8' x 16’ + 4' V nose "Take A Kid Outdoors" House Build

[Chad Holst]

Wow, finally got some work done on the house. It was hard over the holidays to get it in the shop. My bud mike and I worked on the house from about 1 to 6. Then I continued till 9 or so. Finished the propane box and mounted it. The we got to work cutting and installing foam and insulation. The ceiling is now insulated and we have about half of the walls done.

We should be to the point that the sunflower will keep it warm on the inside so I can work on it after work and not have to wait for the shop to be available. This should really speed things along. Our painter is back from vacation so I may be able to get it in this week to have the exterior painted.

I'll try and get some pics posted of the progress.

[calli4120]

I just read thought the entire post and just had to say you have done some very nice work. Wish I was closer so I could lend a hand getting the house ice ready.

Please keep the pictures comming!

[Chad Holst]

Thanks Calli4120, I appreciate it.

The next few steps are pretty easy and straight forward, but then we have to get the interior wall in and start framing out the cabinets and oven/stove, furnace area, batteries, converter and invertor area.

I really wish i could find a local guy that is good with cabinets that wouldnt mind spending some time on it.

[Chad Holst]

Quick update, paint got pushed back a bit, hope to take it in tonight or thursday. Then the interior build will start. Total build time on the house has been 5 days in the shop.

We recieved a donation from Rollie Brant and Wild Wings publishing. They are donating 3 kid ice fishing prints for the house and some extras for prizes at the event.

I will post pictures of the painted house soon.

[Chad Holst]

The House was dropped off at the painter on Thursday night, he said it will be completed on Tuesday or Wednesday of this week. We had to change the outside plan a bit. Originally we were going to do flat black on the smooth siding and then paint the Diamond plate red, however he informed us that all the aluminum needs to be sanded first, or the paint will not stick. He is able to do the smooth sides now, but wont be able to do the diamond plate until summer, as it has to be sand blasted. So we will see if the flat balck and Biamond plate looks good, if not then we will have the plate painted this summer.

We had concerns that we wouldnt be able to logo the house for a few weeks, as it cures and releases the gases, but he uses a special type of curing paint that will be cured by the time we pick it up! Thats great news as we are getting close to our dead line and the graphics company has alot of logos to put on.

We had a meeting with the Ronald McDonald House staff today. We worked on schedules and how we will partner our organization with their kids and families to get them out on the ice. Afterwards they gave us a tour of the house...it is amazing. They are doing a very special thing for families with sick kids. I'm proud to be able to offer our organization to them. This ice house is going to be pretty special. We plan to have it completed by Friday Feb 7th. We will be setting it up at Lowes on the 8th or 9th in Rochester, to hand out flyers for our event the following week and to hand out free hot cocoa to their customers for a few hours, as a way to thank them for the sponsorship Lowes gave us.

On with the build:

We dont have the house right now, so we worked on small things this weekend. We planned out the beds and purchased wood for the bed frames. We cut the 4 pads for the matresses and they will be getting new covers made by Judi Stevens. We went with 26" wide for the 2 beds that fold down from the sides of the house. 34" for the rear top bunk. We have not cut the bottom pads yet, as we have to messure the table/bench area again when we get the house back.

Since the top rear bunk is not as long as the house is wide, we have decided to center the bunk in the middle of the rear and then build cabinets down both sides.

The plan is to have the house back Wednesday at the latest and to finish insulating the walls by friday, then we can start car siding the inside this weekend.

I will post pictures when the house gets back.

[JosMN]

House looks great. I personally would leave the diamond plate as is. If you do plan on going red with it, I would just vinyl wrap it in red. Lot more cost effective. A good install and it will last for years. Aluminum is one of the toughest things to paint.

Normal paint curing now days only take 3-5 days. I do graphics/wraps for a living and once our paint isn't tape tracking, its game on for my installs. No failures yet and I have been doing it for 12 years on over the road charter coaches.

[Chad Holst]

JosMn,

I agree, im thinking it will look great without it, as we have ALOT of diamond plate on it and it looks nice.

House should be back from paint today. We will finish insulating panels and then start hanging car siding.

