A gap in the programme

I've had to hold up the work on the shed, so I thought I'd use some of the sand and rather old cement and lime to deal with a different problem, the hole in the wall:



The wall that was here was knocked down by the previous owner to turn the rainwater cistern into what must have been a rather unsatisfactory garage for cars. When we bought the barn, all it contained was some large timbers and a freezer containing old paint pots. And a lot of spiders. The original foundations of the wall were still there except at the left hand end, where they had been cut through to pass the water and electricity into the barn.



So I mixed some concrete for the new foundations, instructed and assisted by the two older grandchildren:



I cut up one of those old timbers to make a doorway, probably the biggest and heaviest mortice joints I've ever cut, and got started building. The wood has been given a single coat of linseed oil, and it is a very tight fit (sledgehammer) under the concrete slab. I hope it doesn't move, as it won't really be held in by the wall.



Once I started, the weather got hotter and hotter, and today I started early and gave it a break in the middle of the day when it was much too hot. By this afternoon I'd got up to this level, and it is beginning to look like a real wall:



After beginning thinking that 10cm thick concrete blocks would do for the inside wall, I eventually decided that the 20cm ones would require less mortar, and put less stress on my back (all the mortar has been mixed by hand). Occasionally if the stone facing is a particularly large piece, I have to knock a hole in the concrete block to accommodate it. At this stage I am not sure if I actually have enough stone to finish it, but I am hopeful, particularly if I can get a few more of the bigger stones into the wall. The main problem is lifting them, and not dropping them so hard on the wall underneath that it damages what's already been built.

I've been using a lime mortar for the wall, more to use it up as it is getting a little old, but also because it should match the existing mortar. I've left wide gaps for pointing later, and with a bit of luck - although you will be able to see the joins - it should match up reasonably well. The bit on the right is likely to be a better match than the left, where the new wall meets a nicely squared corner of the barn.

one more day ....

.... and it looks like this:



The next job is to cast a reinforced concrete beam all round the top edge, linked in to the corners (which at present are hollow and which take a square reinforcing framework). So on top of the lintel over the door there will just be concrete, not block-work. The lintels over the windows have been finished slightly unconventionally, with a 10cm block put in sideways. Normally these would have cast concrete on top too. We'll presumably need to make the concrete quite a dry mix to deal with the 45-degree edges. This beam will ensure that the walls hold together. I rather imagine that it will be pretty well blast-proof too: Paul did say that the French norms for any kind of building are over-engineered.

The hole in the bottom of the front wall will eventually be filled in, but below it there is a corresponding gap in the foundation slab (there's another one that doesn't show on the right). This is where the pipes from the pool will enter, coming in through a trench. The invisible gap on the right will give access for the well-insulated pipes going back to the barn to heat our hot water.

The rafters (chevrons) for the roof then sit on top of the hoizontal runs of the concrete beam, notched to stop them slipping, the rafters are then close-planked, with some kind of watertight roofing on the planks and under the solar panels.

I cut the blocks myself over the lintels, and where they needed to be shorter to fit in the sides.



Oddly enough this was just about the first cut I did: after this one I went and got my safety goggles, as the concrete really does spray out in all directions.

The work - of mixing cement and cutting and carting around the blocks - has messed up the grass quite a bit, but there's plenty of rain on the way to wash out the cement, and I expect the grass will be knee-high before we get around to the next phase, in a couple of weeks time.

solar heating on its way - in September

Today I was working with Paul to make the walls of the building that should - god willing, and much later this year - have the solar panels on its roof and the pool machinery inside.

My role is builders' labourer - fetching the blocks, sometimes mixing the mortar, bringing the sand and cement down from where they are stored, cutting the concrete blocks to size. Paul does the skilful stuff - getting the blocks level, upright, at right angles - in fact all the real building work.

But this is what it looks like now:



The long wall at the front is now at its finished height (80cm). The solar panels will be angled back at 45 degrees to slope up to the other long wall, which when finished will be about two and a half meters high.

The building site is being inspected by the youngest grandson Isaac (asleep as usual, but he is only nine weeks old) with his mum, Jane. The walls you can see were just one day's work, and - as we also had to go down to the builders merchants to get more sand, more cement, and the timbers for the roof - it was really quite a good day. On the other hand I'm going to have to get yet more sand tomorrow (though we do probably have enough cement now).

By the end of the day the sun had come out and it was pretty hot, so I rather hope we've finally got to the end of this rather rainy patch we've had for the last week or so.

Some work is progressing ... a bit

The windows all went back into the farmhouse in varying states of finish, and we painted and varnished them as time allowed for the first summer visitors. About the best I can say about these windows is that the more I have repaired, the better the standard of the repair. But "better" regrettably doesn't mean "good".


Here is a window whose bottom edge is now a good deal more solid that it was. In fact, before the repairs the bottom of that frame was loose and could be wobbled several millimetres back and forward - with a correspondingly loose pane of glass.



The picture below shows the inside of the same pair of windows. The glazing bar at the top of the picture of the right hand window was similar to (or perhaps actually is) the one shown previously (May 25th) with a large amount of rot at the joint. The joint is now filled with the resin-based filler, and strengthened with a metal T-piece. The left-hand window was one I repaired last year and needless to say the repairs are much more visible.



The glass is now all in one piece, instead of several, and the putty is a good deal more secure. In fact, as we have now painted over the putty - previously it had all been left unpainted, and had cracked away - there is a chance that the glass will stay where it is and rattle a good deal less in the winds.

We have finally got around to starting the building for the solar panels at the end of the garden. I know that putting them at a distance from the house is not ideal, but I have some hopes that the extra distance will be compensated by the larger area, 10 m2. Eventually I imagine we will find out.

Yesterday, in pouring rain, Paul and I dug out the foundations and shuttered the hole - mostly Paul I'd say. By the afternoon the rain had made the ground so slippery that Paul was only just able to get his van up the lane behind the barn, and the pouring of the concrete was deferred for a day or two in the hope of better weather. I spent the afternoon shifting the concrete blocks for the walls down to the site - they had been delivered up by the farmhouse.

This is the present state of the work:



There are four and a half tonnes (=250 blocks) of those blocks, shifted five at a time by wheelbarrow, and it has to be said my back is complaining about the hard labour yesterday. But the forecast is for a dry morning tomorrow and I have every hope that we'll get the concrete poured and the first row of blocks in place. The corner blocks - which are different from the wall blocks - accomodate steel reinforcing to tie them together. It is possible to see just one of the corner blocks edge-on in the picture, a little to the right of the top edge of the wheelbarrow, with the square hole at one end only, and you can compare these with the end-on views of the other 8 or 9 wall-blocks.

The intention will be to get these vertical reinforcing rods cast into the foundation slab, and then up a couple of levels of blocks, at each corner. The first layer of blocks will - I hope - be set into the concrete foundations before the concrete starts to harden.