This week Stu and I were travelling out to Cambourne near Cambridge to carry out an en-suite installation in a former loft conversion.  On Monday we put together our materials list and then headed off to do some shopping, popping into around five different merchants.
 

On Tuesday I started stripping out the soon to be en-suite room, while Stu set about running the hot and cold water feeds up from another en-suite below.  Getting up and down two flights of stairs every time was certainly keeping us fit; maybe we should have installed a lift first.  Stu drained down the heating system and then plumbed in a new towel radiator in the existing bathroom the following day, while I put in some new structural support timbers for the new floor area and then laid new floor boards on top.  On Thursday Stu had to plumb in the correct size towel radiator in the bathroom as he had fitted the wrong towel rad on my say so.  I got my towel rads mixed up and Stu fitted the wrong one in the wrong place, whoops!  After that he ran in the first fix hot and cold water feeds to the en-suite toilet, sink and shower unit.  While Stu did that, I ran in the shower waste pipe work, put down the wet room shower base and fixed some additional floorboards to give a one level floor.  I then started on putting in some new stud work to create some new false walls.
 

Stu had to re-hang the living room radiator on Friday due to the fact the youngest member of the family where we were working had been using it as a warm seating area and nearly had it off the wall!  Stu then ran in the sink waste pipe while I finished off the stud work and started to insulate the new walls with cellotex insulation ready for boarding on return from a well deserved break.

We are making progress with our extension build in Sawtry, but we could be making more progress if the builder’s merchants got their act together.  I had ordered two cavity lintels from a merchant the previous week, ordering earlier than usual knowing that one of the lintels sizes, which is 3300mm would have to be ordered into stock.  I was told the lintels would be delivered into them on the Monday so we could pick them up on Tuesday and continue with our brick and block work.  By Monday lunch time Stu and I had the brick and block work up to lintel level, we just needed our lintels.  I phoned the merchants to make sure we were still on for picking up the lintels Tuesday am.  The answer was no.  The lintels would not be into the merchant’s yard until Tuesday.  Great!  As there was nothing more we could do, we had to take Tuesday off.  On Wednesday morning I was in the merchant’s yard for 07.30 to pick up the lintels.  As the 3300mm lintel is not exactly a small thing, I was a bit bemused as not to see it laying in the yard.  I loaded the 2100mm lintel up, but couldn’t see the 3300mm lintel.  I asked one of the yard lads where the lintel was, but he looked even more bemused than me.  But then again I think that’s how they look most of the time!  I went into the office to make further enquires.  The bemused look was starting to spread, and after some worried looking through paper work it became clear that they didn’t have the lintel.  I had been in the yard for 30 minutes now and was minus the lintel I had come to collect.  Obviously starting to realise the cock up they had made, the merchants started making some worried phone calls to subsidiary merchants to see if anyone else had one in stock.  Very fortunately for them one of their other merchants did have one in stock.  So I made my way across Fengate to pick the lintel up.  All fun and games!

We got the lintels bedded onto the walls and we ran in the brick and block work to plate height so we were in a position to make a start on the roof.  On Thursday we go the two wall plates fixed into position and made a start on running in the timber joists.  On Friday we got all the joists cut and fixed into position, leaving the openings for the two Velux windows to fit into.  As this is a shallow pitch single storey roof we have to do more work than usual on this roof to allow for the extra ventilation.  We had a good system going between us; I was up on the roof doing the fixing while Stu was at ground level cutting all the baton and ply sheeting to size.  We fixed the cross baton timbers into place to provide the through ventilation, and then fixed some plywood sheeting to the top of the batons, ready for some felt, more batons and roof tiles.  After a couple of hours with the sun beating down on us we got all our work finished.  Everything was dead on square and I was impressed with what we had done for the day and the finish of the roof (although I would say that!).  So just as we finished for the day I heard the ice cream van going up the road.  So I ran out to get a couple of large ice creams for a job well done.  Well, it would have been rude not too!

Not a lot to add this week.  Stu and I were still working on building up the extension brick and block work to plate height.  Waiting for the lintels to arrive on site for the window and door, plus the roof materials so we can make a start on that.  I should have more to write about next week.

