Timber-framed outdoor kitchen - Cathead - 1:1 scale

[Cathead]

Another productive day, but only one image. After assembling most of what we'd pre-prepared, it was back to manufacturing. My stepfather spent much of the day carefully setting up a jig to precision-cut all the rafters so they'll drop nicely onto the beams, and finished cutting them as the day ended. I got all the longitudinal angle braces finished and installed; these definitely had some quirks and took some adjustments to fit right. It doesn't look all that different overall, but it's another day closer to completion. We had various other friends and neighbors stop by to help out and socialize; all weekend has been like a grand old neighborhood barn-raising with a nice community of people.

 

Work will stop now for a week, as the reward for a week of hard work is a week of hiking/floating/sightseeing in the Missouri Ozarks and a quick trip to Kansas City. So I won't be getting back to this until early October. But the building is now nice and strong and can wait quietly for me to return.

 

Thanks for reading, take care, looking forward to being able to update again in a week or so.

[mtaylor]

Looks good. Have a great week of trips and relaxation.  All of you working on this deserve it.

[Cathead]

And the rafters are installed. Here they are fully notched and ready to go:

I started with the outermost pairs:

Then worked my way inward, to help ensure everything lined up ok. A few had to be adjusted to fit, but nothing major. Here's the finished rafters:

And here's a shot in the other direction with a nice maple starting to turn:

[Cathead]

And for those interested, and since the rules are looser here in Shore Leave, here are a few photos from our quick trip down into the Missouri Ozarks.

 

Canoeing along the spring-fed Current River within the Ozark National Scenic Riverways, including the wonderful Cave Spring, accessible by canoe.

Alley Spring Mill, one of the most well-known historic sites in the Ozarks:

Otters playing in the clear waters of Round Spring:

Tumbling waterfalls; deep, clear water along the Black River; and prairie grasses on a ridgetop glade, at Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park:

 

Fabulous granite formations and a granite-walled enginehouse from an old quarrying railroad at Elephant Rocks State Park:

And technically not the Ozarks, but part of our recreational reward nonetheless, a Major League Soccer game in Kansas City, in which a dominant home win eliminated one of our greatest rivals from playoff contention.

 

My stepfather's back home now, so it's up to me and Mrs. Cathead to finish the rest of this project!

[Paul Le Wol]

Beautiful cook house Eric. I think I can already smell that brisket smoking 

[Canute]

Neat looking old mill on your trip, Eric. Recently restored?

 

We're just getting some color here in the Smokies. Expecting a lot of day trippers looking at the leaves.

[Cathead]

Ken, Alley Spring Mill was built in 1894 but has been in good condition for a long time. The site became a Missouri state park in 1925 and eventually was turned over to the National Park Service when Ozark National Scenic Riverways was formed in the 1960s.

 

Here are the results from a partial day of work. I cut and installed all the purlins on both sides; note the brilliant fall colors on both maple and walnut in afternoon sun.

And if you look close in that photo you see that I got started on the roofing as well. I cut metal roofing panels to length using a circular saw.

These went up pretty quickly. I got most of one side done before it was time to stop and make dinner. Here you can also see how this will fit nicely with the house itself, since I'm using the same panels as are on the house (making use of leftovers).

Here are a couple neat photos Mrs. Cathead took toward the end of the day. She saw pretty clouds behind me, and though I'm somewhat obscured, they have an artistic feel. The second one shows more fall color developing here.

Thanks for looking in, more progress should occur in coming days.

[Canute]

Framing looks great and I like that metal roof. 👍

[Roger Pellett]

Very Nice!

[Cathead]

The roof is on!

 

 

I would have updated this last night, but after finishing the roof I went up to harvest pears in our orchard and was stung on my left palm by a yellow jacket. The hand swelled up badly and felt like someone had driven a nail through it. Even this morning it's mostly unusable, being painful, stiff, and curled into a claw-like form. It's not getting any worse and should go down over the next day or two, but it's making me frustratingly impaired right now. Same hand as my last injury, so lots of unwelcome deja vu.

 

In theory my next step is to add gutters but that'll have to wait now since I have no grip strength in one hand. So in lieu of any updates on that front, here's a photo of the offending pears and a wider shot of more fall colors from the upper orchard. The near tree is a peach, and the pear and apple trees are mostly obscured behind a line of sumac. If you look closely you can see the huge teepees of bird netting that are required to get fruit to harvest here; birds destroyed hundreds of pears before we finally wrapped the trees (an awful job on a very muggy late summer day).

 

 

 

Thanks for following along.

