mechanical & electrical – St Anne's Build

Week 85

Posted on November 23, 2017 by admin

The contractors are back this week to sort out immediate Stuff. These include things like painting the garage floor and filling large gaps in blockwork in the walls out there, fixing the rainwater diverters, sorting my neighbour’s drive, and changing the loft boards. What’s been lacking on our side is any kind of oversight or ensuring that the work is carried out to the expected standard. So, …drumroll, please… we welcome Phillip to the role of Contract Administrator III. He’s the new Alyson/Ben, and so far he’s a total rock star. He’s come in, assessed the build, found 65 items to put on the rectification list, and written a comprehensive report, with photographic evidence!, to circulate. Why oh why didn’t we hire him earlier?? He’s a cyclist as well which makes his appointment even more jammy.

While Tim has been dicking me around on timing by deliberately not letting me know what the plan is or what he’ll be doing during his Week of Fixing Stuff, I’ve been biding some time for Phillip to get up to speed and take the reins. Brave man is Phillip, jumping on board this moving train. Meanwhile: patience, patience, patience. I won’t be rushing to contact Tim through his lawyers as per recent arrangements to get stuff like rainwater pipework and the insulation complete, I’ll wait it out, try to chillax about the When, and leave it all to Phillip.

Although he’s employed by us, it will be Phillip’s job to impartially enforce the contract as CA. That means that he makes Tim do the stuff he said he’d do, and he makes us pay the stuff we said we’d pay. Our spanner in these works is that thanks to previous management’s weird ideas about signing off everything willy-nilly without checking properly, we’ve paid…

e v e r y t h i n g

…in full. Usually, in a normal world, that would put us in an unenviable position leaving us exposed for overpaying for an incomplete job. But in the Weird World of Building, this is entirely normal; lots of contractors won’t even talk to you unless you’ve paid them first, never mind actually show up and do anything. Three years in and there is so so so much I still don’t understand about all this.

So, returning to the day-to-day….. Mike’s been back with his paint brush to paint the garage floor. You may remember that this was the solution given when it was discovered that a 1 cubic metre hole had to be butchered out of the pristine garage slab (and rebar) to re-route the water pipe that somehow was seen fit to be installed too close to ground level. The reinstatement of the concrete floor left a great big square of different concrete which isn’t cool. The rectifying painting never happened, so they’ve come back to do it now. Over last weekend just gone, in preparation, we, and the now-very-grumpy children, had set up the scouts’ mess tent (thank you 1st Oxshott) in the garden to temporarily house all our Stuff.

house 2017.11.23 - 1 (3).jpg — temporary garage

house 2017.11.23 - 2 (1).jpg — leaning tower of tent

Dave recommended Watco products as the fix, and Mike got set to work on the first day cleaning out the dust, cutting back the plastic around the perimeter and using their Etch and Clean product to provide a good base. That took overnight to dry, so painting started the following day. First coat down and Mike was off to his next job while it dried before the second coat scheduled for our third day of fun and games. Luck would have it that we’d had a storm blowing through the last few days, and you’ll recall that we live right near the heath. This combination is a bit toxic for painting garage floors as loads of beech and oak leaves swirled around in the breeze and blew directly through the door that Mike had left open and onto the newly laid paint.

I couldn’t get in there to remove them because the paint was wet. So I left it. Not my usual vibe as 9 times out of 10 I’m a get-stuck-in-and-sort-it-out kind of girl. Although this was frustrating to see, in actual fact I think the leaves didn’t stick too badly, and the second coat hopefully would have erased whatever slight marks the pesky leaves would have left anyway. I haven’t been in to check because it takes a few days to get seriously un-wet. But,… reminds me of Michael Roux. It will be nice we can repeat our Grand Move of Stuff back into the garage in reverse and return the mess tent to the scouts.

The environmental guys visited this week to inspect the mould in the loft. They tested all the boards with their whizzy little water meter and found the really mouldy ones to be around 30%. They should be around 15%. To our horror, they suggested that the problem wasn’t left-over damp from the flood, but instead, that the flat roof between Gillian’s room and the main structural oak frame is leaking or allowing condensation to build. They think that either it’s a seal that’s properly gone, or that a thermal barrier is missing and making water condense on the boards, causing them to grow their fuzzy mouldy surface. And the growth on the floor is due to spores flying around and settling onto it. Ew.

house 2017.11.23 - 1 (2).jpg — one of the mouldy boards

house 2017.11.23 - 1 (1).jpg — a row of mouldy boards

This means that the whole problem shifts its Sauron-like focus from the insurers re the leak, to Tim re general building and warranty. But he doesn’t know this yet. The environmental report is due out soon and will go first to the loss adjusters and maybe then on to the insurers. I’ve just got to make sure that Tim gets a copy of it so that we can start the ball rolling and get it fixed. I spent most of my day yesterday wandering around in a disbelieving daze wondering how things could get any worse than they already were.

In a fit of wisdom and unusual allocation of resources, Tim sent Josh the young chippy, his finance guy and Dulux to tear up the horrible bit of destroyed rear drive and replace with a 6″ deep concrete float. Nothing like having experts do the job they’re trained to do. All nice guys, but I’d expected Lee and the groundwork guys to do, er, groundworks. James reckoned there were a couple of metres square that needed replacing, but he’d forgotten about the temporary tarmac and barrowfuls of hardcore shoring up the drive they’d put down during last year’s rains. He marked his assumption in yellow.

house 2017.11.23 - 1 (7).jpg — that’s not quite all the horrible-ness, James

All in all, there’s about 12 square metres to replace from corner to corner, and to his credit, they re-marked the larger area before they set to work. And the leftover bit from the demolition needs a clean line cut into concrete as well. Luckily, Mark and his landscaping team put us off for another week, so they won’t have to face setting their fence up and having dead slabs in the way.

house 2017.11.23 - 1 (5).jpg — digging out the broken bits

house 2017.11.23 - 4.jpg — ear defenders are for wimps “I’m deaf anyway!” shouts Dulux

Concrete was poured by the afternoon, and it was looking great until they said that they’d be back next week to remove the kango-ed out spoil. Whoa! Brakes on! No, they’re supposed to FINISH THE JOB and take it all away TODAY. Full truck, I’m afraid, madam. What about my landscapers who are coming next week to put up my fence right through the middle of your pile of shite? Sorry, we only do what we’re told, and we’re clearing another site tomorrow, so that leaves us next week.

Sigh.

Oh yeah, and it rained this week. So that means despite Ricky’s magic touch with a silicone gun, the outdoor lights tripped.

Again.

Week 84

Posted on November 23, 2017 by admin

Flicking through my Waitrose Magazine searching in vain for interesting Christmas recipes this week (and only coming up with increasing feelings of inadequacy looking at saucy Nigella in page after posed page of perfection), I saw this quote by Michael Roux. You gotta hand it to Trevor and Sid for getting onsite double quick when things go wrong. We must be on their quick-dial list which is great for service, but I think they should have listened to Michael.

After much inspecting and head-scratching, Sid realised that last week’s tepid-water situation was down to the lack of a non-return valve in the pipework feeding the tank. It looked like the cold was getting pumped round the pipes when required, but kept filling things until turned off. One of those things was the big hot water tank in the loft which kept getting topped with cold as we used the hot. Sid said he’d seen it before on a dog-washing station (really?!) where a blending valve had been added. The more hot water we used, the more it got cooled down by the cold water. Not great. So one valve installed later, and now we’ve got bags of hot from every tap and shower. Hooray!

