Above 1200 Sq/FT I bought the farm

[ericm]

We bought a farm in Oregon! We're idiots.

Here's some background:

Over five years ago I go serious about building a shop on our 20ac in the Santa Cruz mountains in California. I was getting back into cars from a long spell of mostly working on motorcycles and bicycles, which don't need much room.

We had a three car garage that between motorcycles, bicycles and shop tools has never held more than one car, and a 40x60 barn built in the late 1800s that cars couldn't drive into due to the uneven floor. We use it to store tractors, equipment and gardening stuff. My plan for the shop in CA was to get the dirt work, foundation and shell done by a GC who had done work for us before. Then I'd retire, finish the interior myself and move my stuff to the shop.

The house in CA had a killer view:



I got serious right before Covid hit. My first visit with the county planning dept got me the unwelcome news that since I'm in an earthquake hazard zone, I'd need a "geologist letter". That turned into eight months, a specialized core sampling rig, a full geologist report, and the requirement for a pier and beam foundation with 18' deep piers. Yes, 18'. Or maybe more depending on how the $185/hr geologist who was required to monitor the process felt at the time.


The rest of the process went about the same, only worse. It took over four years to get a permit. The requirements from the county were insane. They wanted a 12x20x3 water retention pond to hold runoff from the building roof and the 40x60 paved turnaround they required me to have. The pond was supposed to be sized to hold the water from 24 hours of 5" an hour rain and release it slowly. We sometimes get two inches for an hour but never anything close to that. The turnaround was for a 70,000lb fire truck and was required even though the existing paved turnaround was 150' away. It has to be all weather which means it needs to be paved, adding to the impervious area. The impervious area triggered the drainage requirement. Etc. Since the county kept adding and changing requirements, the GC didn't get me a quote until near the end of the process. It was astronomical and pretty much put a stake in the project. He did his best to get me a good deal but it wasn't possible.

 

[GlennSullivan]

Apparently that is why businesses and individuals are leaving California in droves; the regulations and requirements on anything and everything, not to mention the general cost of day to day living there.

My wife's cousin picked up and moved his large industrial cabinet making business to Arizona. A well Known automotive specialty cabinet company, Baldhead, picked up and moved to Oregon years ago when they realized being in Cali was making them uncompetitive in the market.

Good luck with your new property, it is unfortunate that you had to spend what is obviously 10’s of thousands of dollars on the now DOA project. Hey, maybe the new owner wants to build a large garage and will purchase the plans from you.

 

[MacTexas]

Following

 

[MFortie]

Yeah, gotta love the CA bldg depts… (Not)

We’re looking at something similar; our oldest has 5 acres in an east San Diego County suburb and is in the planning stages of adding an ADU (granny flat) for us.

I’m looking to build a 48’x80’ shop on the property. The fire agency is requiring the paved driveway, turnaround, etc. When I built my 40’x60’ (rural SD County), a gravel drive was acceptable - not anymore.

Between the drive, fire sprinklers (in a metal bldg), Title 24, and so forth, CA has made it a nightmare to build.

I think the costs are going to be a killer.

We’d go out of state but for the nine g-kids (two with special needs). We’re about an hour E of San Diego now and the wifey wants to be closer. There’s no good pizza out here, so I kinda agree…

 

[Old tool guy]

Your story about the draconian building requirements … was that in CA and that’s why you are moving to OR? And where in OR will you be?

 

[LXCam]

That’s a gorgeous chunk of land you have OP. You obviously snuck out so I’d like to hear the rest of the story.

Btw, after over 30yrs of running a construction business in Cali I couldn’t take it anymore and bailed in 19.

 

[CJM8515]

precisely why CA is seeing a mass exodus. the people in charge are idiots.

good luck on your adventure!

 

[Miss the Pontiacs]

Wow, I thought I was restricted with permitting etc at the lake!
Good luck in Oregon.
PS need more pics of your purchase.

 

[ericm]

Apparently that is why businesses and individuals are leaving California in droves; the regulations and requirements on anything and everything, not to mention the general cost of day to day living there.

