10 September 2013

September 2013

So - the builders are back after their month's break. I'm glad to say they did notice I had built the wall - and they were suitably impressed!

Antoine has been setting out the work plan and  it looks like we wont be on schedule for me to move in at Christmas.  Once the liquid concrete is poured above the underfloor heating system - you have to wait a month.

Although you may not see much change in this photo - the gable ends are now raised to height (minus insulation and roofing). It looks e good, not too high and well below the bamboo level - and out of sight of the old house.










In side I can now get a feel for the size  and height of the office  and attic rooms.  The views are so nice from up here I wish I could leave the roof off !
















The view from the study/ office - might need to cut those branches - but it's still great !

So - back to the tool shed building.
You can see in this photo where I decided to knock out the block work on the bamboo side after realising it was going to be a big and expensive job for very little storage space.  However - digging out the bamboo roots to gain that extra 40 cm took me 4 hours hard work. Very hard work.  Once it was out and below the original foundation (which were too hard to dig out), I concreted in this area and continued up with the block work at the back and front. The bamboo side doesn't need block work as it is absolutely inaccessible.

I already had on site some old scaffolding frames which I cut to give me the 2m long roof supports. Perfectly strong enough, and offer better head clearance wood of similar strength. Also - they were there and free. Putting the in correctly was a bit tricky with no 2 walls true to each other! It is a really crooked corner.  Cutting the PST (undulated roof sheeting) was also a bit hard because the wall to the right is uneven stone and very bowed. But it came together fine in the end.


Still need to finish off some work on the concrete blocks, filling under the roof tiles and fixing them more securely and then to put the door in. Or maybe I should do the rendering first.

Just quickly popped my work tools in before it started to rain!   Using corrugated metal sheets (on hand) to close the bamboo side gave me more space again.

So - the tool shed structure is up - and it looks OK in that corner.   The next few days are likely to be a bit wet - and still no car. I think my next priority will be to sort out transport.

19th Sept.
My legs have never been particularly photogenic - but as you can see from the below - they are even less so now!! NB - my legs are not slim but a lot of what you see is swelling! Honest!!  So much for the health benefits of cycling.  I wont bother to put down what I think about people who are stupid enough to keep vicious dogs.  I took this photo a week after the 'attack'. You can imagine what it looked like before!  I was 'saved' from losing a chunk of my leg by my thick jeans which were elastic type material -so the Alsatian's teeth didn't manage to go deep into my thigh. But the force in the bite was pretty impressive. I daren't start to imagine what such a bite would have done to a kid - or to me in shorts.  I don't know if I did the right thing in not reporting it.  I was never scared of dogs before - but in the last week 2 other muts have chased me on my bike and I now feel  - scared sick. 

 Heading up to the house to take some photos which I'll post later. 


Gorgeous day (as you can see).  Antoine, Nicco and Boris were just finishing sweeping and clearing up. I really have to say the site and building is really neat and tidy.  No rubbish hanging around, everything is always finished off so perfectly.

This last week they have made impressive progress with completing the reinforcing around the top of the walls and fitting in of the roof beams.  It looks so good.

This is the view towards the kitchen - this area will be 'open' up to the  beams.  Which will be about 3.7m at the highest point.

 It's strange to start really seeing the volumes of the rooms and ratios of heights to room sizes.







The attic room here, has a small window for natural light/ventilation.  I' ll probably have a sliding door into this room from the stop of the stairs as there wont be height for opening inwards and opening onto the landing wouldn't be very safe.  I think the clearance is about 2m down to 1.2 (across 3m) and the room is 4m wide.  Ample for storing more than I should be keeping anyway!

Viewed from the field below, the house is starting to really take shape.  Today we talked about the log burner (see photo below) and flu clearance and the gutter at the back of the house which has to be integral to the wall.

