Belt and braces

That was the phrase my friend, Dan, used. As I mentiocned in my Blip on Wednesday, our garage has started to heel over to one side. I was getting rather anxious about it but had difficulty finding anyone who might help. I am far from expert in DIY and anyway didn’t really know how to assess the root causes of the problem.
Fortunately I was talking to my men friends about it and one of them, Dan, generously offered to come and take a look.
He arrived mid morning and we had a cup of coffee together and then went out to survey the situation. It was very helpful to hear him think aloud about the construction of the timber structure - the way in which you need to create stability in a wooden building, and the likely causes of the problem.
Essentially, the keen amateur builder who lives here thirty years ago and built our garage made a fair job of it but clearly wasn’t aware of certain basic engineering principles.
When I took a good look with Dan, it all began to make sense to me. It turns out, it’s not rocket science. Vertical posts need cross bracing to prevent them gradually leaning sideways. A tiles roof needs sufficient cross ties to prevent the weight from pushing the walls outwards etc etc.
Anyway, having made a pretty convincing assessment of the causes of the movement, Dan proposed some temporary bracing to ensure the structure doesn’t move any further. I assisted him while we used some recycled timber and old fence posts to fashion some cross braces inside and a couple of wooden buttresses outside to hold everything in place.
Right now it doesn’t look terribly elegant, but I am confident it will stand firm, and continue to shelter our bicycles, freezer and lawnmower which is the main thing. Dan was very concerned to ensure his temporary repairs were robust enough - and doubled up on some of the measures we took.....which is where the phrase “belt and braces” came in.
I should be able to sleep more deeply tonight. When we have more time, we will find a more stylish longer term solution, but this will do nicely for now.