There's a lot of parts of California where there's far fewer regulations. The counties around SF and LA (and SD too I guess) have more regulations.

Our CA county's building dept was hard to deal with before Covid. When we remodeled the exterior of house here, we were 9 months into it before we got the permit. That was before Covid. After, they changed processes and lost or fired a bunch of staff and it got much worse. They required all submissions to be on the plans through their internet portal. We'd submit and then it would take 3 months to hear back. Also part of the delay was with the geologist and the draftsperson. Because we're in an earthquake hazard zone the county geologist required a "geologist letter". I found a geologist who talked a good game about maybe just using a thick slab (saving $$$). He had a rig come out and do core samples. The spot I wanted to put the shop, the only practical spot on 20 steep acres, turned out to have a pretty thick layer of dirt before they got to bedrock. The thick slab turned into a pier and beam foundation like my house, with extra deep piers. It took most of a year to get the report out of him. The draftsman I hired to put my design on paper in the correct format was slow too, and kept randomly changing things that I'd have to fix.

Before Covid I went into the building dept a few times to ask questions. The individual people there were pretty helpful even if the dept was a problem. One time one of the other people the was from a contractor gettting a permit for a pool house/wine cave. The planner asked how much it was going to cost and the answer was something over $1M.

A lot of the regulations make sense or at least have an understandable rationale when viewed alone, but when they all add up and trigger other requirememnts, that's when it gets stupid. There's enough rich people who can afford whatver it costs so it seems reasonable to the planners. I guess. I'm trying to forget all that.

My wife's cousin picked up and moved his large industrial cabinet making business to Arizona. A well Known automotive specialty cabinet company, Baldhead, picked up and moved to Oregon years ago when they realized being in Cali was making them uncompetitive in the market.

Good luck with your new property, it is unfortunate that you had to spend what is obviously 10’s of thousands of dollars on the now DOA project. Hey, maybe the new owner wants to build a large garage and will purchase the plans from you.

Yep, I'll include the plans when we sell. I added up what I spent on getting the permit and then promptly forgot it.

Your story about the draconian building requirements … was that in CA and that’s why you are moving to OR? And where in OR will you be?

That was in CA. The farm's in southern Oregon.

I have a bunch of pics and more stuff written to post but on the subject of permits, when we were deciding to buy the farm I called up the planning dept and left a message asking about getting a permit for a shop. Someone called me back having looked up the parcel and said "that will be $81. Would you like to come in today and take care of that, sir?". It's not quite that simple but it's a far cry from what I had to deal with in CA.

 

[ericm]

Here's the CA house after we finished the exterior remodel. We've been here for 27 years and really intended to live here until we couldn't.



Pardon the lawn, this was right after the remodel. The lawn looks a lot better now.



As the shop permit process drug on I was seriously thinking of moving. I love California but there's too many people in my part of it. We're too close to Silicon Valley. That was great when we bought the house as we both worked in tech, but since then it has become filled with rich assholes. It took a while to get my wife on board. We did a lot of trips to prospective areas on the west coast and ended up really liking southern Oregon. We still wanted to be on acreage but maybe a little easier to manage than what we have in CA. There's not a lot of houses in that part of Oregon with land, space for my wife to garden on and room for a shop. And fewer that had a house we both liked. One had a new 3000+ sq ft shop but no place for a garden and I hated the layout of the house. Like the living room would piss me off every time I went in it. Also not much view, which is something I really wanted. After looking for a year including a delay for my wife's cancer treatment, we started thinking of building a place if we could find land we liked.

There are two kinds of rural land out there: farm and forest. Due to zoning laws it's difficult to build a new house on farm land but not difficult to renovate or replace an existing house. They don't want what happened to a lot of farm land in California where they just built suburbs on it. Also farm land has some tax advantages and it's, well, usually closer to flat meaning it's easier to garden on. And it's easier to manage than steep forest. Our place in California is on the side of a mountain and level ground is rare. Farm land in this area often has irrigation provided from an extensive irrigation system originally built over a hundred years ago.

