Finally done with the house project and I can start on my challenge car!

Well I have been working slowly on the challenge car but this project was much higher priority.

Front porch was (Sept 7):

And now is:

I'll add a bigger description on the project in a few minutes.

Glad to be done, and really happy with the results!

So the main impetus behind this project was that the two 4x4s holding our entire porch up were starting to spread apart at the top. If you look close you can even see this in the first picture. And also the PO had put down tile on the porch that was both poorly done and chipping up, and also was slippery as hell in the snow. We temporarily put down adhesive grip tape since we didn't want the delivery people to slip and crack their heads open on our porch. 

So First I had to remove a bunch of the metal fascia and plastic soffits to get to the structural problem, and fix it with 2 2x8s going across and tied in really well to the tops of the 4x4s. The 4x4s were over an inch further apart at the top than they were at the bottom so I actually used a ratchet strap to pull them back in before I fully seated the beam. 

Then I chipped up all the tile. Then I laid down a thin layer of concrete repair (just concrete but with really small aggregate so I can be spread thin if needed) about .5 inches thick over the entire surface so it would be smooth again, but then I broomed it as it was drying so it would have some grip to it in the snow and wet. 

Then I recovered everything in cedar, then I stained the cedar. Then I built planter boxes as rails. Then I redid the lights. Then I painted the new concrete surface back to white. 

Whew. 

Looks great and really dresses up the main entry.  The cedar is very pretty.  Good work!

Looks good, definitely can’t show my wife that

Looks great, Robbie! That cedar looks fantastic.

Nice Gnome guarding the Home.

Pete

Sweet!