Roselea

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  • Earth Tubes Day 10

    Day 10 – Friday 20th August

    Down into hell again, well the pit is very hot when the sun shines… Started by repairing the frame holding the exit pipes as it had blown over and snapped the light framing. After repairs we fixed the pipes in place ready for connection.

    Then we moved the sand from the shed side of the hole ready for the first pipe. We then ran the plate compactor along the cleared section and a number of sections of the wall slumped down (one nearly buried the compactor)! More digging…

    We will start by installing all 12 tubes upto the point where they would bend towards the house, this is 2 pipe lengths (12m).

    In the end the first earth tube was installed and the space between it and the wall filled up to the top of the pipe.
    shows the first earth tube installed

    We then spent time cleaning the compactor.

  • Earth Tubes – Day 7, 8 and 9

    With the hole finally dug out, we have been sorting out the bits and pieces that will be placed down, down into the pit! Not much visible work is happening especially our video camera cannot see right into the hole! So you will have to imagine us hard at work 2.5m (8feet) down!

    Day 7 – Tuesday 17th August

    The delivery of the extra 10 tubes we needed and the wooden battens for constructing the framework to hold up the earth tubes and keep them steady while we fill in the hole around them. We also ordered another 10 bags of cement just in case we need to bed or lock in anything down. Today’s work was shortened as we had to go shopping (we have to eat something)!!!
    We did some investigations in the bottom of the hole to see how much work is needed in moving the sand around to lay the earth tubes down. We checked the depth and laid two concrete blocks to get a feel for a particular method to achieve a satisfactory results!

    Day 8 – Wednesday 18th August

    We had visitors around so it was another late start. We cut 4 tubes into 12 pieces and clamped them together. These are the vertical tubes for transferring the air up out of the ground and into the house. We also mounted a wooden framework at the garage end ready for the vertical 3m (10feet) tubes.
    The 120 crates arrived from Jewsons today – these crates called AquaCell are designed to allow large amount of water (usually rain) to be collected and leached out of the sides.
    stacks of blue crates

    Day 9 – Thursday 19th August

    The hired tiny little earth mover machine arrived today and used our mini digger to lift it into the hole! It got stuck in the soft sand!
    The mini earth mover
    So we got on with cutting 6 earth tubes in half and mounting them vertically on the support framework – these tubes transfer the incoming air from the Garage down into the cool earth!
    the entry tubes standing up near mass wall
    Then did the other end where the 12 tubes done yesterday were situated near the point of the house. At both ends we placed the concrete blocks underneath to support them.

    12 tubes clamped togther for the exit

  • Earth Tubes – Day 6 (Finished Digging the HOLE)

    The Hole Is Dug! The garden looks like a Desert with sand dunes in every direction! The machinery are blocked in and cannot get out onto our Loke!

    Day 6 – Monday 16th August

    The final leg of the journey along the spur is completed.
    another picture of the final pit.
    We have excavated many hundred tons of soil/sand and piled it up in heaps.
    all of the heaps of soil
    We arrived back towards the old sewage tank and only just reached the old leach field! Horrible greasey black area with a small box like thing with holes in it! It is only about 400mm (1foot) on each side and only a couple of metres away! Talk about the rules and regulations 50 years ago! We also found another buried rubbish heap!
    The black hole

  • Earth Tubes Plan B – Day 5

    The growing and unstoppable hole continues .. .. We are nearly there! Does anyone want some nice soft sand? Going cheap! Just bring your own 20ton lorry!

    Day 5 – Sunday 15th August

    The main part of the backwards “L” is done today. Just the little spur to do tomorrow!
    picture of the large hole
    The dumper truck is holding well, no sign of the flat battery problem but the level, at the end of the day, was 12.91V which it is a bit low. Again it has been cloudy today compared with yesterday. Yesterday the voltage was a good 13.5V and there were much more loads to move and hence more starts! But it was glorious sunny weather! So the solar panel does do a good job even though it is only rated at 1.5W!

