Week Six – Old stuff vs new stuff

Seems to me there's a fundamental difference between a repair and a new installations. Putting in something that wasn't there already, such as a length of drainpipe in the ground, is intrinsically more creative & exciting than repairing the frame or underpinning the foundation. Don't get me wrong, those things are necessary and I'm really really pleased with progress. Seeing the new timbers in place, and the re-built sections of wall gives me great pleasure. But what really gives me a buzz is a trench being dug for a drain. How sad is that, eh? But the point is, the repairs restore the barn to what it is - a barn. Whereas, digging drains and laying in a water supply are to do with transformation, movement, change, development - life itself. And that's exciting, no?

This week we've had both of those boxes ticked - repairing the old and fashioning the new.

The sole plate on the south plinth was replaced with green oak.

 The concrete foundation for the replacement plinth wall on the north side was poured, or should I say barrowed.

Some timbers seem to be full of woodworm but we are assured they're sound. Of course they'll all be treated.

Traditional wooden dowels are used where possible to joint new timber to old.

And steel bracing is used where strength is crucial.

The borehole for the water supply will be surrounded by a proper manhole. The manhole chamber has a drain in case it gets flooded with rainwater. We decided to create a soakaway with an overflow to the stream, so we had to hire a bigger digger for a couple of days, in addition to the little one we've already got.

That way they'll keep each other company and not get into mischief.

The soakaway is just a big hole in the ground full of rubble, with an inlet and an outlet.

We have a few seriously large lumps of concrete on the site, a legacy from agricultural days of yore. The builder suggested we also hire a pneumatic drill attachment for the digger, known as a pecker. I was a bit reluctant to ring up the hire company and ask for a 3 ton digger with a pecker but the guy on the phone didn't bat an eyelid. At least I couldn't hear any eyelids being batted at the other end of the line when I placed my order, and the right machine and attachments turned up the next day on the back of a low loader. So my builder wasn't having me on - you never know. He hasn't asked me to hire in a set of sky hooks or purchase any pots of striped paint ... yet.

 One down, one to go.

Up on the scaffold we finished drilling the roof tiles - more than 4000. What little job is the builder going to find us next? 

I had a dental appointment this week. You know how it is. You lie there with the dentist's arm half way down your throat, a piercing noise about an inch from your ear, and you attempt to think nice pleasant thoughts to take you mind off what's happening inside your mouth. Well, I tried that and thought of the barn, of course. And the first thing that popped into my head was the digger with its pecker hammering into great lumps of concrete. Oops. Try to think of something else. Me up on the scaffold. Yes, that's much better - lovely views of the countryside. Very nice and peaceful. And what's that in my hand? A Black & Decker which I'm using to drill holes in tiles. Oh no. Try to think of something else. Ah yes. One of the guys on site working away. And what's he doing? Swinging a pickaxe, digging foundations. Gulp. Try to think of something else, quick. Another guy - he's got a power saw trimming a piece of timber. Oh my God. Quick. The carpenter. With a hammer and chisel cutting out a mortice and tenon on a piece of oak. Oh I give up.

A king post supports the trusses in the roof.

but this poor fellow has lost an arm.

Nice to see the farmer tending our field

Oh to be in England now that the daffs are coming out.

Building work seems to generate heaps (literally) of unwanted stuff. I was going to say soil, but much of is actually hogging, but you knew that already, didn't you. As far as I can see, hogging is soil with no loam in it. It's biologically inert. Lifeless. It's really useful stuff, when you need it. Blinding for example - to provide a smooth surface over a layer of hardcore. If what you've got is a mixture of soil, top soil, hogging, bits of concrete, broken bricks, it's known as muck. And the process of removing it is called Muckaway. Like so many things on a building site, it's not cheap. When you book a 15 ton lorry thinking that should be enough to clear it, you'll be amazed at how much of the muck is still there when he drives off.

And finally,

Week Five – Bored at Last

Drilling, round 2.

At the start of the week they moved the rig the required 5 metres from the abandoned hole and started again. This time no hitch, and they were done and dusted by Tuesday evening.