We found this farm with an old house and a garage/ADU. The house has a part built in 1900 and the rest built in the '70s. Low ceilings and not many windows, which is a bummer because the view is superb. But the price was low enough that we could replace most of the house, refurbish the ADU and come out with a nice place that's not too expensive. At least that's the idea.

Here's a pic from the old house's deck:



Being a farm, there's outbuildings. Some are in better shape than others.

 

[thammel]

Interesting!!! How many acres at the farm? You won't be bored!!!

 

[ericm]

Interesting!!! How many acres at the farm?

It's 40 ac. In the past it's been used for hay and pasturing cattle, which is probably what we'll do with it.

You won't be bored!!!

Yea a lot of people have said, politely, that at my age they'd be looking for a place that's less work. But this will be easier to manage than the place we have now, and it should be a lot easier to get help or just rent out the land. Where we are now in CA there's a lot of tree work and brush clearing that needs doing. Unless you're willing to hire a $3500/day crew to do tree work, you're doing it. Mowing or any other work is also expensive. I no longer climb trees but there's a lot of work I can do on the ground. The last five years since we got a decent stove I've been processing a lot of firewood. The tractor and forestry winch help a lot but it's still a lot of work.

The farm is also going to be a lot of work but that's ok. We're not the kind of people to take long cruises or any of that stuff.



Pretty much the only part of the house that is usable is the ~1000 sq ft basement. We worked with the contractor (a design/build firm) to design a house that would fit on the basement and fit on the land. I think we came up with a pretty decent design.






The other side is the side with the view and it's got a bunch of big windows. The living room, kitchen and MBR are on the view side. There's a mudroom on the other side that we'll use for entry most of the time. There's an existing garage with an apartment above that we'll be renovating. The garage is 800 sq ft and there's an additional room next to it that will get turned into a bike room.

One of the sticking points during the escrow period was the well. Or rather the wells. There was an original hand dug well and a more recent drilled well with a pump. Neither one had enough flow for the lender, or for us. The sellers wound up drilling a new well. That one came in at a healthy flow rate and is even artesian. They had to do some funky engineering to get the well head to stay on.




The one problem with this well is that the water is high in boron. That's not good for people (though there is no EPA limit on it) but it also kills plants. When my wife, who is a big gardener, heard that she was bummed. We can use irrigation water when it's available but when it doesn't rain much they turn it off early. The garden will need some water in the shoulder season.

Boron is common in water in the area and there's one company locally that makes a system to deal with it. In order to have enough water for the garden and to avoid having to have a separate drinking water system for the house, ADU and shop, we're likely going with a whole house R/O system. We have not gotten the quote yet but I have talked to locals who have installed it so I know roughly what the cost should be. It'll look something like this:



But not crammed in so tight.

 

[thammel]

Here in Maryland we have a well but my well system is a LOT simpler than that RO system....Wow!! All that to remove boron... I have a pre-filter (Rusco) then my well-x-trol bladder tank. Then a neutralizer (I use calcite/corosex 80/20 mix). Then a softener. Then a whole house Rusco post-filter. Believe it or not, the post filter gets dirtier than the pre-filter. Must be from the neutralizer or dirt in the salt pellets for the softener. I also plumbed in a carbon block filter for the drinking water at the kitchen sink and for the fridge icemaker.

My comment about not being bored.....I actually like projects and staying very busy. As I will hit the 3/4 century mark in a few months, I'm like you...no tree climbing and minimal ladder work. One slip or fall could be very bad!!

 

[ericm]

There's three pumps: one for the well (3hp in our case, it's deep), a high pressure pump for the R/O itself, and then a pressure pump to supply the clean water out of the tank to the house. The water system guy showed me a couple installs and triggered the R/O pump in each so I could hear how loud it is. I want to put it in the basement so that could be an issue. We may use some sound insulation on the floor above the basement. All the pumps are three phase and driven by pressure sensing variable speed drives (the beige boxes with LCDs). The blue cannisters are the pressure tanks for the well and house pumps. With the variable drive pumps you only need a small tank.

