Bobbin House Self Build Norfolk UK

2-4-2010: Brick plinth

admin — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 17:41:32 +0000

Around the house and car port we have a brick plinth using Bovingdon Berry Multi bricks. They have the various cant bricks needed to finish the top of the plinth as well as internal and external corners.

It looks good.

1-4-2010: It’s not an April fool

admin — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 17:29:41 +0000

Yes, more flint picking. It is taking from 12 to 16 hours to pick a ton. Not much fun but at least we are making progress.

26-3-2010: Picture from the flint pile

admin — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 17:26:14 +0000

On the 23rd March 23 started to pick the flints from the Holt Quarry. We estimated that we would need around eight tons based on a covering around 64sqm. Estimates we have say around one ton of 3-4 inch flints will cover 8 sqm.

By picking our own we can try and keep the shape and colour uniform. Our council conditions indicate that we must yuse grey fkintr no bigger that 125mm. This is fine as we are using coursed flint work with the courses matching the brick coursing.

It is rather slow progress as it becomes harder to find suitable flints despite the size of the flint pile.

: Holt quarry reject flint pile

If we bought flints picked by the quarry they cost around £150 plus VAT per ton and will vary in colour. By picking we get what we want and pay around £56 pounds plus VAT per ton. We are picking into one ton bags and the local builders’ merchants are collecting them and delivering them to site.

25-3-2010: Plant room floor

admin — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 17:16:46 +0000

The plant room is the hub of the house services. The ground source heat pump, heat recovery ventilation system, consumer unit and other bits and pieces will be located here.

We have decided to have a drain in the centre of the floor to allow us to deal with any water spills. As the room is an unusual shape we are not using a block and beam construction so we are using a concrete slab.

22-3-2010: Mains Drainage

admin — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 17:13:07 +0000

The main drains have now been extended to join the existing pipe to the manhole on the far side of our land.

17-3-2010: Bricks laid

admin — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 16:54:32 +0000

The first of the Bovingdon multi-berry quality machine moulded stock bricks were laid today. There isn’t a great deal of brick work in the house. The main use is in the brick plinth around the house. The plinth uses the special bricks that provide a top to the plinth including internal and external corners.

We have suffered with some of the plinth stretchers appearing to be imperial size not metric as ordered. Also, the cut headers we ordered are of a poor quality. Bovingdon to their credit did provide replacements but to avoid delays we ended up cutting down the over-long plinth stretchers.

A number of people have commented on how nice thebricks are.

15 to 19 March 2010: More metalwork

admin — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 16:48:21 +0000

The rectangular hollow section (RHS) steel post has been positioned this week in addition to further work on block and beam floor. The steel post will be inside the stair wall and is used to support the upstairs block and beam floor where it goes over the downstairs hall.

8 to 12-3-2010: Block & Beam Ground Floor

admin — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 16:44:32 +0000

The ground floor block and beam installation started this week as did the fixing into position of the three fin plates that support the ground floor oak glulam posts.

1 to 5-3-2010

admin — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 16:40:02 +0000

This week saw support walls for beam and block floor laid.

Also drains runs positioned along north wall of house above teh electricity cable runs.

22-2-2010: Connection to manhole

admin — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 09:49:16 +0000

Another bad day for laying blocks so the builders have decided to dig across the lane, Luckily we own this part of the private lane to the manhole. There is already a connection in the manhole for us but it is badly positioned so we are laying a new pipe and improving the connection in the manhole. We have also provided a replacement manhole cover as the old one was rotten.