Tundy, house and beetle build thread...and exploring.

Time to go play on the mini ex.

I'll surely be getting some sort of equipment this year.

I think a skidsteer would be a nice investment, lots you can do with them.

 

Lots

 

Hey, somehow this popped up and it was put up in CO Springs. Although maybe you’re already locked in with this. @Coop68 too

https://youtu.be/vlCLSmftSIA

 

Not bad good to know!

 

House projects.

 

Using that for the wall studs eh?

 

Shhh

 

Well, since there was going to be nice weather, and I wanted to get out and explore, I headed down to the Great Sand Dunes near Alamosa. Didnt have too much of a plan until Friday when I saw there were a bunch of mines in the Bonanza area as well. Packed up the basics and hit the road mid day. I first attempted to get to Bonanza from the north at Mears Junction/County Road 47YY. There wasn't much snow until I got near the first switchback, then there were some small drifts that someone had already been through. I made it up a little ways after the first switchback and it was getting deeper and more of a trail vs a forest road so I turned back to try the next entrance.

I do have Avenza with most of the PDFs of MVUM's on my phone, but my tablet with all my topo's and trails hasn't been replaced. So I was flying mostly blind since the MVUM is broken across a few areas and doesnt seem to be complete. The next attempt was going well until again, it turned snowy and got narrow... back to 285!

The third time was a charm, People live in Bonanza and the road was clear all the way past it where there were campsites in the NF. It was pitch black by then since I was in a canyon and clouds were blocking any moon. I set up my sleeping bag in the bed of the truck. I fit perfectly on a diagonal but kept waking up. So I tried to sleep across the back seats. It worked better but the seat belts were digging into my back. I woke up to fresh snow so I'm glad I was in the truck.



I went exploring... went up this road to get to the continental divide, but turned back when there was a pretty large creek crossing that was frozen. I'm sure its a tiny creek but the frozen area was a good 100ft across.

I tried another spur (to the right of this picture), and that one ended up being snowy and steep.

Back to the spot that was just past where I camped. Jackpot! There are a ton of mines off this road. Its an easy route, and I took it most of the way to the top. There was a bit of snow bashing but it was all uphill at this point so the few times I lost momentum I just backed up and hit it again. I think its called Round Hill which you can drive up and over, if it werent for a drift near the top, it would have been doable.

But I went back down and stopped by the Antora(per the maps in the area, but I think its actually Antoro) Mine. Its real neat and has a lot of stuff left.









I zipped back down the hill and back out to 285. There is a ton to explore back there, I'll return when I have a dirt bike!

Off to the sand dunes!





Very picturesque. There were a few people there, nice cool winds that could've let up just a little. It was cloudy so no night pictures and I remembered that I only have my telephoto lens for the camera which wouldn't make for the best star pictures.

I'll work on the other half of the pictures some other time.

As far as the pallets... I'm planning on trying to stain the planks to look something like the mines (a random dark brown aged look). I want to side the sheds in the material to make it look rustic, and eventually the house. I was planning on getting a bunch of pallets but just might experiment with them for staining and just buy stuff from the store since it gets old trying to cut the pallets apart. I think I have enough metal roof to do one so far, not sure what color I want to paint that, but probably a grey or brown depending on how the wood turns out.

 

Come on Brandon, your suppose to build better than your Colfax box!

 

Love to google history of these places of course after visiting them. Some of these mine ones tell you exactly what they found, who owns it, etc

https://westernmininghistory.com/mine_detail/10101784/

 

If you want the drift/weathered wood look, heres how to do it. Get a package of 0000 Steel Wool, 5 gallon bucket and 1 Gallon of distilled vinegar. Place a good amount of steel wool in the bucket, pour in 1 gallon of vinegar then pour in 1 gallon of water, seal bucket up and let it sit for about 24 hours. Grab a brush, dip it in the water mixture and start painting it on the wood. As it dries you will start to see the appearance change to the weathered/drift look depending on how much of a look you want, it might require a quick second coat

 

Yup, picked up steel wool, black tea, and some spray bottles yesterday.

So I'll have to see what i can do.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1988-FLU41...ash=item41da1ec984:g:y7AAAOSw05taaPWo&vxp=mtr

I need that in my life.

 

I prefer a genuine Humvee

 

A genuine HMMWV

 

So...

Its a royal pain in the ass to get in touch with metal building manufacturers. Had one call me back last week that was overly enthusiastic, talked to him for 15 minutes (based out of castle rock'ish IIRC). Wanted me to send him my plans so he could get started on an actual number and more details. Nothing... This is the third one that is too busy to call back.

I went to an engineer/architect to get some idea of what I could expect from the metal building peeps (since they wont answer questions). He had the old school unfounded change is bad vibe (metal buildings will leak, have to change out fasteners... ) but did bring up legit hurdles like the duplicate insulation, the need to re-frame inside of an already framed building, window placement, etc.

Being that I want to get the ball rolling (so it can sit in permitting for a month and a half), I'm thinking about just putting a 2/2 with 2car garage on there as well as a separate actual garage.

What I'm running into is the fact that the interior living space will need to be engineered... which isn't cheap. Then the whole flaky metal building people who thus far dont look like a great bunch to try and customize stuff with. The metal building was definitely going to leave me with less windows in the living space than I wanted where a stick frame house I can do as I please. I can get an inexpensive set of engineered plans online and get it rolling. we'll see if I can find ones that'll have an open kitchen and decent bathroom.

 

how about the one you sent me? I went in a did a rough quote based on those plans you had posted here. I got a call from some lady like every day. also emails. I am surprised none of them are interested. It seems like it wouldn't be that uncommon.

 

Most of them are "interested" but are busy and say they have stuff planned out for months.

And that one I sent you that has the nice calculator wont build here. They are based on the east coast and sent me a link with other people. Another company did call me... like every day, pestering me....so i told them to beat it.

 

I was wondering that good to know might not be as simple as we had thought