I decided to wait until the skylight was installed to finish framing the ‘tunnel’ through the attic.   The framing is really just there to support the Sheetrock that will be going up.  Since it doesn’t have a real structural purpose, it didn’t matter when I did it, and I wanted to make sure the skylight looked proper before going ahead with the framing.   Doing the framing was more difficult than I was expecting.   I hadn’t realized just how much lumber would be required to adequately support the drywall.  In addition to the sheer number of studs I had to add, a number of them were at complex angles require multiple measurements and tricky cuts.  Fortunately between my compound miter saw, and my circular saw I was able to cut all the pieces quickly and accurately.

Normally a  big hole in the roof would be considered a bad thing, but in this case its in preparation for the fancy new skylights we’re putting in.  I spent the weekend re-framing the opening, adding headers and sistering in some new rafters to support the load after the existing ones were cut.  Having all the right tools made the work pretty easy.  I used my wonderful Dewalt circular saw for most of the cuts, and used my 50-year old table saw to angle a few of the beams.  By far the most useful tool was the pneumatic framing nailer.  I probably could have done it all with a hammer, however I would have been exhausted and it would have taken twice as long.