about using them to landscape, like the entry frame mentioned, or raised curbs along the drive and parking. Raising them would eliminate the rattler shelters, make mowing easy and they would keep folks from driving into the ditch, field, or lawn in the muddy season (both days of it)
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
So many good ideas out there. Thank you so much!
On the roadrunners for rattlers, we do have them too and they catch them when they can, but mostly they get up on the cars and run around admiring themselves on the windshield.;-)
Well, the builder told me today that he is waiting to hear more from the store Monday and we will go from there. He sounded like he thought it over and decided to take care of things on his end.
If we had to use the heavy things, he said that he would have reinforced the bracing the framers put up on the ceiling and maybe even have the walls blocked to support them. I think that he would have to cut the sheetrock, that has been finished already with texture, to do that.
Most everything around this site is pipe, so logs would look out of place. It is flat, so no terraces around. If the logs were not so very big, some kind of yard entrance, maybe framing the 12' gate with the same 4/12 pitch of the house, with the sides made of several of them of different diminishing heights, could have used some of that lumber, but they really are too large to match anything around there. I would have to treat them or protect them somehow from our voracious termites if I did that. Still thinking about it. All those ideas you gave me are stewing around in my head...
Placing them low would be better, but they are too large even for a horse hitching rack by the tackroom.
I looked thru the extensive contract and the logs were not mentioned. Odd, since most everything in the house is detailed to the nth degree, it seems. I guess that the builder and I knew about them but forgot to mention them in our notes to the attorney that prepared them.
Funny how a little thing like a visual enhancement detail, non structural, takes more time and worry than all the important stuff, is it.
I thought that we were about done with most of the building but little stuff and now this little problem happens.
Thank you to all for the help.
P.S. I still can't get any attachments to go thru, keeps timing me out. GRRR.
For scale reference, the attachment is the quickest pix I had in the file on the beams in the front room, all are over 12" min dia, 16 ft long - semi-divided room 23ft. by 30 ft., but the ceilings are 10-1/2 feet.
The price on these was 'free', felled then when I put the road in and cleared for the house. Cost was own labor stripping, put them up wet with 2 big A-frames and chain hoists.
Yours look great there, with the higher ceilings and the fireplace with big stones in a room with many wood accents.
That makes for good proportions.
Now imagine a smaller white stucco kiva fireplace, ceilings only 9', a span of 19' for the logs, on regular framing (they were going to hang them from blocking six to eight pieces of 2" by 4" in 16", between 2" by 6" ceiling framing, on a sheetrocked white ceiling and walls. I questioned them about it then, as even in the 7' to 8' logs we have now, they appear to be heavy.
Even with a light to medium stain, those 10" logs would be too heavy looking up there, I think, plus they WOULD be way too heavy, needing considerably more extra framing to support them. Two men can't hardly roll them around, much less lift them, when they were delivered.
I asked why they didn't put them up while they were framing, but was told the trim carpenters do that, not the framers. It seemed easier to me to hang them while there was room to move any big logs in there and with only six, sheetrocking etc. around them may have been easier than trying to shoehorn them in there later. Then, what do I know...
I am sure that they will get it done and done right, anyway.
I am thinking that maybe I can use those logs, if I have to keep them, standing up, set at irregular lengths, on both sides of one corner of the yard and on both sides of the gate and treat the bottoms, maybe putting some termite treatment in the bottom of the trench, wrap them in felt paper and cement them in.
The yard fence will have to be 6' to keep skunks, coons, cattle, assorted critters etc. away from it and any dogs/cats in (free roaming dogs and cats don't have a long life span around here, make good wildlife breakfast) so that will let the very big logs look a little more in proportion than a little fence would have.
simple..get cha REALLY big lathe..or a big drawknife..and whittle em down..2 weeks. <G>
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Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Repairs, Remodeling, Restorations.
c'mon people... get with the program... ruby is looking for "vigas"
as in SouthWEstern architectural style....
http://www.nmtimber.com/photo_gallery.htm
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Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Edited 3/21/2004 9:17 am ET by Mike Smith
Vigas. Exactly, but non structural in this house, just for the SW look, along with the kiva fireplace.
The ones in the house I am now are structural and stuck out the wall about one foot onto the stucco outside wall. That foot has rotted out since and the holes stuccoed over, but in the house they are sound and pretty, if you like that look.
And they average 7" (yeah, I am hardheaded).;-)
I think that the builder will have them take these back. There is good demand for them around here, for what I see. Many used in porches, especially added on ones.
Thanks for that interesting link!
Trebuchet.
LMAO!!! Who needs discount airline tickets with one of those in the back yard?
Report on the infamous big logs.
The builder came, looked and agreed that they were way too big, said that he had found another builder that could use them, so they should be gone soon.
He has others on order to be here in a few days.
<G> <G> <G>
Thanks to all!
I misunderstood originally, thought your beams were also structural, but are 'hung' per your description. Keep'em small then - you don't get Earthquakes in Az do you?
10 " vs 7"??? scale???
7" is awful puny. Why not keep the 10 "??
Own house has some 26" dia round beams, wish I'da used more bigg'un like that.
---"7" is awful puny. Why not keep the 10 "??"---
Debating hard if to keep the 10", that are from 9" to 12" in places. The ones in the house now are from 6" to 8" and look good in there, to me at least since I have lived here 32 years.
It is a small living room for such big logs, 19" by 25" with 9' ceilings. They really are a little too large for there and way heavy. Two men could not even move one. If necessary, we could make it work, I guess.
split & treat bottoms for deck steps -
Split and finish as fireplace mantle, I'd use one now if you were in SE Mass. They work well with large fieldstone fireplaces
There is a place in Glendale AZ that specializes in hand peeled logs called Idaho Forest products. (?) Look them up and see if they will trade or buy your logs. They could have been your contractors supplier. Also have you given any thought to using 6" 1/2 rounds bolted to ceiling joists and supported on either end by the top plated of the wall. Much the same look but less weight and cost.