The Final Piece to the Rimrock Observatory

[JayTee]

It has now been a full year since the opening of the Rimrock Observatory. It's quite an exceptional feeling to be able to go out to your own observatory, flip on a couple of switches, and away you go for the evening. But over the past year, the roof was still a tiny bit unfinished because it still leaked during heavy rain. I contracted many local roofers to come in and provide and install the flashing on the north track of the roof to prevent the last bit of water incursion from rain. Granted, it was a small job, but not a single local roofer would call me back let alone take on the work. So now it was left to me to figure out how to install a rather large piece of flashing, work I've never accomplished before but wasn't afraid to tackle. In the meantime, I put about a half inch (1cm) of roof goop up in that channel to further waterproof that part of the roof.

So a few weeks ago because my decent weather window was rapidly closing for the season, I decided to visit my closest building supply/DIY store. My goal was to see if they had a long enough piece of sheet metal 10.5' (3m) that I could fashion into the flashing that I needed. As it turns out, not only do they sell the sheet metal for flashing they will even bend it to the shape that you need completely alleviating my having to bend that metal to my will. I was told that if I need more than just a 90° bend just go ahead and make a drawing and bring it to them and they will make it. just that simple, just that easy. Three days later I picked up the finished flashing.

The following images illustrate the installation.


The red arrow points to the North roof track where I have been having water incursion problems. This is a summertime photo.


Close up of the West side of the track


Close up of the East side of the track


This is the problem area. This channel is where the water collects (it's now ice) and then drips into the Obsy.


This is the drawing supplied to the building supply company to fashion my custom piece of flashing.


This is the flashing now in place, connected to the North wall and glued to the top of the North roof track. There is about a 2" (5cm) overlap of the flashing past the channel. This opening will be closed by expandable foam, called "Pest Block" foam.


This is the other side of the flashing showing its overlap of the track with the red arrow pointing to the track under the flashing. This opening will also be closed off. As you see the flashing is acting like an umbrella over both the channel and the north track.

My hope is that this is all that will be needed to conclude the building of the Rimrock Observatory. YAY!

[KathyNS]

Nice! That should do the job.

[messier 111]

very beautiful observation installation .thx.

[AstroBee]

Lookin' good JT!

[Juno16]

Outstanding JT!

Beautiful observatory and location!

[SkyHiker]

I am glad it's all working! Now you can enjoy your observatory worry free.

You can still easily convert it to a sliding roof, should the garage door cause any more trouble. The sliders would extend down over the pad at the front, and you can put counterweights on the other side behind the tall wall. No winch needed to close it, less obstruction and easier to make weatherproof, I think.

[Bigzmey]

Well done JT!

[Gordon]

That looks like it should do the trick. How much snow do you get?

[helicon]

Looks great JT! You must be very excited to get the project done. It's great that at least 4 members are now building observatories.

[JayTee]

How much snow do you get?

Normally, around 2' total (650mm) is delivered throughout the winter. Last year was exceptional. By this time last year, I had nearly 40" (1m) of snow on the ground. So far this year... Nada, I got nothing on the ground. It's like summer only way colder and everything looks dead! So, is snow a problem, not so much. I'll let you know when it is.

Cheers,