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Friday, October 21. 2011Upstairs!
These pictures don't need much commentary - basically the builders used pre-made roof frame sections to put our one upstairs room together. It's called a "loft" on the plans, and as of yet has no designated purpose other than to grab the best views we can manage from our site up high on the hill.
We're getting plumbing put in to the walls in case we want a bathroom up there next to a master bedroom for example, but that won't happen on day one. First the walls were passed up and laid flat in place ready to be raised: Then one by one the went up: Nail guns did the job of holding everything in place: And eventually the "loft" was largely in place next to the bedroom roof trusses: Of course once they had left for the day I just had to get up there and have a look around: House Frame Progress
We've just reached a landmark - a progress payment for the builder for completing the frame. As such I thought I'd better get the blog up to date!
Mick the builder elected to use a combination of methods for the frame - the "normal" parts of the house were produced by a framing company using a computer-driven system. This is cheap and efficient. However the strawbale parts of the frame use much larger LVL framing timbers, which are significantly beyond the capabilities of the framing company. So those parts and some of the trickier joins were all done by hand. But, I'm getting ahead of myself. It all started simply enough - a few hand-raised LVL timbers forming the end wall of our ensuite (the diagonal one is just a temporary brace). But amazingly after the end of only the second day it looked like this, with the thicker walls as above around the exterior but the computer-produced frames for the interior walls: Here you can see the frame sitting on the boomerang-shaped slab (view from kitchen down bedroom wing): It didn't take long for the kids to start wandering around our first defined spaces, searching for bedrooms to call their own: Here's a close-up of the exterior bathroom wall clearly showing where the strawbales will fit snugly inside the timbers: At the end of the first week it was all starting to look very house-like: We certainly can't wait to live there and get views like this each day: It wasn't much longer and the bedroom wing's "normal" roof trusses arrived and were rapidly piled on - these will be inside the attic and not visible when the house is completed: The one part of the house that isn't a "boomerang" shape is the one upstairs loft/rumpus room. This sits across the middle of the boomerang half way between the angles of the other wings. This makes for some interesting joins which the builder had to work out as he went: Monday, September 19. 2011Framing, Fencing, Farming
After only a week we are able to stand upstairs in our new house! The downstairs frame has gone up rapidly - our builder basically called in his carpenter mates from around the state and has wasted no time in assembling the frame and modifying it to suit as required. We picked up a couple of small changes required, and it's utterly brilliant to be able to have these modifications made an hour or two later.
Roof trusses were delivered yesterday for the bedroom wing where they will be hidden, and we are almost at the point of deciding on what the exposed trusses will be over the cathedral-roofed living wing. The builder will assemble these himself as we the clients are being picky and want these to be features of the space. We have spent the last couple of weekends getting an internal fence up to contain the first furry creature to find its way to our land - we'll take delivery of a Shetland pony this weekend. He is from the house next door to our last one in Picton - his current owners offered him to us as they want to get some cows in their paddock instead. We formed quite a bond with him while living there as we fed him most days over the fence, and hope he settles in well. So we have a 2600m2 field set aside for him to munch on. Given the crazy rate of our grass growth he'll likely need some friends such as sheep to ensure he doesn't over-eat and meet the same fate as his mother unfortunately did. All in good time. Learning to fence has been great fun and it is very satisfying to see the progress. We've also finished getting our cables into the trenches and now just need to complete the back-filling so that he doesn't fall in. As Phoebe keeps saying "we have our own little farm now", which is truly heart-warming - it's just the lifestyle we hoped to be providing for our kids. William keeps trying to escape the shed and go for a wander outside by himself too. Once he is past the eat-everything phase we might even let him. The first couple of trees are in, and we're planning the layout of the rest of the land for more as time permits. Monday, September 5. 2011Come help Build Our House!
We have now finalised details for a four-day strawbale wall raising working bee in our our house in Razorback, near Picton, NSW, approximately 80 kilometres southwest of Sydney CBD. It will be facilitated by Frank Thomas from Yesterday-Today-Tomorrow, Strawbale Construction.
