A Barn Raising Boistfort Style

I signed with the contractor on the fifth of November and by the 13th a crew was here stocking steel beams and getting ready to raise the barn high enough to excavate under it with a mini. They started by getting down and dirty, digging by hand under the barn and creating enough crawl space to set large steel I beams in place to lift the structure. I caught this lucky chap in a rare moment of ecstasy while crawling with a short handled shovel below a historic barn, clearly overcome with the joy that accompanies meaningful labor. Marvelous.

After the initial hand digging the beams where jockeyed into position using a small boom truck. The beam you see pictured is one of four which run the full length of the barn and relieve the weight carried by the original 6x8 wooden beams used when the barn was built.

Next came the cribbing and lots more digging by hand while the team from CDI got ready to set the jacks and start raising the structure. Pictured in the fore ground at the corner of the barn is the 6x8 material used for cribbing the jacks. They are laid one on top of the like a game of Jenga in layer after layer as the jacks are set and reset.

This is the device used to control the jacks, each knob controls one jack, the dial indicates psi of the hydraulics, using this set of controls the operator is able to adjust the pressure and rate of lift individually or all at once. The barn went up about eighteen inches at a time. It was a totally unnerving experience to watch a structure of this size rise like that. I was surprised at the complete absence of creaking and groaning.

And VIOLA!!! Our barn is 10 feet off the ground.
The whole process took less than a week. The barn is supported by huge I beams, and the entire structure is braced and tied together using framing members and come alongs. CDI effectively bypassed all the structural components that existed in the barn and replaced them with carefully placed timbers and cables to create a secure box. Now the contractor comes in to do some more dirt work and set forms for the new foundation.