The abandoned borehole was just left as a hole in the ground and our builder was asked to plug it with concrete. I wondered if in the meantime I should put up a sign 'Danger, Deep Water, Keep Out' and invest in one of those lifebelts on a stick that you sometimes see. After all, 52 metres is very deep body of water.  Maybe just a piece or 4 by 2 will do.

Amazingly the live hole, which to me seemed rather precious, was left in a similar state.

To make sure nobody drove over it, or tipped a barrowload of dirt on top of it it, the builder marked the spot with the piece of broken sleeving left behind from the first borehole

Real men don’t eat quiche, and real workies don’t wear hard hats, unless they have to. Despite our providing safety gear at the start of the project, nobody wears them, including ourselves. On two occasions in recent weeks I’ve walked smack into the scaffold, drawing blood and killing off more than my usual daily quota of brain cells. You might say the very fact that it has happened twice is itself proof that I’m already a brain cell short of a moron. So I get it - I now wear a hard hat, at least when I'm walking around the scaffolding. I feel a bit of a twit and am worried they'll mistake me for Kevin McCloud. Could be worse I suppose. They could mistake me for an Architect.

We had been assuming that we could have tiled / stone floors in some of the rooms and engineered oak elsewhere. Engineered oak is a relatively thick (6-10 mm) veneer of oak glued to a plywood base. It’s about the same price as solid oak floor boards but preferable because it’s less likely to warp and shrink due to the underfloor heating. We discovered this week that putting in any kind of wood flooring increases the cost of the underfloor heating considerably because wood is such a good insulator – you have to have a heck of a lot more underfloor pipes to get the same amount of heat out into the room.  An insulator is not what you want between you and those lovely warm pipes beneath the floor. So we’ve had to have a re-think, and do a grand tour of tile shops across East Anglia from Snetterton to Cambridge to Mersea Island. Current thinking is that we’ll use oak just in the bedrooms and porcelain tiles in all the other rooms. We looked at natural stone such as limestone or travertine but don’t fancy all the hassle of sealing and maintenance that natural stone needs. Some carpets might be OK too, so the jury is still out.

Work on re-building the southwest corner began.
- before

- and after

As well as all the underpinning and blockwork, a lot of carpentry is happening. I now know the difference between a cabinet maker, a joiner and a carpenter. Might be obvious to others but I've only just twigged, so to speak. They all work with wood but it seems to be a matter of scale. As a mathematician I'd say a decent rule of thumb (mind you don't hit it with your hammer) would be: if it's about a metre, like a cabinet,  it's cabinet making; if it's a bit bigger, say like a staircase, it's joinery; and if it's big like a house it's carpentry. Got it? The guy I've been referring to as our builder is a carpenter and spends much of his time up in the roof talking about trusses and cripples. No he's not a doctor - a cripple is a short rafter, as far as I can tell. But it could be a purlin. It's definitely not a plate, nor a king post, nor a queen post. He trained as a joiner which is very problematical for my rule of thumb, but we'll gloss over that. He has been known to lay bricks and wheel wheelbarrows around too. All very confusing.

Some of the timbers in the frame are so decayed they have to be replaced but some can be repaired with new sections spliced into place.

Scarf joint for a roof truss in the making.

The new sole plate for the south wall and the rotten plate it's replacing.

The south wall minus sole plate. Makes you wonder what's holding it all up - note the tall acrow in the centre.

More acrows waiting to be deployed elsewhere

Someone's nicked my wall? The north plinth wall had to be taken down  to be replaced with a stronger, retaining wall as the floor level inside the building at that point is lower than the ground outside. 

Technical visitors and inspectors who came to visit the barn before work started all commented on the state the timber frame. Some barns for conversion are in a terrible state and virtually dropping to bits but this one is pretty sound. As work has progressed on the frame we've found that it's a case of the good the bad and the ugly.

Truss and knee brace connecting with wall plate in the roof – good

A truss in the roof which has so rotted away at the end that it has parted company with the wall plate – bad

Not only have the truss and wall plate parted company with this one but the vertical post which should be holding it all up has gone – ugly, very ugly

Still more drilling of roof tiles - getting there ...

And finally ...