We were back to concentrate on our single storey extension this week, and it was only a four day week due to a Bank Holiday Monday.  On the Tuesday Stu and I put in the block and beam floor.  Stu cut out all the openings into the existing house brick work so we could slot the concrete beams into position.  After the beams were in, it was just a case of in filling the beams with the concrete blocks to provide the new floor area.
 

The rest of the week was spent doing the exterior face brick work.  Stu the cement technician was on the mixer serving up barrows of his finest recipe cement, and in between was loading out the site with bricks and blocks and making up the window and door frames, while I was on brick laying duty.  I was a bit rusty on the brick laying at the start of the week, but soon got up to speed by the end of the week and things were progressing nicely.  A nice simple week.

On Monday and Tuesday Stu and I were finishing off the bathroom refurbishment.  The only thing left to do is fix the shower head to the wall once the missing parts arrive from the shower manufacturer.

On Wednesday we were back over towards Northampton fitting a new front door for a previous client, while on Thursday we working near Cambridge fitting a waste disposal unit.  So that tidies up all the little jobs we had outstanding, so next week we can get back to the extension we have started and make a start on the block and beam floor and start getting some brick and block work up.

On Monday Stu and I had a day laying the footing trench blocks on the extension job, before moving on and starting a bathroom refurbishment job on the Tuesday.  Our first job was to strip out the existing bathroom furniture and to take up, and replace, the floor board that had seen better days.  While the floorboards were up, Stu ran in some new pipe work and moved some other pipes about.  On Wednesday we put in a new stud wall, put the bath together and fitted it into position and tiled the floor area.

While Stu plumbed in the bath on Thursday morning, I put the taps and waste onto the sink ready for its installation.  I then plumbed in and fitted the toilet while Stu set about getting a new radiator and towel radiator ready for them to be fitted.  Friday was a fun day all round.  Stu had to plumb in a new shower with a new shower pump unit, which doesn’t sound too bad, but when there is a big large hot water cylinder in the way in an airing cupboard space it makes things that little bit harder.  So while Stu was doing his best contortionist moves, I was fitting a product called Mermaid board (decorative bathroom panels) around the bath.  Come late afternoon I had all the boards fixed into place and Stu was nearing the end of his shower fitting.  He got all the pipe work completed to the back of the shower, then we got the shower unit fitted to the front and tested it for any possible leaks which there wasn’t.  It turned out to be a long day, which we don’t need on a Friday, but we had got everything done we had planned to do for the week.  So we were on track to be all finished off by Tuesday of the following week.

We were back on site on Monday morning with a full day’s hand digging in the trenches to look forward to.  Last week the Building Inspector wasn’t happy with the depth of the footings so we had to go down another metre.  We made a start the previous Thursday, but the weather was against us on the Friday.  The weather was good, blue skies and sunshine. By mid afternoon we had broken the back of the digging, and we had found the bottom of the existing footings and started to level the trench out.  Tuesday morning we called out the Building Inspector once again to take another look at the footings.  While we waited we tidied up the trench and made it look presentable.  Late morning the Inspector duly arrived and passed off the footings straight away.  Two days of labour intensive digging all for a sixty second site visit and a yes!
 

I had provisionally booked in the concrete delivery for Wednesday earlier in the week, so we were all systems go to fill the trench with concrete.  Stu was on mechanical dumper duty, having the concrete poured into his bucket and then driving to the rear of the property and tipping the concrete into the trench.  I was on rake duty, very technical.  I had to try and push the concrete around the trench to keep it level and even as it filled up.  Which doesn’t sound too difficult, but bearing in mind it was nice and sunny, I still had my thermals on and we had 12 meters of concrete delivered, which meant the sweat was pouring off me and my arms felt like Popeye’s, even if they didn’t look like them!  As we got near the end of the load, Stu was on and off his dumper helping me out.  After about three hours of filling we had the trench filled and all levelled off, job done.
 

Thursday was about clearing the site of all the excess earth we had.  Stu was back on his dumper and I was on the digger and by the end of the day we had filled two large 8 yard skips with about 14 tonnes of earth.  That was that stage completed, next stage is the block and beam floor.

