Day 18: Boundary

Nothing happened on the ground today, but there were indications of possible probelms with the Party Wall Act in practice; we shall see. Sorry thats a bit tantalising but you can't expect to see *everything*.

Day 17: Dry!

We have a roof. The beams are in, as is almost all the tongue & groove boarding. The carpenters stopped just short of the bit where the glass panes go in: they are next to come. One or two of the beams had the staining wash off in the rain, and will need redoing in situ - all were anyway due for a second coat. There are also some muddy traces that will need attention.

Some concern about the damp course that on examination may not be intact all the way round, and on the effect of damp inside the back wall, which has a couple of inches of empty space due to the roof supports.

Handed over a large cheque. Hoping to use bank transfer in future.

Amusing incident: Gavin (SoB) could not find his car keys, despite D & E's best help. 'You'll have to run home' says D. That's to Newmarket. Turns out that he tossed them in through the car window, and his dog sat on them, locking the car. Window was still open, fortunately.

-- Miriam.

Day 16: Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters

... and, indeed, about half the roof beams are in place when we get home, though none of the boards yet. The incisions to take the panes of glass all line up nicely. One of the beams isn't as white as it should be, though - perhaps our painter people yesterday didn't get through the whole lot?

-- Miriam.

Day 15: Whitening the roof

Two new builders come & put up an awning in the kiddies' room to-be. D & I help by pulling on ropes. They set to staining the roof boards and beams with a brilliant white protective stain. Thought we had asked for off-white, but the brilliant white looks good and will lighten the room. We leave them at it.

When we get home, the beams are gone from the side of the house (all but a few rough cut timbers) and are sheltering whitely under the awning, which is gushing jets, showers, rivers of rain. D poses under for the photo, snug in his red coat. (You will have to wait until next week to see the photo - W is in Vienna with the pcmcia flash card carrier.)

-- Miriam.

Day 14: Bills!

Well, it had to happen eventually: not quite a bill, but Ians assessment of the value of the work done so far and the value of the bill that will arrive soon. About 2/5 of the total value, which is more than I was expecting, but if 2/5 of the work is already done we'll be happy I suppose.

Meanwhile, Pete is back with some bricks (he has a wheelbarrow load; D brings in 2, one under each arm). The bricks need to be cut in half, which Pete does with a few strokes of a chisel and a few broken bricks. D and E are interested and make "insect houses" out of the discards. As Pete is starting to mix the cement its time to go to school, to D's disappointment. And when we get back the hole where the roof butted into the house wall which cantilevered out is no more.

Day 13: Chippies

Not a very exciting picture today I fear. The builders returned, again before 8, transmogrified from bricklayers into carpenters: they are different people, and I haven't said hello properly yet. They end up affixing wood (2x2" perhaps) to the wall to support the beam above which will support the rafters, putting a beam on the far side on top of the blockwork, and cutting the rafters. The latter involves deciding how long they will be, ie what the overhang will be: BTB is around for this and we end up with 8" ie 300mm ie the same as the eaves of the house. The rafters also need grooves routing in them to take the little windows facing East. I think they ahve finished doing that.

Also the nice old cast iron drainpipe has got broken off: I think all that is to be renewed anyway. Also the vine has got a bit chopped off (not much) and the pergola has lost a leg (where did they put it?).

M says that someone said that they won't be back tomorrow: the bricklayer needs to fix up the gap under the cantilever and/or the beams need staining.

Day 12: Wood

No building today, because the new walls are drying out to a load bearing state.

However, when we get home, there is a large pile of wood in the driveway, which augurs well for some action tomorrow.

Day 11: Cantilever

As ever, Pete the bricklayer turns up and sets to work in good order. By the end of the day he has the walls about up to the top and concrete lintels over the windows and all is looking good. A slight question over is-there-an-internal-lobby-wall is settled in favour of No, by reference to Ian/BtB. Pete would far rather talk to BtB (I give him Ians number, but its quite clear he isn't going to use it) and perhaps this is fair enough: he is used to BtB who is his employer. When I get back at 3 Ian is there and Bob recently departed, they having discussed this and another issue, viz:

How are we going to support the rafters at Dots end? There is only a single thickness of brick between us, and the roofing "beams" end awkwardly right at our side. Ian had thought of a stout beam running along the top fixed into the wall, but this might be a bit much for it to support. The chosen alternative (by them, but I agree) is to use 2x2"s fixed vertically to the walls to support the rafters, and a beam at the top. This will enable a bit (well, 2") of insulation/soundproofing between the plasterboard and the walls. We explore options (could the vertical beams be exposed and nice? Possible, but fiddly: involved cutting the plasterboard in between, and would spoil soundproofing). I wonder if the wall covering could be something other than the tedioously obvious plasterboard (pine? but M vetoes this). Ian had talked to Dot, who was worried about being able to see daylight through the wall: this will of course end up being fixed, and is anyway only because there is now daylight to shine.