The windows should be arriving in the next couple weeks, and will go in after the roof is on.  I've also found a fantastic deal for the main door.  I had 'glanced' at oak doors but after seeing the prices (upwards of 1800E) looked towards semi-hard wood doors (700 - 800E range). However, I saw a perfect (new) solid oak door,  exactly what I want, when I was at the garage trying to sort out my car problem. Apparently someone had problems in paying their car repairs and had offered the door in payment.  So I got it for 300E delivery included!!    The savings I made there will cover the cost of the car repairs!!




So here is the log burner I have chosen. Invicta Ove. Double burner so very ecological - and - what a beautiful machine!

22nd Sept
So here are the two seats I made from the old iron bed !!  I cut the head and foot ends off at about 60cm exactly where a suitably placed reinforcing bar across the base was and through the ornate sides, then rounded off the sharp edges and welded on 2 legs to each new chair.  I'll need to either have very 'stiff' cushions - or to add more base webbing - but after treating the metal with a special protective finish - they are pretty well finished!  They really suit the area by the pond.

29th Sept
This month has seen real progress with the house. Very good atmosphere with the builder team - equally positive and constructive meetings with the various members (bulldozer man, galandage window man, kitchen fitter, plumber and tiler). Good exchanges of ideas and problem solving thoughts.  Antoine has prepared the 'planning' for the rest of the building work bringing completion to the 1st week of February. That's fine - and having the detailed plan in hand helps everyone!

The roof structure is now on - ready to receive the insulation (under) and sheets of roofing - on top of which are laid the tiles.

The 'genoise' are all finished - and looking so neat!   A genoise is a tile 'over-hang' which carries rain water clear of the walls. Traditional houses here in the South of France don't have guttering.  The higher the house the greater the number of overhang layers (up to 4).

 So this is looking across the dining area towards the entrance door and into the kitchen.  There wont be any suspended ceiling so when finished this is the height of this area - up to the roof apex. A bit odd with light coming through at the moment - but the volume is great!










The guest bedroom will also enjoy a high ceiling dropping to 2.4m at the back wall.  The 2 areas together create such a great volume - it's a shame I have to have a wall diving it!  The internal wall here will have to have good sound-proofing.   The structure will be 7cm brick, clad on one side with 2 layers of 1-2cm pharmacell boards. Sandwiched between the boards I hope to be able to use 'Green glue' - which is recommended for reducing sound transmission.  The cost of green-glue for this wall will be around 200E - but if it offers good sound proofing - should be well worth is.  The pharmacell boards (not plaster-boards which aren't too ecological) aren't cheap either - but I think this would be a good solution / investment. Sound insulation in the house is so important.

Finally I found some really great 'oak' doors in LeRoy merlin. More expensive than the ones I had identified on the internet but so much better a feeling and quality.  Also - these oak doors came in the 2 sizes I need(83 and 73cm) and in sliding door version.   Windows have also arrived now and can be collected as soon as we are ready to fit them (2 weeks time according to the plan).

 

 So to my last image for September. The front door. Some friends delivered it for me to the house and had left it leaning against the wall (not the best position for an unsupported door - it weighs just over 100kg)!!!  I managed (alone) to lay it flat on 2 5x5cm pieces of wood - with huge difficulty as you can imagine - and couldn't resist the temptation to leave a surprise for the builders tomorrow morning!  When they try to lift it I think they will realise how very close I was to being left flattened!!!

So the summer is coming to an end.  The builders are now pushing ahead to ensure the roof is on before the colder wet weather arrives.  However - it happens to be wetter here in the summer here than in the winter - but it can also be much colder than you would expect going down to minus 15C! This last week they have been working on the 'rives' - edges of the roof. More labour intensive than I had realised. The work looks very tidy - even if you can't see it on the photo.

I've been pondering what I can do with all the off-cuts of tiles!  Surely I can make some sort of flower-bed structures?! The roof will be completely water-tight in the next day or two, and then they will do the tiling. The log burner has also arrived (167kg) and been stored in the garage until February and the windows have also arrived. I'll be arranging to pick them up as soon as I have a truck.