January

We came back from a family holiday in the second week in January to find the hydronic heating guys roughing in the pipes for the radiator panels.  We were also excited to see the electricians had been to finalise the rough-in of the power and that the plaster had been delivered ready for installation over the insulation which also happened in our absence.  All in all there was quite a lot done in a week or two.

We met with our site supervisor to discuss any last details before the plaster went on.  His advice was that if we were thinking of any more electrical or plumbing inclusions now was the time to speak up as it would be cheaper and easier to install than it would be after plaster. 

As it happened we did have a couple of things.  We wanted an extra extraction fan in the kitchen, over our second oven is not close to the range hood and has a pyrolytic cleaning system which tend to smoke up.  The second inclusion was the insulating of our downstairs living room to dampen any sound transfer.  We asked for insulation in the interior walls and ceiling and sound resistant plaster to line the walls.  Both inclusions were accommodated quickly and with little trouble to us. 

Internal frame looking from the front door to the back of the house.  We can really start to see how big our house is.

Looking at our kitchen and dining room insullated and  with the plaster already delivered.

Front of house with roof finished an half of the rendering complete.

A pre plaster inspection was then carried out by our home inspectors which again found a relatively small number of faults which were attended to before the plaster was put on.

Lock up- December

We hear from the site supervisor that he is aiming to be at lock up before Christmas, this feels like it might not be possible.  The Hebel has been installed on the top level but the roof for the lower back half of the house is not yet built, never mind tiled.  There are some missing windows and the external doors aren't fixed in place.

Then towards the middle of December there is a flurry of work.  There are fixing carpenters installing doors and robes inside the house.  There is more rendering, electrical and air conditioning works .  Finally as the last week before Christmas closes in, exterior scaffolding comes down and roof scaffolding installed.  The roof frame goes up and within days of Christmas the tiles are on.  WE GOT TO LOCK UP!! 

Top and bottom with Hebel installed but back section without a roof.

With roof trusses on the back section.

With roof tiles in time for Christmas!

...And from the front.

Sure we are without a proper front door but we can still call it lock up.

We meet with our site supervisor who tells us that we will have workers back on site the week after New Years Day.  He also gives us an approximate completion date of late March.  Will we be in before Easter??? Stay tuned!

Playing Catch-Up: November

Ok... I am a bad, bad blogger.  From what I know of blogging the key to a well followed and good blog is the frequency of posts... on this point I clearly failed. In my defence I can only offer the following:  late last year got busy not least because- in the midst of building a house and running a business and trying to do Christmas some kind of justice in our temporary digs- I got pregnant.  So.. In the interest of completeness I offer the following catch up posts:

November

I last left you promising  a post showing our roof tiles and waiting for our frame inspection.  A previous post explained our philosophy on hiring an independent building inspector so I won't go into it again. 

The report came back with a relatively small list of defects and fixes.  The thing we were most relieved about was there were no mention of any defects with the slab.  The defects were mostly with the frame and after notifying  our site supervisor the carpenters were back on site pretty quickly to  deal with the issues.

Plumbers and heating and cooling guys make an appearance and rough in the air conditioning  and the  plumbing for upstairs and the walls.  The roof is readied for the solar hot water system too. Also the green wrapping so familiar to those of you who, like us, have followed other CG building blogs now covers the external frame.

Green wrapping in preparation fo the Hebel

After that it's not long before we see the Hebel on site.  I had expected big trucks and cranes but in reality the Hebel is light enough for one guy with a small fork lift to take the bundles of Hebel panels of the truck by himself.  It occurs to us as we watch the Hebel being put on that it should probably be thought of a bit like a concrete cladding.  This comes as a surprise realisation to us (who knows why it hasn't occurred to us before) as we watch the guys install four horizontal rails on the lower exterior frame and then bolt in each Hebel panel to the rails.  I suppose if we had really thought about it we would have worked out though Hebel is concrete and therefore hard like brick, the prefabricated nature of the material makes it's installation much more like aluminium cladding.  A small but interesting realisation for us only because until now I haven't really heard it described as cladding at all.

Hebel being installed on the blindside of the house where the hot water service, airconditioning and heating units will be.

Hebel finished on the bottom

From the front of the driveway, you can see the roof trusses ready for installation to the left of the house.