Ian then notices that where the roof has been removed, the wall is cantilevered out by 1/2 a brick (see pic). This is apparently a Bad Thing, because the concrete roof (on which the bricks were partly sitting before, probably) is no longer there. Some infill will be needed for good form. Of course the other course of the cavity wall is still OK...

The digger is now gone. Apparently it was Off Hire as of friday, so we weren't paying for its presence. I clean a bit of mud from in front of Betty's house to avoid annoying her. There is now a fair amount of dust around the back, where Pete has been brick cutting, and my red bike is now a bit covered, though since it has a flat tyre I'm not too worried.

Day 10: Bigger walls...

Sunday was a glorious sunny day. Today dawns with rain. Poor Pete is out there at 8 starting up; M delivers tea and as I'm off I ask him about the weather; he is expecting it to get better, and says that this isn't bad enough to stop for. Which seems quite impressive work-ethic-wise to me. He seems to be alone today, I hope he doesn't get too bored. Task 1 is to drill fixings in the walls to which he will attach stainless steel "crocodile" fixings to tie new and existing walls together.

Back later, now its fine and sunny, and more progress: far wall is now up to its full height; the window-marker frames are in place and the cement blocks going up nicely. Odd note: the digger is still there. Have they forgotten it?

Day 9: Going up

Today we start going up! I had thought the slab needed time to dry but no, its walkable on, and to prove this the Pete and Paul take the spanning planks away and walk on it. It won't be up to full strength of course but then the first tier of wall won't be heavy either. They tell us what I had sort-of already realised, that of course they knew about the shower drain, but this has to be into the foul water not the soakaway, so the nice shiny new slab is of course OK. D goes out to watch their preparations to start the wall up while I breakfast: as they say, nice to be building not breaking. M makes them some tea...

At Ians, I sign the letter appointing our party-wall expert.

Going to get E at 3:30 I pass Paul on his bike and Pete in his van knocking off for the day: well fair enough, its friday and about to start raining again. At home, find the wall in the state you see it, with new brick in place and the concrete blocks keyed in nicely: it can't be coincidence that 3 bricks is one block. It all looks good work to me, shame it will all be covered up under render. You can see the darker old bricks and a thin line of spacers underneath the new stuff. In the background are the wooden frames, I presume sized to the windows that they will build the openings for.

Day 8: Slab

Todays work is the slab. Mr Digger and Pete start 8:15 ish with the mesh that got delivered a while back (and which wouldn't have been needed had we not decided to extend, so BTB was gambling we would...). D watches with great interest, I was wondering where from, it turns out he was up the tree!

E, more cautious, watches from indoors as they use the thing I was calling a brick saw to slice up the mesh. This generates showers of pretty sparks and a loud noise if you open the door to take a picture...

When I get back in the afternoon its 6; they are long gone (D is disappointed not to see them in action more). There is a nice new concrete slab laid all supported by various bits of wood (thats what the large sheet of plywood was for), the soakaway is filled in nearly and the trench has a pipe in it. The only slight concern I have is that there was supposed to be some kind of drain from the shower going... where? Through the new slab? No sign of it. Phone Ian; he's out. Ah well: its their problem, and its probably not a problem. Also a message from Ian: we need to sign some party-wall type papers.

I wonder what is on for tomorrow? They can hardly start the new walls until the slab dries.

Day 7. Trenches, pipes, blocks

Today Mr Digger arrives at 8:15 (possibly not quite the work ethic of P+P, or poss because he knows he will be finished the first bit and awaiting someone else, which indeed happens) and starts up. He finishes demolishing the side and end walls (I query this, because at one point the end wall was to stay, but apparently BTB has decided it will be easier to take it down and rebuild it. And anyway we need stuff to put into the soakaway). He uses the digger to pick up the rubble and dump it in, and at one point I even help out by shovelling it back into a pile. I then have to restrain D from helping too much. Anyway, we need to get off to school.

