So for most of the summer I did not have a lot of time to do much of any work on the cabin. But I did manage to finish the porch (except the siding) and I am currently working on getting electric service in the building. Let me tell you how our local permit and code enforcement is. So I had my buddy Joe come up and hook up the service from the meter box to the breaker box, and that same day I called the C.O.G. office so they would send an inspector up to inspect it so the electric company can turn it on. Well the next day the inspector comes up and he looks at the meter box, says everything there is fine, and then he looks at the breaker box and tells me I don’t have my ‘bonding screw’ in the box…so I found the screw and he told me to put it in and he’d pass it. Well I looked all over that box and could not find the place where it went, Joe also looked and could not find where it went…and to make things worse…the inspector took a good look and couldn’t figure out where it went!! The only thing the inspector could tell me is that it goes in the neutral bar. Well there are 4 neutral bars!!!

So after a while of not being able to figure out the location of where this screw goes I just jammed it in one of the holes that seemed like it could possibly go. I figured I could put it anywhere in the neutral bar and the inspector would see it there and pass it. Well the inspector came up the next day and still did not pass the breaker box, he said the bonding screw was not doing what it was supposed to do (which he then told me that it’s supposed to connect the neutral bar to the enclosing)…and we still couldn’t find where the screw went. I called Joe about this and he said the whole deal made no sense, but he then went to a store in Tunkhannock that sells the same breaker boxes as I have and he had to look on the back to find exactly where this hole was. The screw did fit but it was a place where I would have never guessed. So the inspector came up again and finally passed my electric service. Hopefully Claverac (the electric company) will be there soon to hook it up.

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So I’ve been working hard on this cabin. I started the project back in August 2007 and have slowly but surely been restoring it. This building was built all by hand with wood that came off the same property sometime before 1900 (They approximate the building to be about 150 years old, no one has found out for sure). It used to be an old school house (Tripp Lake School) and used to sit right next to the road. About the year 1905 it was picked up and moved to it’s current location and had an addition built onto it so it could be lived in and it became a one season summer cottage. Over the years several people had stayed in it but for the past 14 years no one had occupied it and it became neglected all together. When I started to work on it, there was a lot of water and insect damage. Enough damage to the point of where it was not livable. Trees had also grown up to close to the building which damaged parts of the foundation and roof. I made an arrangement with the owners to fix the place up to make it livable, not only for one season, but for all year-round. I plan to live in it when it is finished.

So far a lot of work has been done. We took out all the interior walls and floors, and fixed all the support underneath. The leaking roof had caused a lot of support to rot, and the damage from wood ants and wood bees was unbelievable. But it’s all fixed now. It has all new floors and walls and we fixed the parts of the ceiling where it had leaked. They had paid a contractor to put a whole new roof on it. On the inside we framed up all new walls and put up all new dry wall, and we just finished the tape & spackle. By next week I should have the whole places primed ready to paint. On the outside we took off the front porch because it had already fallen down, the new one should be built soon. We are also building an addition off the back side for a bathroom since there currently isn’t one. I don’t want to have to use the outhouse in the middle of winter. I’ll keep you posted on what else goes on.

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