Above 1200 Sq/FT Harley Jim's place

[harley jim]

Thanks Grizz
Got up at 5:00 drank a pot of coffee and headed to the lumber yard and to the metal roofing store to pick up ordered materials.
Went home and dropped the trailer. I then went to Donnies and we finished the tubing, we now have all of the tubing for 36 frames. We finished at 2:00 I went home and started removing 17 ft. of metal from the center of the cabin roof and Donnie started on the new plas table. He wants it on wheels so he is building a cart.


The before shot! That door is about 71" tall, it ain't going to work.

I got the metal off but didn't take the pic.
I'm working on the far end, duplicating a truss to move to the front center. When I'm done the lower three ft. of the roof will be gone.

Then this door will be on the 6'x 14' porch!
It started getting dark and the mosquitoes started in on Pat so we had to quit for the night!

We had some Northern Lights last night, my neighbor Rebecca has a fancy phone so she got me a pic to share.

 

[harley jim]

View attachment 2199657

 

[harley jim]

I got this far today, Pat helped me until about 2:00 then Dude came over and helped until 5:00, had a business meeting at the lodge at 6:00

I'm hoping to at least get it dried in tomorrow, more would be great but reality is that dried in will probably be it.

 

[Prospecter]

Dried in is good. That's a lot of fitting and fussing. It all takes time!

 

[harley jim]

Well! I didn't quite make dried in!

All of the climbing took its toll on me. I was barely able to move yesterday so progress was slow. Also we decided to take down a large limb from the tree on the right, it was about 40 ft. long and was directly over the new porch. It will get there sooner or later!

 

[xtremek]

Still looks like a lot of good progress to me.

 

[harley jim]

I'm not as good as I once was but I'm as good once........


I got it dried in today.

 

[LeonardY]

 

[harley jim]

Got a little closer


One more day and the metal will be done. It won't be tomorrow, we have 12 trike frames to finish by Friday. We have been waiting for a part for the plas table, it got here today so we will be able to cut tomorrow.

 

[Prospecter]

Scaffolding sure is nice to work off of. You're making great progress on the fussy bits.

 

[harley jim]

Prospector, Im so greatful to have access to this scaffolding. A friend of ours asked if we could keep it for him, he didn't have room! Sure, no problem.
It would be so hard to fit those pieces using a ladder, at 66yr old I don't move like I used to.
I didn't take any pics today, I ran an angle grinder for five hours cleaning parts, nothing really interesting about slag!
Hopefully we will have everything cleaned tomorrow and we can start assembling frames, we need to have 12 finished by Friday to stay on schedule.

 

[Prospecter]

I originally bought scaffolding for use by family uneasy about heights. For them, it was like working off the ground. Now, at 67, I also do it for myself. Much better than getting tangled in a ladder and riding it to the ground. Most recently day before yesterday on a stepladder.

 

[harley jim]

It's getting crazy here again!



Got a lot of parts ready to start welding frames tomorrow!


The upholstry shop called and Pat's couch is ready for pickup.


Picked up the chairs a couple weeks ago, so Pat is very excited to put her living room back together! First thing in the morning we gotta go!
If y'all remember we were painting the living room earlier this summer while we were remodeling the lodge, like I said its getting crazy!
Saturday I hope to finish the metal on the cabin roof. Still no rain in sight according to the seven day forcast!
Our new neighbors who bought the house across the road about two years ago are loading a straight truck at this moment in western New York and then headed this way permanently!

 

[Prospecter]

Those wing chairs are beautiful. And especially nice in a drafty house like ours.

 

[harley jim]

Prospector, thank you.
We like our antiques, we bought this set at the Hwy127 yard sale probably about 12 years ago.
Hwy yard sales are a big thing around here.

This is what it looked like back then.


First incarnation! I know Pat, it will get rearranged several more times before it's done.

I worked on a customer build today, the guy who bought it is having a bunch of custom stuff added.

This one gets a headlight.

And a cooler! I just build them, the customer picks his poison!

 

[harley jim]

No pic but the metal on the new shed porch is done.