On return, I mkae him some tea, and in return he is prising up the patio slabs.

When I leave with E at 10:30 the digging has stopped for a bit while he awaits... something builderly. SoBTB is here with him.

Back after 4 and there are big changes. The rubble is all gone; there is a trench dug to the soakaway, the slabs are all stacked somewhere; there are some big pipes (mid right in picture) and some grey concrete beams (I think; top right). Also there is some orange plastic fencing around the whole, for no especially obvious reason. This morning, I had been a bit concerned about the digger hacking up the grass as it too-and-fro'd dumping rubble, and slightly harrumphing to myself that it would cause less hassle with a wheelbarrow. But, now, all that is a bit irrelevant as the grass has a trench dug through it...

On a minor note, the plumber (who I've never met) has been and capped off the outside water pipe and put a tap on it, so they have a water source and can use the loo.

Day 6: Soakaway

When I come back at 2, I find that the builders have arrived sometime this morning and begun to dig the soakaway. There is quite a bit of scraping on the drive - as they tell me, they had to use the diger to pull the skip about in order to get the digger in. Unfortunate timing. And indeed the digger is a bit bigger than I was expecting - not a little bobcat thing but quite a hefty object. Doing this are SoBTB and someone who stays in the digger but who was probably Irish. Talking, SoBTB (was he Gavin? I think so) says that soakaways are usually 1m^3 but they tend to do them 1.5m^3, so there is a square hole that size, currently about 1' deep. Turf is to one side; topsoil piled carefully on a big sheet of plywood; and the subsoil is coming out: some in the skip. Gavin says it is a pity to throw it into the skip, so we find a place for it at the bottom of the garden. Its odd how a not-terribly-large looking hole in the garden generates a huge pile of soil when its outside; and then a not-very-deep layer when spread.

I go inside for lunch and leave them too it. Sitting on the sofa and looking out its clear that they have a time-and-motion problem: the digger can dig about 2-4 times as fast as SoBTB can carry it away. So the digger (which I assume is expensive...) spends a fair while sitting around waiting for him.

I leave to pick up the kids; by the time I'm back its past 4 and they are off. The hole is finished, and some of the rubble is in the hole, which is good recycling (did I mention that the outside wall came down today? Well it did). They have put some of the old doors on top of the hole - how useful, more recycling. It should stop the kids falling in. I show DE the hole; and the soil pile. D finds Sam to play with; they go off to play clay games. Argh, just as long as I don't have to touch them. D and Sam get into the hole so I can photo it, for scale. It comes up to their shoulders, so its a bit less than 1m deep to the top of the current layer of bricks.

Looking in the skip, there is now a fair amount of horrible clay in it from below the sub-soil I suppose.

Day 5: The end of the lintel; and some news on costs

Not much building work today, but a little bit of demolition :-) But the main thing was getting news on the costs for the extra work and agreeing them.

So... a bit if a recap on the story so far: the roof had to come off, which affected the do-we-want-to-keep-the-existing-outline. And the obvious answer was "no, but how much will it cost?". The first answer was a little more than we (and Ian) were expecting, but not by too much; and by lunctime Ian had better figures to come and talk over, so he did. The final figure was a-bit-less-than-3k extra: which accounts for a new roof and foundations, and losing the rather elaborate window seat and some work no longer needed ot batonning the roof. For about 4m2 extra floorspace, this is reasonable.

While we were outside, I pointed out the lintel I mentioned in the last post, which appears quite unsupported (in fact isn't really a lintel at all, just bricks laid on the window frame which is no longer there). Today it had developed a few cracks and was potenitally about to fall on our darling infants (or even us). Ian agreed, and in that rather direct way that builders and architects seem to have, he took a spade to it and with quite a few hefty blows brought it crashing down. So many and so hefty that it was quite likely strong enough to stay up, but it was due to be replaced with a real lintel anyway. Note that the pictures are captured from our camcorder (remember folks, with a pc9e you have to switch to usb/memory mode, or it won't appear as a device when you plug it in...) and are therefore of rather poor quality and colour. I've stitched 6 together in photoshop for fun.

