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http://www.lowes.com/pd_540478-12704-30-...rs#BVRRWidgetID

I was introduced to these ideal connectors by one of our club members (electrician) at camp when we did an addition last summer. Have since put in some new HALO can lights and they were included with the cans. Working on finishing an attic space and using them there. I'm a convert.

You can still pigtail using the ideal connectors. Advantage is if one outlet goes, you don't lose the rest of the circuit. Rarely happens, but may make you feel better.

Yeah... That's the same link I posted earlier in the thread. I'm more than likely going to use them.

Yeah... That's one of the things I like about them you have 3 ports for the wires: One in, one out and one for the pig tail.

Yes, I copied the link. I bought the bag of 4 pin connectors. Lots of times that 4th one isn't needed but its there when I do.

Good idea!

Fairly productive and fun weekend up at the cabin...

I got there on Friday and had stopped at Lowe's and picked up a little 5000 btu unit and promptly went to cutting a hole in the tiny cabin. Did I mention how bad I hate to work with the cement siding...

Anyway framed it in and trimmed it up on the outside and sealed everything and man what a difference... We really take A/C [And hot showers] for granted in this generation.



Worked framing up the lofts Saturday, and by Saturday afternoon Mrs. Irish and I were ready to shower and have a good time. We had a few friends over for some grilled brats and chicken thighs. My buddy Bill brought his old open back 5 string banjo and I had my trusty Applause 6 string guitar. It is really fun picking and playing some songs with old friends and having some good food, good drink and good fellowship.



Table saw as a bar...



I love my little cast iron hibachi grill...



My buddy Bill the banjo picker...



Despite all the booze, eating and having a good time we actually managed to get some work done... Mrs. Irish and I framed both lofts and got the decking and the handrail posts/hangers built. I still have to install some ledge boards under the joists...





It was hot as hell up there. I drank water until I was sick of it and only until I started drinking beer later did I finally have to go pee. Then I switched to whiskey. Seriously in weather like this it is hard to drink enough to stay hydrated.

Looking good. Love seeing the progress on this. Would love to have something like this one day.

That's gonna be real nice when finished!

You pee with beer (and alcohol) cause it suppresses anti-diuretic hormone (ADH). This hormone causes the kidneys to reabsorb water and when it's suppressed they don't do this causing you to pee more. That's why you dehydrate with alcohol.

And damn fine cabin, you got one heck of a view there.

Hahahaha... No kidding. I was fully hydrated before I started drinking beer that evening. Thanks for the post, but I understand the science. Plus I have a wife , and if you have one too, you'd know that they are going to make damn sure you drink enough water and do whatever else you are supposed to be doing.

Thanks Jono,

I'll be honest for a long time I "invested" my discretionary income in toys like sports cars and motorcycles and that was a lot of fun, building them and restoring them, and I made some nice profits on them and had a lot of fun doing it, none of it was long term.

Then on one of our many motorcycle trips together, Mrs. Irish and I were riding around looking at some cabins in the mountains and thinking "Wouldn't it be nice to have one of those..." We'll of course my thinking was, "No way we could ever afford something like that." Of course if you know much about women you'd know that women don't think that way. She was thinking we could actually do it!

I can't tell you how many trips we made to North Georgia and Northeast Alabama looking at land only to have Mrs. Irish go... "No, I don't really like it..." Until we finally lucked into this piece of property and simply got a hell of a deal on it. It took me 53 years and the help of a good woman to get focused to get something like this and it has taken me another 2 years to finally start to get something built other than the tiny cabin. It is still a long row to hoe and we are hoping to have everything finished up, doing most of the work ourselves by Thanksgiving 2017.

We want to get it finished while our parents are still able to enjoy it with us. They're all in their early 80's...

I can tell you from experience if you want to do something like this, you have to really start focusing on it and saving up for it, and then once you can scrape together enough money, start looking hard. There are deals on land out there, but it takes a lot of looking. And then once you find it and buy it, it takes a lot of hard work. I have to be careful when we are up there and schedule short days of work and leave plenty of time to relax and have fun, because I don't want to get Mrs. Irish burned out. She's a good helper, but she has her limits... And it's up to me as a good husband to know what those are...

Thanks for the nice post, you should come up and visit us one day on a weekend and Mrs. Irish and I will give you and your wife a tour and we can talk about land and such.

Thanks... I finally figured out what I'm seeing in the view, with the exception of that little mountain just to the left of center of the view. It's about 10 miles away. The ridge that runs along the horizon is Taylor Ridge over in Georgia and the parts to the extreme left are about 45 miles away. The ridge to the right that drops off is Chief Dirtseller Mountain, and it's about 10 miles away. There's a gap in Dirtseller Mountain on the extreme right and you can see the High Point of Taylor Ridge sticking up and it's at about 1460 ft. elev.

The extreme right is almost due east at about 90 degrees and the extreme left is due northeast at about 45 degrees.

It took me some time, a topo map and my compass to figure that out, because the angle that your viewing everything can play tricks on your eyes. Cell phone compasses can be wonky sometimes. I ended up relying on the sun rise one morning and calculated where it came up on the horizon near the summer solstice, then referenced that on my topo map.

It's been a while so I thought I would give a cabin update...

We didn't do a lot on it this summer, because of the heat and because we did a little travelling on the weekends. Three weekends ago we had a large forest fire up there and had to evacuate Saturday that came to within less than a mile of our cabin. Weekend before last we took my folks to the beach, so this past weekend we were finally able to get some more stuff knocked out.

We picked up the new wood stove from Elder's Ace Hardware in Rome, Ga. It's a small one, but it makes up for it in weight. The two strapping young men at Ace weren't able to get it loaded on the truck and had to resort to a fork lift. Which left me to figure out how Mrs. Irish and I were going to get it up the stairs to the cabin. A little thinking, a ramp, a cable puller and a little ingenuity and it's in there.



It's going to be a perfect fit for the small space:



For anyone thinking of purchasing one of these it is a very well built stove, solid welds, thick steel made in the USA...



Saturday and Sunday Mrs. Irish and I finished up all the wiring. Which mainly consisted of wiring all the overhead lighting and exterior lighting. The fact that we are leaving all the joist exposed adds a certain degree of difficulty in that, because you have to figure out something that will be safe, to code and actually look good.

She wanted canned lights in the kitchen and this is what I eventually figured out. Built boxes and ran conduit to each one. It's going to have a nice industrial, but finished look. She likes it and that's what's important.



Lastly, if you're going to work all day at the cabin, you've got to have some fun, Whiskey, Steaks and some Alabama - LSU football over at my buddy Skip's cabin...



Mrs. Irish is going to get started on the insulation in a couple of weeks and I'm going to start finally working on the exterior trim and siding. Which means it is going to finally start raining...

My next big project is the fiber cement siding, and I have been dreading it, because I hate to work with that stuff. After searching around, I found these shears that seem to be the bees knees. Has anyone ever used these?

Just a few thoughts that I would consider before expanding. A small cabin for vacation or temporary use would be good, but as you get older got to consider other factors. How would travel be for emergency care going down that mountain during inclement weather. Increment weather top of mountain on side of hill not best place to be. You will have to go up and down a mountain for groceries. Not to much growing of crops on a rock. Small cabin idea makes more logic you won't have much invested if you need to vacate or sell. Seen a few people in out of way places run into same situations and just thought I would mention these. Nice small cabin.

We use a similar tool for sheetmetal and they are great, worth every dime.
Do you use nails or screws for Hardy Board?