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Valdes island light house from then

Tree house was little on going project when I visit light house on Valdes. This was my second visit on island after frame set up.

All hard work experience moving from boat to location seems disappear and only memory comes back from visit. Jim and Karl did great job finishing the exterior and I can feel how much fun they had doing so. Winter are cold and short day light but great opportunity to enjoy the sun rise and sun set. Island cottage life seems very relaxing moment, I hope I can give this opportunity to my wife and kids life.

Tree house project

We spend four days weekend on Valdes island and we had to have something to do, so we decided to build tree house.

We could plan noting until we gets to island and find the potential tree to build tree house. After we got on island, we started thinking about building it on three trees that will make stable platform also was a bid easy to access. But, we found arbutus tree that near the ocean and kind of high place to locate tree house, so we decide to challenge on this one.

I made very quick structure idea in my head and we discussed about it. Every one left decision to me, and Kyle showed me his collection of drift wood so we said, lets put one and think next step after one is up.

First one is to bolt beam horizontally to falk, this was nothing but heard to lift. No scaffold to stand on, one hand to hold the piece. Drift wood is well preservative so good materials to use but very heavy. My hand start to shake while holding in place so we had to use brain not just muscle.  Using rope to lift, rope to tight in location secury but I think we were working on edge all the time. Just tried not to make stupid decision and move.

Second day, we put three pieces in place. Only three pieces but satisfaction after the task was pretty significant. V-shape tip beam that neck sit on fist beam, connection was pre-cut on ground but putting that in location without support was not easy.  We managed this by locating beam on ballance point, hold one end with rope from under, start to push piece our bid and bid.

Tree were amazingly stable but still moves, and this little movement makes a fear for me to tip toward out side to reach the connection. I don’t know how we did it, but V-shaped beam with knee support got up. Once all connection secured, I was not confident to stand on tip yet. It was even scared to see Kyle jumping to test the structure. I thought about connection over and over, what can fail this structure? All my answer was positive, it will support but still no guts to tried out.

Then we put some platform board on top, and start to reach to tip as I needed, more I do, start to losen my fear and trust the structure.

Then we went to hunt for more material that give us t

he imagination where we can go next. We found one curved piece and I had idea where to put it right away. I had to put this in place even we were not ready to proceed so I can start to think about next process. That is all we could do in three days, looking forward to go back to play with this again.

Having no plan, cutting without lay out or scale of tape is just like we made little fort when we were kid, we forgot about our task, duty or any thing that pressing our life during this activity and we went back to childhood.

On a way back, ocean were so calm almost reward from our challenge work, dolphin alsojoint nature congratulate our venture!.

Soba or Udon recipe

My friend Paul said he was going to cook Udon after he seen my blog so I will give my recipe how to eat these noodle.

First, I recomment to get Udon because you can ger very decent freezed dry Udon from Japanese food store.

• Udon (freezed dry) Boil 2 minutes until frozen take off, it is already cooked.
• Fresh ginger (ground)
• Green onion (chopped)
• Ninben source (concentrate noodle source) Add 1/2 watter with this source and put ginger, green onion in.

Then dipp the noodle in a source and enjoy with Beer!

Richie set up

Kiyo and I just came back from raising Richie frame. Frame went up in three days, weather was not great but had one good day to raised most.

It was good set up, very good client Richie and his son Karsten and contractor Jay who I respect as very hard work timber framer, we all worked very hard to set this up and get done in short period time.

I felt many things during set up, I thought we worked hard without any jokes and just kept working, I was wondering if I was doing all right but I seem do this every time, always concern to spend time, want to get it done quick.

Kiyo is my apprentice he said he was not able to enjoy the set up, not because of hard work, he did not know if he was great help, this was his first frame to set up. We went over many things during drive back and we know what we can do better again next time.

But, what matter is, either we get job done, build good frame and client are happy. We got job done, we believe it is great strong frame and Richie and his family are happy! This is right size of house frame for me, and Jay said it is clean design that I agree. Price was right, we could worked on without interruption and I am happy about result.

• First day, unload lift with fork lift, build bent on floor without any equipment. Me and Kiyo is not as strong as others, it was a bid hard for us.

• Day 2, rain, no crane, Jay wanted to raise it without crane but I resist, so half day working.
• Day 3, crane came! Put all bent up to plate.

• Day 4, all purlins and rafters were up left to home around 1:00 PM. Total 167 pcs, 9,000 bdft, so 55 pcs, 3,000 bdft a day for set up.

Kirf cut in boxed heart timber

I would not use any green material to build frame unless there are good reason to.

But the price of KD material and green materials are double the cost and sometime I have to find a way to build frame with lower budget.

Fortunately, we have good forest surrounding and we can source reasonably dry dead standing material. Limitation of these materials are sizes of logs that we will not able to get FOHC on bigger and longer materials.

So we applied kirf on timbers to focus all check in top to prevent it to check on side. Timber with boxed heart, it will tend to check where ever close face of timber to center so most likely, it will check on side.

We had one project that had time in between so we applied kirf right after we received this dead standing material, put bigger dannage under also side to air can go through to dry timber while waiting. We had about 10 days to leave this timber in our shop and this is the result.

• M/C was average 18% when we received material and it came down to 16% at the time we start to plane.
• Kirf need to be apply before plane so kirf on top can open.
• We have seen the kirf opens average 1/4 inch so it is working.
• We have planed 4 side after so timber is square with open kirf on top of beam, no side check.
• We will be checking this timber next while to see if the system works.

Fache entrance frame

This is renovation project in Sun Peaks, design by Karl Willms. Building is not too old but style seems a bid old. Almost every house in this Ski resort uses timber in some way, often see full timber frame in this area. Our project was not big so we focused on quality, furniture quality to see if that makes difference in appearance. I presented locking mechanizm with wood joinery that is not used in any aspect, just came up on my head, but I have done similler kind of joinery in a past.

The challenge was to fit in existing roof, but it went easier than I thought. Mibroc guys are always great to work with, support us greately. Our crew Kiyo and Eiji stayed late a couple days to get this done, I was up set up main frame only one day and left the rest of work to crew, too cold!

I have not seen it completed picture yet but our work is done.

Light looks very original but cheap!

This is the light that we bought from IKEA and made into kind of sign where people enter to the restaurant. Light is very cheap only 40 dollars and rock are from my house. Made logo in Illustrator and traced well because the light behind. Waxed paper were not easy to penetrate the ink but it gave the effect that made more interesting. I definitely will do this again.

My daughter Mizuki always admire my work, she gave me such a good time in my life. Kiyo is new crew that reach his hand to where I need, thanks Kiyo!

Table design

I designed table that can tighten the table top after the wood shrink.

Also legs to be attach with screw mechanism that can stand solid on un even floor.

Small insert table can connect two table to be 10 seater and use table as display board while it is not in use.

Project portfolio

I have been making project portfolio myself and Monica at Willms Design Service has been helping audit my English.

I use program call Indesign, photoshop and illustrator.  It became 46 pages, It can download from link below.

http://www.daizen.com/services.php

Sanuki udon (noodle)

Sanuki is one of three famous udon noodle place in Shikoku island. It is all self serve, the boil the noodle only and we put stuff even broth by ourself, but taste great. One noodle cost less than $2 all our familly got full with $8 buck from pocket. Kids loves this noodle.