Saturday, July 12, 2008

Jim fixed

I forgot all about skype Saturday interfering with my mental regimen. So just a squify sketch. When I thought about putting the pole up, something about the structure and the action of inserting bolts made me think of it from a particular angle. That is to say, pushing the pole against the pillar. While I was sitting on the neighboring shingle roof soaking up the sun in a break from drilling holes, I realized that the roof was the perfect platform to work from. We just had to put one bolt through on the bottom plate, then we could use that as a hinge so that both of us could push the pole up from the side into a vertical position and slip in one more bolt through the top plate to stabilize the thing.
It worked perfectly, the only danger I could forsee was pushing the thing over too far and losing our grip at the last minute, so I pushed one twelve foot long 2x4 in at the top just under the blue metal roof and clamped it on to the pillar to act as a stop, just in case.
Nothing very dramatic in the concept, but I was impressed by how simple the problem became when my brain changed the angle of approach. From the front to the side, and then visualized the hinging potential of the bolt put in while all the weight of the pole was supported by us standing safely on the neighboring roof. The old Sub C at work as usual I suppose.