Huge thanks and appreciation for Sarah, Rachel, and Jim for helping me and Dad with the unloading (and to my sister Ellen for cooking us sausages)! The panels were maybe not quite as terribly heavy as I expected them to be, but it definitely took all of us to easily maneuver the biggest 8' x 11' pieces. And maneuver them we did...
Since it was an "all hands on deck" sort of event, there are very few action shots. That is, there are no action shots. Sorry.
The task was to first remove the panels from the truck into a preliminary stack, then to reorganize the stack so that they'd be in the order I would need to install them. Doesn't that sound easy?
Ha! Ha, I say!
Sarah, Rachel, and I (with Jim and Dad's help with the big panels) finally managed the task by separating the panels into three(ish) piles: the first third to install, the middle third to install, and the last third of the panels to install. After that first-order organization, it was much easier to reinstate them into a single pile in the exact order of installation. Of course, if we'd had plenty of space to spread them around, we could have unloaded them and placed them individually and formed the stack with a single step, but--there you go.
About that order of installation, though: Technically, it's highly recommended that you start installing SIPs from a corner of the building and work out from there. This helps stabilize the structure and make sure you're making it nice and square. However, I have some doubts about whether it would be possible to install the bits over the wheel wells if the adjacent panel were already installed. That makes "starting from the corner and working out" impracticable, and makes figuring out the correct order of installation a little more complicated.
I think to clarify my thought pattern, I need to share my plan for framing the wheel well arch. Here's the sketch--and I apologize for the poor image quality. It's too close to bedtime to be bothering with the scanner!
Basically, whenever you build tiny house walls over the wheel well/fender, the sill plate--the bottom bit of the wall--has to go up and over the fender. What I'll construct to accomplish this is a double 2x4 header supported by a trimmer, with a king stud next to it. (The "trimmer" and "king stud" are the vertical pieces.) The SIP, represented by the shading, will slide over and cover the king stud and the top 1.5" of the header. The trimmer and the rest of the header will be a solid surface to screw and glue the last bit of 1/2" sheathing to seal up the gap that remains. (Just so you know, on the inside, I'll build a box around the bit of fender that protrudes into the house and fill the whole thing with spray foam insulation.)
My thinking is that the panel needs to slide horizontally to fit over the trimmer, but it also needs to slide horizontally in the other direction to fit over the spline in the panel already installed next to it. Maybe these selections from my shop drawings will help you to imagine the dilemma:
In the left-hand image, a single panel spans the whole wheel well arch, so we need to lift it and lower it straight down over the arch. It's the middle panel on the 9'-tall side wall. We could probably manage to do it with the adjacent panel--one forming a corner--already in place, but it's a big panel and, with more slots to fit it in at once and fewer angles to grab it by, it would be much trickier. In the right-hand image, two panels connect over the wheel well. Without the adjacent panel in the way, we could easily get them into place just by sliding them, without having to lift them over the arch. So--we might as well, right?
So I've devised an order of installation where the corners will go in as quickly as possible, but the first panels will be the ones that span the wheel well. I'll brace those first panels with 2x4s to keep them plumb (straight up and down), since they won't be attached to anything else. That should do it, I hope!
Anyhow, here's the final result of our SIPs shuffling mayhem: a correctly-ordered and safely tarped pile of panels. Whew!
Meanwhile, Dad and Jim were leveling the trailer. Normally, it shouldn't take long to level a trailer, especially one with leveling jacks already bolted on, like mine does. However, it turns out our driveway is badly out of level--or, rather, the level area is not wide enough for a fully 8'6" vehicle like my trailer. The leveling jacks were not going to cut it. This was their ultimate solution:
That, friends, is a godawful pile of scrap lumber nailed together to miraculously form a solid footing for the wheel. I guess when it comes time to drive off with the house, we can just put a nice 2x10 or 2x12 there as a ramp and drive that side down it--right? That sounds like the kind of thing that's far easier said than done. Hmmm. Maybe I'll ask Jim to do it; as a real-life house builder (and former neighbor, and father of a childhood friend), he was a real asset to our operation today!
Here are the splines, by the way. These fit into the grooves cut in the vertical edges of the panel, to make the panel-to-panel connections. They're full of foam, so that eliminates thermal bridging at the panel seams. Hurrah!
Also with my delivery came a full-sized set of laminated shop drawings, a booklet on how to assemble SIPs, enough of the long, massive SIP screws to connect the walls to each other at the corners, a roll of SIP tape to seal the seams, and a case of specially-formulated SIP adhesive (AKA mastic), which bonds the materials together at all the panel-to-panel, panel-to-lumber, and panel-to-spline connections (in addition to screws or nails, of course).
Tomorrow I hope to get the sill plates and the wheel well arch installed, and hopefully the walls will be done by the end of next Tuesday...
Although by writing it, I feel like I might jinx myself. Eek!
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