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jamieled

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Blog Entries posted by jamieled

  1. jamieled

    Finishing up

    By jamieled,


    Finishing
    As predicted, progress has been a bit slow. We've been working away on internal joinery/finishing and a bit of outdoor landscaping when the weather allows (in-between baby-management and working). We got our building warrant completion cert. and VAT reclaim back about a month ago which has also helped.
     
    Costs
    For reference, our finalised costs were just shy of £1300/sqm including all professional fees/admin, site setup, construction and fitting out costs. I think this is a fair reflection of the amount of work put in by us vs labour bought in. We had some fairly labour intensive jobs, such as trenching the water pipe ~300m through the woodland that, while they took us quite a while, we would have paid a lot of money (and likely had a lot more destruction) if we'd paid someone else to do it. We did spend quite a bit on labour for the groundworks/founds, framing, plasterboarding, electrics and plumbing, insulation and some finishing joinery. The bulk of the spend was prior to the significant materials price rises. Knocking all the labour costs out and it becomes possible to see where you get closer to £1000/sqm. It's been tricky enough juggling work, looking after small children and trying to finish building and so while reducing the costs might be feasible I hate to think what situation we might be in now if we had tried to do everything ourselves (add in the materials price rises recently and I'm also more relaxed about not drawing it out).
     
    The house
    We've now spent a good chunk of our first winter in the house. Our main heating is a woodburner, with a few direct electric radiators as a backup. We light the stove for a few hours in the evening most days when it's cold (say 0 and below) and every other day for an hour or so if it's milder (~5 degrees ish outside). We've used a small wood store's worth of timber. Despite a relatively poor airtightness test result compared to some others on here the house seems to hold heat well and is fairly comfortable.
     
    Finishing off
    We're now mostly in the realms of landscaping. We're not a massive fan of patio slabs, but wanted somewhere to sit outside. In the end we got hold of a load of broken bits of caithness sandstone, bought by the pallet from stonesource in Inverness. Quite heavy and time-consuming to work with but very solid and the variation in the stone gives a nice finish.

  2. jamieled
    There's been a considerable hiatus in both blogging and building. Looking back, my last post on November 22 last year was explaining how we were finding it tricky to make progress and that my wife was due to give birth to twins in early Jan this year.
     
    Little did we know that about 24 hours after writing that post, said twins arrived 7 weeks early necessitating a fairly urgent trip to Glasgow, first for my other half and shortly after for me to be present at the birth. For medical reasons I won't go into here, we have only arrived back home about two weeks ago, a 5 month spell in hospital essentially curtailing all building work (not that it was ever going to be the priority even if things went smoothly).
     
    So I expect progress to be fairly slow now, but we have a relatively short list of tasks to completion, including sorting the parking and turning area, finishing the outside drains and completing the access ramp and level threshold platform for the front door. There are a fair few number of other jobs which are needed to properly finish the place, but those will have to wait a while and aren't essential.
     
    We're currently pondering a plan around our VAT reclaim. I'm intending to apply for a temp habitation certificate, partly because it might take us a while to get to completion. However, it's easy enough to buy and store any materials I might need to finish my final jobs now, so I'm tempted to try and use that certificate for my VAT reclaim.
     
    For anyone following this blog, you may remember a rather large electricity connection quote from SSE (which we paid). 18 months after connection, a cheque arrived in the post for a substantial sum, due to their final costs being a lot lower than quoted!
     
    Anyway, I took a quick few snaps this afternoon to liven up this post. I hope to try and get some better ones once we're more finished, and a future post will also consider our final costs.
     

     

     

     

     
     
     
     
  3. jamieled

    Air test

    By jamieled,

    Only a short update for now and a distinct lack of photos. I'll put something more interesting up in the next week or so. Suffice to say that combining work with trying to get to completion has been quite difficult. Throw into the mix that my other half is shortly due to have twins and you understand why I'm often getting comments like 'do you ever think you've maybe bitten off a bit more than you can chew?'.
     
    One milestone recently was getting our air test done. I've decided to write a bit about this as a) There seems to be a fair bit of interest in this on buildhub and b) our result is not quite as I'd hoped and so I thought a few musings on this might help others.
     
    I haven't had the actual test report through, but from the results I saw on the screen, we ended up with a value (no laughing please from the passivhaus crowd) of around 3.4 m3/m2/hr. This is fair bit higher than I'd hoped for, but as I'll explain below, maybe not too surprising.
     
    The guys who ran the test spent a bit of time wandering round trying to find leaks and allowed me to do the same. There were no areas of the house where they could find significant leakage, but one or two small leaks easily dealt with. This obviously leads to the question of where it's all going. For reminders, our house is built from 300mm I-beams, filled with cellulose and then boarded with OSB on the inside, with all joints taped. All the services are ducted in and the ducts sealed. Windows have expanding foam strips around them and are taped. I don't think I'll ever know where the weaknesses are, but my suspicion is now around either 1) the OSB itself and 2) Where the 1st floor joists meet the outer rim board (a detail I failed to think through before it was too late).
     
