Catching Up

Sorry I have not up dated that much lately however I have been away on holiday.

As you can see from the pictures I uploaded before I went work has started on the extension. The builder have been and dug all the rear foundations and finally poured the concrete on Tuesday, see picture below

They started on Mon 12th May the day we got clearance from Thames water which ment we could actually do the foundation!! Work I think has been quite slow as this has taken so long however everything has been dug by hand due to poor digger access and also rain rain and even more rain. It would seem that every day the guys came to dig it rained!!

However, the house is beginning to look more and more like a building site every day,

The foundation for the new garage foundation has been dug and will be poured tomorrow (I hope) here is the foundation they have dug,

Water and all!!

Whilst the builders have been digging I have been trying to get the spare bedroom finished so we can move all our living room stuff into the spare room and live out of there as a living room as I knock wall between the living room and dining room as we plan to move this wall back 1m to extend the size of the living room. This will, I am sure, be fun as I have never done anything like this before!!

Have a look at the pictures I have taken of the spare room, all we need to do now is a bit of painting and it will be ready to move the living room upstairs.

Before I plastered the hole in the ceiling I had to get the building control officer to sign off my gallow brackets and new flooring joists which he did on Friday when he was looking at the foundations. Finally a picture of our bedroom wall with the skirting on and painted, no need for the pollyfiller thankfully!!.

That's all for now

Garry & Christine

I got Plastered

Hi All,


I plastered my bedroom wall yesterday, it is the first time I have plastered for a couple of years so I think the result is pretty good. I am going to seal it tonight so I will really see what it is like, this will determine if I need to get the polyfiller out!!!





Another picture from a different angle!!



That's all folks,

Garry & Christine

Foundations

More pictures of the work carried out by the buider



Earth in the front Garden


Earth in the front Garden


Foundations for single story rear extension

Foundations for single story rear extension

You can just see the drainage pipe, I think the builder will need to go lower so the foundation sits under the base of this pipe. (I think the second pipe, foul water one, is lower!!)

Still trying to finish the chimney breast

More pictures of the bedromm etc..


More bonding and temparary floor down



Wall ready to plaster as all bonding has been done.



First picture of the builders work, digging the founds!!


More foundations

A picture of the garden (Cristine's baby)

Trying to finish the Chimney

Hi All,

The plans have been resent to Thames Water and they have given up permission to build over the drains. So work has started so it was really pleasing to see the I will have to say I am really chuffed with this!!

Pictures below




New joist for bedroom floor


Bracket in wall using chemical resin fixings


Joists shown from the first floor bedroom


Joists where the chimney breast was


Bonding plaster making the wall level

More to follow

Garry & Christine

It's Gone

Hi everyone,

The chimney has gone. I was off work on Friday and managed to remove almost all of the chimney, the amount of dust did not please Christine. I need to somehow get her to understand that when knocking things down dust is made IT IS NOT MY FAULT. Anyway enough of the dust, now it is settled and Christine is back talking to me I can tell up that there are a load more bricks in a chimney breast than you might think. I have managed to fill a 6 yard skip with all the bricks so you can image it was a lot harder than I thought.

Things are starting to move forward with the build, I have appointed a builder and he is planning to start around the 10th May and plans to be finished around the 10th August. This will be the basic rear structure along with new garage, utility room, first floor bedroom, bathroom and attic room. This will not cover the electric's, plumbing or decoration as I plan to do this when I have some spare cash!!. So deposit is now paid so fingers cross everything will go to plan. Although we have pencilled in this date Thames Water could put a spanner in the works if they do not agree the works, my architect is having to re-draw certain aspects of the plans and put them into Thames Water. This will mean that we will have to dig a trench from the front man hole to the rear man hole and re route the rainwater drain. This is a pain and an extra cost but what is really annoying is that I will have to lose about 600mm from the side of the rear extension.

Anyway pictures below show the space where the chimney was.

Catch up soon,

Garry & Christine

Picture taken in the spare bedroom looking at the wall

Picture taken in the spare bedroom looking down into the dining room

Picture taken in the spare bedroom looking up into the attic

Picture taken in the dining room looking at the wall

Gallows Brackets

Hi All,

I have stared removing the chimney breast. This weekend Chris (Christine's dad) and I installed the gallows brackets and lintel that now hold up the chimney breast!!

This is the first bit of construction work to begin on the house and as always took longer than I thought. It was the first time I had used chemical resin to anchor bolts to the wall so this took a bit of getting used too. We seemed to go through more that the guide said as you never know how much has gone into the hole so we kept putting more in. But the end result is 3 gallows brackets installed and a lintel to hold the weight. Now all I have to do is remove the stack from the ground and first floor, put in new joists, get the chimney capped and then call for the building inspector to double check everything to make sure it is OK.
That's all for now.


Garry & Christine.