He doesn’t usually carry a non-return valve around with him, so he cribbed one off the setup in the girls’ bathroom that he was due to check anyway. We’d bought one of those fancy ExoFill taps where the waste doubles as a fill, so it eliminates the need for a separate spout. Very whizzy and not that expensive. Our problem was that it never filled with any speed. It was always just a dribble. It was odd, because the pipes were 25 mm diameter, the same as the sink which flowed like fury. Sid thought the slowth might be the thermostatic valve plumbed in upstream, so he gradually took it apart over the course of the morning. The valve was ok, and the cartridge worked, but what he found was that there was a massive wodge of silicone gunk in the pipework blocking the flow. Wodge removed, and now the ExoFill is a torrent. Fabulous.

house2017.11.16 - 1 (1).jpg — torrential bath

Dave came to site midweek to check that the mould growing in the loft required the loft boards to be changed. You may recall from previous posts about June’s flood that the contractor was working from a Scope Document that set out what work was required to fix the house. This document became the kind of bible for the remedial works, and is the one the insurers approved. One of the items on it was to replace stained loft floorboards. That’s a large job and one that Tim’s been avoiding even though it’s in black and white on the snagging list and the scope document. I’m not quite sure why this one has been left and left and left. It’s even more curious because another item in the document is to cover the ceiling lights that poke up through the floor of the loft with little hoods to protect them from frying the insulation that they get covered with. At the moment, the solution was to leave the lights completely bare of insulation in the whole area which leaves great big cold spots–not great from a thermal efficiency point of view.

The question is: why would Tim hesitate to have the insurance company pay to replace the loft boards when he’s got to go up there anyway and take them up to add the hoods and insulation? A bit of mould would work in his favour here. I just don’t get it, and I don’t like to think he’s being contrary for the sake of it. The Loss Adjuster wants proof that the work hasn’t been carried out if he’s to chase Tim, and Tim needed proof that there is mould to carry out the work. So Dave’s visit was all about recording these things, taking some snaps, and writing a report (and corresponding invoice) to say the bleeding obvious and get the whole thing in motion. A big thanks to Dave; he’s always welcome and always good for a very measured and balanced view on how to manage the situation. And another week goes by…..

house2017.11.16 - 1.jpg — mouldy loft and lights ready for their hoods

Ricky the New Sparky was in on Friday to sort out some of the light sockets too. We’ve got dippy things occurring like inconsistent multi-gang switches (the main lights are always the switch nearest a doorway) a fancy skirting light missing its innards, and fiddling with the outdoor lights sunk into the ground to stop the circuits tripping every time it rains. That was an easy one–the seals had been installed upside down. There are six of these, and now they’re bomb-proofed, sunk in the right way round and all siliconed up.

Hopefully we’re getting to the very end of Bits And Pieces.

house 2017.11.22 - 2.jpg — happy ground light

house 2017.11.22 - 3.jpg — not happy skirting light

Week 82

Posted on November 11, 2017 by admin

My last post turned into a bit of a rant, so with this one I’ll do a complete 180 and focus on the really good changes in the build.

One of my pieces of advice for anyone starting a project like this is to plan the kitchen and the fireplace first. There are soooo many decisions that need to be made from soooo many trades that it’s best to coordinate a single plan before anyone arrives onsite with their spanners. The kitchen is a no-brainer for planning; with half a bijillion kitchen shops on the high street it’s one of Those Fun Things to do with a huge project like this.

Screen Shot 2017-11-06 at 16.34.17 — chimney plan

But the fireplace has just as many trades involved if not more. We made the decision early on to have the face sit flush with the wall and the chimney sit proud of the house.

And we decided that the fuel would be gas. Neither of these stuck, and we now have a false chimney breast with a wood burning stove. Marvellous. The design process has taken literally months, and I have managed to piss off my whole team, including my darling husband, so much with indecision and general questions that we removed it from the build and made it be a client direct package. Again, marvellous, but at least I’ve now got just me to please with no deadlines apart from those I set myself. The next deadline is Christmas, three months since moving in, and even that looks dicey.

We wanted a grand statement, more like a piece of art than just a hole-in-the-wall modern fire. Clinton has always liked CorTen steel, so Steve from Bradley Stoves ,who is doing the installation, recommended a guy called Toby to fabricate the steel cladding. Toby is doing another steel cladding job for Steve, and he runs Arc Fab Sussex in Lewes. Toby’s specialties lie in Big Things like narrow boats, railings, and bridges. He is also a trained artist so likes doing “little” jobs like ours. This “small” piece of steel will be 3 mm thick, 2.6 m high and 2.1 wide with cuts, curves, and supports to house the stove and the TV. Anyway, it was a pleasure meeting him and seeing the site, and now we’ve welcomed Clive the draughtsman on board to measure up so we can have it made.

Screen Shot 2017-10-26 at 11.04.48.png — the goal

house2017.11.04 - 14.jpg — part of Toby’s narrow boat project at the yard

But I’m getting ahead of myself. The stove has sat forlorn, half-installed by Steve’s gang for months while I got my act together coordinating the cladding. The family and I did some final measurements to make sure we were set on the dimensions before Steve’s crowd came up to build out the final interior of the chimney breast.

house2017.11.04 - 46.jpg — think twice, cut once

house2017.11.04 - 21.jpg — first bit of the metal carcass

house2017.11.04 - 42.jpg — the carcass is filled with rock wool

the whole thing is covered in 50 mm fireproof board

As well as building the skeleton for the chimney breast and cladding it in fibreboar, the guys also brought up the lovely piece of 30 mm thick Autumn Brown granite that we chose in the summer, now cut to size and all ready to fit. And because it’s St Anne’s and nothing ever goes quite to plan, they gingerly lifted it out of the van, and it broke into two pieces in their hands. Back in the van it went. Of course, the yard they got it from doesn’t have another piece big enough, so I spent a couple of harried days racing round Surrey finding a replacement match. Luckily, I found one in Hazelemere, and I’m waiting on confirmation of the final dims before committing to a size in the order.

Next up is drafting the final dimensions for the steel, fabricating it, weathering it, and installing. Clive is the draughtsman and does the drawings for Toby, so he drove up early one morning to Measure. This is no small undertaking as he takes on board all the risk if the beast arrives onsite and doesn’t fit (actually, if this happens we’ll probably end up rebuilding the innards). He’s a lovely chap who used to be a blacksmith in nearby Bookham. He’s got more involved in the drawing side of things recently but he still keeps his hand in the Making Process by silversmithing. Not so great for his wife who doesn’t wear jewellery he says, but fabulous for his daughter. Anyway, lasers at the ready, and he’s gone away to draw plans and liaise with Toby. If Steve can give us an install date by the time it’s built, the whole thing should be done by Christmas with any luck!

house2017.11.10 - 1 (2).jpg — can you find Clive’s laser line?

Other things brewing are fitting out the study with its desk and cupboards. We’ve got Barry onboard, and he’s been very patient with us while we work out the finances. We’ve got a simple idea, and it’s just a matter of pressing the go button.

house2017.11.04 - 16.jpg — Barry’s plan for the study ..

Nisi installed the CCTV cameras a couple of weeks ago. After the wire-debacle, we’ve got some natty little grey cameras in three places all linked up to a DVR in the data cabinet.

