Roselea

Category: Groundworks

  • Perimeter Wall Commences – Day 1

     We finally start going upwards with our building, we have done virtually all of 9 corners out of the 14 we have in our house. The first course of block work is laid in these corners, using our L template and other tools to make a good neat job.

    First-layer-on-9-Corners-1

    First-layer-on-9-Corners-1

    We have put down 44 blocks in today’s work, 23 for the morning session and 21 in the afternoon session, each taking one load of mixing using half a bag of cement and 3 builder’s buckets of soft sand, which is about a 4 to 1 ratio (40 litres of sand against 10 litres of cement powder).

    First-layer-on-9-Corners-2

    First-layer-on-9-Corners-2

    Tomorrow, we will put down the 1 odd block to finish off the front Great room corner and then do the front extension porch and the front Utility room corner and then we will be back to the beginning again. We will check the alignment by stretching out some string and see how each corner matches up. Then we will start on the second course of concrete blocks on all the corners, but this time, put down 4 blocks on top of the 5 blocks we have done today. Because of the overlapping nature of the 140 mm wide blocks, we will have to slice off 75 mm off one block to make it go around the corner, overlapping the joints and hollows properly.

  • Assembled More Tools and Setup for Job!

     Today, we finished assembling our various templates and tools to help us build the wall. The L right angle template is working fine outside, after we have also made a couple of plumb bob holders, one for the corner and another for lining up the arms.

    One was using an standard camera tripod unit with the adjustable head removed to straddle over the corner and position the plumb bob down to the point at the corner on the L template, and the other one is a little triangular platform with 3 legs.

    Tripod-and-Tripod

    Tripod-and-Tripod

    Then, we made a little flat tool with two spirit level vials screwed on it and a short post going upwards  to attach the laser detector unit to. This will both test the height of the block and also the horizontal level too.

    On the other end of the laser level system, is the transmitter and we built a 4 tier “shelf” unit to allow for the laser generator to be placed on 4 different levels, each one being separated exactly 225 mm apart, that represent’s the height of a block (215 mm) plus a 10 mm mortar line.

    Storie-Laser-Pole-and-Detector-Unit

    Storie-Laser-Pole-and-Detector-Unit

    After lunch, we set up the equipment for mixing the mortar, got out the machine, water and electricity, opened up one of the stack of cement bags and discovered that it is going hard in places, so we sieved the content to get rid of the lumps!! Then getting the laser platform with its new “shelf” set up and calibrated that for an extra thick mortar joint (doubled to 20 mm) to adsorb any unevenness in our foundation strips.

    At this point it was nearly 5 pm so we decided not to start block laying today, instead we went back to the workshop and made so more tools!

    The old tool for controlling and applying a flat 10 mm thick mortar layer on the vertical ends of the blocks was adjusted to fit the narrower 140 mm wide blocks, instead of the 215 mm blocks it was last used on.

    Finally, we started making another template to control the amount of mortar along the top of the blocks when we are stacking the next layer on. This will create two 30 mm wide grooves to allow for a 15 mm thick load of mortar to be placed on the top surface so when we put the next concrete block on top, it will squash and wiggle down to a more consistent 10 mm thickness.

    Tomorrow, weather permitting, we will definitely start in earnest on actually building a wall!!

  • Final Preparations Towards Building Perimeter Wall

     Today, we finished off the preparation work of moving the remaining 300 concrete blocks, well actually more like 250 blocks as we still got a an untouched palette load of the blocks left after all the locations around the perimeter of the house now have a pile of these 140 mm wide hollow blocks, ready to hand for constructing the 4 layers of the outer wall.

    Perimiter-wall-blocks-piled-up

    Perimiter-wall-blocks-piled-up

    Then we adjusted the “hooks” on the Batter Boards to mark the position of the perimeter wall, which is always located 150 mm from the outer edge of the foundations, putting in two screws to represent our 140 mm wide wall. The original two outer screws that had defined the foundation strips were removed.

    Screws-marking-a-wall-position

    Screws-marking-a-wall-position

    Finally, we built two more “helping hand“ tools, giant right angle L templates to guide and orientate each of the 14 corners so that they are nicely right angles and also vertical too.