    If I look back on some of the build, I think that I probably didn't spend enough time figuring out some of the detail earlier on. That said, I had a distinct lack of housebuilding experience when we started, and so I spent a lot of time trying to figure out the basics of drainage, roofing, cladding etc etc... It's now quite clear to me that if I was to have done better on some of these small airtightness details, then I'd have had to either take a lot longer on the build or go down another route (perhaps buying a kit with a minimum guaranteed airtightness?).
     
    Anyway, disappointing thought it is, we're in November, it's about 2 degrees outside and the house is toasty and will keep its heat well into tomorrow. While there would have undoubtedly been some benefit in getting it more airtight, it's a lot better than anywhere else we've lived. Frankly, my disappointment was pretty short-lived as we have more important things to worry about. Final bits before I can apply for completion are the access ramp and some outside drainage. Oh, and then the twins might arrive...
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
  4. jamieled

    Lockdown progress

    By jamieled,

    We were pretty lucky to get a big plasterboard delivery the week before lockdown. The inside is now boarded, taped and painted.

     

     

     
    The bathroom floor has been tiled. A wee thanks to @nod for pointing me in the direction of ditra. Floor seems solid enough and looks neater than I thought it might.
     

     
    The water treatment has been plumbed (thanks to @PeterW for the plumbing advice). Needs a bit of refinement to make it look more aesthetically pleasing but it is watertight, which is the main thing.
     

     
    Next stop second fix electrics and plumbing. I'd originally taken a year off work which is now up, so the sooner we get out of the caravan the better. Laptop on a wee solar panel and dodgy 4g connection isn't ideal.
     
  5. jamieled
    It's been a while since I last updated this, but we're slowly making progress. Since the completion of the roofing in November, we've mostly been cladding, the joiners fitted the doors and windows, we boarded the inside and last week the cellulose got blown in. It's reassuring how well the house retains the heat from a small portable heater, unlike anywhere else I've ever lived!
     
    Bit of a delay in the cladding due to me underestimating both how much we needed and also how much we discarded (too much sap). Weather's made things a bit slower at times as well. Photos below.
     
    Cladding in progress (don't look too closely). The ends have all been trimmed and bevelled now but this is the only photo I have.

     
    The snow arrives, makes for cold hands when they're above your head hammering all the time.

     
    Boarding the first floor with OSB

     
    The insulation arrives.

     
    And disappears into the walls within a day..

     

     
    Next up, try and sort the foul drainage as it's been a bit neglected, MVHR first fix and then ready for electrical and plumbing first fix.

  6. jamieled

    The roof

    By jamieled,

    I'm posting this as a single blog entry for a number of reasons. One as it's the biggest bit of work we've done without professional help. Two as sheet roofing seems to be a topic of interest on BH and three because this stuff was hard going, with minimal information available on fitting guidance, so hopefully this might help others.
     
    We are using eternit profile 6 sheet roofing. It is fibre cement board and we initially chose it due to some perceived benefits over wriggly tin (principally acoustics, condensation management and durability). Cost wise it seems to come out roughly similar (from what I could tell).
     
    One of the biggest differences is in weight. Each cement board sheet is in the order of 55kg. All 54 were manhandled on to the scaffolding, and the roof. Without doubt this is the biggest downside and I'd strongly recommend anyone considering using this stuff to be sure they have a way of moving it safely.
     
    Another challenging aspect is the sheet thickness. At around 7mm thick, this means potentially 28mm thickness where 4 sheets overlap. To avoid this, the sheets are mitred, which is a pain to do accurately on a curved sheet. The profiled wavelength and amplitude is greater than on most metal sheeting which when combined with the sheet thickness makes neat fitting around velux quite hard, irrespective of the pre-planning we did. A profile 3 sheet is available which is more similar to traditional metal sheeting.
     
    This probably sounds highly negative, but we're pretty pleased with how it looks. We've had a few downpours recently and it's looking quite solid. Still a couple of small bits to complete, but nearly done. As to whether I'd use it again, jury's still out...
     
    While it's still fresh in my mind, the other things I'll note are:
     
    -there is a right and wrong way to overlap sheets which is not obvious in the eternit guidance. It's not crucial for weatherproofness, but it can make the roof appear bumpy if not done correctly.
     
    -eternit helpline was not hugely helpful, but the local reps were definitely worth speaking to and very useful.
     
    Anyway, the photos:

     
    Above shows the sheet overlaps, with the mitre clearly visible. When the top right sheet is added, this disappears.
     

    Above shows the sheet overlap in section, but it also helps illustrates the sheet thickness.
     
    Below are a couple of more general shots of the finished product. 

