What we did:
- Roof timber structure cont.,
- Ground floor screed.
After last week’s heated dispute, we were all friends again. The chippies continued with the roof timbers and started installing some of the insulation, whilst the rest of the team worked on finishing the ground floor. Later in the week we had a surprise return of the brickies to make some amendments to the brickwork.
All smiles onsite
Three months of working closely with other strong personalities seemed to have taken its toll, ending in a bit of a tiff at the end of last week. Thankfully the long weekend gave us all a bit of a break, so we were back to being pals again this week!
I’d realised by this point a large part of this project was going to be about people management, but I guess that included giving myself a break from the others!
Made like an aircraft carrier?!
This week, the carpenters continued making up the roof structure and although things seemed to be progressing, things didn’t seem to be going at the pace I’d luckily become accustomed to. Part of the reason for this was the sheer amount of timber which was going into the roof structure. Everyone who visited the site commented on how much timber was going into the roof, with one person proclaiming “forget landing a plane on this, this is built like a ******* aircraft carrier!”
Finishing off the ground floor
Also this week, the screed was poured. This is a concrete-like material made of sand and cement used to create a level surface which finished flooring can be laid on. Once poured on the ground floor insulation, this was levelled out using a laser to find precise levels (you can see this in the picture below) and left to dry, except someone decided to leave a massive footprint in there….nice one.
Precision brick laying
As well as having the strongest roof anyone had seen on such a building, I’d also been told we had (unnecessarily) fortified foundations, meaning my building can now withstand earthquakes. Adding to these statements, which I took as accolades, now it also emerged the brickies had built the most uniform building many of the experienced tradesmen had ever seen – let me explain.
At the first course (layer) of bricks, the building footprint was 18.7m x 6.7m. After building 2 storeys, many would assume this should be exactly the same at the top. But, given bricks are not exactly the same size and different amounts of mortar are used between bricks, there is usually a +/- 50mm difference. In our case, there was only a 5mm difference! Being 10x more accurate, this may seem impressive in context, but also highlights how inaccurate most traditional builds are and yet another prompt to look at modular or pre-fabricated construction where large sections of a building are precisely manufactured in a factory to specification and then transported to site and fixed together. This way we can achieve more precise structures, faster construction and higher eco-standards. Yes it may seem like a no-brainer, but like I pointed out in week 9, this requires longer in designing/planning, so overall may not be worth it, at least for now.
Playing catch up
Coming back to this week, usually I visit the site on Sundays to inspect parts of the work more closely, and grab some content for this blog, but this week I was surprised to see the brickies and some of the team onsite. In fact the first thing I noticed when I arrived was the smell of a lovely barbeque fired up to keep morale high. After pulling my attention away from the menu, I found they were onsite to try and pick up some time lost by slow progress on the roof, installing some insulation on the roof. Also, the brickies were back in town…
Brickies lay down some amendments
One of the downsides to the brickies throwing up the brickwork so quickly was that they were perhaps more prone to having to re-do work. Alas, here was an example. Normally brickwork within the roof is left until the roof structure is on, and then the brickwork completed neatly flush to the roof. (Interestingly, as these bricks may come from a different manufactured batch, there may be differences in colour – take a look around and you’ll see what I mean!) Instead in this build, the brickies ran ahead and built up to where they expected the roof structure to be and as such had to come back and make some changes. The hard working Romanian gang put a solid shift in on Sunday but will be back to complete the front section another time.
Next week the velux windows should be arriving and after installation, the roof tiles can start to be installed, finally getting us closer to becoming watertight!