Out of Mortar - Again

Thursday & Friday (New Year's Eve & Day) the chimney got mortared to within 10 rows of the kiln shed roof. The top row of bricks has only 3 of the 7 bricks mortared before the mortar ran out.

See how much higher than the blue ladder the chimney goes to, now. It is getting difficult to lift the bricks onto the chimney stack. It is much easier to lift a brick over one's head if the brick starts from a lower position. An 8.5 pound brick lifted from head level feels much heavier than the same brick lifted from knee or waist height - try it if you don't believe me.

The photo on the left shows the chimney not in alignment with the rough cut hole in the shed roof. Looks like I will have to rent a Sawz-All to cut the hole bigger. Some more of the support wood needs to be cut, as well the aluminum roofing needs to have corners squared for the chimney bricks.

I checked into renting a "person"-lift to work above the kiln shed roof - obviously the blue ladder is not tall enough. And the 'lift' should extend over the roof edge to just where the bricks will come through the roof.