{"id":4379,"date":"2026-05-27T13:01:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T20:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/?p=4379"},"modified":"2026-05-28T07:34:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T14:34:12","slug":"the-pleasure-of-getting-a-final-inspection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/?p=4379","title":{"rendered":"The pleasure of getting a final inspection"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Building a building is a complicated and lengthy process. I have been experiencing this experience full-time for the past half year. And, before that I was experiencing the experience of getting a building permit, and before that I was experiencing the experience of hiring structural engineers and civil engineers and soils engineers to get the drawings necessary to get the aforementioned building permits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This is my finished shop building, located on the shores of Burro Lake.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I did a lot of the drawings myself, which saved me a lot on overall costs. The structural and civil engineering was done by licensed engineers. I was able to do the electrical and some of the site plan work myself. I learned a lot about how buildings are engineered and built.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also learned about how local building departments work, which is to say I learned to be very patient. It took about two years to get the building permits I needed to begin construction. Then I was forced to move the building, so I had to return to the building department and apply for a modification to the permit. That was a short but painful process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once all those were in-hand, I hired a contractor, who hired a grading man, and that man delivered a tractor to the site, and within minutes was pushing soil around. In the following days, he moved 150 cubic yards of soil out of a hole he made in the hillside. Then, into that hole he put 150 cubic yards of non-exapansive soil. He followed that with some sand and some top soil and about 600 back-and-forth trips with a sheep\u2019s foot machine to compact it. A soils engineer stood by, watching, and occasionally pounding a radioactive probe into the soil to measure the density.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When it reached a certain density \u2013 measured in pounds per cubic foot \u2013 she shouted \u201cOK!\u201d and they stopped.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This is the front of the shop showing the 14-foot roll-up door. It will allow me to fly a Zeppelin through the door and into the shop.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the weeks that followed, they covered the site with a sheet of waterproof plastic, and added sand on top of that, and compacted it again. Somewhere in there, the grading contractor dug trenches for the pipes that would eventually deliver electricity and compressed air, and take away sawdust. It was quite fascinating. Also expensive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In January, nine cement trucks drove to the site and unloaded thair contents into a concrete pump, which pushed the liquid into a crane, and out into the forms that had been laid on the site. There was also about a million yards of re-bar in the forms. In less than five hours the pad was finished. I posted a time-lapse video of this here. You can watch a time-lapse video of the cement delivery and form-filling here.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the weeks that followed, various teams of builders arrived to do their part of the work: erecting the steel building, installing insulation, pulling wire through conduits, installing lighting, plugs and fire sprinklers. We ran a large high-pressure water main from the tank on the hill above to provide firefighting water to the building. And, eventually, it took shape.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A week ago Wednesday, an inspector from the Building Department arrived to make the final inspection. Which we passed. So the building is now complete. But it\u2019s empty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This is the interior of the shop building. I emptied it so that I can coat the floors with polyurea resin. That involves a lot of cleaning and preparation. Left-of-center is my new rolling ladder, which gives me access to the mezzanine where I will store lumber and supplies.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The entire process took six months and five days. It was costly. But with the millions I have made from this blog (I\u2019ve never made a dime on this blog), cost is meaningless. It\u2019s just pocket change!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This morning my contractor and I removed everything from the interior of the shop in preparation for my applying a floor coating. That is several days of work, starting with soap and water, followed by an acid wash, a primer and a final coat of polyurea. It will take me about a week to finish that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, then, after it dries for a few days, I\u2019ll move my tools into their new home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Building a building is a complicated and lengthy process. I have been experiencing this experience full-time for the past half year. And, before that I was experiencing the experience of getting a building permit, and before that I was experiencing … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,960,30,963],"tags":[63,64,1025,1112,1021,1114],"class_list":["post-4379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventures","category-building-things","category-technology","category-woodworking","tag-blognosticator","tag-brian-lawler","tag-construction","tag-olympia-steel-buildings","tag-steel-building","tag-wood-working-shop"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4379"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4379\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4388,"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4379\/revisions\/4388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelawlers.com\/Blognosticator\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}