29. A lot happening

This week we have had timber floor installation, painting, cabinetry installation, tiling, painting, electrical fitoff and door installation all happening.

Finished external colour scheme

28. We have a date

Saturday, 27th November is 'Moving In Day'. It will not be 100% complete, but sufficient for us to move in!

27. Painting

The painters have been working on the internal walls this week. We are very pleased with the result! 

The timber ceiling has been started too, and looks great.

Gallery wall, towards front door

26. Plastered ...

The house - not us! 

The plastering team worked all last week to complete the setting, and finished off the sanding on Monday. They have done a really excellent job, and it looks wonderful. The house is fully square set, with no cornices or architraves, giving it a very clean look.

Living room sheeted and set

Kitchen area with a coat of paint to test the colour

Bedroom, ceiling painted

Dining / kitchen area

The painters have started work and the timber ceiling will be installed this week.

25. Not much

No plasterers last week, so not much happened. The last of the external cladding was finished, the posts and bearers for the deck were installed, and that's about all!

24. A good week

A lot has been done this week. The major achievement was installing insulation throughout the ceilings and walls, then having the whole house lined (Gyprock & Villaboard) inside.

R3.0 insulation, made from recycled glass bottles!

23. Progress

It has been a frustrating week, with several sub-contractors failing to arrive when promised, but eventually, on Thursday, the Custom-orb cladding was started.

Rear of garage

22. External cladding

The rain delayed the delivery of the Custom-Orb steel cladding for the back of the house. The access road into the property can get slippery when wet, and as a semi-trailer is needed for the long sheets, it wasn't possible to get the material on site. A smaller truck managed to bring the Scyon Matrix compressed-cement sheet cladding for the front, so the wall cladding has finally begun!

Garage cladding -north and west

21. Catching up

It seems to have been a long time since the last major post - things have been happening, but not as quickly as we would have liked. Progress hasn't been helped by the unusually wet winter; normally we can rely on several very dry, cool months which are perfect for building. Not this year though! We've had a lot of rain, and many areas of the country have been flooded. Today we finally got the plumbing to the water tanks completed so we should capture some of this persistent rain at last.

Roof is almost completely finished -
just a couple of pieces of gutter to be fitted

20. Solar farm

The solar panels have been installed on steel posts on the north-facing bank. We have a 5kw system, which should mean our electricity account is close to $0 (or we may even earn a profit). We are charged 19.4c per kw that we draw from the grid, and get paid 44c per kw that we feed back to the grid (surplus to what we use). It isn't hooked up yet, but should be within a couple of weeks - then we can start generating!

19. Roof sheeting and windows

The roof sheeting is all installed now, and there are only a couple of very small sections of gutter to be fitted before we can say the roof is complete, and the guard-rails can come down.

Roof sheeting and insulation in progress

18. Fascias and gutters

The timber fascias have all been installed, so the roofing company was able to begin work on the roof sheeting. First the gutters were attached to the fascias, then roof battens fixed, insulation blanket (wool, R1.8) laid and the steel sheeting fitted over the top.

Carpenters fitting trimmer beam to main roof

17. More roof, and other infrastructure

Work has been proceeding on the roof, with a couple of days lost to rain. We had almost 100mm in 24 hours! This is supposed to be the dry season, but is has been a very wet winter so far. If the water-tanks had been connected we would have filled two of them in one day. The tanks have been moved into position and are waiting for the roof, gutters and downpipes before we can collect any water.

Collection tanks at rear of house

16. Roofing structure

The garage frame is now built and the roof structure over the main part of the house is almost complete.

Garage (with carpenter's trailer inside)

15. Taking shape

Plenty of work on the timber framing has been happening, including the first of the roof rafters. The ply bracing sheets help to define the spaces - it is looking great! The carpenter is waiting for steel posts to be installed before finishing the framing on the front (north) side of the house.

14. Going up

The wall framing is about half finished and should be complete by the end of next week.

13. Good progress

In the two weeks since the last post, there were a few rainy days that slowed the progress a little.  Still, a lot has been done and the project is still ahead of schedule by about three weeks. The forecast is for a dry and sunny week, so full steam ahead!

Joists were installed,

12. Bearers go up

Now we can really start to see the structure - it will move quickly from here. The posts, bearers and joists are made from steel. It is a great system that results in zero waste: the lengths of steel section are delivered, then cut to size, fitted and welded together on-site. All offcuts are returned to the steel fabricator to be recycled.

These pictures show the result of less than two days work.

By the end of this week we should have all the joists in place too, we hope.
 

