Learning new tricks is always fun… and the Habitat for Humanity – Bay Waveland affiliate has some good ones to teach. Because they “blitz” build so frequently with large groups of visiting volunteers, a smooth system is essential. For instance, do you see the compass rose in the picture? Here, House North always points to the front of the house, so it is easy to communicate by talking East, South, etc. It’s more accurate and less wordy than our typical “…right side as you look at the front”. And painting the rose on the floor is great for a bunch of new volunteers in on a blitz! Nice idea!

Another good idea is labeling all the walls with letters, so putting them up in the right order and location is as easy as saying your A-B-C”s.

All plates are all prepared before any walls are built. Wall locations are chalked first, so the plates can be nailed in place to avoid errors. All markings are done on the inside faces of the plates instead of the edges which seems to make it easier to get things like ladders in place. Also, the truss layout is written onto the inside of the plates before they are separated which is tons easier than trying to measure it after the walls are built.

How about attaching  the string for eventual straightening of the wall before putting it up? It sure is alot easier to do while the wall is laying flat on the deck!