The water system at our CA house is simple in comparison- just a well and a 10k gallon tank way up the hill from the house. The water's so clean that it doesn't need any treatment. The huge tank is for the hydrant that's required. Current county code requires two tanks, one totally separate to feed the hydrant and one to feed the house. They say it's so you don't get your water system contaminated by the fire truck but a backflow valve would prevent that. The wildland fire trucks here don't even connect to the hydrant. When they park at a house they use a garden hose to top off their tank. That's so they can roll at a moments' notice without disconnecting anything.

 

[west_perf]

Congratulations, looks like an awesome place. The previous place was beautiful as well and I'm sure it's bittersweet letting go.

 

[littlebean]

great view, looking forward to the next steps

 

[mdim]

That looks like an amazing spot. Southern Oregon has some really nice areas.

I've heard horror stories from other folks of trying to build up in the Santa Cruz mountains. Years of permitting and crazy requirements like you ran into. When we were looking at getting out of San Jose, we bought a place up in Mariposa County. Building department is like 2 ladies behind the counter who really want to help out. Did a whole driveway, grading, shop building, etc for like $300 in permits (took a week to get) and a couple of basic inspections. So it IS possible to build in California, just maybe not in the Bay Area lol....

 

[GlennSullivan]

It seems every place you turn, you are running into extra expense. We have Town water and never thought about Boron content, but I do notice that when it rains, our grass likes it alot more than when it is being irrigated by the sprinkler system I guess I'll look into testing our water.

 

[ericm]

That looks like an amazing spot. Southern Oregon has some really nice areas.

I've heard horror stories from other folks of trying to build up in the Santa Cruz mountains. Years of permitting and crazy requirements like you ran into. When we were looking at getting out of San Jose, we bought a place up in Mariposa County. Building department is like 2 ladies behind the counter who really want to help out. Did a whole driveway, grading, shop building, etc for like $300 in permits (took a week to get) and a couple of basic inspections. So it IS possible to build in California, just maybe not in the Bay Area lol....

I think most of the less populated parts of CA are fine for building, unless they're unlucky enough to be a far flung corner of a mostly urban county.

Both counties in the Santa Cruz mountains **** for getting things built, and they **** in different ways. But they both end up costing you a lot of time and money. According to the GC I was going to use, the other county wouldn't even let me build a shop since we had a barn on the property. We'd have had to tear it down and replace it, or figure out how to make it useable as a shop in addition to tractor and equipment storage.

We looked hard in the Sierras. I had work there in the '80s that had me traveling to all the national forests in the central sierras and staying in a number of towns. We spent most of our honeymoon in Placerville and Sonora. So I knew places that I'd liked in the past. We even looked in the eastern sierras, which we both have come to like after me doing a bunch of bike races there and my wife driving the support van. There's just not a lot of services out there, like health care. Funny how that becomes a factor when you get older.

We even looked up on the north coast, where I went to college. Either it's gotten more run down, or it's the same and I didn't notice back then. It was kind of a bummer. We have a friend who moved there and found out that she can't get even basic health care- there are no doctors who are taking patients. She has to travel to the bay area, a six hour drive. Nothing really grabbed my wife and with cancer she's rightly concerned about health care, so we took that off the list.

We're hoping we made the right choice but until we have lived there for a few years we won't know for sure.

 

[ericm]

It seems every place you turn, you are running into extra expense. We have Town water and never thought about Boron content, but I do notice that when it rains, our grass likes it alot more than when it is being irrigated by the sprinkler system I guess I'll look into testing our water.

I think boron is fairly rare. But getting the water tested is a good idea especially if you can see a difference in the grass vs rain water.

A while back I got a call from the local fire dept wanting to come inspect the site. They need to sign off that there is a 100' buffer that's been mowed all around it before we can get the permit.