Outside, we talked about soakaways, positioning thereof (probably on Dots side, so as not to spoil our only decent bit of lawn where GE's dogs have wee'd on it; also to avoid the kids climbing frame) and likely dates for a digger to come in for the new foundations. Tomorrow is possible; wednesday more likely. Later, Ian rings, having called BTB: some digger at some time tomorrow looks likely. This is good: keeping the momentum of the work going.

Day 4: all quiet on the western front

A quiet day today, just tidying up. As always P+P turned up a bit before 8 and got stuck in. Mostly dumping stuff in the skip, separating abs from neutral junk, together with a bit of noise and sparks when they needed to slice up the reinforcing rods. I make them some tea. Its cold out there today, and windy. They really need a little workmans hut to retreat into, with a brazier to warm them and let them make tea.

When I leave at 10:30 they are still going; M gets back 12:30 and they are gone; the place has been swept and is pretty tidy (tidier than our living room, for example...). The top photo was taken late afternoon during a hail shower: thats the white stuff on the mat. As you see, they have left part of the wall near the loo: I assume thats for stability for the moment. Speaking of which, pic 2 shows the view backwards (this was the back window, now cut downwards to be a deep window with seat). But there is no real lintel above, just a line of bricks... I'm not quite sure what is keeping it up.

Day 3: roof no more

DE are back and E is up at an unearthly hour in giddy expectation of seeing these wonderful creatures called "builders" who she has never seen before. They arrive a little before 8 so her desires are gratified. She and D go out and I introduce them.

Ian comes round for a look and chat; the roof is indeed to go, and at roughly the same time they are chipping away at the edges near the gutters. Soon the brick saw starts as they cut a line through the asphalt so they can chip off our side and leave Dots in peace. They way they did this impressed me: they measured the distance on the inside, transferred it to the outside, then using a scaffolding plank Peter marked the line down; and then cut it; and they got it right. If I had done it, I would have made multiple measurements and multiple cross checks and got it wrong. Sorry the picture is so poor: its taken through a window that is - ahem - not quite as clean as it might be. Plus reflections.

I go off to Cambourn (elec) and come back at 10; the gutters are down (that I painted so carefully 7 or so years ago...) and in the skip; the asphalt is chipped off. I go to work. When I get back past 12 the roof is down in a heap (D said it was exciting to watch) and they are breaking the bits up into a skip and carefully separating out the not-very-dangerous asbestos, all while wearing masks which I suppose is necessary. It becomes clear that the roof was asb formers, with reinforcing rods (actually twisted pairs of thick wire) laid in place and pebbly concrete poured on top.

Ian comes round again with a redrawn plan to show to Robert, who is due "now" and arrives in now+10mins, which is close. I have my lunch and let him and Ian discuss it outside, then ask them whats up. Costings will be a few days, but it looks like everyone is happy this way: the room will be bigger, and the work will be less fiddly for the builders. Of course the total cost is likely to go up... We discuss what to do with the "pergola"; in the short term, just shift one of the legs.

The skip gets taken away and replaced by an empty; 3:30 they have stopped clearing rubble and are tidying up. Now its nice and sunny. A side effect of the roof being off is that the passageway door is brightly lit and this is good. They have brought some reinforcing mesh and some other things which I think are only going to be needed if we do dig out new foundations, which is not supposed to be a firmly made decision yet, although its near-inevitable and only dependent on some reasonable costings from BTB. The picture shows the roofless state. If you look carefully at the left you can see how the "beams" lie between us and Dot: they are slightly awkwardly on our side, and this will require a wooden beam along the side to tie the rafters to.

Day 2: the roof trouble

Day 2 dawns clear but with a curious ripping sound, rather like a large tree slowly falling/tearing in the distance. I suspect the blackthorn above the garden shed but no.

Paul arrives at twenty to 8; Peter a little after. I get up and talk to them; they don't want to start till 8 because the noise may annoy the neighbours. Considerate. I offer them tea/coffee; they choose tea, white, with sugar. Now its 8: they start to cut through the brickwork from the garden-facing window at the end with a brick saw which *is* loud.

I do b'fast and misc elec stuff. M heads off to work. The electrician isn't here yet (9:30) and he needs to get inside so... well, I leave them the back door keys, having rather little choice. We had hoped to wait a week or two to see that we trust them but, well, tis done. Peter goes off to get some more supporting beams, leaving Paul at a loose end. He volunteers to rebuild the bike shelter I bodged up (the ripping noise was the tarp pulling loose...) and I make him another tea. I go to work and leave him at it.

