Sometimes in construction annoying things happen. Like when your glass install company orders the sliding glass doors to the same exact frame size as the rough opening dimensions that you specifically gave them. The whole idea of a rough opening size is to give 1/4" of wiggle room around the sliding door frames to allow for things to be slightly out of square and plumb, and to allow for other things like flashing to happen between the frames and the rough opening. So after patiently waiting for the doors and the glass to come in and be assembled, then again patiently awaiting a break in the glass company's busy schedule to allow them to install the doors, I get a call from the installer that the frames won't fit.

Ugghhhh.

So I run to the site to find that they've already left. I measure and re-measure the rough opening sizes, look through my notes to see that they match exactly the rough opening sizes I gave for the order. The next day I head down to the glass shop to discuss the order and they pull up their notes which show that they took the rough opening size I gave them and transposed it into the actual frame size. Grrrrr. To cut down the frames isn't too big of a deal, but re-ordering glass will take two more weeks.

More head scratching on site ensues. I finally realize that the amount of play inherent in the design of the sliding door track frames should be enough to allow for the existing fixed and sliding panels to fit, assuming the track frames are slightly cut down (approx 1/4") and then re-built in place. I discussed this with the installer and he thought he could make it work, so we work to try to find another break in his schedule to get it done.

The next monday they show up and install the track frames and one fixed panel. The next day they curiously don't show up, so I call to find that they didn't have enough man-power to lift the panels up to the deck level. Since we are building steel stairs for the deck in the shop, and installing them after the siding is installed, this presents a bit of a problem as it will take brute strength to get the panels up to be installed in the tracks. Days later we manage to coordinate with myself and another able-body to help muscle the panels up top and get them installed.

Now that the doors are installed the space has really taken on the very stripped down nature of the design. The lack of headers above the clerestories and the sliding glass doors really begin to set up a clear connection from the relatively tight interior space to the surrounding deck and sky. Custom brake-pressed paint-grip flashing and column cover help to tie the bronze coloured door frames to the surrounding siding which will be installed shortly, as soon s it arrives this week.