Winter Preparations: Oiling Timbers

With the autumn rains approaching, the preparations for overwintering the houses and everything around intensify into a final big push. Ever since I came there have been a bit more than a dozen, roughly 3-4 metre long pine timbers that have been sitting around for more than 12 months. They were put up against a shorter piece of pine, which is held horizontally in between the branches of the two plum trees in front of the pioneer’s house. While still working out our best strategy on how to proceed, we decided that the way they’re secured between the two plums is good enough.

We would pull them down as much as possible without ruining the structure, so it would be easier for us to apply the old engine oil. After saturating them with the smooth, dark, almost black substance the timbers would be pushed up and shoved as close to the previous one as possible. Dragomir and I arranged them, so that in standing closer together we would have more free space around them, together with the idea that it would provide some amount of rain protection for the innermost wood. 

Evening approached steadily, soon followed by a slight rain. We were right on time.
I enjoyed looking at the way the water droplets would bead up on the surface of the wood, repelled by the oil.
Our work was a success!

Written by Boyan