Please join us from Thursday the 27th to Sunday the 30th of October 2011. Times: 08:00am to 05:00pm The project: A 4 bedroom strawbale family home measuring approx. 225 square metres plus Rumpus in loft. The house is made up of two distinct wings, a bedroom wing and an open plan living/dining/kitchen wing. Main features of the project (will) include: Passive solar design, double glazed FSC timber windows, A&A worm farm septic system, grid connected solar electricity, in-ground rain water tanks for entire water supply. Selection & purchase of the land, planning of the house, and restoration of the land (5 acres) all incorporate Permaculture principles. The working bee: This working bee is free of charge for participants, morning & afternoon tea and light lunches will be provided. In exchange for your labour you will be able to gain hands-on experience raising the strawbale walls for this project, making custom sized bales & installing and fixing compressing plate. The slab, frame, roof and bottom plate system will be completed prior to the working bee – ready to commence stacking of bales. Rendering will possibly commence on the last day of the working bee, or on Monday the 31st of October, if you are interested in learning some basic rendering skills you are welcome to stay on and help us with this, please let us know about any possible extra days you like/would be able to stay when you register. What to bring for work: Please bring closed (work) shoes, gloves, long sleeve shirts, long trousers, some warm clothes for chilly mornings & evenings, a hat, sunscreen, insect repellent and a water bottle. Camping on site is possible. BYO tent, sleeping gear, torch, other necessary camping gear and breakfast and dinner. Basic toilet & shower and BBQ facilities are available. Please register with us via email, phone or some commenting here. We will advise of directions to site, advise of local accommodation options and any other necessary details at that stage. Please book as soon as possible as places are limited. We hope you can join us for this exciting event! Thanks again for your interest, Tim and Liz. Saturday, September 3. 2011Behind on the blog - check Photos!
Hi all, especially the newcomers from Frank and Ingrid's strawbale mailing list - thanks for dropping by!
This build blog hasn't had quite the updates I've wanted to give it - we've been busy building instead! However I've just done a huge upload of photos - drop over to Flickr to look at our photos with comments there. I'm aiming to get some better written updates with details of what we've done and why up here shortly. Monday, August 15. 2011Site Migration In Progress
Please brace for a slightly bumpy ride as I migrate my sites on to a linode. It's been fine thus far however there will no doubt be obscure things which don't work for a while.
Edit: I think that's all done. Please let me know if you see anything more broken than usual. Wednesday, August 10. 2011Onto the Land we go
After an amazing amount of stress, physical labour, coordination and time, we are now as of a week ago somewhat settled living on our property! We've built a bathroom and kitchen and backed a caravan in to the bigger of our two sheds, and this is now home.
Between Liz and I (with assistance from our ever-helpful parents), we have have run conduit for power, cabled all the data, built and installed kitchen cabinets and sink, waterproofed the bathroom, and coordinated the many sub-contractors who've made the place somewhat livable. That was difficult enough, but add in moving home (we have too much stuff!!) and two challenging little people and it's been in retrospect the busiest two-week period of our lives. We now have the satisfaction of no more rent to pay, and many more smaller tasks we can complete at a somewhat more sedate pace over the next few weeks, months and years. Phew. Tuesday, August 9. 2011Come Plant Some Trees
This Saturday from 9:30am we'll be planting trees with Landcare across the back section of our property. Where we now live!
This collaborative effort is aiming to restore native bushland across the country, and we have previously volunteered our time on a number of local properties to assist this cause. Now it's our turn, and people will plant approximately 250 native trees to provide native habitat. These will all be species native not just to Australia but to the Razorback area. If you are interested in helping out, we'd love to have you along. We are only 45 minutes south of Sydney and it will be a pleasant environmental day out. Please do let us know you are coming as we will be providing lunch. You can even reduce some of that guilt by answering "yes actually, I did plant some trees to offset my carbon output!" Many thanks, Tim and Liz. Tuesday, June 28. 2011Sheds - Standing. Trenching - In Progress
Today after only two days our two sheds are standing. The team of local builders who put them up were nothing if not extremely efficient.