Between problems with the tractor I bought with the property, the mower they sold me, and getting someone to actually come out and mow, it didn't get done. Then the local state fire district moved the fire danger to extreme. When it's extreme, they outlaw mowing of dry grass. Or running a string trimmer. Or even a chain saw. So the guy who was scheduled to mow the next week called and said he wasn't going to do it. Apparently this is the earliest they have gone to extreme, and it took everyone by surprise. But there were a lot of fires locally, some caused by mowing dry grass, so it's understandable.

With the uncertaintby, we pushed the shop building to October.

I got the tractor running acceptably and will just deal with the mower blades being dull until I can get the proper tools to remove them. Last week they lowered fire danger to high so I took the opportunity to get out and mow some. I had to quit at 10am each day but I started as soon as it was light enough to see, so I got in a good 3.5 hours each day. I got most of the 100' I need, just one spot that needs a little more which I can do next time. And some more around the house for fire safety.




This actually a shot from earlier- I was mowing the field next door. It's owned by someone who lives far away and doesn't do anything with it. The previous owners said they mowed it. So I mowed it as a test of the tractor and mower. Also it's got a lot of star thistle in it and I wanted to knock that back as well as I could so there's less seed to spread to my land.

 

[GlennSullivan]

It is amazing the skill set / knowledge base you need to have depending on where you live in the country. I’ve lived in the northeast most of my life. We purchased a second home in FL 10 years ago and I literally felt like a child, based on what I knew vs what I needed to know to own and operate a home there. Now 10 years later, I finally have a decent handle on the tropics.

 

[ericm]

Part of the reason we're moving is so I can build a shop. We decided that the 30x60 hay barn is too crappy to turn into a shop and if we harvest hay ourselves we'll need a place to store it, so we're keeping the hay barn. The half fallen down barn in the pic above was being used as a shelter for cows. It's got some good wood in it but it's not really worth saving. And it's on a relatively flat part of land. So we decided that we'll remove it and put the shop there.

I have a guy lined up to do the demo work and grade and compact the pad. His crew is going to set the better wood aside so we can reuse it and to save it going to the land fill. They offered to just push it into the field and burn it this winter but I didn't want to leave a bunch of metal in the field to find later.

The shop will be 40' deep by 80' wide, with one 24x40 section on the right side being separate for farm machine storage. The rest will be finished inside with white metal, and insulated.




The builder is a local Cleary outfit. There was another property in the area that I liked but was too far out. It had a huge very nice shop built by the same company, which is why I contacted them. There were a few other local companies that advertised that they build pole barns but I could not get them to return calls. Most people in the area have been pretty responsive so it was kind of puzzling. I hope these people do a decent job.

I added a man door between the two rooms after this drawing was done. There's a couple windows on the other side (the view is even better than from the house) and a fifth garage door to the machine shed part, on the right side. Doors are all 12x12 and the walls are 14'

 

[GlennSullivan]

Part of the reason we're moving is so I can build a shop. We decided that the 30x60 hay barn is too crappy to turn into a shop and if we harvest hay ourselves we'll need a place to store it, so we're keeping the hay barn. The half fallen down barn in the pic above was being used as a shelter for cows. It's got some good wood in it but it's not really worth saving. And it's on a relatively flat part of land. So we decided that we'll remove it and put the shop there.

I have a guy lined up to do the demo work and grade and compact the pad. His crew is going to set the better wood aside so we can reuse it and to save it going to the land fill. They offered to just push it into the field and burn it this winter but I didn't want to leave a bunch of metal in the field to find later.

The shop will be 40' deep by 80' wide, with one 24x40 section on the right side being separate for farm machine storage. The rest will be finished inside with white metal, and insulated.




The builder is a local Cleary outfit. There was another property in the area that I liked but was too far out. It had a huge very nice shop built by the same company, which is why I contacted them. There were a few other local companies that advertised that they build pole barns but I could not get them to return calls. Most people in the area have been pretty responsive so it was kind of puzzling. I hope these people do a decent job.

