Day 7 (9) - Foundations and other stuff

It was a busy day at the office yesterday (Day 7 - Tuesday) with no time to take any photos or write a detailed blog.
In summary though, Callum and Steve laid the new supply pipe from the water main which will now run diagonally accross the front garden to the corner of the new garage to run alongside the existing gas and eletricity supplies.

Front garden showing new supply pipe. The existing stop-valve is located under the square paving slab in the foreground

New water supply pipe exiting corner of house alongside other utilities

They then removed what was left of the old garage floor, levelled it out and then back-filled with rubble. Once the three courses of engineering bricks are laid, hardcore will be filled in, followed by sand and then a waterproof membrane. Steel mesh will then be placed within this space and tied in to the existing house and then concrete poured in on top to create the new slab and new foundations for the side extension.

I hope to take a few photos later on today to show the progress of the brickwork.

"Character is like the foundations of a house - it's below the surface", Anon

Day 6 (8) - Concrete, tree stumps and an escaped dog

After the break over the weekend, it was back to normal this morning.
Darran, Callum and Steve were out on the site after their morning brews, removing the shoring from the 2 trenches and readying them for the delivery of the concrete for the foundations.

The concrete, once set, will provide the base upon which the bricklayers will start to build upon, The concrete was delivered by Master Concrete which delivers concrete in a Volumetric Concrete Mixer (VCM). As opposed to the old fashioned Drum Mixers, a VCM delivers the ingredients (water, ballast, cement powder) seperately and mixes them as they are poured out on site. In this way, you only pay for what you use and you don't incur any "un-carried" charges (the charge for unused, mixed concrete being returned and disposed of).

The 45 tonne beast

Our delivery was the maximum 9m³ which is poured out at a rate of 1m³ of concrete per minute.


Water, ballast and cement - easy as A,B,C

Before long, the porch and side extension foundations had been laid and covered over with plywood so as to protect it from any adventurous cats (although Eddie did manage to get out via the back garden, run out on the Green opposite our house, and give Callum the run around before baing brough back in.
The concrete will set overnight, ready for the bricklayers to start their job beginning with a few courses of engineering bricks.



Steve & Callum supervise the flow

Out at the front of the house, the smaller trench for the porch was also filled and the guys took advantage of having the mini-excavator to dig out the trench for the new water supply pipe and remove the tree stumps of a birch and beech tree to allow us to lay turf once the build is finished.

That's it for now.

Hasta mañana!