11. Footings are started

The real beginning of the construction!  The strip footing for the garage is done, and the pad footings for the steel posts are nearly finished.  There's a minor delay because of the (unexpected) rock in the ground which means ten of the ninety holes need to be dug with a jack-hammer then formed up to create the concrete pad. 

Jonathon is home from his surgery and gradually recovering. He sees the surgeon on Friday, and all being well, he will have the plaster cast removed and replaced with a fibreglass boot.

10. The 'Big Dig' finished

The excavation is finally completed and the rock removed.

The builder has erected profiles around the perimeter of the house and tomorrow the surveyors are due to mark out the exact position, then the real construction work can begin!

Update on Jonathon's injury: he has waited until today (Monday) for the surgery to insert a plate in his ankle. Hopefully he will be able to come home tomorrow!

9. A setback

On Thursday morning we went to meet Adam at the site, and unfortunately Jonathon slipped on the edge of the excavation - right near ground level. He only fell a very short way (about a metre), but he heard a loud crack and didn't move. When I went to see if he was OK it was clear that his foot was at a rather strange angle. We called an ambulance and he was taken to the local hospital. He has a disclocation and fracture of the left ankle, which requires surgery to correct. As I write, he is waiting to go to the operating theatre - the staff are hopeful that it will be tonight, we hope so too. If so, he will probably be allowed home on Sunday.

8. The 'Big Dig' begins

Monday morning the excavator started pulling out the shale and loading it into trucks to be taken away (apparently there is a large hole on a property nearby that needs filling).  After a couple of hours, it became apparent that this is a VERY BIG dig, and would take several days.

7. Preparing for the 'Big Dig'

The next stage is the 'Big Dig'. A large part of the shale bank behind the old shed position has to be removed to accommodate the new house. This was due to happen this week, but the excavator operator was held up at his previous job, so it is scheduled for next Monday.

6. The pool goes in

The swimming pool shell is the first part of the building to go in, then the rest of the house and deck will be built around it. It was a very quick process, only taking four days from lines on the the ground to the concrete shell. 

5. Approved

 
It might seem a little late in the day, but we received the formal approval for the building on Friday. We knew from the certifiers that the application had been approved a long time ago but various administrative procedures meant that they couldn't release it to us until the last hoop had been jumped through and the last piece of paper received.  Whew!

Not much to report this week, the surveyors pegged out the pool; the construction of which is due to begin on Tuesday.

Watch this space.

4. Demolition and Installations

What a big week! 

Saturday morning a shipping container was delivered to the site. We'll use this as a temporary 'shed' while the house is being built. The delivery wasn't without incident (of course). Because of the wet weather the access road to the top of the block was quite slippery and we were concerned that the truck would have trouble getting up there. After one failed attempt the driver reversed back down and told J that he'd try again in first gear! No trouble at all that time.

3. Builder appointed and getting started

We chose our builder just before we left for our four-week Home Exchange in Hong Kong, and recently signed the final version of the contract.

The tenants living in the 'shed' on the block told us that they were moving out earlier than expected, so we postponed our trip to China and came home to move ahead with the build.

The project starts on Tuesday 27th April - we are excited! The two rainwater supply tanks are being delivered and setup, the old septic system is being capped off and decommissioned and the demolition is going to start.

2. Designing the house

Next, we (well, Jonathon actually) got out the pencils and paper and started drawing. As the property faces due north it was relatively straightforward to get the general layout. Our major design considerations were:

• Energy efficiency - passive heating and cooling. This involves orienting the house to face true solar north (not magnetic north), minimising windows on the west and south, and ensuring the roof overhangs allow the winter sun to warm the interior of the house and keep the hot summer sun out.
• A lap pool, facing north to maximise the swim season. 
• 2 bedrooms and a large theatre room. We've designed it so that the theatre could be divided into two more bedrooms if required (by any subsequent purchaser)
• Maximising the view from most rooms. 

The layout was constrained by the contours of the land - we only wanted to build on the flat area. We also had to take into account the geotechnical properties (ie the structure of the soil and rock) so that expensive piering is not required.

1. Buying the land

Not long after we finished building our house in Noosa Waters, we sat down one evening with a glass of wine and said 'if we built again, what would we do differently, and what would we keep the same?'  The main thing that we decided we would do differently was to have more land (for privacy, peace and quiet, and to grow some veggies) and to be north-facing. We didn't do anything for a couple of years, as we did enjoy the house and location, but eventually neighbours and dogs began to become more annoying, so we made the decision to move again.