Author: Jackdaw

Friday morning the window installation began.  The first thing was to take the windows from the palette and work out where they go … and these triple glazed units are HEAVY!!

The living room windows and sliding door proved too much for the crew of three so it was decided to await reinforcements on Monday and to install the ground floor windows.

The windows we have chosen are the Perfectline 70mm triple glazed units finished in a dark grey anthracite colour.  The smooth grey (RAL 7016) colour was also chosen for the Main Door & Back Door and will be used on the metal parapet capping around the roofs.  The frames are all using VEKA profiles with Winkhaus tilt & turn mechanisms.

The tilt & turn mechanisms are handy as they can be opened slightly for ventilation or fully opened to clean or yodel!!

By end of Friday all the smaller windows on the ground floor and the back door were in place.  Monday saw the complete installation of the 7 windows upstairs.  The guys from Amberline are efficient & thoroughly good to deal with.

Our windows are en-route from Poland and should be ready to begin installation tomorrow Tuesday 13th November.

The windows are VEKA profiles from Amberline Ireland and feature a 70mm PVC profile and triple glazed units with tilt & turn WinkHaus hinges on all the opening windows.

Amberline Ireland are the suppliers of all our windows, sliding door and front door and were selected for their combination of cost, expertise and a number of client testimonials/ recommendations.

We are really looking forward to getting the windows installed so the house can dry out and we can begin the interior plumbing & electrical fit-out.

On a Bank Holiday Monday the team from Bautech Construction arrived bright and early to begin covering the roof.

The roofing system uses fibreglass as the waterproof covering.  The timber deck is carefully covered with a series of fibreglass fillet pieces to round all the corners and provide a continuous surface.

The timber edges on the roof gulleys are sanded and rounded.  Once it has been fully cleaned and any damp spots have been blowtorched to ensure a dry surface the covering begins.  Strips of  fibreglass sheet are fixed in the gulleys and parapet to form the edges and along any joints before the larger sheets are applied to the main rood surface.  Special rollers ensure the sheets are fully embedded in the resin and there are no air pockets or bubbles.

Once cured and dry the translucent fibreglass is covered in a resin which offers fire-retardant features and a nice continuous colour finish .. the resin can be coloured but we were happy with the dark grey colour that it comes in by default.

With the malodorous weather this week, the BauTech guys have been challenged to keep the work areas weather-tight and dry so they can work. With some clever timber work and plastic sheeting they’ve managed to create tent structures over the sub-roof areas to enable them to work through the showers.

We have chosen a polished concrete floor for the entirety of the ground floor of our house. This should work well with the underfloor heating system installed by Ashgrove Renewables.

On Tuesday the crew from Concrete Concepts arrived on site, checked out the layout and ordered the first load of concrete for the floors.

Using a laser level the finished floor level is precisely calculated throughout the house.  With the smaller rooms, the job of ferrying barrowloads of concrete into each room is a painstaking process but it isn’t long before the first room (the pantry has a concrete filling.

On day 1 the back bedroom, pantry and living room were completed.  After a few hours of curing, the steel strips are carefully tapped into place across all the door sills, and key places which prevent cracks forming in the finished concrete (or more accurately encourage them if they do happen to happen underneath the strips).

The process of pouring, curing and finely smoothing the surface takes several hours and the Concrete Concepts crew were onsite until the early hours waiting for the concrete to reach a suitable finish .. and braving the cold and wind & rain which pounded the house overnight.

On day 2 the kitchen-dining room and hallway were poured .. and the final stage of the steps and utility & bathroom will be poured on day 3.

We’ll have to wait about 21 days for the concrete to cure to a level where it can then be given its first grind and hardening .. and we can see how the floor is going to look .. we cannot wait.

The Kingspan Frame has now been installed and the crew have left the site.  They’ll be back in a few weeks when the windows & doors are installed to perform the airtightness taping of joints & testing.

The plumber Kieran installed all the rainwater downpipes so that the roof can safely drain while we await the arrival of the guys who will install the roof finish in a week.  We also managed to lay 160mm of roof insulation and fix a smartply OSB timber dick on top to cover all the roof surfaces.

Terri & I spent most of the weekend installing the 190mm worth of underfloor insulation throughout the entire groundfloor … lots of measuring, cutting and hacking but we just about completed it all by late Sunday evening in the fading light.

The plumber came on Monday and put in all the pipes that sit below the floor such as toilet waste and floor drains.

Ashgrove came Tuesday and fitted all the pipework for the underfloor heating on the ground floor and the first floor pipework for the kickspace radiators.

Time to start laying the underfloor insulation in preparation for the installation of the heating pipework next week. I managed to lay the first layer in several rooms but the overnight rain leaking in through the unprotected roof gaps meant that it all had to be lifted and swept & vacuumed out … what fun!

On the upside, the crane managed to lower the monster canopy over the hall door. There was a lot of tricky manoeuvring of the huge frame with the crane and posts to get it all in place. The large outside beam had to be straightened after giving us a bit of trouble when lowering the canopy. Once the canopy beams were bolted in place it felt a lot more secure and steady.

Friday dawned dry & bright and with all hands on the roof deck we hauled 40 bales of insulation up onto the roof followed by a hefty pile of smartply osb3 board. With the sun shining we managed to completely cover the main roof in two layers of 80mm insulation and begin the timber deck before the day ended. Safely covered in a heavy plastic sheet overnight the work will continue tomorrow.

The rain has not really relented for the last few days making the finishing on the exterior of the building a bit of a problem.

Fortunately there was enough to be getting on with on the interior with the steel posts to be fixed in place and walls to be checked & levelled.

So no major changes on the outside .. while we wait for the rain to ease.

Plans to start decking the roof have been adjusted in anticipation of a better day on Friday.

With the overall house frame now in place .. all the secondary jobs begin.

The roof parapets have to be fixed in place, the airtightness and weatherproof membrane fixed around the outside to create a big blue box.

After a wet and windy overnight .. the last 2 days turned out OK and by end of Day 5 all the parapets are in place, the roofs have a covering and the weatherproof membrane is largely fixed in place. Just in time for the torrential rain and wind forecast for Tue night!!
Fingers crossed it is all still there tomorrow.

An early start to the day and the good weather augured well for the fitting of the first floor.

By 11:00 all the first floor walls were fitted and soon the roof panels were dropped into place.

The last roof panel was lifted and fitted by lunchtime and the full shape of the house could then be seen. We had to go up for a look.