They’re IR too, so we can track foxes scuttling around at night as well as any miscreants lurking in the shadows.

house2017.11.04 - 20.jpg — I’m watching you, Wazowski

The garden has totally taken over in the three years we’ve been out. All those lovely plants I tended for all those years, and all that awful lawn that turned to moss and we cursed over, are all no more. I have only ever once hired a professional to help out with any garden, during one spring when I was vastly pregnant with one kid or other and couldn’t get near the ground much less have any stamina to actually do anything horticulturally useful. But Nicola’s plan required the A-Team of landscape gardeners, so we’ve invited Mark and his gang on board to do the job. A few months back I put out a request for recommendations on Facebook, and almost everyone I know wholeheartedly recommended Mark. So we’re lucky to have him on board with Max, Duncan, Sam, and sometimes Wes & others, and they’re really cracking right on.

house2017.11.04 - 22.jpg — clearing the front of the house including the cherry we planted in 2001

house2017.11.04 - 23.jpg — pile of stuff and protecting the drive

After clearing the site, they brought in 60 tonnes of soil in stages. Robbie the driver got to know the lane really well.

house2017.11.04 - 4.jpg — Duncan laying the soil

house2017.11.04 - 9.jpg — ready for planting

house2017.11.04 - 8.jpg — we’re going to have to watch the street-side for people doing some creative driving

house2017.11.04 - 10.jpg — cleared and ready for setting out

It’s not quite accurate to call the front a “knot garden” as it’s more like a few squares with some defined borders. We’re using steel edges to delineate the beds from the path, and the path will be laid in National Trust-esque Breedon Stone. This is a self-binding aggregate that’s more like a path and less like pea single.

Screen Shot 2017-11-10 at 11.35.21.png — the plan for the not-knot front garden

house2017.11.04 - 37.jpg — the beds line up with the windows

We originally wanted a standard plant like a bay or a holly in each box, all lit up with fancy spots. But since Nicola has drawn this up, I’ve discovered Anthony Paul Landscapes on Max’s recommendation, and he does some lovely things including a hydrangea set in clipped box. So we’ve decided to blatantly copy that instead. Fewer lights = less cash required = fabulous.

house2017.11.04 - 38.jpg — those rainwater sumps are still too high

One of the reasons we did the whole build in the first place was to re-site the garage in to a more normal part of the house, i.e. the front, and have the sunniest spot as a patio, i.e. the back. It is so lovely to finally see it come to fruition as a space where we can hang out rather than use as a parking space to bake a car or two in the summer sun.

Type 1 scalpings were next, and lovely new soil to the beds. The manhole covers were changed to ones that will have Breedon in them so they’ll disappear more.

house2017.11.10 - 2.jpg — lighting cables under the Type 1

house2017.11.10 - 3.jpg — incoming Breendon on the truck

Screen Shot 2017-11-10 at 11.44.17.png — the plan for the back garden

house2017.11.04 - 6.jpg — the geotextile membrane goes down first

house2017.11.04 - 35.jpg — the side garden is broken up for fun planting

Max laid the paving so quick that I missed taking photos of it. The yellow Tracpipe is the gas for the fire-pit. Now that we know how long to cut it, we’ve got to get the plumbers back to do the gas work. I’ll try to book them in at the same time to cut the pipe install the whole fire pit thing all at once–saves two call-out charges.

house2017.11.10 - 7.jpg — wooden edging in the back, rather than steel to save some cash

house2017.11.10 - 8.jpg — one day this will be a fence

house2017.11.10 - 9.jpg — building the step

house2017.11.10 - 10.jpg — the side border along the drawing room windows

house2017.11.10 - 1 (1).jpg — so lucky with the weather today–shorts in NOVEMBER

Pointing and bed prep will finish next week, then we can concentrate on planting. I’m due to go with Mark to choose a paperbark maple as a feature tree, and Nicola had Himalayan birch, coral bark maples and fruit trees in the mix too. There’s also a big hedge to plant. There will be a lot going on in the coming months, and this will happen in dribs and drabs when Mark’s got some time. We’re in no rush, especially since we’re not allowed to walk on the new turf until the Spring!

Week 81

Posted on November 10, 2017 by admin

We’ve moved in!

Practical completion kind of happened on its own between Tim and Alyson behind the scenes which was weird. I would have thought this momentous event certainly warranted a fanfare or fireworks, or at least a pause for thought. Instead, the only communication I had from Tim on Moving In Day was an email with an invoice for half the retention. Lovely.

The move went really well, as predicted because each of the other 4 1/2 times we’ve had the pleasure of working with Removals In Action, they’ve been completely ace, and the whole process was calm, cool and collected. The kids were brilliant. We’ve lived in three rental houses and one friend’s, having moved all our clobber in the 77 weeks of the build from handover to PC. Andy, Kevin, Simon, Paul, Kesta and the gang are now like old friends. Having the driveway complete before Moving In Day made life a heck of a lot easier than it would have been otherwise. Lots of space for the trucks, cars and boxes.

house2017.11.04 - 19.jpg — all packed up and ready to vacate the Tiny House

house2017.11.04 - 49.jpg — empty drive waiting for Andy’s vans

house2017.11.04 - 13.jpg — back of the house on a rainy moving day

house2017.11.04 - 2.jpg — and now to unpack…

I managed to fix a few things the week before Moving In, like completing the installation of the ensuite lights. These are the ones that hang on either side of the mirror-we-haven’t-bought-yet. I’d bought two from Mr Resistor, and they managed to send along an incomplete order (missing out one lamp entirely!), so we sent that back in a fit of meh. We re-ordered from Ocean who were actually cheaper and simply brilliant. When they arrived, the electricians got semi-stuck in and installed the bases to the wall, but not the glass covers. The covers then floated around from room to room in their respective boxes for weeks, so rather than risk having them squished by or lost in all our stuff, I got my spanners together a few days before Moving In, delved into the sea of Styrofoam packing, and sorted it.

house2017.11.04 - 48.jpg — ta-da!… lights

Downstairs, I had been looking at the coats cupboard with interest for some time. My vision was to have a very long rail for all of our coats, paired with a comprehensive shoe rack underneath. After much research on the internet for heavy duty brackets (6 people have many many coats….), I copied a design from a one-man-band in Poland and managed to have my own set made by Pete in Sussex from bobsbrackets.com (brilliant), and powder coated (by KG Sprayers in Guildford–again, brilliant). In another fit of DIY, I even bought a drill and some bomb-proof adhesive and enlisted a child to help put it all up. Finally, and with huge relief (for me because I could unpack yet more boxes, and for Child because it meant she could resume fiddling on her phone again),–it turned from a Coats Cupboard into an Electrical Cupboard. The only thing left is to buy and varnish a lovely piece of oak planking for a shelf on top.

Screen Shot 2017-11-04 at 17.41.36.png — a blatant copy–plans for Pete

house2017.11.04 - 39.jpg — gratuitous pic of rail with brackets

Now that we’re in, we’ve had a few worrying moments as we’ve got used to the place. Were we going to be happy with our decisions? Would everything work? One issue was that the room thermostats kept going off. There are five downstairs and eight upstairs, so having to reset each one, on a daily basis, was rather a pain in the seat. Here’s a quick review of how these things work to set the scene: with underfloor heating, each room or zone has it’s own control unit. The main controller in the garage is set to go on in the morning and again in the evening, so it looked like the electricity serving the thermostats was going off with the main controller. Dave the plumber was suspicious that this wasn’t meant to be wired this way, so referred it to his boss Trevor and Steve the electrician to figure out. After two days of emails back and forth, it turns out the system is wired perfectly; we were meant to rely on the individual room controls rather than the main control. Crisis averted, but would have been avoided completely if we’d had any remotely adequate handover from any of the trades who installed any of the systems. But that’s another story….

