February 3, 2010

Demolition


This renovation involves making the house smaller -- by 1200 sq ft. Specifically it means removing a master bedroom suite and part of the family room. Today the demolition began! The difficulty lay in trying to preserve the 6" x 12" x 15 ft ceiling beams so that they could be reused in the new construction. To begin, some brush was removed to widen the road. Next, Mike Saski the operator of the backhoe, placed the back of the bucket very gingerly between two beams and gently lifted the roof. When that part was lifted a little, he moved his machine to the section between the next two beams. And so on. Gradually, the whole roof was lifted enough so that the claw could take the material away. Next the sides of the building were removed. By the end of Day one, the Master Bedroom and Bath were gone!!