New Design approved and posts are in.

I went to the building department to have my drawing approved and they were fine with the new design. So I went to work finishing up the three holes. All I used to dig the holes was a shovel and post hole digger. I had done this once before at another house and ended up renting an auger, but with only three holes to dig I figured I could skip it. The dirt also ended up being very easy to dig so I was very pleased with how the digging went.

Once the holes where dug I called the town to come and "inspect" the holes. This is to make sure you don't skimp on the depth of the hole. They came by the next day (during the week) and looked at them for about 15 seconds. Approved!

I then had to get cement - I decided, on my way home from work to get some of the cement in my Mini. Well, it turns out that my Mini doesn't hold much more than 800 lbs so I couldn't get much cement. I needed 5 80lbs bags per hole so that was 1200 lbs of cement to get. I'll make a long story short and say that next time I'll bring the Jeep and I'll get more than I think I need (it's always easier to return a bag then to run out in the middle of pouring cement to get one more bag).

So then all I had to do is rent a cement mixer and start mixing cement. I actually think this is fun so I had a blast doing this part. You have to mix water into it until it sticks together and the rocks in it shouldn't roll anymore. I also ignore the sign on the cement mixer that says not to stick the shovel in while it's going - that's the best part!

Once I had each post poured I lined up my strings again to find where the post's center would be and stuck the "J" bolt down into the post leaving about 1 in. above the top of the post to connect the post anchor to later. When all was said and done (and it had cured overnight) I took a picture to show my work. You can see all three posts in this picture and the "J" bolts sticking up on each one.