Need peoples opinion: We can either do a 30" regular pre-hung door $45(plus trim) for the bathroom or we can do a bi-fold 30" door($25) plus trim. which style would you guys use? I am thinking the regular door will look better, but like the idea of keeping the door open without having to vent the door for heat in the bathroom and still not taking up alot of room with a door sticking out into the house.

[09ultra]

What a project and for a great cause!!Looks amazing

[Chad Holst]

Aghh. Still waiting on the house to get back from paint. I took today off just to work on the house for 4 straight days, and now it seems I wont even have it home.

I did pick up a Deep Cell Battery yesterday and a fire extinguisher.

We also have a new sponsor that is going to be helping with some electrical items we will be needing for the power system.

Have a great weekend everyone. Tight Lines.

[Chad Holst]

Finally got the house back from the painter. (sorry for the poor pictures at night. Flat black if you cant see it on pictures)

Here are a few pictures and the completion of foaming the inside and getting ready to car side the walls.

Pictures are not posting right...hmm. A bit small.

Every time I look at it I cant believe how tall it is. I love the added height for the wall space for beds, but dang its a big girl.

[Chad Holst]

Put some long nights into the house this week and spend 38 of the last 42 hours trying to get as much done before the event next weekend.

Here are some pictures of the progress:

during the week we were able to get the counter cut up, and framed in, added the stove/oven. put in the bathroom door and put car siding on non cabinet areas. We will add the final 45 degree corner car siding after the power is done being hooked up.(that piece serves as an access to the wires, if we ever have an issue.)

This is from Friday night-Sunday night.

to be continued....

[Chad Holst]

...continued:

We still need to stain ceiling, but may wait until we get the cabinets done and the house closer to being finished. The ceiling will be a natural color.

here is what the logo on the house will look like:

[Chad Holst]

Thought i would post a few things about the build over the last week. The good the bad and the ugly.

We have re-thought out lay out of the beds, back bench/table/seats and the placement of the 32" TV.

For those that are building out a house like this, i would recommened drawing out EVERYTHING first, then do it a second time, then take that drawing to a finished house and imagine what goes where, then draw it again...lol.

When you are dealing with this tight of a space, everything effects something else. As an example, we had to change the TV location from the front of the house, near the bathroom door, to the wall on the door side. Because of this we had to move the bed, which meant we had the outlet in the rear of the house in the wrong spot to not cover the outlet when the bed is down.

Anyway...what we decided to do...

We realized we would not have enough leg room under the table, for 4 people to sit facing each other. We also didnt like how far the rear set-up stuck out into the floor plan. it would have been hard to manuever a wheel chair back there. We also would not have had any "table seating" for a wheelchair occupant. So we decided to make a full bench seat all the way across the back of the house (8 feet), then put a flip up section on the front of the bench to allow the back cushions to be added to the seat to make a full bed. Like this:

It will also be nice to have the large storage area under the bench incase we need to transport any bodies.

For the table, we will put the post in front of the bench, so that the back side has the bench to sit on, and the front can be a wheelchair, or a regular chair for sitting on that side. Then when not in use, it can be stored on the side, with clips. Like this:

We decided, for added wall space, to elliminate the bed above the back table, and just do 2 lower baeds at the rear, on the side walls. This gave us more room for our wall art, TV, cabinets and rod holders.

I am still milling over the built in tackle box/display case, but i have figured out the bait well situation.

More to come.

[Lip_Ripper Guy]

For those that are building out a house like this, i would recommened drawing out EVERYTHING first, then do it a second time, then take that drawing to a finished house and imagine what goes where, then draw it again...lol.

This is the exact advice I give everyone wanting to build a house. SketchUP is super easy to use, and free. You will save time. You will save money.

For my last build I had four different layouts drawn on graph paper. Then I decided on the floor plan, and put everything in SketchUp.

From there I drew the floor plan, the framing plans for all 5 walls and roof, siding plan (for bends, and to make sure all the overlaps landed on studs), electrical layouts including where the wire would run, and cabinet plans. I also was able to figure out exactly how to cut each steel stud to eliminate as much waste as possible. When I was done, I ended up with (1) 3' piece of tube steel, and maybe (6) pieces less than 6" long!

