Planning: The Lay of the Land.

While we were up in Wisconsin, Mia and I took really good measurements of the tree(s) that we want to build on and the distances between them.  We even took compass readings so we can later decide the best direction of the slope of the roof and so on.

I drew up a very basic layout of the trees.  Here is the scale drawing if you would like to play along.

I am going to use this to draw out the Beam plan and the Joist plan of the tree house.  Those should be soon to come.  Just a brief explanation of what in in the drawing, the small tree is self explanatory.  The large tree has a branch that starts about 4 feet off the ground, so that is what you see as a dotted line.  All the sizes and distances were measures at 7 feet off the ground since that is where I expect to build the tree house.

The Tree

The Tree.  The center point of a treehouse and probably the single most important part of the entire project.  This must be taken seriously.

Ok, so I may be over dramatizing this a bit, but it is important to get a good tree.  Since we have a lot of trees to choose from on the property, we can be somewhat selective.  For the first thing, we do not want a fast living tree.  This includes Poplar or Birch, both of which shoot up to a nice size, but don't live for very long.  They also have very spongy wood so it would not hold a fastener very well.  We want this treehouse to last a little but and it would be bad news to come back to The Hut someday and find the treehouse smashed to the ground.

The criteria I was looking for was as follows: a big tree at least 5 feet in circumference, healthy with no mushrooms or excessive dead branches, straight with at least 15 height that is free of branches, a neighboring tree that is about 10 feet away, and not Birch.

Well, there are a lot of Birch trees on the property.  They look nice and tall and big and straight ... but you just know they are going to be a recipe for disaster sometime in the future.  Mia and I walked the property looking for a nice big tree that is pretty much ANYTHING other than Birch.  There was a lot of "look at that tree ... aww nuts, it's Birch".

We concentrated on the bigger trees that were not Birch.  Some looked a little sick.  Some were REALLY far away from The Hut.  Some didn't have a neighboring tree that was big enough.  After all the searching, we kept coming back to the same tree.  This one:

And this is her sidekick:

Here they are together:

What I like about this arrangement is that the trees are about 11 feet apart, they are straight and healthy looking.  Here we are measuring the bigger tree's circumference:

Over 7 feet!  Ok, this is a good tree.  But, what kind of tree is this?  There were no leaves close to the ground to pick, so I had to take a picture zoomed into the leaves that were way up:

So what do we have?  Heart shaped simple leaves, alternating pattern, smooth surface... after doing the research, we have a wonderful specimen of an American Basswood.  This will work nicely.  It doesn't have the regal stature of an Oak, or the sexiness of a Maple, but it should have good heartwood to tap into and will live 120+ years.

I am not quite sure of the sidekick tree because I didn't take as many pictures of it, but I think it also is an American Basswood, which is fine with me.

Now that I have the tree(s) determined, and I laid it out on paper, I can design the treehouse that will span between the two trees.  This is the REALLY fun part.

Out With the Old...

As the cycle of life goes, that which is new will eventually become old.  Doug built a tree house about 20 years ago and nature did what nature does, slowly rotting away the structure so there is now just a skeleton of what was left.

Gina tells me that the treehouse was incredible fun for her and her siblings, when they were younger.  That is why it is fun to design and build a new one for the next generation, but visiting the old treehouse is still neat.  If you sit there long enough and watch, you can still imagine the by-gone days when the Pleticha kids played there.

X Marks the Spot

For those of you familiar with the property of The Hut, here is a little game.  Mia and I explored a lot of the property and we settled on a spot to build.  There is a really nice looking tree that we can use with a nearby secondary tree that will help. 

OK, so here is the game.  If you want about the most vague hint you can get and want to find the spot, here is your photo clue.  X marks the spot:

Give up?  OK, if you want another clue, try this photo:

Still not quite sure?  Ok, here is your last picture that should clinch it.  Again, X marks the spot.  I purposely didn't make the X very obvious.

Happy hunting!

Go West Young Man

We loaded up the $50 of treated lumber and headed on out West (and North) to drop it off at The Hut.  A special thanks to Jay Kirby for letting us borrow the trailer.  Here is a picture of the triumphant arrival of the Lumber to the hut. 

By the way, we put off unloading the trailer for a whole day because we had other stuff to do.  A second special thanks to my whole family.  It was neat to see Gina and Mia working as a team to bring the long lumber over to me to tuck under The Hut.  Frank and Anna even got into it by carrying the (very) small pieces. 

I have great helpers.

Let's Build Something - Ladder

Since I have all that used lumber, and it is going to be transported to the tree house site fairly soon, I thought it should be a good idea to get whatever I can build done now while I have access to power tools ... and the power to run them.

I decided it would be a good idea to get the ladder built now since there is a lot of cutting, drilling and screwing involved.  The added bonus is the ladder can be easily transported, unlike a wall for example.

I know that I want the floor surface to be 7 feet off the ground, and after doing some research, I decided to have a 70 degree angle ladder.  Subtracting the width of a 2x8 floor joist, I figured that the ladder can be 7 feet long.  I also researched that 10 inch rung spacing is good for kids, so I went with that.  Lastly, I made the rungs 18 inches wide so the finished product will be 21 inches wide (18 + 2x1.5).  21 inches long can tuck up into 24 inch centered joists if I decide to have the ladder hinge up into floor with a pulley.  Just trying to think ahead :)

For the materials, I used 2x6s for the vertical stringers and 2x4s for the rungs.  I cut short 2 inch pieces from 2x4s to make cleats to go under the rungs for added support.  Lastly, I used 2 1/2 inch long galvanized deck screws to assemble everything.  

Here are a few pictures to show the build in progress and the final product.

Here is a close up to show the rungs and the cleats that support the bottom of each end.  This gives each rung 10 screws to support it, so this should be sturdy.

And of course I called in my product tester.

It got a resounding thumbs up.  It took a while to get her down from there.  Imagine what will happen when there is a tree house at the top.