Week Forty Two – What was that Question Again?

Wondering what to call the barn when it's finished.  My mind is a bit foggy on this one.

How about Misty Hollows?

Some rebars for reinforcing the slab in front of the rear wall.

We're getting the power company to re-site our electric meter. We have to prepare by digging a trench across neighbour’s lawn - as you do. He has a pole in his garden which supplies our barn via an overhead cable. The don't do overhead any more - hence the trench.

Upstand. The vertical part of the steel reinforced concrete retaining wall. They start by assembling the rebars as specified by our Engineer. They'll next put shuttering, sheets of ply, in front of it and pour concrete in. But they have to do the horizontal slab  first - or else the concrete would just run out the bottom ...

Have to provide ducts for services and drains for plant room through what will be the concrete slab.

Still concerned with the quality of our borhole water. Before getting it tested again we've been running the pump, discharging into the stream, to flush out the stuff left by the drilling operation and hopefully get a more representative sample for testing.

Water looks reasonably clear after the pump has been running for some time. Otherwise it looks rather brown which, we're told, indicates high iron levels.

Suffolk’s answer to the Himalayas? What shall we call it? Mount Never Rest?

The wall above/behind the chimney breast has been plastered. Looks great.

In addition to water quality and and retaining walls, issues this week have included:  how to join the plant room to the main building (plans show them touching corner to corner - how do you do that?); how high should the plinth wall on the garage / plant room be and how many bricks to order; is there any way we can accelerate the building process?

And finally

Week Forty One – Bunker Building

We often have little feathered visitors inside the the barn. This one has been known to spend the night.

The underpinning  of the existing back wall is now done so it's time to make it a retaining wall. When the bomb drops this will be the safest place in Suffolk.

Digging down under the walls reveals some of the strata. If I was a geologist I'd explain that this is a gravel layer overlying sand on top of what looks like the blown soil covering much of central Europe. And of course there's evidence of glacial till meaning this area was under an ice sheet some 8000 years ago. And under all that is chalk all the way to Australia. But what do I know?

Bringing the services into the barn from the plant room and evacuating foul water from the barn requires ducts and drains below what will be ground level. Don't you just love that word - foul? Hmm.

Round the back we've been moving the heap of  old timber. Most of it's only good for kindling. Or maybe a bonfire?

Some of the rafters have been hidden by plasterboard which makes the ceiling look a bit odd. So to preserve that overall sweep from one side to the other we've had some false rafters nailed up under the hidden ones. They're bits of our own old oak  so they're not really false. Just cosmetic.

Outside, down the hole with the rebars. This whole trench will be filled with concrete, about 25 meters cubed. Gulp.

Here's the underpin showing ground level behind the wall.

The rebars for the slab fully assembled look like a giant sofa. Not a very comfortable one.

The trench with the rebars waiting for the concrete to be poured has to be covered up against rain or it would fill with water - not good.

No, not a case of flying withdrawal symptoms. Just using the dumper to move lengths of timber.

And finally