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damontOkay, for this next bit of the project we return to the right side wall for the area above the French doors, and between them and the main back wall of the house. To go above the French doors I would need two trapezoids and an irregular pentagon. I cut the smaller trapezoid because it needed to go in first, and then went on to cut the second trapezoid. Except that somewhere in there I made a mistake in measurement, and the two sides that were supposed to abut each other weren't the same length -- off by about a centimeter. So I erred on the side of caution and recut the angle so those sides matched.
This turned out to be compounding the oops, as the mistake in measurement had led me to cutting the second trapezoid too short on that side. So now, after dry-fitting the two sections, I had a very skinny rhomboidal gap at the top of the panels. HEAVY SIGH. After very careful measurement I cut out two very skinny triangles, removed the right-hand trapezoid, inserted the one triangle and banged it into place with a bit of scrap 2x4 (that scrap got used as a hammer, or as something for a hammer to hit, multiple times during this project).
I fastened in the first trapezoid after that, put up the second trapezoid again and rested it on the flashing, then slowly moved it into place with my right hand while holding that second skinny triangle in place with my left hand. Everything went together neatly in the end, and while I had a really ugly 4-way intersection of two unsightly seams, I also knew that Caulk Covers A Multitude Of Sins, and this is one such.
Next I had to cut the pentagonal piece -- really just a rectangle with the upper left corner cut off. Measurement had to be careful here to the shiplapped side edge came JUST over the right side edge of the French door frame's side flashing. This way the edge of the long strip (between the doors and the main house) would mate up with it properly. Thankfully that went off without a hitch, and now that wall looked like this.
(Right side wall, all panels installed EXCEPT between the French doors and the main back wall of the house. Click to enlarge.)
Next I had to cut the small rectangle that would eventually go in the bottom corner up against the main house. Before I installed that I would need to make a cutout -- more on that later -- but I needed the piece cut so I could support the long strip without needing hands, while I used said hands to nail and screw that strip in place.
That ended up taking longer than I expected, as I had to take the long strip down a couple times and shave off the cut edge to match spots where the main wall of the house wasn't straight. (Settling is, after all, very much a thing after 50 years, and settling never happens evenly. NEVER.) But eventually, with the aid of that small rectangle, a rubber mallet, the sledgehammer, and the aforementioned scrap of 2x4, the long strip was correctly positioned and fastened in place. I then removed the bottom rectangle for measuring and cutting out the outlet box, but that's a story for another day.
At the end of that particular day here's what it looked like. Click on the thumbnail for the full size photo.
(Right side wall, all panels installed EXCEPT in the bottom corner nearest the wall of the house. Click to enlarge.)
Yet more to come.
This turned out to be compounding the oops, as the mistake in measurement had led me to cutting the second trapezoid too short on that side. So now, after dry-fitting the two sections, I had a very skinny rhomboidal gap at the top of the panels. HEAVY SIGH. After very careful measurement I cut out two very skinny triangles, removed the right-hand trapezoid, inserted the one triangle and banged it into place with a bit of scrap 2x4 (that scrap got used as a hammer, or as something for a hammer to hit, multiple times during this project).
I fastened in the first trapezoid after that, put up the second trapezoid again and rested it on the flashing, then slowly moved it into place with my right hand while holding that second skinny triangle in place with my left hand. Everything went together neatly in the end, and while I had a really ugly 4-way intersection of two unsightly seams, I also knew that Caulk Covers A Multitude Of Sins, and this is one such.
Next I had to cut the pentagonal piece -- really just a rectangle with the upper left corner cut off. Measurement had to be careful here to the shiplapped side edge came JUST over the right side edge of the French door frame's side flashing. This way the edge of the long strip (between the doors and the main house) would mate up with it properly. Thankfully that went off without a hitch, and now that wall looked like this.
(Right side wall, all panels installed EXCEPT between the French doors and the main back wall of the house. Click to enlarge.)
Next I had to cut the small rectangle that would eventually go in the bottom corner up against the main house. Before I installed that I would need to make a cutout -- more on that later -- but I needed the piece cut so I could support the long strip without needing hands, while I used said hands to nail and screw that strip in place.
That ended up taking longer than I expected, as I had to take the long strip down a couple times and shave off the cut edge to match spots where the main wall of the house wasn't straight. (Settling is, after all, very much a thing after 50 years, and settling never happens evenly. NEVER.) But eventually, with the aid of that small rectangle, a rubber mallet, the sledgehammer, and the aforementioned scrap of 2x4, the long strip was correctly positioned and fastened in place. I then removed the bottom rectangle for measuring and cutting out the outlet box, but that's a story for another day.
At the end of that particular day here's what it looked like. Click on the thumbnail for the full size photo.
(Right side wall, all panels installed EXCEPT in the bottom corner nearest the wall of the house. Click to enlarge.)
Yet more to come.