Another weird thing was when I woke up on one of the first really cool mornings to find ALL the windows fogged up. Naturally, panic ensued, so I hit Google to find the reason and see if there was an easy fix or something more sinister. Usually condensation happens because something in the window system isn’t working correctly: there’s a breach the double glazing seal, or a gap between the window and the frame. Both these scenarios give water beading up on the INSIDE of the glass. Ours was OUTSIDE.

This is actually an example of the windows working perfectly, and also highly efficiently to boot. Warm air inside is kept well away from the cold air outside because the windows are double glazed and separate the two. The outside window gets as cold as the air, and water condenses on the surface into little beads. This happens for the same reason you get dew on grass: the outside temperature fell below the dew point; we essentially had dewey windows. It only occurs when the humidity is very high, and as it happened, it was a couple of days before hurricane Ophelia wandered over northern England making the humidity a stodgy 94%. Kinda neat from a nerdy physics point of view, but annoying for watching the encroaching storm from inside the cozy house, until the windows warmed up and went clear again.

house2017.11.04 - 41.jpg — physics lesson

One of the reasons I haven’t kept up the blog is because we’ve been trying to come to a completion arrangement with Tim the contractor. Sticklers that we are, neither Clinton nor I have any capacity whatsoever to tolerate a lacklustre job, so to move in and to STILL have things incomplete or broken is really unsatisfyingly, amazingly, shit. Despite having been issued individual certificates for plumbing, electrics, and other systems, some bits still don’t work. Parts of the electrics are completely off plan, and unbelievably, there is still a leak IN THE EXACT SAME FITTING that failed in June and caused the flood.

house2017.11.04 - 30.jpg — oh. my. gawd.

Needless to say, Trevor got Dave and Sid out within the hour to tighten and refit the valve.

A few big things on the snagging list remain outstanding, but all “diligent” work by the contractor has stopped since PC. Nice to not be overrun with guys working onsite all the time, but nothing is being done to finish the contract. It’s a Mexican standoff in Oxshott: Tim is waiting for us to pay and sign a Completion Agreement, and we’re waiting for him to finish the work before we pay. Alyson has waded in as Contract Administrator with many shrugs of shoulders, and says now that she can’t comment on Tim’s work, meaning that we’d have to pay Dave the Architect instead to oversee the snagging completion. Dave says he has attended as much as he feels is necessary, and isn’t keen to come up to check lack of progress for us. It’s all incredibly disappointing, and the finish line still seems some distance away. .

What stuff am I talking about?, you might ask. Well here are some examples:

My poor neighbour has suffered through 3 years of our build, and the drive that she now has sole use over has been truly mutilated by the builders. She’s been so awesomely generous about letting them park in her section of the drive, but now as she drives out (and the newspaper delivery guy drives in at 6:00 am every day), the mashed-up concrete slabs pivot on a non-mud section and go ka-dunk ka-dunk announcing the arrival of anyone driving up to her door. It’s a big job to make it good, and we’re not asking for pretty here, just good. Fixing it as a gracious Thank You from the contractor would be nice.

We have two water butts to contribute to our Part L regulations for environmental impact. They’re fed by a diverter in the rainwater downpipes that is supposed to allow the butts to be filled until they can’t be filled any more, leaving the leftover water to go down into the rainwater drains in the ground. The guys who installed the aluminium guttering and drain pipes cunningly fit the diverters lower than the holes in the water butts THAT THEY DRILLED THEMSELVES. Duh. One is ridiculously off and near the ground, the other is just a little low, but enough to make the whole apparatus completely ineffective. This wouldn’t be so bad, but it’s something that I can’t run around with a spanner and fix; it requires the guys to come back and do it properly, replacing pieces, and that means that Tim has to instruct them.

The electrics are an absolute nightmare. We never had an agreed physical plan on paper or pixels that we can all refer to, so it’s a matter of going back through three electrical foremans’ emails to figure out what the spec was. How Alyson ever agreed to the final figures I’ve got no clue. Even now as we’re having electricians in to check circuits and move cables that were cut too short, it’s still a hot mess with no plan to reference, and there is not one iota of joined-up thinking. Here’s an example: we were advised back around Christmas time last year to get a Rako control system thing in the kitchen and the drawing room, and Paul (Electrical Foreman until Feb 2017) was super keen to get this on board. Lovely, we thought! One switch and lots of flexibility. Then Paul left unannounced to start his own business, and he was replaced by Mark in mid-March. Mark never really got to grips with anything at all, and despite huge promises of sorting everything out that Paul had left hanging, we still had no plan, lots of variations, an accumulating catalog of errors in wiring, and a deteriorating relationship between the contractor and his subbie. Mark didn’t hit it off with Tim and was eventually fired in the Summer for telling James he wanted to knock Tim’s block off. Nice! Mark was replaced by Steve whom we’re dealing with at the moment to get things fixed. He’d doing his merry best and keeping a cool head, but there is still no plan so switches are inconsistent, wires are too taught, sockets don’t work, and the whole outdoor circuit including the coach lamp, trips into oblivion. Completely frustrating. Especially since we’ve paid out for the job to be finished and functioning.

Today we found that the reason why the 5A circuit in the family room doesn’t work. One of the sockets was omitted but the electricians wired it in anyway, and everyone had forgotten about it. Even the plasterers who’d plastered right over it, leaving the wires unconnected and the circuit open. No wonder the remaining sockets in the loop didn’t work.

Getting back to the Rako system, one of the blue units is a bridge that allows access via a remote device like a phone. Kinda bling for us, I know, but really cool. It needs hard wiring to a data point, but lo-and-behold, Steve’s company didn’t spec one in because HE DIDN’T UNDERSTAND THE SYSTEM HE WAS FITTING. Honest to God you couldn’t make it up. As an afterthought the fix was a loose cable in the cupboard. Like it?

house2017.11.04 - 15.jpg — See? It works. Quit making such a fuss.

Clearly this wasn’t the solution we’re looking for, so the best they can do now is run the cable back into the Horrible Boxing and have it eek out by the Rako Bridge. A normal system would have hidden the data point or wired it directly. Poor Poor Poor.

The woodwork is being snagged, and after the flood, many skirting boards have shifted. Slipping slivers in the gaps was a nice try, but didn’t win any prizes for great workmanship so the short section was replaced.

house2017.11.04 - 25.jpg — solution?….. why even try this on?

Tim agreed to carry out an extension to the wood floor around the fireplace in the drawing room as our very last Variation. But now the skirting is too high. Despite Alyson saying that she couldn’t comment on Tim’s work, she went ahead and blindly certified it, leaving us exposed to the entire charge even though there is now a massive gap between the skirting and the floor. Rather than complete the job and THEN get paid like any normal trade, Tim has done half the job and now can treat it as a snag that he can do whenever he feels like within the year-long rectification period. Brilliant.

Our final Variation that Tim agreed to carry out was an extension to the wood floor around the fireplace in the drawing room. But now the skirting is too high. Despite Alyson saying that she couldn’t comment on Tim’s work, she went ahead and blindly certified it, leaving us exposed to the entire charge even though there is now a massive gap between the skirting and the floor. Rather than complete the job and THEN get paid like any normal trade, Tim has done half the job and now can treat it as a snag that he can do whenever he feels like within the year-long rectification period. Brilliant.