When I come back at 2 ish Paul says: the roof will have to come down. Ah. This was always a possibility if the roof beams spanned the wrong way. As you can see from the photo the roof is a bit odd: there are the sheets of asbestos that form the ceiling, with a sort of shaped asbestos former above, in which are laid concrete beams with some reinforcing (in the photo you can just see the reinforcing, spiral reddy-dark metal at the bottom of the pic, just R of centre. The black bit in the centre of the pic is, I think, the electical cable conduit).

There is an electrician there too, and they are all wearing dust masks, so I go in round the front. Power is off to various bits so the electrician can cut cables etc, and this means the phone and the wireless aren't working. Time to head off!

Stop via Ians: discuss all this: if the roof is coming off, should the walls go to and just make it bigger? Or not. A flat roof or peaked. But how to avoid spilling rainwater onto Dot (our neighbour. Friends, remember this: buy yourself a *detached* house). How elaborate to get? Planning issues too. Argh... I really don't want more choice at this stage but we've got it and there is no avoiding it (other than just deciding not to choose...). Anyway, Ian will come round at 8 tonight. Now I'm off to ma's to collect the children.

Later: Ian comes early, so M talks to him (inc some ideas I had in the car, like ditching the bow-window-seat as over-elaborate, and perhaps the "lobby" bit isn't needed either), he has thrown up some new plans, we'll have to talk early tomorrow to see if work can continue (pulling down the ceiling seems a near-certainty, so I presume that can continue no matter what we decide about where the walls are). The builders have had some sand and cement delivered but I'm not quite sure what they are planning to do with it, I didn't think we were at the constructing stage yet.

Day 1

Day one was supposed to start at 8 am when the builders were to turn up, which is an unearthly hour all by itself. But due to - ahem - my slight failure to quite finish clearing it the day before (I stopped about 11:30 pm), the day begins at 7 am when I rise and trundle a last few loads of plant pots (that I don't want but can't quite throw away), bits of wood, etc etc, down to the garden shed.

Builder #1 turns up (on an electric bicycle) a bit before 8: he is Paul, and introduces himself as "the demolition man". Soon after Peter the bricklayer arrives, and they have a bit of a poke around, doing builder-type things. Its like having mechanics look at your car or (the other way round) me looking at my mothers computer (or explaining domains to Manfred :-). In other words, they look at it and instantly see and understand things I never have. Like the layer of headers of the interior wall. We talk a bit and I confirm that all the bits left in place are definitely junk and may be thrown away.

Ian McGonigal our architect turns up soon after, with the contract, which we sign: £18k+, for phase one. BTB is a bit later (thus confirming the correct attitudes for builders so carelessly broken by his men who arrived on time :-) because he got stuck in the traffic. He signs too, which is just as well, as judging from the noises outside the work has started: good. Gavin (?) the builders son turns up in what may be a twin SUV to BTB's and will be joining in, we gather.

All seems well so we leave them to it. I have interviews at work today but hope to get back before 4 when Paul and Peter will knock off.

But the interviews run over so I don't make it back in time. When we do get back, there is a skip in the driveway with a load of bricks in it, the windows, and misc junk. Everything is neat and tidy, and they appear to have swept up the interior: a good sign. As you may see from the photo they have taken out the interior walls, leaving just a "header" pillar for stability. The ceiling is now propped up by scaffolding: we're not sure if this is just a precaution or if it will fall down otherwise...

Hello and welcome

We're having building work done and it started today! Hurrah!

Anyway, I thought it might be interesting to write it up day by day. Quite possibly only for me, but who knows, this may become a cult site with vast numbers of hits, ha ha.

The blog title is a play on "Bob the builder" of course, in fact I was somewhat surprised it wasn't already taken. Our builder (the head honcho) is called Robert Smiley, so it fits, too.

For the intro, here is a "before" pic. Its a brick outhouse type thing, with an "exterior" bit (near) which we've used as a bike shed; and an "interior" bit which was my workroom. Phase 1 is knocking out the interior walls (after checking that the flat roof will still stand up...), converting the toilet bit into a mini toilet/shower area, building a nice bay window at the back to admire the garden from. Slightly undefined areas are what happens to the rainbutt; and where we put the bikes. Well, we'll deal with that when it arises.