Week 5 - laying the stone base layer and services
Entry posted by Red Kite
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The last of the big muck away at the start of the week and then laying the base stone layer means that we are pretty clean on site and the mud is hardly an issue. The surveyor came and marked out accurately and the Architect produced the detailed layout for the services - electric, telecom, water and soil stacks and you can see these being laid in towards the end of the week. They will come up through the slab and so need to be pretty accurate. Pretty soon we will be ready for the steel and shuttering for the slab and some serious concrete. It is amazing to see how fast this moves forward and how big and deep the base is when you get to stand in it and look up. Also exciting to start to see the layout of the two houses being defined by the services that map onto the floor plans we have held in our imagination for such a long time.
An interesting development this week was the concrete filled trench you can see being dug an then filled back in with our first concrete pour. The SE originally wanted this 1m deep below the slab, but the BCO was not even sure why you need anything under a 300mm steel reinforced slab (and the G/Ws have never seen it needed before). The SE wants it to protect the front of the slab from frost damage and expansion and contraction in the area where it comes out at ground level and is not insulated underneath. Some negotiation resolved this to 300mm of concrete under the front of the slab as 'sufficient', and then the ground workers said it would be a real pain laying the drainage pipes through the concrete so we have a deeper section where the pipes go that will be filled in with dense concrete blocks around the pipes, and then have the slab poured on top. A bit more complex but it saves a bit of digging and concrete so everyone is happy.
We seem to end up steering these type of these things between the G/Ws, the SE, the Architect and the BCO, but rather than being a nuisance it is really interesting to see how this all comes together, and we would much rather this than the G/Ws blindly following the plans. Pete (the Gaffer on site) often says, "Chris come and look at this - I am not sure this is the best way to do this" and we really do listen because he has done this at the sharp end for years, the voice of experience!
Also there are a load of other things to figure out in term of suppliers and lead time - like front door, lightwells etc - when you have 12+ week leadtimes these decisions get critical pretty rapidly and staying on top of it keeps us both pretty busy!
See https://www.dropbox.com/sh/th9f6e3cel5dm1q/AAAfsWdAH184J75bCNUUtzVra?dl=0 for the week by week video diary - Week 5 ?
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