We’ve got an ongoing argument about whether the work has been completed fully in the loft where the flood occurred. It smells damp even now. I’m not above asking friends who come round to see the house to follow me up to the loft to see how it smells. (I have patient friends). The scope of the remedial works includes replacing the stained loft boarding to the standard as if were new. And they’ve done none of it. Predictably, in the first couple weeks of November, mould started growing in the loft. After sending these exact same photos to Tim, he STILL disputed the existence of mould, damp, incomplete work,…. you name it, and has referred me to the Loss Adjuster. The Loss Adjuster referred me to the Architect, who needs to come onsite and take MORE pictures for the Loss Adjuster who will then refer to the Insurers who will tell the Contractor to do his job. Lovely.

house2017.11.04 - 34.jpg — only a little mould

The electricians know that our job has sucked from start to finish, so last Spring (before he left) Mark had offered to install the cabling for a CCTV system, gratis. We thought that finally we were getting a little bit of an acknowledgement that the service on offer had been less than perfect. So we were on a roll until we had our cameras fitted and found that the muppets had installed old-fashioned coaxial cable rather than the Cat5 they’ve got throughout the rest of the house. It was probably a contractors pack of wires supplied by someone who isn’t quite up to date with the current CCTV gear. It all means that this choice puts a cap on the quality of the cameras and prevents us from installing a true IP system that talks to the rest of the house. In future years it will be like having an old iPhone that struggles with the latest update as technology passes you by and renders your beloved phone into a brick.

house2017.11.04 - 47.jpg — it’s coax for sure, sigh

None of these things are critical, but the quantity of fuck-up, Tim’s poor attention to them and this gruesome chess-playing approach has soured the whole journey. People ask me if I’m happy now that I’ve finally moved in. Yes I am, of course I am. It’s a beautiful house. The heating works and it’s great to be back Home. But it’s painful to feel had over. To have paid the bill in full and to STILL feel had over. And it’s disappointing to watch Tim’s perspective change from keen as mustard in 2015 to build a striking building, to 2017’s version of swearing at us down the phone, communicating through lawyers, and actively avoiding doing the work he signed up to do. Charming.

Week 63

Posted on June 25, 2017 by admin

Post redirected, banks informed, car insurance changed, schools notified, meters read, cleaners booked, checkout from rental organised, and… off we go at long last. After two years of being away from St Anne’s, we’re finally moving in to the New House. What an adventure!

What could possibly go wrong? We’ve moved twice already, so we’re a dab hand at packing up with all the incidentals and hiatus in broadband (for the four teenagers this is the biggest hiccup in the process) that go along with it. What do you suppose is the worst thing that could happen at this stage? Problem with the removals? Kids getting ill? Car breaking down? I’m sure there are a few potential perils that could befall us now. But, Monday rolled around, and Andy and his removal team were top notch as usual (we’ve had the pleasure of them moving us four times now including once for the office). The kids remained amazingly buoyant and kept calm despite their five A-level exams this week and two the next between them. So even though Mum was going a little nuts, it was all looking great.

Until Tuesday.

We let the removals guys in to the pack up the rental in the morning and rushed over to site for an early meeting to find Tim’s car parked up in the lane and much activity onsite. Apparently, the main valve that regulates the water pressure from the mains leaked overnight. This valve is in the loft and is the first piece of apparatus besides pipework that the plumbing sees after it enters the building from the mains. It’s placed just upstream from the hot water tank up there above Gemma’s room. Somehow a bunch of water came out of it, and I won’t say any more because the loss assessors and legal teams are involved. But it must have been on a long time looking at all the damage.

the join in question is the one with the white silicon tape to the left of the regulator

all the wood floor is coming up to let the floor underneath dry out

lots of skirting started bowing immediately as water cascaded down the walls

light fittings were removed and put in a pile in the kitchen

The rest of the week has been spent getting our stuff into storage and trying to find an immediate short term rental. We’ve got some great friends who have kindly put us up for as long as it takes which is incredibly generous, and we are very grateful that everyone has a bed, cups of tea can be made, and that we can use their place as a base. They’ve even let us use a part of their garden for all my potted plants. But somehow we’ve got to get cracking back into real life next week what with school, work, and exams, and coordinating what’s in and what’s not in the storage pod. Somewhere, buried within the solid mass of boxes, we’ve got to retrieve gear for a D of E Gold expedition, school shoes, and outfits for two proms before Friday. The contracts for the legal team are also buried along with all our warm clothes as it’s just gone from sizzling heat wave to soggy cold snap. My little Toyota would be bursting to the gunnels with all this stuff, so I think we’ll have to acquire other forms of transport to schlep stuff around town. So that’s another thing to organise.

And after that it’s picking up the pieces to find our third rental during this project.

There is no time to wallow in what this all means or how much it’s going to cost, we’ve just got to get on with it.

Good feeling gone.

Week 62

Posted on June 17, 2017 by admin

Welcome to Week 62 in our 36 Week project…. It’s all about finishing now.

house 2017.06.16 - 17.jpg — bathroom niches have their lights

house 2017.06.16 - 20.jpg — tiled flooring is down in the bathrooms, but no shower screens yet

house 2017.06.16 - 16.jpg — fiddly short tiles cut to finish the floor, but no mirror

house 2017.06.16 - 15.jpg — master vanity unit has been moved, but no lights

house 2017.06.16 - 23.jpg — Rich tiled the utility splashback ..

house 2017.06.16 - 22.jpg — .. and started the tiling in the kitchen

house 2017.06.16 - 6.jpg — looks much more kitchen-like; requests for moral support go unheeded…

Lots of pressure to Buy Things like… doorbells. Have you ever given much thought to them? The button bit can be a nice design piece, and there are many many different types to choose from. But the ringer, chime, sounder, whatever you call it, has three flavours: school bell, electric programmable with a bijillion different “songs”, or an antique from eBay. We went for a chrome schoolbell in the end. Boring, but necessary.

house 2017.06.16 - 7.jpg — doorbell: brick mounted or doorframe mounted?

house 2017.06.16 - 8.jpg — garden getting cleared gradually

house 2017.06.16 - 1.jpg — tiling and water butt

house 2017.06.16 - 4.jpg — thinking herb garden thoughts

house 2017.06.16 - 5.jpg — more herbs: got a recommendation or favourite to share in comments below?

house 2017.06.16 - 2.jpg — horrible scary crack filled

house 2017.06.16 - 3.jpg — security lights installed

house 2017.06.16 - 18.jpg — oak beam in lieu of bricks to support garage installed

There was an area on the back porch where the supports under the structural oak were slightly shy of the windows leaving a 20 mm gap. There was 10 mm tolerance generally for windows abutting to structure in the specification, and the guys managed to put it all on one side, making the 20 mm of air. The windows were installed just after Christmas, and this gap had been glaring at us ever since. One transgression for the Quirky House Police, but it’s filled now and looks much better.

house 2017.06.16 - 26.jpg — Paul filled the gap with surgical precision

house 2017.06.16 - 27.jpg — plinth splits for guttering downpipes restored

The bricklayers elevate their work to an artform. I hope that they’ve enjoyed working on this place, because they’ve had a lot to think about. Mind you, this week’s daily quizzes were mostly about war films which really tested my memory of dates, battles and geography. Oh yeah, ….. and what is the only airport in the States with an actual airplane in it? And whom is it named after? But check out the symmetry around every wall and detail as you look at any photo with bricks in. Genius.

house 2017.06.16 - 9.jpg — study is finished with flooring and electrics

house 2017.06.16 - 12.jpg — massive patch panel in the utility room to centralise all the data points

house 2017.06.16 - 13.jpg — fireplace with temporary buildout, but the room looks miles better with a coat of paint

house 2017.06.16 - 19.jpg — colours look alright in the kitchen into family room — Dulux Trade is A-OK

house 2017.06.16 - 14.jpg — master bedroom detail

house 2017.06.16 - 24.jpg — wardrobe rails in

house 2017.06.16 - 11.jpg — electrics are getting there one socket at a time, but not sure about the labelling…

We’re moving in on the Thursday of week 63. In theory. Kitchen commissioning on Monday morning, air permeability test in the afternoon. Tuesday is the contractor’s last formal day on the interior. Wednesday is cleaning, and Thursday we’re in.

