After that hole was made (note the new steel beam that was installed last week) they started cutting two holes in the floor joists. Hole #1 is just inside the building and allows the excavator to scoop into the basement and then rotate and drop in the dumpster. Once they are done, this hole will be occupied by a trash enclosure and a new staircase.
Hole #2 is for the fermentation cellar, which will be a 2-story space (basement & 1st floor). This part of the brewery will be a fishbowl like Goose Clybourn down the line and the extra tall ceiling will accommodate extra tall tanks someday soon. Here you can see the subfloor and joists being removed. Parts of the two massive beams were cut away later. Even old growth Douglas Fir wood melts like butter at the hands of a chainsaw. I'm spinning my minds about how to reuse all this wood and the leading candidate seems to be benches in the fireplace lounge.
The rest of the week, the guys have been jackhammering the concrete pad in the basement and wheelbarreling the chunks to the back corner to Hole #1. They are just starting to excavate the hole for the serving tank walk-in cooler under the bar. Hopefully next week we'll start the underground plumbing.
Upstairs Matty, Stephen Jablonski and I continue to gut the office space. I'll admit to being pretty tired from all the manual labor at this point, so I'm enjoying a few days of rest. For those of you watching the clock, we are making great overall progress so far in construction. Unlike the financing stage which was rife with process delays, we are steaming ahead full speed.
People often ask, 'What kind of beer are you going to make?" I usually give a snappy "lots" or "all kinds" response since nothing is set in stone yet. But just to give some guidance, Handlebar has Bell's Hopslam on tap right now, and I think that if I could only brew one kind of beer that would be it. It's made with honey, but doesn't have the usual overbearing sweetness you often get.