 

[harley jim]

Were getting ready for Florida!
I spent the whole day building wheelie bars! Donnie is going to see a man for a quote on cutting our flat parts so we can catch up a bit.

 

[xtremek]

That's a **** load of trikes. If you still want to do more roof metal work, you're more than welcome to come to Michigan and help me do the next roof. Should only be about 16' off the ground at the short end.

 

[harley jim]

Buddy there is nothing in the world that I would like more than to come and help you do that roof!
I'm so tired of the grind here this summer. The trikes blew up on me like I never expected.
And the lodge project turned into my project.
I'm glad this summer is over.
I'll be so glad when Nov 10th gets here and my season will be over for the year.

Pat and I worked on the cabin today. We took the alcove and the door out, we had to remove the 5/4 board from what they called the porch and install a sheet of flooring, we got lucky in that the hole in the floor was exactly a 4x8 sheet!


It got dark before we finished but the door is now flush with the front of the cabin. I'll have to use the siding that we removed from the alcove to fill in around the door.

I'm plan on putting a wood heater in the cabin and possibly the wood cook stove also, so this will be where y'all will find me when I finally do retire! Sitting here in my Mother's old rocking chair stoking the fire, while Pat makes homemade biscuits in the wood fired cook stove... heaven!

 

[harley jim]

I had to run errands this morning, I stopped by Jeds and got a set of wheels for our next build.



Couldn't decide between these so I got a different set.
We got a drop tube frame built and needed some wheels so we can test drive it tomorrow.

We had several folks in pigeon forge trying to get on the trikes that had disabilities and had trouble so we designed this drop tube frame.
We're hoping this will be easier for folks to get on and off!

 

[xtremek]

Glad your year is almost over. I think I like the lines of the drop tube frame better, actually.

 

[harley jim]

I do to, it's really starting to grow on me.

We got it back from powder coat after lunch.

Started putting it together.

One of the side covers had some sand in it so it went back.

We have most everything packed in the trailer, still have some boxed kits to pack, waiting on some parts from the laser shop.
We leave a week from today!
Going to eat supper at Granny Cantrell's when I get there!

 

[bugnut]

Jim the drop frame looks good and I like that color! Safe travels.

 

[harley jim]

Thanks Joel, it did come out nice!

 

[xtremek]

What are you using for a motor controller? Are you using a live axle or an open diff. Man, the red POPS!!! Gorgeous color.

 

[harley jim]

It's a vevor system we get from Amazon, we try to stay with Amazon parts so when we shipped one the customer gets our parts list of proven parts and we can help them better if we know the parts. Of course they don't ever stick with the script!


I'm really proud of this one, it came out perfect!

We use a peerless diff, live axles are no fun, especially in a trike, they push straight line really bad.

Tomorrow we pack more kits, again!

 

[harley jim]

Got some of the front finished today.

 

[Prospecter]

That door looks great. What do you have planned for in front of it?

 

[harley jim]

It will have a 6'x14' porch. It will have 5/4 decking boards and 4x4 corner posts. Nothing really fancy.

 

[xtremek]

With the rest of the building being so simple the 4x4s should look good. But with that elegant front door, I would think you'd want something with some kind of design on them.

 

[harley jim]

,
Kirk, that's the delema! It's supposed to be a cabin, kind of rustic, not primitive for sure, but rustic flair! We're going to paint or stain it, we've just not decided what will look right.

I'm looking for some cedar 4x4 to make the front truss with. I have three cedar logs here if I could get someone to mill them, I have a buddy with a saw mill but it's hunting season so no Bueno on him doing it.

 

[xtremek]

Router some kind of vertical flute into the corners of both posts? Are you going to have a railing going back to the house from the posts? Stop the flutes a couple of inches above the railing. Then do the railing stiles the same way? The posts (and railing?) need to be the transition from the front door to the rest of the cabin, style wise. Somewhere in the middle of the two. My thought at least

 

[harley jim]

I like that, I did a porch for the Arc (animal rescue) sort of that way, I took a router and did a round over on the corners, stopping short of the top and the handrail. Were not sure we are going to put handrail on it yet. It will tell us as we go.