    Block-Corner-setting-tools

    Block-Corner-setting-tools

    We will start in Ernest on Monday by building up each corner (each contains a minimum of 14 blocks, in a four tier L shaped pyramid like structure) before we fill in the long straights.

  • Preparing for Building Perimeter Wall

     Today, in glorious summer weather, we went around all the foundations and filled in the gaps and drop-offs around the edges of the foundations to the surrounding soil, so we didn’t “fall” off and twist an ankle or our trolley won’t move as it bogged down in the groove or the uneven surface.

    Then we moved about 450 of the 720 blocks we have ordered, and positioned them spread out along the sides of the foundations strips for the Great Room, Bedroom 1, Bedroom 2 and finally part of Bedroom 3.

    Half-the-blocks-moved-

    Half-the-blocks-moved-

    Tomorrow in the morning before the rain comes in the afternoon, we will finish off along the front of the building and down the garage side of the foundation strips.

  • Tidy Up Day 2

     We finished off the tidying up task by removing the last lengths of shuttering and putting all the loose pieces back under cover in our Timber Storage. The used pegs (which are no longer usable) and broken boards we took to the bonfire corner up on Mount Sod ready for a day of wet showers to have our bonfire.

    Shuttering-Removed

    Shuttering-Removed

    We also opened up one of our impromptu concrete block molds to see if it had worked. The resulting blocks are a little uneven but seem to be fine.

    Concrete-blocks-removed-from-mould

    Concrete-blocks-removed-from-mould

    Tomorrow, we will move the piles of concrete blocks into strategic locations so that the 700 blocks will be in easy reach when we start building the wall!!

  • Tidy Up After Concrete Poured!

     Today, we started going around removing the shuttering boards and planks from the foundation strips. We also picked up the lumps of concrete that spilled over the edges and started the general process of tidying up after the great day of 14 cubic metres of concrete being poured and splashing around our trenches!

    We got a little more to finish tomorrow and stack up the board and CLS timber planks back under cover in our timber storage area, ready to be reused for something else later.

  • Foundation Concrete Is Poured!

    Here’s the site  at 7:46 before we got started …

    Aug-15th-The-site-before-work-started

    Aug-15th-The-site-before-work-started

    Our day started at 8:30 am with the arrival of the concrete pump lorry (half an hour early) ..

    Concrete-lorry-arriving

    Concrete-lorry-arriving

    The pump operator Alan set up his equipment including orientating the lorry, putting out the support arms, priming the pump and putting down tarpaulin sheets to protect the Loke surface against splashes etc.

    The boom arm is made of 4 segments, each being 8 metres (26feet) long so stretching across to our outermost trench was no problem ..

    Pump-Lorry-with-Legs-Extended

    Pump-Lorry-with-Legs-Extended

    Pump-Boom-fully-extended-1

    Pump-Boom-fully-extended-1

    Pump-Boom-fully-extended-2

    Pump-Boom-fully-extended-2


    Then at 9:40 am, the first load of concrete arrives and our work commences in earnest! We started by the Great Room and went around all 4 sides, then around the kitchen and bedroom 1, then around the back of bedroom 2 and bedroom 3 going along pass the side door position, around the Utility room and turn along the front and finally around the Entertainment room. Our first two loads of concrete (each being 6 cubic metres) got that far so we had to order an some more concrete, we had a quick measure and estimated we needed about 2 cubic metres to do the large front extension area of the Entertainment and Hall sections and the two pads in the middle. But when we finished had rather a lot of left over so we could have cut down on the extra quantity to about 1.5 cubic metres and got away with it, but we had to make a quick decision and we didn’t realise that the pump itself had more concrete in it’s the hopper and pipes too!

    We poured the most of the extra into two of our ready made viaducts (which we had fixed ends on whilst the last load of concrete was being mixed) and slid in thin dividers to make square blocks that we might use in the garden (as stepping stones?) or act as weights . The rest was loaded into some ‘Trugs’ and will may be used as all weather seats?

    Excess-concrete-in-impromptu-moulds-2

    Excess-concrete-in-impromptu-moulds-2

    Excess-concrete-in-impromptu-moulds-1

    Excess-concrete-in-impromptu-moulds-1


    Then, we went around smoothing all the edges and especially the corners and junctions to make sure that there wasn’t any lumps sticking up. The air tunnel corner by the Utility room was especially tricky but with careful checking with a spirit level, we scraped and smoothed it out ok.

