Author: Shaun

  • Garden Room Shelving

    The 27 pieces of shelving for the Garden Room was finished being sanded smooth this morning. All were vacuumed to remove all the dust and first half painted before lunch.

    Then after lunch, while the second batch was painted, the first was gently rubbed with fine sandpaper and the edges filled with caulk, ready for the full gloss coat tomorrow.


  • Kitchen Final Coat & Shelves Prepared

    The second coat of Oil White paint was applied to the various surfaces that were painted the day before. The shower cubicle is now a gloss white along with the hot tank & air con cupboards and the shelves under the sink & its worktop.

    The shelves were sanded and rounded, all 26 separate pieces! The shelves near the doorway into the garage had their corners chopped off to avoid that sharp jab when trying to cut the corner off!

  • Smoke & Fire Detection Installed

    The Smoke and Fire detectors have been wired up and connected into the lighting circuit. All are linked together and seems to be in working order with the pressing of the test button!! Very loud!

  • Kitchen Painted White

    All the bare wooden surfaces were painted white. The air ducting, the shower cubicle, the covers over the hot tank and air con unit and the shelves under the sink & worktop!

    Next task is to do the shelving!

  • toilet Sliding Doors put back!

    This morning we put back the sliding doors for the toilet in the Garden Room. They were given a clear coat of varnish a little while ago. We changed the locking mechanism to grip the drive cord running around the two pulleys so it would be easier to release the doors from the drive cord in the future. We have smoothed down the edge and corners of each door and painted down the middle with Walnut varnish to darken the white fermacell to match the colour of the magnetic strips we are planning to use to provide a locking mechanism and also a soft buffer to avoid the clunk noise when the doors slide together!

    Later on, we will put in an electric motor and control circuits to control the doors for us and automatically close or open the doors on a press of a switch etc.

  • Garden Room Shelves

    We calculated what shelves we needed in the Garden Room to provide storage space while the room is being used as the kitchen. It turns out to be two 300mm (1foot) deep shelves approximately 4.1metres (14feet) long along the back wall above the sink and worktop, two 300mm (1foot) shelves 1.78metres (just under 6feet) long in the gap, above the worktop, to the right of the cooking area and a further three 400mm deep (1 and third feet) 1.6metres (just over 5feet) left of the chest freezer, below the Utility Rail and back to the doorway. Plus Three 300mm (1foot) shelves 2.8metres (9feet) above the Utility Rail over the chest freezer and going back to the doorway too.

    Finally a set of six shelves both below and above the Utility Rail positioned left of the doorway, these are only 200mm (8inches) deep.

    Oh yes another se set of four 200mm deep shelves below the Utility Rail over by the hot tank cupboard in the gap before the sink worktop!

    We have sliced up 4 sheets of 18mm OSB boards! Next to rout the edges and corners to make them safer etc!

  • Covers On!

    The compartments where the hot water tank, air ducting and chimney, and fan lies, are now all covered up!

    They just need a coat of paint!

  • Smoke Alarm circuit Design

    We analysed our building layout including our temporary living quarters and selected 4 devices, 1 optical smoke detector, 2 ionising smoke detectors and 1 heat sensor, all linked together as required in the regulations. The two ionising type of detectors are for the store room and our living quarters in the corridor between the lounge and bedroom 1. The optical type is in the kitchen and finally the heat sensor in the garage right up front on the highest point of the room (the ceiling slopes upwards towards the front).

    We started laying in the 3 core & earth, lighting grade cable, through the building. We will tap into the lighting circuit in the garage.

    The detectors should be arriving soon, along with batteries for each of them.

  • Kitchen & Hot Water

    The sink seems to be sealed! We ran water into the sink and nothing leaked!! The waste disposal unit operated just fine too! Phew! Thanks goodness for that! We switched on the immersion heater during lunch time and we returned back to a half a tank of hot water! The basin in the toilet delivers the hot water after about 30 seconds of waiting (it is a long run and the head of pressure is low. The kitchen sink came through ok too after about 20seconds (of course it is a shorter run).

    We put the shelf in under the sink and put a self in the section between the washing machine and the tumble dryer.

    We also sealed off the final part of the air ducting above the air con unit to direct the old waste air up and out of the building. Then we put up a door to cover up the hot water tank cupboard using a piece of 9mm hardwood ply (measuring 560mm wide and 2270mm high) with a slot cut into the edge to allow the lighting channel’s flange to be accommodated.

    Tomorrow we will be doing a smaller cover to hide the electronic controls and junction boxes, plus another cover over the air con section. We also will put up open shelves along the back wall above the new worktop ready for all the “stuff” of our kitchen! With just a splash of white paint on the bare wood surfaces to finish off then the kitchen would be ready for occupying!

  • Shower Cubicle Bits and Pieces

    We put together a light box with two low energy bulbs in it, to provide plenty of light inside the shower! It was made of spare pieces of our fermacell boards to make a box, with aluminium foil glued onto the inside surfaces, to reflect as much light as possible downwards. The light switch is mounted outside high up on the cubicle.

    We also fitted an air duct from the cubicle to the main ducting to provide some extraction of the steam and heat, to draw in fresh air, as the whole cubicle is one sealed box (ceiling and walls all joined together). The fresh air will enter around the door itself! It probably would get hot very quickly and may feel too stuffy! So we thought we had better fit an air extraction point!