     

     
     
     
     
  7. jamieled

    Frame progress

    By jamieled,

    The last week or so we've been blessed with pretty nice weather which has allowed for good progress on the frame. We hired in a hiab lorry for a morning to help with lifting the gables, ridge beam and roofing.

     
    As everyone probably finds out, now we start to get a better sense of the size of the house and how it sits in the landscape.

     
    SSE came in the other day for our grid connection. Those who have been following our progress might remember this was quite pricey, and when you see the number of vehicles involved you start to understand why.

     
    Here's hoping for a few days of decent weather to allow us to complete the roof.
  8. jamieled
    Been a busy few weeks. Following the groundworks, the slab was set out and poured. It was a bit of a warm day, and there was a definite sense of urgency as it went off fairly fast.
     

     
    Now we've got a local joiner putting a frame up for us. It's being built from I-beams on site. I'd planned this all as best as I could, expecting our posi's next week based on what the supplier told us about lead times. It now turns out it will be another 4 weeks. While I'd rather not leave the frame exposed longer than  we need to, we can't do much about it now, so we'll have to wrap it up as best we can. At least it's not winter.

     
    In the meantime, the tedious business of burying the water pipe continues...

  9. jamieled

    It starts!

    By jamieled,

    Progress this week. More photos than words for now. HQ is set up, including the shower.

     
    After felling the trees on site, a few big machines visited to get the logs out.
     
    Leaving the site looking like this:

     
    The last few days have then involved a lot of muck moving and getting decent material out for the tracks and base, leaving us looking something like this:

     
    Next stop, foundations!
  10. jamieled

    Trees!

    By jamieled,

    Since the last blog entry we've been working away at co-coordinating the paperwork for the building warrant . But progress is slowly being made. Last week we heard we've been lucky enough to get a 50% grant towards our grid connection costs, which is a big help. Anyone else who's thinking of applying, feel free to get in touch if you want to know more about it. I think you need to sit within SSE's (North Scotland) area.
     
    As part of our build we're removing quite a few conifers, the condition being that we replant with a load of native trees. One of the constraints on this is that the conifers sit quite close to a HV line, in particular within what the DNO call the red zone (where if the tree went the wrong way it would hit the line). For a while it was a bit difficult trying to figure out how we'd get these down, but in the end we were lucky enough to take advantage of a line shutdown by the DNO a couple of weeks ago. So now most of the conifers are down (only a few remaining), we just need to get them extracted.
     
    In other tree related news, we also arranged to mill a few of the hardwoods that were felled a year or so ago. Pretty pleased with the results, these will now air-dry and then probably need putting in a kiln just before we use them.
     
    Action shot of SWMBO taking it out on a tree:

     
    The aftermath:

     
    Logs ready to mill:

     
    And some of the results:

  11. jamieled
    Rather surprisingly our planning permission was granted at the end of last week. It turned out to be easier than we'd thought and a good few weeks before the planning authority were required to make a decision. We have a few conditions, some tree related as we're surrounded by them and one or two of the usual suspects related to foul drainage etc.
     
    As there's no progress on site, we've been doing a bit of woodland restoration (the main reason for building a house here). As I know you all like photos, the pictures below show the removal of some checked/failed sitka on an area of bog close to the plot. The plan is that it will eventually help restore the hydrology and then the habitat. I suppose you say we're just dealing with the 'garden' until we're ready to build.
     




  12. jamieled

    Draft plans

    By jamieled,

    We've got some initial ideas together, image attached.  For anyone interested, we've used an architect to help us.  The picture roughly shows the situation, the current plan is to take out some of the conifers in the background and place the house there, replanting some other areas with natives.
     
    To give the attached a bit of context, this is a house which allow us to work/restore an area of woodland, hence why the main entry is through the utility room.  Overall we're looking for a fairly functional house that will cheap to run but will also make the best of the views as we're in a nice spot.
    The 'bottom' wall of the plan faces roughly SSE (lean-to/kitchen on north side).
     
    Windows are sort of nominally placed and sized as we just wanted to get the outline design and room arrangement sorted first so expect them to change.  Same for external wall thickness.
     
    What's missing/not going to work?


  13. jamieled

    Initial ideas

    By jamieled,

    We're at the beginning of the self build process, up in the Highlands.  We have a site that has full planning and we have quite a few ideas, so for now it's cracking on with a lot of research.  We originally acquired the land as a bit of an exercise in woodland management, specifically with the long-term aim of developing native woodland and productive timber (though we might not see it in our lifetime).  The planning is almost a bonus,  living on site will make the woodland worl easier.
    We've found an architect to help work up some plans with the aim of getting a building warrant by the end of the year.
    Currently we're pondering:
    What the best way of integrating a wood burner, solar (thermal and/or pv) and potentially ASHP is. Whether we go for a completely off grid electrical system or pay SSE an estimated £15-17k!   How much of the build we will do ourselves and what sort of construction method we go for.  We will be using timber in one form or another. Lots of things to think about and probably loads more.


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