DMiller
Senior Member
First instinct usually gets men injured, baling to clear the machine is not so smart.
I can tell you that you can’t sign in as John Doe or Joe Dirte
So I show up up to tilt some walls up, turns out they are 60' long and 14' high, wood construction. Not only tilt them up, but because of the carpenters poor planning, LIFT them and put them on a hill side, so he could get at the walls underneath. This guy was a joke, and would NOT listen to anything I had to say, so I decided to just do it his way, to a point.
He insisted only 2 points were needed for the lift, though I told him the center would bow, and the ends would droop, and IF I did get it up in one piece, the top plate would just pull off. JUST DO WHAT I TELL YOU, he yelled, OK, no problem. The tilt just started, and one end snapped, turns out he had forgotten to pull the nails that located his top plate on a snapped line, while he framed the wall. AND, he had only broken his top plate and his double top plate by 24", (not even to code) AND..... he had rigged it (his call, not mine, I told him "you built it, you rig it") right where he shouldn't, at the max weakest point. I set it down and turned the rig off and told him that was it, I was outa there. Harsh words were spoken, he used the F word several times, directed at me. I kept my cool and just got annoyed, not angry, as I did not want to set the trusses anyway, this guy was dangerous. I did mention that I had my journeyman carpenter card when he was still in diapers, (we nail benders that now operate need to sometimes let the carpenters we are working for, know that....) and why in the heck he didn't frame that wall in two sections was simply indefensible. I would have left before the failed pick, but a long time trusted contractor had arranged the job, and I didn't want to let HIM down. Turns out, this yahoo was his cousin, and he apologized to me for getting me into the situation, and I am still golden with him. I almost feel bad for giving him enough rope to hang himself, for lifting it the wrong way, but it was the way he demanded it be done and I guess he annoyed me just enough to not feel too bad about the results, just maybe he learned something. I did feel bad about the 4 carpenters, his helpers, that now had a wasted day on their hands because of their boss's ignorance.
I should also mention, that the day was shot anyway, as this was the nearest wall, and most of the others were going to be beyond my load chart capacity, (estimated 3500 pounds, 85' away, not going to happen) with no way to get closer, as I had all kinds of other things in the way and it was a steeply sloped site, he was screwed from the get go due to his poor planning, a broken top plate was the least of problems.
A big frame building collapsed in my area yesterday, 16' high walls, about 60' span. The contractor is one I have worked for many times, including just last week. He called me Monday for this job (I think it was for this job anyway) but I told him I was busy the rest of the week and he got a guy with a BTC boom truck. That operator is good, he just has crap equipment, and at this time I have no idea why the building fell, whether it was the boom truck operators fault or not. The paper mentioned something about the wind, but there really wasn't any all day, (dead calm) and I pay attention to that more then most. Not even any dust devils, but anything is possible. 1 dead, and one critical. I flew over the job site late today and took this picture, which IView attachment 200866 will forward to the contractor at some point, or maybe not.
https://www.eastidahonews.com/2019/...-identifies-man-injured-in-building-collapse/
So I show up up to tilt some walls up, turns out they are 60' long and 14' high, wood construction. Not only tilt them up, but because of the carpenters poor planning, LIFT them and put them on a hill side, so he could get at the walls underneath. This guy was a joke, and would NOT listen to anything I had to say, so I decided to just do it his way, to a point.
He insisted only 2 points were needed for the lift, though I told him the center would bow, and the ends would droop, and IF I did get it up in one piece, the top plate would just pull off. JUST DO WHAT I TELL YOU, he yelled, OK, no problem. The tilt just started, and one end snapped, turns out he had forgotten to pull the nails that located his top plate on a snapped line, while he framed the wall. AND, he had only broken his top plate and his double top plate by 24", (not even to code) AND..... he had rigged it (his call, not mine, I told him "you built it, you rig it") right where he shouldn't, at the max weakest point. I set it down and turned the rig off and told him that was it, I was outa there. Harsh words were spoken, he used the F word several times, directed at me. I kept my cool and just got annoyed, not angry, as I did not want to set the trusses anyway, this guy was dangerous. I did mention that I had my journeyman carpenter card when he was still in diapers, (we nail benders that now operate need to sometimes let the carpenters we are working for, know that....) and why in the heck he didn't frame that wall in two sections was simply indefensible. I would have left before the failed pick, but a long time trusted contractor had arranged the job, and I didn't want to let HIM down. Turns out, this yahoo was his cousin, and he apologized to me for getting me into the situation, and I am still golden with him. I almost feel bad for giving him enough rope to hang himself, for lifting it the wrong way, but it was the way he demanded it be done and I guess he annoyed me just enough to not feel too bad about the results, just maybe he learned something. I did feel bad about the 4 carpenters, his helpers, that now had a wasted day on their hands because of their boss's ignorance.
I should also mention, that the day was shot anyway, as this was the nearest wall, and most of the others were going to be beyond my load chart capacity, (estimated 3500 pounds, 85' away, not going to happen) with no way to get closer, as I had all kinds of other things in the way and it was a steeply sloped site, he was screwed from the get go due to his poor planning, a broken top plate was the least of problems.