Going, going, gone!

Well that’s almost it for another week. There’s not a whole lot more to see but I feel I’m clearer about what’s going where.

Further materials have been ordered and I’ve decided how I’m routing the mechanical ventilation and heat recovery ducts. Andrew is coming in a week to help hang the unit (the bracket is ready on the wall), fit its large intake and exhaust ducts, cut the large holes for them in the outside wall and then seal around them.

The waste drainage for toilet, shower, sink and bath are planned and materials arrived today. Next week I’ll be cutting another hole in the floor and trying to make all the necessary connections, up to my elbows in 110mm soil pipe, strap bosses, inserts and solvent weld waste pipes.

The current dry cold has been a pleasant change from the usual damp. The ditches, streaming last week are frozen solid. Everything has dried, the ground, the timber, us, and I realised it was a good opportunity to break up the misplaced surplus screed without making too much mess.

I’d told the men where I wanted the excess but it was too awkward. Behind the plant room seemed ok as a hurried compromise, but the slurry wasn’t properly levelled and when it rained the resulting concrete apron held a pool of water against the house.

I started with a large drill then with a bolster, lump hammer and mattock cut, broke and lifted the rest, leaving just a small table that I’ll incorporate into the foundation pad for the air source heat pump. The drilled holes weakened the concrete so I could break it without damaging the foundation insulation it sits against.

I was out of the wind and despite also being out of the sun I had to take off clothes. By tea time I had a good base of hardcore. Casting the foundation pad will have to wait for slightly warmer weather.

A birthday descended on Wednesday, out of the blue. Without warning. How do these things happen? I spent the morning beginning a support for the ventilation exhaust manifold in the plant room, under the opening that connects the room to the space between ceiling and first floor – a neat design tweak prompted by Andrew that eases routing services round the house.

Not long after three o’clock we were crossing the Kintyre peninsular to catch the last of a falling tide before dusk… Mission Spoot.

Finding empty shells was encouraging but we need a lower spring tide. It was a nice jaunt, a useful reconnaissance and also yielded a pocket or two of winkles for tea.

Upstairs, where the plant room protrudes half a metre past the main wall of the house, I’ve marked the floor to show the joists beneath and where things will come through it. I’ve cut the first hole, to get the fresh air duct up into the back of the bathroom to its manifold and from where seven semi-rigid (sort of bendy) plastic ducts will carry the fresh air to the three bedrooms and the living room. The bendy ducts will run along the eaves of the bathroom, diagonally up through a yet to be built cupboard in bedroom one then into the space above the small flat ceilings of the bedrooms and landing. Each bedroom and the living room will have an outlet or ‘valve’ in the ceiling.

To double check that the upstairs ceilings won’t feel too low I tacked a large piece of cardboard to the rafters. It feels fine and there’s plenty of space for any overhead lighting needed.

Still in opportunistic mode and wanting to finish the workshop larch cladding I got on with trimming down the wood fibre insulation under one of the windows to make space for the forty millimetre thick larch sill. I made a wooden gauge to check the angle (for the slope of the sill) and attached a stick to indicate the depth. It was bit tense , using the multi-tool closer and closer to the sealing tape round the window…

… but this afternoon I finished fitting the reveals; first workshop window ready.

I admit it took me three goes to make one of the sides (it must be Friday), the first slightly too shallow (I’d thought it matched the other side but it didn’t). The next which should have been perfect was several centimetres too short – I’d cut the sloping sill angle up instead of down. The third is indeed perfect.

After the cake Tash branches out with her first woodwork

Well that’s it for another year.