[Keith Black]

Nicely done, Eric. Very Impressive. 

[mtaylor]

Sorry to hear about the hand and the sting.  Not fun when they sting you.   The kitchen is looking good and so are the pears.   I've never seen them cover the pear trees here and we have miles and miles of orchards all over the valley.  Some places though did use "bird cannon"... fired a charge of natural gas if I remember right and that kept the birds away.  Haven't heard one going off in a long time though.

[Baker]

Very nice work. 

The fruit looks delicious

[Cathead]

Made a start on the pizza oven itself. First step was to build a concrete block foundation, over which a concrete hearth will be poured to support the oven itself.

 

Loose-stacking blocks in the basic shape:

Adding the angled support over the front gap. This allows access to the interior for firewood storage:

Closeups of how I built the overhang. Two parallel steel angles spanning the gap, with concrete blocks set onto them:

I ground away a notch on either side of the blocks so they'd sit on the steel angles with their tops flush with the other blocks:

Overhead view. I carefully broke another block to fill the angle on either side:

Next, I filled each corner with concrete, inserting rebar. These stick up a few inches to help anchor the hearth onto the foundation:

It'll be a few weeks before I'm able to pour the hearth. Not only will I be very busy, but we need a stretch of warm weather for the hearth concrete to set properly. Look for more updates in mid-November, hopefully.

 

Thanks for reading!

[Cathead]

No progress on the oven. We went on a 16 day camping/hiking trip down into the Ouachita Mountains of central-western Arkansas. The weather in our region was glorious and warm for all of that, would've been perfect for pouring a concrete slab and finishing up the oven, but we weren't home. Then just the other day a major cold front blew through, dropping us from a record high over 80 ºF to below freezing now. Going to be near or below freezing for at least the next 10 days, so all the oven work is on hold.

 

I did get my first deer of the season, allowing us to inaugurate the kitchen building for one of its intended uses, as an improved butchering site. We used to just hang deer from a tree, but were looking forward to hanging (and working) within this structure. Here's me with the harvest and Mrs. Cathead starting on the skinning.

 

However, we decided after this that we needed to change plans. It just isn't going to work to process deer in here once the oven and related grill are built. Not only won't there be much space, but it'll be pretty hard to keep the nicer food-prep surfaces clean when we have to hose off carcasses and so on. In our heads the work space was larger than it is in practice when a big animal is hanging there. Plus it'll be hard to fully clean the floor of drippings and droppings.

 

So I came up with a new solution, influenced by a discussion of ship's boats and davits on @mbp521's beautiful USS Cairo log (discussion starts with this post). I built an extension of the main roof beam that acts like a davit for a block and tackle, that will let us hang carcasses securely from the building, but outside of the main food prep area so mess isn't a problem. This way any mess and wash water just drains into the ground, and we realized we don't really need roof cover because I don't hunt (and thus don't do initial butchering) on rainy/snowy days. At worst we can hang a tarp or sheeting along the side of the kitchen to keep mess away from the cooking areas while processing. And we can always still hang a dressed carcass under cover for a few days if the weather is good, when mess isn't a problem anymore.

Notice how I've got the block & tackle secured to the king post using a bungee cord? That was especially influenced by the Cairo discussion regarding whether/how tackles were secured on Civil War ironclads. This way I can leave the gear out without wind whipping it around and tangling it. Now I just need to get another deer!

 

If/when we get a warm spell, oven-building will go back on the agenda. Until then, thanks for reading. 

 

 

[mbp521]

Wow Eric!  I know I am late to the party on this one. For some reason I was not getting any updates on people that I follow and I had no idea you had this log going on. I need to go in and check my settings to figure out what’s going on. 
 

I must say that you, Mrs. Cathead and your stepfather have done a beautiful job on the outdoor kitchen, and I am extremely envious. I have the plans for one of my own (not near as fancy) it’s just getting the time to do it with all the other projects that I have lined up. So glad that our davit discussion provided some inspiration for your game hanger. 
 

I love the Ozark’s, one of the places I miss most about living in in Arkansas. Way back when, we used to do a lot of camping and canoeing up there, but haven’t done it since moving to Texas 24 years ago. So many beautiful places to go and see. 
 

Now that I know this is here I’ll be following along. 
 

-Brian

[Canute]

Nice work with your crossbow. Well done on your work area.

[Baker]

Nice work and enjoy your meal 👍

[Cathead]

Got deer #2 this morning and achieved proof of concept for the new processing davit added to the kitchen in the last post. Works great to hang just outside the main structure, more room to work and easier to clean up. Still waiting on the right combination of warm weather and sufficient free time to get back to building the grill and oven, but at least the structure is starting to earn its keep. 