    Aug-15th-The-site-after-foundations-poured

    Aug-15th-The-site-after-foundations-poured

    Foundations-Poured-1

    Foundations-Poured-1

    Foundations-Poured-2

    Foundations-Poured-2

    Foundations-Poured-3

    Foundations-Poured-3


    We didn’t stop for lunch and had only a couple of water breaks during the time when the concrete lorry had to go and get more concrete. It was a long single session but there was not much choice in the matter when you are dealing with concrete !!

    Here is a time lapse of the days work (it’s high resolution – press the full screen button at the bottom left of the movie to see)

    This is a major step forward for our house building project, having the foundations actually poured and setting! We are getting out of the ground at last!

  • Preparations for Concrete Finished

     We finished the preparation tasks, in readiness for the ready mixed concrete coming Monday.

    We went around all the trenches and making sure we can work alongside every stretch of it with our new patting and scraping tools. Plus we sliced off the excess “sticking up” bits of the pegs that are holding the shuttering in place.

    And finally, we went around double checking the depth and where necessary, adding more sand to make up the level properly, it was quite a lot actually, probably about 100 to 150 litres of extra sand we had to put in which means reducing the risk of running out of concrete.

    But we will see on the day!

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-1

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-1

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-2

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-2

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-3

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-3

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-4

    Foundations-ready-for-concrete-4


    Oh yes, we made two more patting tools, this time, 1 metre wide versions to do the pads and the front trench, both being a metre wide.

  • Preparations Continues..

     Today, we put together a series of tools for scraping and patting down the liquid concrete in the trenches. We have a range of different height of shuttering so each one needed a different tool made.

    Concrete-tools

    Concrete-tools

    Also we discovered that the bottoms of the trenches seems to have “sunken” downwards since we had scraped and compacted the soil last week. We were testing our new tools for ease of use and making sure the gap from the flat bottoms to the level of the soil was correct at 150mm but we found it more like between 160mm and 165mm in quite a lot of places. We think this was caused by a week’s worth of water evaporation (we did double check the height  and position of the shuttering itself and it is within a few millimetres so that hasn’t changed) so we will have to go around again and put in more sandy soil to bring up the required depth of 150mm.

    We have ordered the concrete and they will deliver exactly 12 cubic metres as they would prefer to use just two lorry loads, rather than split it into three loads and have that extra little bit spread across all three. They will be willing to go and get another load but a minimum of 1cubic metre or more only.

    We will play by ear on the day next Monday morning and if one of our independent pads doesn’t get filled, then we will just mix some concrete ourselves and pour it in on top to bring it to the correct levels.

    The concrete is graded at Gen3 strength as this is what we need for our foundations, this does cost a little bit more but it makes for a better quality and we want to get it right in the first place (and only time!!).

  • Consultation with Concrete Rep Changes Plans

     Today, we started organising our new viaducts shoots so to be ready for the arrival of the ready mixed concrete, but discovered the “heavy” truth  of concrete and how it sluggishly works!!

    The representative from the concrete supplier came this morning to discuss and advise us on what will and .. what will NOT .. work! If we wanted to use our new viaducts to guide the concrete from the edge of our site from the Loke, then unfortunately, the concrete would only dribble into the trenches and sluggishly move only so far along the channels, thus requiring massive amount of manual pushing to get the concrete to where it needed to be ALL around the foundation trenches. There is well over 120 metres of it all together! Phew!

    So .. we have to hire a concrete pump with a boom arm to carry the concrete through pipes and deliver it directly into the trenches. This means that we don’t have to use the more expensive free flowing formula and use the more cheaper standard grade. This would help to offset the cost of the pump itself, not completely but that’s life in the world of house building!

    Apparently, the boom arm can reach about 30 metres from the pump, fully supportive all the way without any legs!! Wow!

    Concrete-Pump

    Concrete-Pump

    So this means that our lovely newly created viaducts won’t be necessary after all, or perhaps only needed if even the huge reach of the pump isn’t quite far enough to reach the far corner furthest away, then we can just chuck down one of our viaducts to complete the journey!!

    The pump and concrete will come Monday morning. So in the meantime, we are doing other jobs inside and around the site that has been neglected in lieu of getting the foundations done sooner.