When we first started this project I had visions of the finished product being presented in a more defined way. I kinda expected a ta-da! moment. I thought we’d have some time to think about the job, to go around with the contractor in a logical way to see if anything was overlooked, to snag it, to rectify the snags, and to move in with a huge smile. As it is, it’s rushed, the project manager is on holiday, the electricians are still (incredibly shockingly and disappointingly) not finished, snagging hasn’t started, the air-test is going on unsupervised and might fail our SAP calcs for us, and there is still a ton of work to do outside both within and outside the contract. Like, there is no drive and no lawn, but these will be done by others. There are no curtains, yet. And, strangely, there is no TV aerial which somehow counts as AV equipment which was conveniently client-specified but not highlighted until now.

There have been many parts of this project when we’ve seen our naive decisions come to fruition, and some have worked out just fab and the product is marvellous. But mostly, I really just haven’t wanted to look at bits and pieces in case we’d made a poor stab at something. I feel far more fear than excitement or pleasure at moving in just now. Maybe it’s just the fact we’re coming to the end of a period of exam hell with the kids and staffing challenges with the business all at once conveniently coordinated with the week we’re moving in. Maybe it’s because it’s the hottest week of the year. Maybe it’s that the budget is starting to burst at the seams. Maybe in five years’ time this feeling of unease and self-doubt will have morphed imperceptibly into something more comfortable, settled and positive. I hope my future self laughs heartily on reading today’s momentary dip in my attempt to retain a consistently high level of relentless positivity throughout this long journey. This future self will be enormously grateful and very happy in our family home that we’ve had built the way we wanted and was intended to provide the centre of gravity for the six of us at least for many many years to come.

Right?

Week 61

Posted on June 10, 2017 by admin

Clinton celebrated a penultimately significant birthday on the weekend by going back to school: blacksmithing school. He’s always happiest when he’s making and building and doing. So with some stout shoes and safety glasses, off he went to the Quinnells’ at Fire and Iron to get stuck in to Make Stuff. The course was about blacksmithing technique but with an artist kind of vibe; the goal was to take home a few cool pieces at the end of the two days. With a little guidance from the instructors, he’s gone and made something quite amazing, unique and special. You’ll have to wait for the great unveiling in a future post, but I will hint that it’s for the house.

The long-awaited visit from British Telecom to attach the house to the rest of the planet was scheduled for Monday. Matt the Engineer arrived promptly first thing to rig up the line. Jamie got stuck in to finish off the trench, and James and I deciphered where the electricians had cunningly hidden the location for the BT box (spoiler: in the garage). So Matt got busy connecting, and Jamie filled in the trench afterwards. Apparently there’s a dial tone and everything!

house 10.06.2017 - 1.jpg — we love a good trench

Other outdoor work included laying more paving slabs and turning on the outdoor lights.

house 10.06.2017 - 16.jpg — replacing a wobbly slab

Steve’s team came to install the wood burner in the middle of the week. Cue much amusement from the guys wanting to know when the fish will be delivered. Installation went off mostly without a hitch with a little drilling out of the brickwork for ducting and a little bricking up for a base that the thing sits upon. It’s a closed system, so we don’t need air bricks to the room, but there is a need to supply air to the appliance itself, and another need to vent out the chamber so it doesn’t overheat, especially since we’re sticking a great big TV above it (eventually). The extra size of the exterior brickwork plinth at the bottom made it a little challenging for the guys to connect the bottom duct since it was so long, so they had to come back the day after and finish the job. It looks great as it is but we’ll add to it in time: eventually the build-out sections will be built bigger so the TV is set back behind the stove. We’re going to develop this design with Steve now that this portion of the job is complete, but at least it’s safe at the moment and passes all its HETAS requirements for building control. It’s a complicated design, but Dave’s watching over it, and it will be awesome.

house 10.06.2017 - 2.jpg — Rais 900 all alone

house 10.06.2017 - 3.jpg — where it will live

house 10.06.2017 - 23.jpg — woodburner, mid-install

house 10.06.2017 - 7.jpg — temporary buildout and ready to go

The mechanical ventilation system failed it’s commission a couple of weeks ago, which was slightly scary. The pipes are all running in the void between the concrete first floor and the ground floor ceiling, and getting to them now would destroy a ton of decorating. The system runs to all the wet areas including the downstairs coats cupboard where all the electrical controls are housed. The problem was that there wasn’t enough suction on the longer runs to the other side of the house and to the kitchen, so it failed its installation tests. We have been waiting on tenterhooks seeing how the company would deal with this, and they came back this week to fix it. Their solution was to fit a second motor in the loft to give it enough oomph. So now we’ve got double-spiders up there, all labelled up nice and pretty, and it sucks like fury. Hooray!

You may have noticed in one of the photos above that the exterior light was ON! Yes, the lights are on at long last. Lewis was characteristically sanguine about showing me the gleaming little LEDs and lovely warm Edisons outside, but I am pretty sure he’s kinda proud of getting near the end, and I think I even caught a sly smile or two in there somewhere. It’s another threshold of making the house look like a home.

I’ll take you on a tour of some of the mostly-finished rooms….

house 10.06.2017 - 8.jpg — shoes-off policy upstairs now that the floor protection is up

house 10.06.2017 - 9.jpg — Gareth’s room

house 10.06.2017 - 10.jpg — Gregory’s room

house 10.06.2017 - 12.jpg — first floor hallway

house 10.06.2017 - 13.jpg — the glorious linen cupboard!

house 10.06.2017 - 14.jpg — Gillian’s room

house 10.06.2017 - 17.jpg — up close and personal with a newel post

house 10.06.2017 - 18.jpg — boys’ bathroom with burglar PIR in hallway

house 10.06.2017 - 11.jpg — master vanity needs shifting to the right 100 mm

It was all looking marvellous indeed! But then… the heavens opened. This time last year, you’ll remember that the storm drains on the local roads up the hill failed, and my neighbours got flooded out with the grounds guys altruistically running bricks to them to raise their furniture before the water got to their beds and sofas. Since then, much repair work has been done, and one neighbour was able to move back in just after Christmas; the other is due to move back in at the end of the summer.

This year it was our turn for drama.

The water was either down to the oak frame or the windows, and it was only in a few places. First we phoned Neil who has built a bijillion of oak frames in his career, and he was totally cool about it. Although he’s never seen anything like it, he offered some suggestions and kept a cool head. He was down onsite two days after we called, and he agreed to do some sealing around the edges as a failsafe. He came with Grant and an enormous ladder on the weekend to put the CT1 in some gaps and seal it up, so we won’t be seeing this sort of thing again. The next step is to talk to the window company about the seals around the windows, but that’s a little more complicated because there are so many materials (mastick, sealant, bronze frames) to contend with. Ben’s on it and we should come up with a solution to cover that side as well soon. This belt-and-braces approach should mean we’ve got an air and water tight arrangement, and this is important as we look forward to the all-important Air Test for the SAP calcs in a couple of weeks.

