Day 5

It was a great day with lots of progress but we had to deal with snow in the morning. Hard to climb on all that old soot with snow added to the mix. We did get down a couple of layers in the afternoon though.

here's the pictures
http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewforum.php?f=15&sid=cd164ac57813e8effc0b9322bc036b43

Day 6

Wow it's going fast now, hard to keep up with the numbering. The second set of rafters are all off the roof. One more set to go now. The crane is coming today and we will start taking all the beams off the third floor ceiling. It's getting very crowded up there. 15 students from LA arrived and put in a great day yesterday. Huge help cleaning up the site and moving lots of material. Big help, they slept well. The eves are coming apart and we'll get into the cantalever system today.

http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/...0680dd2f9e1ffa7

onward

Hap

Day 7

Another huge day at the site. Our kids from Lawrence Academy put in there second day and were a great help. We'll see them for one more day on Saturday. The NHK and Fukushima TV stations were on site all morning so we'll make the news tonight. Oh how I love the crane. Thinks move fast with a crane on site. We made it down to the Box today.

http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/...2804bb827936a68

Days 8-9

Couldn't log in last night for some reason. We got all the tie beams off the box yesterday and now were're into the ones that run the length of the building with scarf joints. One very cool miter came apart yesterday

Here's the pictures
http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewforum.php?f=15&sid=7349568d1169319083e5441c2eb4f1d5

Day 10

Well it took me awile to get these reduced and to unwind from our busy week. Our progress is amazing. The big news today is that Monma found an oil painting of the original builder, his great, great uncle Monma. Wow Provenance

Takishita-san came and gave a good-by ceremony for the Konno family, Lawrence Academy and the local villigers. Great stuff. People traveled from many places to attend.

[url=ttp://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1261&start=15&sid=f745aaa42abdc971c1f86410b7bdb6d9][url=ttp://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1261&start=15&sid=f745aaa42abdc971c1f86410b7bdb6d9][url=ttp://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1261&start=15&sid=f745aaa42abdc971c1f86410b7bdb6d9]ttp://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1261&start=15&sid=f745aaa42abdc971c1f86410b7bdb6d9[/url][/url][/url]
Hap

Day 11

Another tough one. We didn't use the crane today. We finished breaking all the walls out of the first and second floors, carefully removed the "TOKONOMA" (art alcove) and moved a mountain of trash. I have posted a picture of an "end grain cover up" that came out of the tokonoma. I'm sure I will be using this picture for years to come. It perfectly demonstrates the Japanese intent to hide joinery. Note that the piece is also buried in the wall!

I also put up a picture of Takahashi daiku. He has been on site with us from the beginning and works so quietly you wouldn't know he was there. He has recently passed the first level carpenter's exam. This is a really hard thing to. Maybe Chris Hall could comment here?

Here's the pics
http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/...1a42062a64#7418

Day 12

We are down to the last 6 rooms now. Look closely at the Unseen joinery picture. How did someone think of that? We're all getting a little tired

Here's the pics

http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/...0e2ff071a178a5c

Hap

Hap:

No one is responding to your posts, but rest assured, people are reading and looking at the pics. Thanks for blogging it. CB.

Dismantled, We did it!!

Here's the pics from the last post day.

The big news is the discovery of a piece with a dated back. We've had a running discussion on site about the real age of the building. We know there was a major construction in Meiji 23 (1891), But some details point to an earlier construction. This makes us think the build might have been expanded in Meiji 23 rather than built new from the ground up. We found a hand rail holder in the inner hall way upstairs that is dated Meiji 3 (1871). This leads us to believe that some of the strusture goes back farther. We have lots of research yet to do

For now we are all very happy to have it dismantled and most importantly, we are all safe.

hap

http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/...2d6def91f8c5cb7

Day 15

Here is where the rubber meets the road folks. Cleaning up. Notice that our first level carpenter is treating the trash just like a fine project, stacking very neatly

In the implosion picture, Moma san has attached a cable to the building after taking a chain saw and cutting most of the way through every post. It worked very nicely

http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1261&start=30&sid=da049f949c0b

Hap