It’s been a long time coming, but we’re finally wrapping up the entry monument & picnic shelter we built at Erie Highlands for Oakwood Homes. It all started when I began to generate shop drawings and realized the design details on the architectural & structural drawings needed modification.

Once we got all the connections dialed in, we fabricated & pre-assembled the timbers to ensure everything would fit properly once we were on the jobsite. The trickiest part here was getting the forklift out of the shop!

After fitting all the timbers and drilling over 800 holes for the steel plate hardware, we stained the timbers and loaded them up. Fortunately, the jobsite was only a few miles from the shop, but it still took about a half hour to drive the forklift over.

It took a couple of days on site to re-assemble the timbers, install all the steel brackets & hardware, install bracing and prep for post bases. With some tight tolerances at the steel bases and the alignment of threaded rod epoxied into the concrete pier, lifting the main portion of the structure into place was a delicate sequence of events, especially considering it weighed over 10,000 pounds!

Erie Highlands – Monument SunsetAfter a pretty long and exhausting day, the raising was complete. I’m not sure how it happened, but apparently I drew the short straw and got boomed up some 30 feet in the air to unhook the straps! Once I got settled in the harness, it wasn’t too bad – and what an amazing view. A special thanks to Roland Younghein of Rocky Mountain Boom for his direction and more importantly, his patience!

Eventually, the electrician wired up the lights, the mason installed the stone veneers, the sign was hung and the wire mesh was installed. Roughly 9000 pounds of steel brackets, another 1000 pounds of nuts & bolts and over 6,300 board feet of Douglas-Fir timbers went into this structure, not to mention a few weeks of blood, sweat and tears from a great crew. Much thanks to all involved!!

Erie Highlands Picnic Shelter – Erie, CO

 

There were five trusses that were less than the maximum shipping width, which allowed us to deliver them to the jobsite already assembled, also reducing field labor costs. Most of the steel brackets, hangers & hardware were attached prior to booming members into place.

Once the structure was up, we installed approximately 2000 linear feet of 2×6 tongue & groove decking. For added stiffness, a layer of 7/16″ osb sheathing was installed over the decking.

With the tile roof, stone bases and picnic tables installed, we have a finished product!

Upcoming Projects

I haven’t got the chance to get up to Broomfield, but I’ve been informed that the timber entry for Jax Ranch & Home has been installed. I should have a lot of pictures by the next article.