The brick guys returned to repair the damage we did to taking out the piers, and to fill the extra holes the in the bricks made by the electricians in their quest to find good spots for outdoor lights and power. They should finish up next week so they’re only here for a wee bit, but I didn’t get away lightly…. “Who was the last man to walk on the moon?”, asked Paul in the morning. With a completely blank mind, I said Charlie Duke whom I knew was an astronaut, but I also knew was the wrong answer. I’ve even read Andrew Smith’s Moon Dust, and I SHOULD know these things! When I came back onsite in the afternoon to drop off some thing or other, it was “What’s so significant about the River Roe in the States?” Galling, because I’m American, and I’m sure he picks these questions because of it. I will leave you to go and find the answers yourselves!

house 10.06.2017 - 5.jpg — chipping out the decimated brickwork

And James has got all comfortable in his man-cave in the kitchen.

Week 60

Posted on June 4, 2017 by admin

Not long to go now. Three weeks until we move in. There hasn’t been a light bulb lit yet which is worrying, but they’re all getting wired in at least.

house 29.05.2017 - 1.jpg — sorting narrow from wide beam

house 29.05.2017 - 3.jpg — hooray for lights in the upstairs hallway

house 29.05.2017 - 4.jpg — family room lights/James’ new digs

house 29.05.2017 - 16.jpg — Where do these go, Jimbo?

house 29.05.2017 - 27.jpg — fancy floor lights under the stairs

house 29.05.2017 - 12.jpg — cill lights in the kitchen

But the biggest thing this week was saying goodbye to the old garage. It put James out of a home and his new office is now sitting in pieces in the family room. He doesn’t really sit at his desk very much now that we’re coming up to the close–lots of managing lots of trades all the time. I’m sooooo glad to see the garage go. What a beast! Jamie says the beams were in excellent nick which is surprising given the decrepit state of the rest of the structure: cracks in the floor, leaky roof, cracks in the brickwork. It’s main problem was that it sat right on the sweet spot for the garden. When our future selves are sitting out on the new patio with a cold drink in hand, we’ll shake our heads and remember it fondly, I’m sure!

We had the happiest labourer ever onsite this week. John, I think he was called, and he was a luck-of-the-draw-from-an-agency bloke. I guess he was used to working in London where these guys are normally tasked with horrible jobs like moving supplies up and down 7 flights of stairs a gazillion times on a given day in the middle of summer, so this surely seemed a picnic in comparison. When James and Jamie allowed him to drive the dumper around and get involved in the garage demo, well, he was just over the moon! Like a total kid, smiling all day long, as if he were hiding in a candy store at Christmas, not doing a day’s work around on a building site with big machinery. It’s a pleasure to have him onsite and his enthusiasm was totally contagious.

house 29.05.2017 - 24.jpg — 3 lorry loads to remove most of it

house 29.05.2017 - 25.jpg — by the end of the week, even the concrete base was gone

Inside, some final pieces are coming together. In preparation for the fireplace installation next week, the electricians put the wires through the ceiling towards where the sockets will live for the hi-fi. These wires will get boxed in, and it’s lovely that they’re away from all the scary heat from the stove area. Dave’s done drawings, so everyone knows what the finished product will look like.

house 29.05.2017 - 10.jpg — wires ready for boxing

Additional boxing will be put on the other side of the room to hide the gas pipe. We put this in to future proof any requirement for gas in the room. Like if we wanted to change our lovely wood-burner to gas if it was too hot for instance. Or if we just wanted a change. Originally this pipe wouldn’t have been in the way because we’d intended to cover this area with a low set of built-in units. But with (more than a few) changes in design, this pipe got a little orphaned. Boxing is not a great position to be in, it smacks of afterthought, but it’s the best solution we’ve got at the moment.

house 29.05.2017 - 11.jpg — orphaned gas pipe

The plumbers are making their way round the bathrooms. The WC was transformed from Box to Room over the course of the week.

Lots more to think about outside. Like clearing,….

house 29.05.2017 - 14.jpg — earth – (and) – child

We’ve got to decide if we want to spend the extra cash on swapping the porch soffits from painted ply to oak tongue and groove. What do you think?

house 29.05.2017 - 22.jpg — porch: ply or T&G?

house 29.05.2017 - 23.jpg — more soffit decisions

More work was done on the brick slips, and they’re all finished now–hooray! Thanks Clive. A bit of fancy mortar and we’re done.

house 29.05.2017 - 20.jpg — front slips are in

house 29.05.2017 - 21.jpg — still getting large deliveries….

Work on the bridges is looming. We’ve got a design through from the engineers, and it looks like we’ll be able to drive the space shuttle across them they’re designed so robustly (is that a word?). I’m not sure we need something so bomb-proof. There’s is a ton of extra hardcore to get rid of, so we can use that to fill, and I’ve still got lots of 450 mm diameter corrugated plastic pipe to use too. I’m sure James and Jamie are sick to death of moving it around site anyway. It’s turned a little Where’s Wally with these dang pipes.

house 29.05.2017 - 28.jpg — 450 mm pipes

It was half term this week, and I must say a big thank you to the kids for being so great and leaving Mummy alone to get on with site visits, curtain choosing, counting pennies on spreadsheets, and generally being preoccupied. They should be getting on with GCSE and A-level revision anyway, right? We did manage to get out and about one day, the highlight being a great big Surrey snail round Ranmore Common (we’re very easy to please). Sadly the ice cream van had scarpered due to impending summer storms which we managed to dodge. I’m very grateful to the kids for being so self-sufficient. I definitely owe them some cakes when this is done!

I’ve put this one in here because Dad might like the digger-as-sundial on a weekend when there’s nothing going on onsite.

Week 59

Posted on June 4, 2017 by admin

Got the lamp back this week with its two new panes. Even bought it some new bulbs on amazon. I toyed with the idea of polishing it up back to its original copper, and you can see a little test piece where I gave it a go under the sign-hanging bit int he photos where it looks more brown. But Stephen says just to clean the dirt off it and polish it with beeswax. So that’s what we’ll do. Now just to fit it when the electrical guys are ready, or better yet, just ask them to install it before they forget.

The electrical control gear arrived, but there was a bit of an information gap of how to wire it up. It looks very nice and should be a little bit like plug-and-play since the hard part was planning the system and choosing which circuits would be set up to be controlled before the first fix. The easy bit is fitting the units, but the hard bit might be programming. It will be all installed nicely in the cupboard and will be finished once all the lights are on, the units are commissioned by the manufacturer, and the wires tidied away.

house 29.05.2017 - 15.jpg — control central: it will squeeze in there somewhere

Smoke alarms were fitted with blue bag covers while the decorating continues.

house 29.05.2017 - 17.jpg — safety first

And other rooms are starting to be fitted with their arrays of LEDs dangling from the ceilings.

