Yellowtongue

     Over the weekend we had some friends visiting, and took the opportunity to move the yellowtongue out of the storage shed down to the house site. Laying the sheets on the joists, we covered them up with tarps for a bit of weather protection as rain was predicted. Yellowtongue is a type of particleboard flooring made from "precision milled wood flakes and bonded with moisture resistant synthetic resin". This was provided with the kit home when it was delivered. Each sheet is 3.6 metres long by 90 cm wide and weighs 30kg, which Josh says is not that heavy and he is able to carry it on his own. It may not sound like a lot of weight, but imagine lifting a 30kg backpack or box - that's pretty heavy. When he and I were carrying them together I found it to be an almost unbearable weight, as for me around 15kg is just getting beyond what the limit of what I can carry. Whilst I CAN carry 15kg, I know that I am pushing my body to its limit, and doing so will definitely lead to long term damage (and pain!). So I had to tell him that I could not help carry the boards as they were too heavy for me.

      On the Friday before everyone arrived Josh carried 7 of the sheets down to the house site on his own, which is around 100 metres down a hill on rocky and uneven ground. He said that the weight of it was not so much the problem, as was the length and width of the sheets, making them very unwieldy. So he created a tool made of a camping shovel, with the head folded to a 90 degree right angle, and 2 G-clamps. This allowed him to carry the sheets underneath his arm like a really large surfboard. His body was very sore the next day after carrying all those sheets at an awkward angle, combined with the constant tromping back up the hill to get the next sheet. The boys helped carry the rest of the boards with two people on each board, and it was lovely to see all the work get done so quickly and easily (of course it was easy for me - I was just watching!). THANK YOU GUYS!!! All done in a couple of hours, after waiting for two months trying to figure out how to get this done.

      The next step is to cut half of the boards to the right size, and the other half will stay full length. I figure the easiest way to do that is to make a temporary floor on the joists out of the yellowtongue, and then lay them over the sawhorses in order to cut them with the orbital saw which has been purchased for this express purpose. We will have to remember to measure twice and cut once, as we do not have any yellowtongue to spare - and getting more on site would be both difficult, and expensive. We have 20 sheets, which is JUST enough, but could really do with one more anyway. Once they have been cut, they need to be placed in exactly the right spot and screwed to the metal joists. Hopefully this will be a trick that we figure out BEFORE we do it the wrong way!