I added a man door between the two rooms after this drawing was done. There's a couple windows on the other side (the view is even better than from the house) and a fifth garage door to the machine shed part, on the right side. Doors are all 12x12 and the walls are 14'

That is the size shop I wish I could have built, unfortunately property size, setbacks and existing house determined the size, I ended up with 30D x 50W with a second story in 13’. and cathedral ceilings in the remainder. If I had it to do over, I would have expanded the second story to 25’ of the width.

 

[kwyjibo]

Nice farm! My wife has been hinting at a return to the PNW region in the next few years so I'll be keeping an eye on your thread.

 

[ericm]

That is the size shop I wish I could have built, unfortunately property size, setbacks and existing house determined the size, I ended up with 30D x 50W with a second story in 13’. and cathedral ceilings in the remainder. If I had it to do over, I would have expanded the second story to 25’ of the width.

When I first started talking about a shop, my wife wanted a two story shop with the first story half built into the hillside, and a road to the upper story. I had to explain how that would definitely not fit into the budget we had in mind.

The current target budget for this shop is actually not that far off of my original budget in California- the one where I was going to do the interior work myself, before Covid raised prices and the county came in with new requirements. But the building is twice the size and I'm planning on having it all built out for me as I'm now too old to want to spend time finishing it myself. I'm still a bit in shock how much cheaper things are there.

 

[GlennSullivan]

When I first started talking about a shop, my wife wanted a two story shop with the first story half built into the hillside, and a road to the upper story. I had to explain how that would definitely not fit into the budget we had in mind.

The current target budget for this shop is actually not that far off of my original budget in California- the one where I was going to do the interior work myself, before Covid raised prices and the county came in with new requirements. But the building is twice the size and I'm planning on having it all built out for me as I'm now too old to want to spend time finishing it myself. I'm still a bit in shock how much cheaper things are there.

Those are good shock kind of things as opposed to the cali kind.

 

[ericm]

The plan was to remove a crappy (literally) half fallen down barn that had been used as a cow shed for who knows how many years and put the shop there. I had a guy lined up to do it but he had some personal problems with a soon to be ex wife who had transferred his contractors license to another firm and gotten some of his equipment repossessed. I got the excavation company that my GC for the house uses instead. This week they're working on it.

Here's some shots of the soon to be former barn:







Note the jaunty lean angle!

It's been two days and the barn's gone. Most of the paddocks and loading ramp is gone. We're saving the metal fence panels that are in good shape. Those were all tied together randomly with scraps of wire of whatever type (mostly baling and barb) and baling twine. Except where there we factory brackets of some kind to connect them. So it was kind of a puzzle. Yesterday I helped the excavator operator to remove them. Today I got smart and worked ahead of him so he didn't need to stop. His time is much more valuable than mine at this point. Hopefully tomorrow they can finish the demo and get to grading, compacting and filling.

At this point we're considering running cattle for the spring and summer. We'll start out just renting the pasture and that will keep us busy enough (the fences need a LOT of help). Maybe later we can buy feeder steers in the spring and sell them in the fall. It's going to be a little weird to be a vegetarian who is raising cattle but the best use for a good part of the property is grazing animals of some sort. I grew up around horses and have had my fill of riding them and my wife has zero interest, so that's out. No one grazes anything else in the area. Except the one guy who does bison, but locals question his judgement. There are a lot of reasons besides the bison but they sure don't help.

 

[Bruce 993 SEA]

Following...cool project!

Cheers!

 

[littlebean]

there's years of life left in that barn yet...........................I'll get my coat

 

[ericm]

The ground in the cow barn appeared to be flat but it turns out it was not. One side slopes down. It is full of old cow ****. At the far wall of the building (the downhill side) it's 2-3 feet thick. We're going to have to move the building a bit to get away from that area. Which will mean removing more from the other side where the ground slopes up. At a minimum the excavator will cut a swale to keep water from flowing down into the shop. Probably we will cut away the slope to make the approach flatter. It's steep enough that we can't go more than 20-25' without taking a lot of material, so I won't be able to back a trailer straight in. I'm not too bad at backing trailers but I can probably manage by unloading outside.

It'd be great to have a 50x50' turn around like we do at the place in CA but it's just not going to work out.