All told, the drawings probably took 15-20 hours, but saved me from having any of the scenarios that Chad outlined above. I saved a pile of money by being as efficient as possible with studs, siding, and diamond plate.

[eagle_3464]

This is why I am designing everything in SolidWorks before anything gets cut. My wife keeps asking when I am going to start building? I tell her not until I have everything designed in. I want to know exactly where the center of gravity is so that I can place the wheels on my frame and have the balance just right without too much weight on the tongue. It's been a long process but I want it done right the first time. Great project for a great cause Chad.

[Chad Holst]

No time to add much text, but thought you guys may want to see the outside. We have that ready for the big Event this weekend. I'll post more of the inside when I get some much needed sleep.

Have a great weekend.

[BartmanMN]

The logos really pop on that black. Looks good.

[OutlawBiz]

The shack turned out great!Just out of curiosity...how did the guys at the Lodge (Team Lodge) help you out? They are a GREAT group of guys & produce an incredible shack. They are built right here town. In fact, I actually designed their logo and produce their shack graphics / decals etc. In fact their logo is what caught my eye on your shack.

Sounds like a great program you are offering to the kids as well. Nice job!

[randerson]

They supplied the Frame

[eagle_3464]

Very nice looking house. Congrats to you and your team of workers on this project an a huge thanks to all the sponsors that made it possible. I wish I was a kid because that is going to be one enjoyable house.

[RiverChuckNorris]

Absolutely AWESOME! Your time and effort is an amazing testament the kind of man/fisherman we should all hope to aspire to. Thanks

[Chad Holst]

Sorry for the long delay in replying. We had our Event on Saturday and have been busy with that and the work that comes after the event.

About the event. We got hit with a winter storm. I snowed...it blew and it got cold. But we still ended up with 701 participants this year. So even though it wasnt the 1,200 we hoped for, to make us the largest, we still had an improvment over last year. With good weather i am convinced we would have had atleast 1,200. The media really did a great job this year. The Ice house project made the front page of the paper monday in Rochester, KTTC did a few great stories and FOX ran a nice piece on SAturday/Sunday.

Team Lodge: They are TOP NOTCH. We had requested to get a wheel system from Lodge, to go on the frame we had steel to build. He said to just bring him the steel and they gave us a completed frame! THEN...he proceeded to give us windows, LP hook ups, a Battery Door and is sending us a 20,000 BTU furnace. They were a HUGE sponsor for the house. Between them and Lowes, we recieved a major portion of the needed materials.

Infact Team Lodge was planning on bringing over a Show house and stage for the event but Dave's dad had a heart attack on Thursday and he ended up flying down to AZ for that. (sounds like he was going to be ok)

Dave said the furnaces came in last week, so he is shipping it out now. We can then start on the front of the house and the cabinets, etc.

[Chad Holst]

Quote:

The logos really pop on that black. Looks good.

Thanks. Alot of people doubted the flat black would look good... but i think it worked perfect for what we were doing.

Same goes for the Diamond plate. Everyone like the diamond plate chrome, but we are sand blasting it this spring/summer and it will be painted red. I think it will really look good with the flat black and then red boarder. I dont want anyone to think this was a factory made house. i think that color scheme will set it apart.

Now if we can get the interior ready for 1 good weekend of fishing before ice out...i will be very happy.

It sleeps well. We stayed in it Friday night, to keep an eye on all the equipment on the ice for Saturdays event. No heater and -5 degrees. We did have a very small electric heater to keep it from getting dangerously cold, but the water bottles were slushed up in the morning. Brrr.

We will also find out how well my carpet square edges will hold up to the water from melted snow/slush. We had already dropped the house when we decided to pop holes, just for looks...and we got slush everywhere. For any new house owners. drill the holes first, THEN drop the house....lol. Rookies..

My guys think im crazy, but i already wish it was bigger and am talking about how we will do the next one. I see a fleet of "Memories Of Hope Ice house"s in our future....long future...but in the future.

I suppose we should first worry about how we are gonna pull the first one we built around...as the cheap jeep isnt gonna take much more of the abuse.

I'll post as we get interior sorted and moved along.

[aczr2k]

The house is coming along nicely, its looking great. Pickup a catch cover slush bucket, they really do work great.