 

[mbp521]

Nice quarry Eric. Looks like the freezer is beginning to get stocked. 
 

-Brian

[Baker]

Do you need a special permit to hunt where you live?

Here, in Belgium, there is a rule for everything. i need a license for hunting.

I am not allowed to process the killed animal myself.

and for the outdoor kitchen I must of course also apply for a building permit.

Rules,rules,rules 😳 in this small country.

[Cathead]

Patrick, it depends on where you live. In general I would guess that much of the US is far more open and rule-free than most of Europe, but there are urban areas that would probably feel very similar to you. And the US is a huge and diverse country that devolves a lot of power to its states, and they do to their counties, so there's a lot of room for variation. I mean, my state of Missouri alone has six times the land area of Belgium and a very wide range of landscapes from rugged mountainous terrain to flat prairies to rolling farmland. Population-wise, we're half the size of Belgium but have counties ranging from a million people to less than two thousand.

 

Hunting permits are regulated at the state level, but vary by county. As far as I know, every state requires some kind of permit, but they're not difficult to acquire. Rules vary widely on how many deer you can take, what kind, etc. depending on local/regional conditions. For example, in some parts of Missouri there are limits on how many deer you can take but in my county there are none (more specifically, unlimited does, still limited to two bucks). Given that I saw twelve of the darned things just yesterday morning, that's good. Also here in Missouri, the first two landowner hunting permits are free and after that they're $7. Which is fine since the funds go to support our very highly regarded Conservation Department. Fees are different if you're not hunting on your own land (we have extensive public lands open to hunting here in Missouri) but they're still affordable and accessible to residents. It's a lot more expensive if you're from out of state, but that's fine with me.

 

As for processing yourself, did you mean it's banned at the national level, or that you can't do it in your specific location? In the US, local regulations might prevent you from processing an animal in certain settings (like the front yard of an urban house) but there's no basic national/state restriction on the right to do so. If anyone tried a rule like that in the rural US it would be universally disdained and ignored.

 

As for the kitchen, again it depends on where you live. In general, the more urban the more restrictive, and the more rural the more permissive. My county does not require permits for structures below a certain footprint, such as this kitchen. Such freedom cuts both ways; it's nice to not go through layers of bureaucracy, but there's also a risk of neighbors doing obnoxious things. For example, in a neighboring rural county with no building rules, someone built a giant horse barn and arena right on their property line very close to another house, and the dust/smell/noise caused major problems for the adjacent house and undermined their property value and resale ability, leading to some nasty lawsuits. No rules works best when everyone's a respectful good neighbor, but it doesn't always work that way.

Edited November 27, 2022 by Cathead

[Baker]

thank you for explaining.

It would be a mess in this small densely populated country if there were no rules.

But our national "hobbies" are : avoid taxes as much as possible and to interpret the rules as broadly as possible .

You can freely buy an air rifle, but you are not allowed to shoot it, even  in your own garden

But, If I shoot a pigeon in my garden with that thing, my neighbor won't mind. A pigeon less that dont sh..t on our roofs anymore he thinks then.

And that pigeon, it goes into the soup, without feathers and intestines of course😋.

ps, please don't tell anyone 🤣

[Keith Black]

 Eric, have you thought about putting a dry well in where you hang your deer? It would allow the blood to soak into the ground deeper and when you wash up the runoff doesn't run everywhere. 

[Cathead]

Keith, interesting thought. Initially we were just going to lay some gravel and/or wood mulch there and haven't gotten to it yet, but that was before we made that the butchering area. It's worth considering now that we've shifted operations there, we could dig that out a bit and layer in more gravel. We'll give it some thought.

[Cathead]

We soared to 71ºF (22ºC) here today, quite a change from lows below 0ºF (-18ºC) last week. That broke today's old record high by a full 4º! So I took a day off and got a bunch done on the outdoor kitchen project, which has been otherwise dormant during a long stretch of cold weather and general busy life. This update will come in two posts since there are two very different accomplishments.

 

First I made some upgrades to the structure, primarily by adding a gutter along the west side that feeds a downspout that feeds another gutter carrying water away to the southeast and lowest corner of the landscape. This will keep rain off the main entrance into the structure. I might or might not add a gutter to the east side. Like the roofing, all the gutter/spout materials were salvaged from last summer's work on our house for reuse here, rather than buying new material.

