Here's to a fruitful 2011

For our final act of 2010, Karen and I imported 7 trailer loads of quality horse manure from the other side of the hill. Claire, our donor, was delighted, and Karen was pretty impressed with my trailer-backing skills. Forget running a half-marathon or getting a degree, boys, can you reverse a trailer?

Spot the wheel

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The mother lode

We've only just begun

We marked our first year at Redlands by closing up the front of the studio. We got in a pro to frame the window and door. Ben and Amandine were home for an early Christmas and Ben helped me haul the double glazing unit up from the garage. Once installed the internal temperature soared to 18C (64F) which shows that the passive solar heating works! Now I need to finish the insulation and airtightness so we can store that heat.

Love the view - suitable for knitting or making music

The pallets make for an instant porch

All I need is a rocking chair

Final grading

A milestone: the rough grading of the garden is finished! With help from Ian and Dave, we got the final contours in place. Now we just need Spring to come and get the grass growing.

Rob in the big digger

Ian at the controls

The final shape of the studio corner revealed

Soil coming around the corner

The level raised in front of the house and the apple bed nicely filled

Meanwhile, Karen has been cleaning, etching and sealing the concrete floor. You can see the remains of the lawn now- good news

Moving dirt around

The digger arrived at 8.30,and we got going, moving the soil excavated from the studio. We put a load as backfill to keep the studio snug, and started filling the veg beds. It turns out Ali was better at driving the digger, but don't tell him I said so.

Roof and floor, almost at once

J&J Roofing came last Saturday and had the standing seam aluminium roof on in no time. They will come back to finish the flashings and gutters when K & I have put up and painted the fascia boards. The studio is watertight, on the top side at least.

Ali came home to help with the concrete floor. K&I had a busy day on Sunday cleaning the damp proof membrane, putting in the insulation (150mm polystyrene), cutting an fitting the steel mesh, and various other bits. Ali arrived around midnight and we saw him in the morning. Jewson's failed to have our bull float ready this morning, and the concrete arrived early, so we had a mild panic. The conveyor didn't want to work, and we didn't want try to push even 2 m3 of concrete up from the driveway. Fortunately, it all finally worked and we got the concrete in with the help of Paul. Final float was at about 7PM, well after dark and just before a welcome roast chicken and sticky toffee pudding.

The truck with the conveyor had a faulty drum, so a second truck brought our little load

Larry, Curly and Moe

Broadcasting the pigment - this will be the finished floor

The micro orchard

The bed for the espaliered fruit trees went in today. Karen and I shifted soil and put up the boards on the high side. This will form the back edge of a flower bed, which Karen marked out today. We have decided on steel posts for the trees to minimise the size of the posts. Next project is pouring the floor slab for the studio, booked for next Monday, and shifting the "ramp" that was created by excavating the studio - Rob on a digger!

Top board level to within 5mm. Check it out, Tom.

Just add manure.

Bottom bed got bigger and will swallow tons of soil.

Veg garden rising and PHPP

Timber for raised beds arrived week ago and Tom was booked in for some more building.

Rob ready to do some damage

Test run of the boards

Tom under close supervision - the architect is banished indoors for this operation

The day's work finished at dusk, and in light rain, but the progress is evident

Following much heated discussion about how level and how much of a circle segment the walls should be, the freestylers won out (since they were doing the work). A fair bit of fill was added to the lowest bed - manure needed now! We have the trailer hitch and all we need is the trailer and a shovel.

Peter Warm came today to discuss how to approach the Passivhaus standard and get me going on the detailed design and calculations. More on this later. Thanks, Pete! You managed to give straight answers with great diplomacy today.

Determination

Dave and I finished nailing down the roof deck at 7.00, but there is a roof deck!

Some tricky rafter cutting

Enjoying the sunset - just a few sheets of plywood to go.

The deck is down!

Roof is coming on

Although the details are evolving as we go, the studio is looking more and more like the original concept! Miracles never cease.

The studio nestles into its corner nicely

The view is great, even on a relentlessly overcast day

Raising the lintel

Reinforcing steel under the sill - the last blocks are in place

Dave suggests checking the level of the lintel bearing

That is level! Thanks to the hard work of everyone and a dose of good luck

The big lintel ( four 8x2s) drops perfectly into place

Walls nearly finished

Karen is out of action due to minor finger surgery, so Dave came today to help finish the walls. All of the funky geometry came together at the front corner, made more interesting by an on-site decision to move the west window to the front wall. Nonetheless, we got the east wall finished and got all of the final blocks and reinforcing steel in place. I will try to finish the cutting on Monday so we can start putting the roof on!

Dave and Rob get a feel for the final size of the room

Tea break between carefully located windows

Why Durisol?

A brief explanation of the Durisol  blocks. I only recently learned about this product, but it has several attractions for the green DIYer. The blocks are made of 80% recycled wood (mainly pallets I think) and are low energy in manufacture.They can be partially filled with insulation; the rest of the void is filled with concrete and any steel reinforcing required. They can be cut with woodworking tools, including a hand saw, which was used to produce this tricky corner:

The U(insulation) value of this block is 0.15, which is about 40% better than the building regulations require for a house. They are laid without mortar joints, and the concrete fill locks everything together and provides strenght and thermal mass. The blocks are vapour permeable, and when finished off with lime render and plaster will be airtight but breathable. Durisol will take back the off-cuts and re-use them to make more blocks. The roof will be standard timber rafters with hemp insulation between and a wood-fibre board underneath. The floor will be insulated with 140mm of polystyrene insulation, so there will be very little heat required, We will postpone installing the woodburner until we see a need. Things are moving slower with a smaller workforce.

 

Karen finishes another pour

Find out more here: http://www.durisol.net/ 

Raising the walls

Ruben stops by to check the inventory

Mark Collings gives confidence to the team

Paddy and Tom under the streetlight: dedication!

Amandine show good vibration technique

Karen said, "make sure the DPM is big enough."

The brothers are still competitive

Dave joins us for lunch - sunny and warm

Paddy points out where the view is: put the window here!