Good progress.....

We now have a complete beam and block floor and the trenches around the lower courses of bricks have been back filled, even though the weather contrived (again) to delay things. The local council building inspector called to site on Thursday and passed the work done so far. (Hooray!)

The site looks more like a builders merchants at the moment with three different types of bricks, and the blocks for the inner walls, rather cluttering up the place. Still, Dean the brickie and his team should arrive on Tuesday and then we should see some real evidence of a building.

Its always a surprise to me how careless people can be when there's no-one around to complain. The blocks were delivered by one of these lorries with a crane on the back and the driver hoisted the packs of blocks over the Hares fence and onto the site. Fine, except that he placed one pack on a lump of concrete so the pack was tilting to one side. That was bad enough but he then lowered another pack on top of that to create a very dangerous situation. Concerned that someone would get hurt (and being the holder of the insurance policy for the site) I decided to do something about it so I went to site this morning to move the blocks in question. As soon as I cut the straps around the pack the blocks on the top row (well over 6 feet above ground level) fell to the ground. I've now moved the blocks into the centre of the site where they are out of the way, unlike most of the other packs which have been placed very annoyingly right where the brickie will be laying bricks/blocks. I can well understand how accidents happen on building sites - they're a minefield.

Off to Brookvale tomorrow to fill some of the holes in the drive - all the lorries have rather accelerated the wear and what were small holes have grown somewhat.

Jan & Rog

More progress despite the torrential rain

Our usual shot from the drive plus another from the side to show progress over the last two days. The block and beam floor is almost complete now, but yesterday's very heavy rain delayed things a bit, and washed out some of the mortar from the bricks that had been laid. This doesn't matter too much as the courses in question will be below ground level so a quick bit of pointing before the backfill, and no-one will know.

With the backfill around the lower walls scheduled for next week, and the bricks being delivered too we hope to be building walls soon.

Had a site meeting with Roy the project manager today and found that he has been supplied with outdated plans, rather than the latest versions. Fortunately this doesn't matter too much as the differences are a couple of internal walls that can be easily changed. However, it does show how easy it is to end up getting something different to what you expected.

After the weeks of dry weather it is rather galling to have such heavy rain now. Hopefully the drier weather will return.

Jan & Rog

This week's progress

Well, not quite to the stage we expected but most of the lower courses of brickwork have been completed. Unfortunately we were short of one lintel so the area that forms the porch has yet to be done.

Jan and I spent yesterday and today clearing the hedgerow of dead wood and pruning back the trees/shrubs. We have added nearly 10 foot more garden with the clearance as the hedgerow has encroached more and more on the garden in recent years.

Gill and Pete from number 5 had trimmed their hedgerow last weekend so we had a grand bonfire today. The heat was so intense from the leylandii that even the green cuttings disappeared in minutes.

Next Tuesday sees the arrival of the concrete beams that form the base for the ground floor. I'm quite intrigued to see how they all fit together, and how they fit the water and waste pipes when the beams are in place.

Jan & Rog

The build has really started

Day one of the build today and a double skin of brickwork has been completed along the back and both sides of the house. Fine weather is predicted tomorrow so we imagine that the remaining walls will be finished up to damp proof course level by the weekend.

Jan & Rog

We have a building site Houston

Yes, the toilet has arrived so we must have a proper building site now, surely?

Lots of activity today - sand, cement, the aforementioned toilet, wall ties, engineering bricks, and a bright yellow cement mixer - a big one - proper job!

In order to get things moving, and as our brickie Dean isn't available for a couple of weeks yet, our project manager Roy has organised the groundwork company (Weller Constructions) to lay the lower courses of bricks up to damp proof course level, and then lay the concrete beams that form the basis of the ground floor. Once that's complete and passed by the building inspector, Dean the brickie will get to work on the facing bricks.

With the delivery of "stuff" imminent I had to get the site insured. As a condition of the insurance, any plant has to be locked away so the garage has been cleared and the cement together with the mixer are securely stored within. The cement mixer is wonderful - resplendent in a new coat of shiny coat of bright yellow paint. Its just a shame that they didn't remove all the old cement before they painted it.

Roy has also obtained quotes for the roof trusses and managed to beat my price for the facing bricks by nearly £500 and so paying for himself already. He's really very good at keeping me informed about progress as I get regular telephone calls from him. We seem to have a really excellent team of people now.

I noticed that in addition to the deliveries there's some work been done to mark out the corners of the walls. A thin layer of mortar has been laid at the corners and then lines scribed in the mortar to form right angles for each corner. This should mean that come Monday some bricks will finally be laid.

We've also put in place one other task - the trimming of unwanted and dangerous branches from the hedgerow which will be attacked by Marc Dellar and his new chainsaw on Monday. Due to the size of some of these we've asked that he leaves the bigger bits for us to use on the wood burning stove.

As a footnote, its now just over 12 months since we first agreed to buy the land. In many ways we don't seem to have made much progress in that time, but conversely, a lot seems to have happened!


Jan & Rog