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ultramods

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  1. ultramods

    Quick Progress Update

    By ultramods,

    A quick photo update, I will do proper blog posts over the next few days......
     
    The ground works were started back in August, however there was a long delay with the timber frame being manufactured (partly due the the first floor layout changes), which meant that the TF kit wasn't  delivered until November the 18th.
     
    Last week the house was made wind and watertight.
     
    This week the ground floor UFH was laid and the screed poured. 
     
    We are hoping that the steel for the cantilevered stair will be fabricated and installed over the next 2 weeks.
     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     


  2. ultramods
    In 2009 my wife and I moved into a 3 year old developer built house in Kingseat, Newmachar which is 6 miles north of Aberdeen. 
     
    Kingseat was originally a farming estate, in 1859 Aberdeen District Lunacy Board required a new mental health facility for paupers and acquired the site. The hospital was constructed between 1901 - 1904, the various buildings were laid out in a villa format, with lots of green space including trees, a football pitch and tennis courts.
     


    One of the old hospital building - our current rental accommodation is in this building
     

     
    The hospital closed in 1995, due to the historical importance of the buildings the area was designated a conservation area. 
     
    In 2006 a house builder was granted permission to convert the old buildings into flats and to build new houses in amongst the old buildings.
     
     

    Typical developer house
     

    Another typical developer house
     
    I have wanted to build a house since I was a teenager (I'm now 36), in June 2016 we finally decided to take the plunge and put our house on the market, with the intention of building a new house. Initially we were looking for a plot near our current house with a more rural location. However when we saw there was a plot of land available in the Kingseat development we decided that this would be a better option because our son (he is now 8 ) had friends in the development.
     
    Our house was on the market for a while because of the fall in the oil price, we managed to sell in February 2017 (10% below valuation). We immediately made an offer on the plot, after some negotiation (on price and us agreeing to put in a mutual driveway at the back of the plot to neighbouring property at our expense) our offer was accepted, although the sale didn't complete until October 2017.
     
    The plot is a corner plot approximately 950 square metres. The plot previously had planning permission for a 200 square metre house, however this had lapsed.
     

     

    South 
     

    North East
     

    North East
     

    North
     

    South West
     

    South 
     
    In the meantime we moved out of our house in May 2107 and moved into a rented flat 100 metres away from the plot.
     
    In March 2017 we started working with an architect, initially had a topographical survey of the site completed, Followed by a tree survey. All the trees in Kingseat were covered by a tree preservation order and we had 4 trees in the middle of the plot. Luckily all 4 trees were not one of the original species planted at Kingseat which meant we could remove them.
     
    Next we starting to design the house, our brief was:
    Open plan living room, dining room and family room utility room snug master bedroom with dressing room and ensuite 3 other bedrooms, ideally all with ensuites attic trusses for potential future development of 2 further bedrooms/office Attached double garage 2.7 metre ceiling height ground floor and 2.4 metre first floor   
    The house would be traditional on the outside, similar to the other houses on the development. However inside wanted it to be very contemporary light and airy house with white walls, flush white doors and skirtings, cantilevered stairs etc.
     
    The following Images are the style we were aiming for.
     

     
     
    Our first planning application was rejected because the conservation officer thought the orientation of the house was wrong and the exterior was a bit too bland.
     
    The architect and I had a meeting with the conservation officer and discussed the changes that she would like to see and what I would be comfortable with. I feel that we left that house with a better house! The interior was almost identical, however we added an extra gable to one end of the house to make it less symmetrical and broke up the building by changing the garage cladding to black timber.
     
    The only thing I wasn't pleased about was reducing the roof pitch to reduce the ridge height, so that it's a similar height to the old cottage next door.
     
    In December 2017 our second application was accepted. The following is the design:
     

     

     

     

     

     

     
    Ground Floor

     
    First Floor
     

    Future development option for the attic space

     

     
    Architect 3D render of open plan area.

     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
  3. ultramods

    2: Site Clearance

    By ultramods,

    As part of the agreement for buying the plot the previous owner agreed to clear the plot of the 2 mounds of earth.
     
    In April 2018 The site was cleared by the previous owner. 
     
    We had to arrange a tree surgeon to fell the 3 trees.
     

     
    Before 
     

     

     
     
    The tree surgeon cut the trees into manageable logs, these were easy to get rid of, to various friends.
     
    I thought the best way to get rid of the remaining branches and shrubs would be to chip them, I left them to dry out between April and July as chippers don't like greenery.
     
    I hired a Timber wolf chipper (£150 for the weekend including delivery, fuel and PPE), it should handle 5" diameter branches. 
     
    The chipping was slow going as all the branches had to be stripped basically to straight poles, otherwise the chipper would jam or get blocked/bunged up. We filled about 1/2 the box trailer with chippings but then the chipper started to play up, so we put the reaming branches to the local skip.
     

     
     

     

     
     

    Ready for the site scrape  
     
     
     
     
     
     
  4. ultramods
    After yesterdays site scrape the ground workers started again at 07:00 this morning (22nd August 2018) to dig the trenches for the foundations.
     
    The idea was to dig the trenches today and then pour the concrete tomorrow. However whilst I was at work around 16:00 the local friendly drone guy sent me a couple of photos which looked like there was concrete in the trenches - this was a nice surprise.
     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     
    Tomorrow 1 of the brickies (the other 2 are on holiday) is going to start the under building (foundation walls), they estimate that this will take 3 days.

  5. ultramods
    Yesterday (August 21st 2018) the ground workers arrived at 07:00 to scrape the site, erect some Heras fencing and mark the house out.
     

     
     
    The engineer did the setting out first of house boundary.

     
     
    Next the digger driver and one ground worker scraped the site. 

     

     

     

     
     

     
    Next the engineer marked out where the foundations should go, ready to be dug tomorrow.

     

     
     
    The digger also ripped up the old tarmac road that ran through the plot. 
     
    They finished at 18:00
     
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