 

Remember that deer-hanging davit I added on the north side? I wanted to protect that wood, and the pulleys, by adding a small roof extension over it. I used an old piece of roof cap, again left over from the house project and matching what's already on the main kitchen roof. I cut three triangular wedges to match the cap angle and screwed them in place onto the beams:

 

 

Then I simply popped the metal roof cap on and attached it with roofing screws:

 

Ties the whole thing together nicely. In the next post I'll describe progress on the pizza oven, a preview of which you can see in the last photo above.

 

 

 

 

Edited December 29, 2022 by Cathead

[Cathead]

Now for part 2, progress on the pizza oven itself. Here's a reminder of where that's been dormant since October:

 

The next overall step is to pour a 3.5" concrete slab over the whole top to provide a solid base for the oven itself. Before that can be done, I needed to provide a base that spans the inside hole, block the open holes within the concrete blocks, and build a form around the outside.

 

Step 1: Interior

 

I built a frame of scrap pine 2x4s (all pine used in these steps was also saved/salvaged from the porch work this summer). This fits snugly in the interior and will support a piece of Hardiebacker concrete board that will seal the opening. Notice that it's recessed about 3/8" below the surface of the concrete blocks to allow the board to fit reasonably flush with the upper surface.

 

This is supported by scrap pine supports underneath, set up on thin wedges. There's no hardware anywhere, it's all cut to fit tightly and hold together on its own. Once the concrete is set, I'll knock out the lower wedges and all the parts should disassemble themselves from below. That's the goal, anyway.

 

Here's another view:

Step 2: Exterior framing

 

Next I built the framing that will form the outer walls of the concrete slab. The slab is meant to be 3.5" thick, so I first built a lower layer of 2x4s flush with the concrete blocks, but adjusted to be absolutely level using shims:

 

You can see that the foundation slopes to the south (following the base slab), so the wooden frame appears to tilt upward to the south. No big deal, it'll be slightly thicker at that end.

 

Once this was in place, and level and tight to my satisfaction, I added a second layer of 2x4s to create the actual walls of the concrete form:

I then screwed on cleats to connect the two levels of framing into a solid mass. I also screwed on extra 2x4s horizontally to the upper frames, to help ensure that they don't bend outward under any pressure from the concrete:

Step 3: Blocking the interior holes

 

I still needed to block the remaining interior holes in the concrete blocks, which I didn't want/need to do with solid material like gravel or concrete as that would be too much expense and work. So I made a series of wooden plugs nailed onto thin supports, using scrap cedar from on-farm-milled lumber (like the rest of the kitchen). These drop into each hole and fit closely enough that I can use masking tape to seal off the remaining gaps:

These will be forever entombed but I don't care, they're scrap wood that would go onto a bonfire otherwise. And here's a view of the finished result:

 

All that's needed now is to cut the filler board for the center and tape over all the smaller openings. But I won't do that until we're close to pouring, which could be anywhere from the next two weeks to the next two months depending on weather.

 

It's really exciting to get this step done as it creates a feeling that we're much closer to having an oven, even that if that could still be months away. But now we can take advantage of the first long-enough warm spell to pour the slab with very little further prep. I already have six bags of concrete in the garage just biding their time...

 

Thanks for your continued interest in this slow-moving project!

 

[Cathead]

I took advantage of a few warm days last weekend to add an arbor off the west side of the structure. As a reminder, here's the original digital model showing one theoretical approach to this. I ended up using far fewer rafters/beams as the goal is just to grow and train some shady vines up onto it. 

 

 

Step one was to set up the two outer corner posts. I built a mock-up using braces to make sure I got my dimensions, design, and post locations right. The plan was to set the two posts using a metal bracket that pounds into the ground, avoiding the need for any post-hole drilling or other foundation work. I've used these before for light-duty construction, they're great. Image below from Lowes:

 

 

I notched both the posts and the cross-beam so they'd fit tightly together and make the joint stronger and more symmetrical:

 

And here's the main frame erected and temporarily braced for stability:

 

I added a couple angle braces for extra stability:

 

 

I then measured, notched, and cut each of the six rafters individually, as the structure isn't perfectly square. Here are the outer two installed; I did these first to stabilize the structure:

 

And here's the final version with all six rafters:

 

It'll be fun to get the vines growing this spring, hopefully we can get some nice shade there on the western side to keep the summer sun from blazing in to the main kitchen late in the afternoon.

 

[Jack12477]

Eric what species of wood are those beam/posts with that beautiful purple hue ? Is that Purpleheart ? Or ??

[Paul Le Wol]

Very nice Eric, we used to grow climbing beans on a similar structure. They were  finished producing just when you wanted to have the sun warming you up again. Of course our climates might be a little different.