We got setup in panama city today, the show is huge, I don't think I will be able to cover it all in three days.


Made it to the condo.

It's way up there.


We had supper at the place next door, the entire inside is covered in dollar bills.

We'll be back on site at 7:00 in the morning, more to come.

 

[xtremek]

I think a flute would look a little better than a round. Stop the flute about 4" before you would put a rail, if you were to put one on. That way you can add one on later if you want. Maybe wrap the bottom 3' with a 1"x, and a top and bottom collar. Keep it very simple. Just a suggestion.

 

[harley jim]

Made it home from panama city, didn't do much today, can you call it jet lag if you were in a truck?


We had a good spot.



Were right about 12:00 in the center pic, right next to the bathroom!
Pretty close to the pizza truck!

This guy.

And this girl were our next door neighbors,

The shriners were across from us, they were parking and security.

They had some good raffles, 6 tickets for $20, it is a Henery 410 axe!
We had a great time, met a lot of people. Sold a bunch of product. Made some new friends.
But I never saw Shortycort all weekend!

 

[harley jim]

Got back to the shop today! Neither of us were very motivated but we managed to clean the shop and get Roy's trike back on track.

We started this trike before we restocked our trailer. Roy is an 83 year old biker/street rodder. We made him a roller and he took it somewhere to get the tank and cooler done. He brought it back with this plastic cooler on it, well sort of on it! We took it off and made proper mounts. I tried to convince him to get a vintage coke cooler and put on it but no Bueno!
So we have to mount and finish the bad tank chop that he started, mount the seat, and a set of harley floorboards, we're hoping to have it ready for powder coat by Friday!

 

[Mr.zippy]

Got back to the shop today! Neither of us were very motivated but we managed to clean the shop and get Roy's trike back on track.

We started this trike before we restocked our trailer. Roy is an 83 year old biker/street rodder. We made him a roller and he took it somewhere to get the tank and cooler done. He brought it back with this plastic cooler on it, well sort of on it! We took it off and made proper mounts. I tried to convince him to get a vintage coke cooler and put on it but no Bueno!
So we have to mount and finish the bad tank chop that he started, mount the seat, and a set of harley floorboards, we're hoping to have it ready for powder coat by Friday!

If you screw around enough with these trikes Jim, you're gonna have a full blown 80 hour work week business! How many of these things have you made? (Full disclosure, I have no use for one, but I want one!)

 

[harley jim]

Too late Mr.zippy, we're already booked into six shows in five months next summer!
We're over 50 units delivered, we have repeat customers that have ordered 8 to 10 frames shipped to there location. I had a man contact me from Australia, he wants two kits!
It's done shitwrecked my retirement.
Until it isn't fun anymore I will go with it to a limit, but I have the option to bail at will!

 

[Bob Heine]

Too late Mr.zippy, we're already booked into six shows in five months next summer!
We're over 50 units delivered, we have repeat customers that have ordered 8 to 10 frames shipped to there location. I had a man contact me from Australia, he wants two kits!
It's done shitwrecked my retirement.
Until it isn't fun anymore I will go with it to a limit, but I have the option to bail at will!

Jim, you can follow the lead of most big companies and raise the prices incrementally until the orders stop coming in. If you do that in reasonable increments you can taper off a bit at a time, At some point you'll probably get a buyout offer you can't refuse.

 

[harley jim]

Bob, that's the end game! I can't wait.

Until then.

We got Roy's assembled and he came for a ride to make sure it fit him. He said it fit him perfectly.

We are doing all of the metal in satin black. He is having the tank and cooler done in harley orange.
We are not doing any of the body work or paint so I am a bit scared of what the end result may look like, I can't handle a hack job!

Roy asked for this plate to be added to the back of his cooler. He is having some lettering added to it.

So I added another one on the front to use as a mount/stabilizer for the front. It made things easy for me.
We got it torn down and sent everything to powder coat by 3:00 so we called it quits until Tuesday. So now it's back to the cabin!