Jungle gym

My wife suggested I make some sort of a jyngle gym for the kids. I agreed but warned her that it would take “a whole weekend”. Nine working days later (six days of my own time; three of those with my dad helping me) the contraption is ready (excluding the railings surrounding the deck, to be made of thick rope).

Made of Siberian Larch. My own design, using Google Sketchup (if somebody is interested, I can try to post the actual file). I tried to add strength during the building process by making the deck diagonally, and by adding some diagonal corner supports. I also tried to pay special attention not to create any spaces where a child’s neck or head could get into a bind; towards that purpose I filled the gap between the diagonal corner supports and the actual corner with diagonal thinner boards, and lifted the “skirt” of the climbing wall clear off the ground.

Hardest part by far was the foundations: Figuring out the vertical measurements on the ground with a self-made water-hose-level, and making & positioning the concrete feet in the right positions both vertically and horizontally. I built a separate jig that held in place the metal feet while the concrete (in up-side down turned buckets with their bottom cut out) hardened.