Category Archives: Construction

Cabin Update: Electric and Water

Agua y luz. Water and electricity. When you move into a house, this is what makes it a house and not just a shed or storage area. We recently finished up the electricity installation including the fans and it really makes it feel like home when you can just turn on the lights at night, the fans when it gets hot, or turn on a little music.

Outdoor fans for the front deck

Britton also framed in the last bit of the wall and the bathroom loft area. We are in the home stretch!

Bedroom fan and framed wall

Rafters above the bathroom and closet

To install water at the cabin, Britton connected about 300 feet of 1/2 inch tubing, buried about half of it, crossed the property, affixed it beneath the sky bridge and then connected it to the cabin.

Waterline where it travels under the bridge

Waterline where it connects from the bridge to the cabin

Next up was internal copper water lines which Britton soldered. Thankfully we have plenty of leftover copper pipes that we reused from the old wooden house and so this was fairly inexpensive. Britton has also worked a little with copper piping before and so this went fast. There was one pipe rupture but Britton fixed it pretty quickly.

Bathroom plumbing and wiring are ready!

You could call this the house that Britton built. Almost everything he did himself or with one other helper. There has not been a moment when he was not working hands on. An amazing feat. It can take a little longer when it’s just you and you’re learning as you go, but he has been a champ. He’s done a great job!

We are now on to the next phase. The skin. Drywall should arrive this upcoming week and Britton and Waldemar will begin installation. It’s all coming together and really starting to feel like a house. I can’t wait to move in!

Home sweet cabin!

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Lush Tropical Gardens

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One of our favorite parts of this big project we call our property/finca is the tropical gardening. When we first arrived, there was just a huge mess of competing underbrush, weedy trees, thorny bushes and vines that we could hardly walk through. Certainly not what you would probably think of when you imagine tropical gardens.

After some initial clearing efforts in 2013: Hawk Alley

Making our way through the property when we first bought it in 2011

There was very little in the way of broad leaf classically tropical looking plants. We weren’t even sure that it was possible for us to grow them since Rincón can be quite a bit drier than some other nearby areas like Mayaguez and into the interior mountains. We thought we’d give it a try anyway.

Growing bananas is one of the most beautiful and fruitful of our tropical gardening

We give a little extra water to the new transplants than they would otherwise receive, but the irrigation is fairly minimal. We are constantly adding new plants and choosing new sites and always looking for new gingers, heliconias, bananas, palms and other tropical ornamentals, edibles and exotic fruit trees.

Britton buying some ginger and heliconia starts at the Rincón Farmer’s Market

It’s an art to leave the jungle for the most part in tact while also making trails that are walkable even in the rain and planting new additions that we can tend to. We are getting better at it every day. The most densely planted area we call the Tropical Garden.

Britton looking cute with his umbrella in the Tropical Garden

It is down from the turkey coop and immediately west of Hawk Alley: the Roble tunnel of trees that hawks like to cruise through. It is really starting to fill in now and I love that this will be our walk to the cabin when we move there. Eventually we will probably put in concrete steps and other amenities to make the walk a little easier, but even in the rain it is already a nice little stroll through the jungle. Here you can take a virtual walk with us in the rain from the tropical garden to the bridge and cabin.

Tropical gardening is one of the most enjoyable aspects of our time here. We look forward to creating more and more lush tropical areas around the property. As these initial plants grow we will be able to separate their corms and transplant them too. When we need a break from the work of the cabin, this type gardening is a fun and easy reprieve.

Speaking of the cabin…it is almost all fully lit up with electricity woohoo! Next up…water. Then we can water the new tropical gardens over there too!

Cabin lit up at dusk

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Sacar La Columna

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Well needless to say building a house is hard. It makes it harder when you’ve never done it before. I suppose that is true of everything though and I love a good challenge. I haven’t ever worked with concrete besides putting in fence posts so there has been a bit of a learning curve. Here is a good example of this learning process….

We are working on building basement walls under the house. In doing so I had to build wood forms between the columns that support the house. We used concrete nails to attach wood forms to the columns. Normally this would be fine. What I noticed was one of the columns was very brittle. In fact when we were putting nails in, entire chunks of concrete broke off….

Building Forms Between Columns

We had been suspicious of this particular column since it was made. We had a few people look at it and everyone said something to the effect of, “Oh it’s fine”. I figured that if there was a problem, it would probably be apparent so we have been moving forward with other tasks. When I saw the chunks break off though, I knew that it had become an apparent problem.

When we made the columns we didn’t have a concrete mixer. Now that I do, it is much easier to keep the mix very consistent. I can now readily notice concrete that has the correct level of cement and that was cured properly.

No Cement Mixer

Original Forms

So how do you replace a column that your house is resting on? I did some research on jacking up houses. It is something that is done from time to time so there is actually some information on the subject. Usually people will lift an entire house off its foundation to do repair work. I wasn’t sure how much weight I was dealing with or what kind of jack I might need. After reading up, it turns out that a wood house isn’t really all that heavy (compared to a concrete house). 2x4s plywood, 2x8s and roofing panels. So I settled on a 6 ton bottle jack.

I really only needed to lift the house about 1/8th of an inch off the corner column. Just enough so I could whack the column out with a sledge hammer. The jack worked well for this.

I have never liked being under heavy stuff. Cars on jacks scare the living crap out of me. I just never feel safe. Being under a house on jack stands is even worse, especially when it starts to creek and moan. Online forums had prepared me for this saying that the house will make noise. Even just 1/8th of an inch. Go slowly.

I then was able to pound out the column down to rebar. It was at this point I knew I had made the right decision, it was ridiculously brittle. It took no time at all to remove the column, it basically just crumbled apart.

Column Down to Rebar

I have learned a lot about concrete in a short amount of time. The mix of rocks, sand, cement and water is extremely important to get right. Curing is also important. When we made these columns I had trusted that the guys had made concrete before and knew what they were doing. And for the most part they did, the other 11 columns are fine. It was just this first column that was poured that either didn’t have enough cement OR didn’t have enough water. I think it was a lack of water.

Another part of working with concrete is making forms. The forms are the molds. You have to make them very strong because they will be holding quite a lot of wet concrete and it is very heavy. I have heard of stories of forms busting and cement spilling everywhere. Even a man in line at home depot told me a story of a form breaking. Then you have a real mess on your hands.

I also had to think about how I was going to pour the concrete into this form. The house rests on it so there isn’t any room above. I also wouldn’t be able to pump the concrete in. I decided to make a little scoop on the side of the form where I could pour concrete in.

Also important is to use a bonding agent when trying to join cured hard concrete to wet fresh stuff. I used some bull bond on the existing walls where the column was going to be. There is also rebar that joins them. The connection should be sufficiently strong.

New Column and Half Wall

All said and done, the new column is fantastic compared to the old one, not that it looks all that different. I have no worries about it now. Looking back I can’t believe that I jacked the house up, took out the column and poured a new one. It seems kind of crazy. Its all done now and I have moved on to other problems, which is a good thing.

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