We’ve got some really fancy lights in the floor and skirting, and these are going in carefully and gingerly so they don’t mess up Mike’s paintwork, Rich’s tiling, or Josh’s joinery.

house 29.05.2017 - 9.jpg — skirting lights

house 29.05.2017 - 13.jpg — heating manifold all wired in too

Terry and Josh installed the new less fussy oak cladding in the master bedroom. Neil had dropped off some whoppers of replacement beams the week previously–they were so big that it was impossible to lift, much less finesse into place. So Neil kindly took them back to deepest Sussex to shave a bunch of weight off and make them more manageable, but with still leaving enough meat for the beams to join in the middle and cover the steel along the ridge-line. Even without the extra weight it was a job and a half to fit these large beams, up on the tower, in the middle of May, while the heating is being tested. Terry and Josh get all the fun jobs.

house 29.05.2017 - 2.jpg — finished beams

house 29.05.2017 - 18.jpg — shavings from making the mortice and tenon joints

Bathrooms are coming on and the tiling looks great. The tilers have a bunch of criteria they use to line up the tiles. Mostly they like to centre on specific things like fittings and windows. But sometimes decisions have to be made to un-align tiles; one of these was maintaining a non-cut edge around the shower trays on both wall and floor tiles. This is to ensure a good seal around anywhere water might sneak in. If you don’t cut these edges, the porcelain finish remains intact and it reduces the possibility of water getting inside the actual tile. This is good. But sometimes the resulting wall tiles that are aligned with windows then don’t line up with the joins in the floor. This may be perceived as a little un-good. But I’d much rather have structural integrity be the focus, and we’ve chosen a colour for the grout so the lines kinda disappear anyway. I’m sure that when we see the finished product with all the furniture and vanity units in, it will be amazing.

Some other nice bits percolated through this week.

The priority is to get the inside of the building all completely finished, cleaned and sorted. But tiny jobs outside can be attended to in between.

Next week is a big outdoor week with the return of the grounds guys with the lovely big noisy machinery again.

Week 58

Posted on May 23, 2017 by admin

Without going into too much drama about tempers flaring, lines of communication being tested, inspections on the edge and deadlines looming, …, despite all this, it’s all mostly going to plan. This week’s post will be mostly pictorial as I’m struggling to write anything at all coherent in the rush to finish this project. Loose ends include all electricals as we haven’t seen a blub a-flickerin’ yet, the entire fireplace concept, some of the big wood pieces from Neil, the sanitaryware, tiling and the drive. On the positive side, the Moldovian chippies Adrian and Vadim are generally fantastic and are busy getting on with doorframe, skirting and ironmongery. Terry and Josh finished the stairs too–I don’t think they’ll be in a hurry to fit any more capping in the hand and floor rails, but Josh remains undeterred, even when faced with a chisel in his hand and a trip to Epsom hospital. Didn’t stop him smiling when he returned to site to finish the day’s work.

The cornice company arrived early in the week and transformed some of the rooms.

house2017.05.23 - 9.jpg — awesome coving, but, oops, poor decision on light placement

house2017.05.23 - 10.jpg — does this work around the units?

house2017.05.23 - 1 (1).jpg — drawing room looking more formal

Finishing touches around the staircase are being decided with things like skirting beading, window/stair boards, and capping under the newels. James is great at making use of extra pieces to create some of the finishing touches. And it’s only when you see these things installed that you can get a feel for what the finished product looks like. Most things have been fantastic, and some require small tweaks, like the window board used on to top the plasterwork in the front bay. We’ve decided that the trim should have a profile more like the stairs, so this bit of boarding will be replaced, but it was excellent to have the flexibility and chance to check out the profile and have the option. This exercise prompted some deep thinking about what exactly we’re trying to do in the space.

house2017.05.23 - 1.jpg — is it a window board or a stair board?

Likewise with the trim between the structural oak and the floorboards. Initially, I wasn’t keen to have so many different kinds of oak hanging around, so I didn’t want the trim in at all when we started the finishes. And James’ advice was not to have too many different trims or the whole thing looks cluttered. But now I feel that if each piece does what it’s expected, then it follows the ethos of honest materials in the house, and it should be ok to have a little bit of trim that matches around the house, and it will blend in better in time. We opted for the little bead around the structural oak in the photo. The floors remain protected, and the windows will have a layer of dust on until the final sparkle-clean, so it’s hard to tell what the final finish will be anyway!

house2017.05.23 - 2.jpg — beading on the floor

Vadim and Adrian have been boxing in pipework and building wardrobes around them. We’ve decided on a semi-complicated painting scheme with the interiors being darker shades of each room’s trim.

house2017.05.23 - 14.jpg — Gemma’s wardrobe

house2017.05.23 - 15.jpg — Gillian’s wardrobe

house2017.05.23 - 7.jpg — double checking the spec on ironmongery

Looking forward to snagging the kitchen next week. We’ll discuss a few trimming bits, and do a double check on things like the work-surface edge.

house2017.05.23 - 8.jpg — discussion piece: is this pencil or bevel?

The bathrooms are looking good, but we’re finding a few things that could have been better designed. Like,…. the door slamming into the unit when entering the bathroom. We’ll have to install a rubber baby buggy bumper on the back side of the door along with advice to tell the boys to be jolly careful without entering their bathroom with too much energy (shouldn’t be a problem, they’re a bit slow int he mornings). Much consultation with Allison in the States and friends in the UK to generate a survey of vanity unit heights in an attempt to get ours right. We’ve decided 900 to top of unit is a good height–a little higher than most, so it won’t be our family keeping the local chiropractors in business.

house2017.05.23 - 16.jpg — boys’ bathroom

In a dull moment, the guys found time to remove the plinth they’d lovingly installed before we changed our minds. Our MO seems to be build it, then remove it….

house2017.05.23 - 6.jpg — plinthless fire

…. just like the piers!

Clinton never really liked the piers in the front; they were only put there to carry the rainwater downpipes into the ground in a clean swoop. So, taking advice from the architect and structural engineer who both said that they weren’t critical to the structure, we decided to take the bold (= expensive) move to remove them. This leaves an obvious problem for the bricklayers who now need to come back and make these areas pretty again. But the overhang looks much less fussy now, and we’re happy with it. At least we were until a giant gaping crack appeared around the first floor cavity trays.

On further advice, we adopted a suck-it-and-see approach, and the whole thing looks pretty stable despite the crack. It hasn’t shifted since it first appeared, so should be ok. After all, there is an enormous great big steel holding up this side of the house, and the roof is all complete as one separate structure spread across the whole building. It SHOULD be ok. At least it is when I close my eyes. And a little mortar in the joint before we move in and all will be well. Right?

Lee, Jamie, Djokovich, and the groundwork gang were back to lay the paving for the patio. Their work was hampered by the water board inspector who deemed it fit to ask the guys to dig the main supply to the house a little deeper. This was an enormous pain which required un-building of the garage and some of the edging stones the guys had laid last week. The inspector didn’t stop there, took a deeper look at some of the work and started going off on other trench work depths, like the supply into the taps in the garden. He even had a go at some of the pipework internally, which never happens apparently. Usually the inspector has a cursory look around near where the water enters the building and leaves the M&E team to get on with things downstream. The groundwork guys have done hundreds of jobs like this without fuss, and the plumbing team was livid by the time the inspector finally passed it all, and all the trenchwork could be filled in. They’d none of them ever seen anything like it. Clearly this house has been jinxed from the start. The guy earned a few choice nicknames around site, and luckily for him some of the spare pieces of wood lying around didn’t get airborne.

house2017.05.23 - 13.jpg — high water table in the mains trench

house2017.05.23 - 4.jpg — on the positive side, slabs are looking good

We’re even venturing into town to look at furniture and light fittings. Mostly these experiences highlight that fact that neither of us like shopping very much, nor do we like going into town unless it’s work related. We’re much more country-bumpkins these days. Either we’re super boring (likely), or we just dread the time it takes to travel around aimlessly looking at one low-profile uncomfortable sofa after another. I think Clinton was definitely going to lose the plot entirely if he got close to one more Edison bulb singeing his retinas. The best way forward is to continue on our current course of clicking our way through doing most of the furnishings.