  • Earth Tubes Plan B – Day 4

    With the newly energised Dumper Truck (the battery is now fully charged!) Stephen dashed out to do as possible before the forecasted heavy rain comes!! guess What? No Rain! Stephen worked all day and we counted 36 loads dugs out! Phew!

    Day 4 – Saturday 14th August

    Lovely day with both the weather and the amount of work done!

    It’s time to go around the bend tomorrow! The spur of the L is next!
    the hole at the end of day 4
    The pile of stuff dug out.

  • Earth Tubes Plan B Day 2 and 3

    Stephen is working hard in digging the Great Hole! It is a case of doing a few hours in between rain showers and sometimes heavy ones!! But also tackling man made problems like the battery going flat on us (The infamous Dumper Incident!).

    Day 2 – Thursday 12th August

    Quick before the rain comes!

    Day 3 – Friday 13th August

    The Dumper Incident or is it a Friday 13th thing??!

    The Great Hole is coming so watch this space!!

  • Dumper Truck is down in the Dumps #2

    Yippeee! We managed to jump start the dumper truck! We tipped the load and drove it back to the house to connect the battery charger!

    Phew! That is a great releif and thanks to our cousin Neil over in Blackpool for his 20 years of expert knowledge of heavy machinery and everything with a engine in it. Cheers Neil!

  • Dumper is down in the Dumps!

    OH GEE WIZ!

    Our truck is broken! The starter motor is making a horrible crunching noise! Oh Blimey!

    We phoned our cousin for his expert opinion and listening via our mobile phones, he recommends checking the battery charge level! The noise reminded him as if the starter motor is not quite engaging fully. The battery level was 12.2V which is rather low! We do have a solar panel mounted on the dumper truck to keep the battery charged up but we have been using it many times in the last couple of days and it has been very cloudy too! So we are not surprised that the battery is flat!! We are trying to jump start it using the mini digger to just get the truck going so we can finish emptying the load and drive it back down the slope!! Yes we are stuck half way up the slope!

    We have our fingers crossed !!

    Stephen sitting on the dead dumper

  • Earth Tubes Design Conclusion!

    We have finally settled on a design of connecting up all the earth tubes and getting the air in and out of them! We have 12 tubes all together, each one being 150mm (6inches) diameter internal) in order to provide time for the air to exchange its thermal energies with the surrounding thermal mass! The 12 tubes is equivalent to a single 600mm (2feet) diameter pipe!

    After consulting with our friendly structual engineers, who advised us that our original design of using concrete blocks to construct a chimney and tunnel to pass the air down to the tubes, has potential problems at the joins due to the loading pressure from all directions but especially the sides, at 2.5m (8feet) depths! They advised the use of pre-casted concrete pipes segments to make the chimney and tunnel / chamber but this lead us to realise that we could route the tubes themselves upwards with 90degrees corners and terminate them inside the buildigs! This makes it so much easier and avoid mssing around with concrete blocks, pouring concrete around them and other reinforcing methods or drilling holes in the sides of concrete pipes!!

    So Many Thank goes to our engineers at Burrell Partnerships of Norwich!!

  • Earth Tubes Plan B Day 1

    We started digging for gold today! The 4.2m wide (over 13 feet) by 18m long (59feet) hole is quite big with a spur (like a capital L) spur for another 5m (16 feet). Oh Yes it is as deep as we can go with the digger and this is about 2.5m (8feet) down! Down! down we go! Now that’s a lot of dirt or rather in this case sand!

    We discovered that the sand is quite loose and keeps collapsing into the hole so we are being careful not to get too close with the digger!

    Day 1 – Wednesday 11th August

    The heaps will grow and grow so we might end up blocking the camera view! Certainly the house’s windows will be completely blocked! So we are thinking of extending the pole up some extra metres to peer over!