Two weeks ago we were meant to be starting on a bathroom refurbishment in Sawtry, Cambridgeshire.  The client had purchased all the bathroom furniture and units, so we were just going to replace like for like with some additional tiling to be donw.  Unfortunately they had also bought some bathroom decor panels which their primary use is for shower areas, but the client thought they could be used around a bath.  This was not the case.  So we were now in a position where it was extremely difficult to carry out the refurb without these panels or at least having a viable second option.  The client decided they wanted to continue with the decor panels, but they would have to order some similar panels which would work around a bath.  The earliest these could be delivered was the following week.  So Stu and I were in a position through no fault of our own where we now had no work for the week, plus it was going to spoil our plans for starting an extension the following week.  Fortunately the extension we were due to start on was also in Sawtry.  So after a few phone calls and some re-arranging we managed to make a start at our extension job, with our first job being to dismantle and dispose of the existing conservatory that the extension was going to replace.  This only took us a day, and there was little else we could do until the following week when the plant machinery arrived, so we ended up having to take Thursday and Friday off.

On Monday we were able to start on the extension work proper.  Our first job was to dig up the conservatory foundations.  The digger and dumper duly arrived during the morning, so Stu and I set about filling the skip with the conservatory’s foundations.  Once the skip was full, we couldn’t do any more until a fresh skip arrived the following morning.  The next day we measured up and set out the footings.  The skip was exchanged and we made a start digging out the footings.  The only problem was that we were filling the skips quicker than the skip company could change them over.  The skip was due to be exchanged on the Wednesday, but the skip company could not do this until late afternoon so we ended up losing a day as we had no new skip to fill.  We were back in business on Thursday and were going to have the trench dug out.  I called the Building Inspector out to have the footings checked off and had the concrete provisionally booked for a pm delivery.  Everything was in place and ready to go.  That was until the Building Inspector decided he wasn’t happy with the depth of the footings and wanted us to dig down further.  You can’t have the footings signed off until they are virtually finished, by which time there is not much chance of getting the digger back into position if you do need to go down deeper, which we did.  So this meant we had to dig out the remainder by hand.  We had to go another metre down and we had twelve metres of trench to dig.  Roughly, we were going to have to dig out nearly six tonnes of earth by hand (actually with shovels, but you know what I mean).  Great!!  We had no option but to get started.  The weather reports were not looking good for Friday with heavy rain forecast, so Stu and I thought it was best to give Friday a miss and look forward to more hand digging on the Monday!

This week was one of our easier weeks.  On Monday and Tuesday we finished up at Northampton by hanging the last of the doors, fixing all the architrave and skirting and putting in a new loft hatch.  After that we had a good tidy up and we were all finished, for now.  We have a new front door to go back and fit in a few weeks time.
 

On Wednesday and Thursday we were doing some repair work to a roof in Peterborough and fitting some new facia and guttering, and then we had a long weekend by having the Friday off.  Next week we will be starting on a bathroom refurbishment in Sawtry, with a single storey extension lined up after that.  So we have the work coming in to keep us busy.

When we got back to site on the Monday morning we had a weep on the sink waste and a weep on the shower unit.  The sink weep was easy enough for Stu to sort out, but the shower one was a bit trickier.  Stu had to have the plasterboard wall off on the landing so he could access the shower pipe work.  He tracked the weep down and set about putting it right.  While Stu actioned that, I set about laying the last of the tiles. By lunch time, the weeps were sorted and all the tiles laid.  In the afternoon I grouted up the tiles, while Stu siliconed the shower and bath.

On Tuesday and Wednesday I left Stu in the bathroom to fit the bath panels and plumb in the sink and the towel rad while I set about taking out the two in built wardrobes, knocking down the block wall that was at the back of the two built in wardrobes and erecting new stud work so that one bedroom had a new stud wall in it, while the other bedroom gained a larger walk in wardrobe.

I finished off the wardrobe stud work on Thursday by boarding it out with plaster board so John and J the plasterers could do their thing on Friday.  Stu finished off in the bathroom by fitting the toilet and the shower screen.  Friday morning we travelled over in the snowy conditions, which weren’t too bad, until we got to the drive way of where we were working.  Unfortunately this is positioned on a hill, and the van started slipping and sliding as I tried to find grip.  We had travelled for 45 minutes no problem, but nearly became a cropper in the last few metres of the journey!  John and J arrived shortly after wards and set about their work, while Stu and I had a good tidy up and left late morning as there was nothing we could do until the plastering had been finished.