 

[ShiverMeTimbers]

Congrats on leaving California. I left San Diego 11 years ago… never moving back. i worked as an environmental consultant so I am very familiar with the permitting and level of turd polishing required to do anything there.

 

[ericm]

Here's some pics of the demo of the old corral and cow barn:





Almost gone:





The pad is in:




Unfortunately there's going to be garage doors along the opposite side from where this pic was taken. So the excavator will be back out with "a big machine" to cut that down. They'll move the dirt to go around the pad to help hold it in place, like on this side where I took the pic. The other side to my right is just bare gravel and won't stay in place. They will also put down 4" of gravel on the garage door side.

The excavation and pad is going to cost nearly twice what I'd budgeted based on the original quote from the other guy, but he'd also said something to the effect of if we have to go over it'll be time and materials so I suspect that it would have cost more with that guy too. The site was just more sloped than we thought. The company I hired spent nearly a week just bringing in gravel ("3/4 minus") and compacting it with a roller.

When I was out last week I had the rep from the pole barn company check it out and he said the pad itself looked good it just needed dirt around the edges.


The house is coming along pretty fast. Windows are in, wrap is on the walls and roof and they're putting the siding on. They want to get the rest of the siding, doors and roofing on before winter gets going.

 

[Dividing Creek]

digging your view across the valley

 

[ericm]

Being a farm we're zoned for agriculture. It turns out that this means there's no final inspection for the shop! It also means that we needed to sign a document saying that the building is for a farm shop and won't be used for retail sales or marijuana or animal shelter. All of those things are ok but need additional permits, or in the case of animals, need to be built to a different standard. Something about electrical needing protection from corrosive fumes from manure. It also means that I need to have the area around the building mowed 100' out for fire safety. They take fires seriously there. So does my part of California but in a different way and some regulations are more lax.

The fire inspector was out last week to check the mowing and found it acceptable. But he also said that while the driveway to the house is ok, the road from the house to shop needs gravel so it can take a fire truck. Normally they'd just put that in as a condition to be met before final inspection but since there's no final the county says we have to do it to get the permit.

So I made a call to the excavator guy who's becoming my new buddy. More $$$ than I'd planned but the road needed help anyhow to make it driveable by cars and not muddy when its wet.

My wife and I are going up this week for what the GC calls the electrical walkthrough of the house, where we say what goes where. I'm excited because it'll be the first time she's come with me on a trip up in a long time. Between caring for our oldest cat and her cancer she hasn't been able to travel. Both she and the cat are doing well so this time she can make it.

 

[ericm]

Sorry no pics. The excavator finished the final grading and the road last week so I sent word that the fire inspector should come out again. He did the next day, on a Saturday. He texted me from the property to tell me that it looks fine. Today the planing dept called me to tell me that they're going to approve the permit and we just need to get the ag exemption doc and a floor plan in. They did this in a few days and they called me! I'm still overjoyed at how helpful everyone is and how fast stuff happens. This would have taken many months in my county in California. The nice young lady from the planning dept probably did not understand why I thanked her for calling.

Had a video call today with the HVAC contractor and someone from the house builder's firm. We laid out where the mini split air handlers will go. My wife cooks a lot (lucky me!) so we want a good performing ventilation system for the stove. The appliance guy came up with a 1200 cfm in line fan so we won't have a loud fan in the hood, and I found a design for the make up air ducting and placement- basically it comes out of the hood around the inlet. (1200cfm is probably overkill but we can turn it on low when that's all we need)

I think this will work a lot better than having the make up air dump into the room somewhere. With a 1200 cfm fan you need make up air, and with the house being well sealed I would want it anyhow. Without it, if the fan's on and I open the wood stove it could **** smoke into the house.

The HVAC guy is also willing to put a big MERV11 filter on the inlet side of the HRV like I want. The area gets wildfire smoke in the summers and I don't want to just turn the HRV off when its smoky outside. We're fortunate that the design left us a big space above the pantry that can house all this stuff. We didn't plan it that way. The builder's rep suggested that they insulate and sheet rock the area so all the equipment inside will be inside the conditioned envelope, and put in a light and folding stairs so I can get up there easily to change filters or service stuff.

