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  • From: "Jeanne Driese" <jeanne13 AT earthlink.net>
  • To: <homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] moving big stuff
  • Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:21:43 -0500

Thanks Gene,
That was informative and easy to picture with your descriptions! Magnolia
won't fit up my steps so I will just have to do without having a private
stonehenge. :)))
Jeanne
tnhillwoman
North East TN zone 6
----- Original Message -----
From: Gene GeRue
To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
Sent: Tuesday, December 16, 2008 10:18 AM
Subject: Re: [Homestead] moving big stuff



On Dec 15, 2008, at 6:41 PM, EarthNSky wrote:

> Well, will someone, please, describe this to me?
>>>
>>> http://j-walkblog.com/index.php?/weblog/posts/moving_big_rocks

First, the guy must own a concrete company or have lots of money, as
possibly indicated by a McMansion pictured in the distant background.
He casts huge "stones," blocks of concrete, some as cubes, some as
long beams that weigh many tons, and then moves them by employing
balance points. On a concrete pad, one small stone balance point
(never shown was how he got that stone under there) and a suitable
horizontal gripping lever and he turns them easily. Add another
balance point, another stone, and the same turning moves the block by
the distance between the two stones. A similar balancing system shows
how he moved a barn three hundred feet, turning it one way and then
the other. All using only his one person-power.

He is determined--a key personality trait--to build his version of
Stonehenge--personally, with nothing but shovel, concrete, wood and
his energy. He is shown lifting a monster beam of cast concrete
perhaps two feet square in section by twenty feet long and then
tipping one end of it into a dug hole, then washing sand away from the
area where the beam touches at the bottom, thereby causing it to
continue to fall down on that end until the whole thing is standing
plumb.

The earlier lift is accomplished by creating a balance point, then
putting weights on one end of the long beam until that end goes down--
think really big teeter-totter--then adding another piece of wood just
at the raised side of the balance point thus created by the tip. Then
the weights are moved to the other end until that end goes down. Back
and forth, adding more spacers until the monolith is raised to the
desired height. Not shown is how he gets the initial balance point
placed. On dirt I guess it could be created by digging at the center,
placing the first balance point block, then digging away material in
both directions out to the ends so the unit could be tilted, thus
beginning the lift.

There is a shot of two such stones standing erect with another monster
across the top of them. Not shown was how much forming and scaffolding
was necessary to move the beam sideways onto the uprights after the
lift.

It is suggested that these methods were used to build Stonehenge and
maybe the pyramids. It's hard to explain with few words. Keep the url
and watch it at someone's house that has high-speed connection. One
might think of this as folly but he sure seems to be enjoying the
exercise. And if a homesteader ever needs to move something heavy,
this is one way to do it.

I prefer Magnolia.

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