 

[runit]

Great property and build! Can't believe people pay all those fees for plans and permits and testing!

Following!

 

[ericm]

We got the shop permit!

 

[manwithtools]

We got the shop permit!

That was fast!

 

[ericm]

Yes the shop permit was fast once we satisfied the not too many requirements. I think it took the GC a month to get the permit for the house and most of that was waiting for someone from the county to inspect the old house. I think to make sure there was one, as it's supposedly impossible to very hard to put a house on Oregon land zoned for farming that didn't have a house on it, but it's ok to replace an existing house.

The shop building company called me this week to tell me that the materials arrived. They'll be able to start building in a couple weeks.

The company rep told me that it'll take about a month to put up the building. I can't be there the whole time. I'm not sure what parts I should be there for, either to make sure it's done right or because it's interesting.

 

[ericm]

The shifting on my Ibis Ripley mountain bike has sucked since new. It's Sram XX1 mechanical with a 10-50 cassette. No matter how I adjust it, there's a couple shifts in the middle of the cassette that are reluctant. If I adjust so they work ok then its off at one end of the cassette or another and makes noise or won't shift at all. And the largest cog has always been sketchy to shift into. Not a big deal as I rarely use it. My rides are mostly on hills but I'm still strong enough not to need it.

I've checked the hanger alignment a bazillion times, set the B screw with the suspension sagged (what a pain) and tried every different combo of adjustment I can think of. I can make it **** less but it still *****.

I had the idea that Srams electric shifting might work better. Last year there were some decent black friday deals on their higher end parts but I waffled and missed it. I didn't want to pay the list price so I waited for another year. This year the X01 and XX1 deraillleurs didn't go on sale and weren't even easy to find. I did find some GX ones though. Digging into it I found that the only difference between the models is the jockey wheel cage and the wheels. GX has a ****** looking heavy stamped steel cage. X01 is alloy and XX1 has one side in alloy and one in CF. But there are companies making cages for the AXS derailleurs. Hmm.

I wound up finding a deal on a GX upgrade kit with the current "ultimate" shifter. And a reasonably priced alloy cage from a small company in southern Oregon. And some chinese pulleys with ceramic balls that spin much better than the GX ones.

All together the stock parts weigh 436g (derailleur is disassembled, I forgot to weigh them assembled):




And 400g with the replacement cage and wheels (the upper wheel is not mounted, it's just on the scale):



When I was racing I was a weight weenie- my road race bike weighed 12.5 lbs with the lightest wheels I had for it. With power meter and computer mount and bottle cages. I'm no longer racing or as much of a weight weenie but the cheap steel parts would have bugged me. The weight reduction from the cage was less than I'd hoped but they're really sturdy parts. I guess that's to be expected for parts made by downhillers.

Pairing the wireless shifters to the derailleur was painless. Of course I checked the hanger alignment before mounting the new derailleur and it's still dead on. Once mounted the derailleur needed adjustment. Rather than turning a barrel adjuster to change cable tension as with a mechanical derailleur, you press a button on the shifter and then press the upshift or downshift button. Each press moves the entire shift range over .2mm. I set the upper and lower limit screws that keep you from accidentally shifting the chain into the frame or wheel, either of which is bad. Riding around on my driveway it shifted pretty good. But one shift was a little reluctant. I got out the SRAM app and used it to micro adjust the position on one cog. You can tune specific cogs! Can't do that with mechanical.

I haven't done a real ride yet but riding up and down the driveway it's shifting far better then the mechanical one ever did. Even the largest cog is useable. It's as good as the best mechanical shifting on any of my road bikes, all of which have much smaller range cassettes, and fewer cogs, so their shifting is easier.



Yea my bike is dirty. I'm good at wrenching but not so good at cleaning. Since I ride pretty often I don't see a need to clean the bike when it's going to get dirty again next ride.