We now have lockable space for the first time on our land, which will be shared with our builder to avoid him having to bring in a shipping container for temporary storage. I have also spent a lot of time trenching to run the electricity and data between the structures on our land, with the hope of meeting deadlines for solar installation - it's going to be tight but the promises have been made by suppliers. This trenching has use pretty much every method available - some rock wasn't moving without the lend of the neighbour and his excavator, while the majority was done with a borrowed 50-year-old chain trencher "ditch witch". Some tight corners however have resulted in me using a trenching shovel, trowel, and finally yesterday hammer and chisel. This build will certainly have sweat equity where we are able to invest the labour and time. Putting up huge sheds would also have been possible, but the expert pace given our time pressures helps massively. I'm having next week off work between roles which will allow us to power full steam ahead onto our land. This means finishing the trenching, wiring up the services, and commencing the fitout of the shed to a basic living standard. Thursday, June 16. 2011Sheds
One of the things that happens when you decide to build a sustainable house is that you have to recognise that it's not going to be a huge house. Our design is marginally over the Australian average size of 232m2 at around 240m2, which is not unreasonable considering that average-sized house is on a block maybe 500m2, while we are on 20,500m2.
It was going to be smaller at one point, and then much larger, and now we're at a size we are comfortable with for what we are going to be using it for. But there's no escaping we have lots of stuff which we currently jam into spare bedrooms, garages and the like, none of which our house will have. So, you look at what people do on large rural lots and we decided to get a lot of cheap floor space with a shed. The main shed is 9x11m, designed to fit our caravan inside for temporary occupancy: This is what we are currently racing to finish so we can move on to the site and watch the house build, plus stop wasting more money on rent. Once the house is complete, we'll sell the caravan (you're not allowed to have a second dwelling on your land so fitting out bedrooms and the like would have been a waste). It will have a bathroom and a laundry, while the caravan contains a kitchen and our beds. We can also heat and cool the caravan efficiently - something almost impossible in a large uninsulated metal shed. It will be basic but more comfortable by far than either the caravan or shed alone would be, plus the bathroom and of course the shed itself will serve as future useful space for putting our stuff, which was the original problem. The other problem is that of solar power. Neither this big shed nor our house are ideally designed or located to fit solar panels. There is some conflicting information, but the general recommendation is that for grid-connected solar power you want the panels and inverted located as close as possible to the meter. In our case, the panels on the house would be about 100m from the meter, and the shed around 200m. The shed is also not aligned north for maximum solar gain, and the roof isn't ideal. So we are building a second smaller shed, 5m x 6m, and calling it a stables. It will have a skillion (one sloping pane) roof, angled directly to true north for maximum solar gathering, and is located as close as possible to the meter - around 40m. Any closer and an existing well established tree would have overshadowed it. The stables function is for future livestock housing - whatever cute furry thing Liz and/or the kids claim follow them home in the future :) Today is the first day this week I have seen the sun, so with luck the slabs go in on Monday, the shed kit is built shortly thereafter, and the solar panels get installed just before the June 30th deadline before they become much more expensive due to government rebate changes. Then mid-July is the current target to be moved up to the land permanently, to watch, assist and be intimately involved in our sustainable house build. The sheds themselves aren't overly sustainable, but they are built minimally to purpose, and will last a long time. Owner Building
One of the decisions you have to make early in the process of building who is going to be your main contractor (the person ultimately responsible for delivering the building project). You've really got two main options:
Becoming an owner-builder when I got my license in 2009 was pretty straight forward - pay any of the several accredited online training providers $80 or so for a course and an exam. If you pass this (mine was less than an hour) that's it - you're an owner builder. Since then the system has quite rightly been made more complex with you needing to attend a multi-day course. Having your license is of course only the start of the complex string of paperwork required for any project like this - the next step once you have some plans is to take your license and the plans to the Department of Fair Trading and get a permit for the actual job you intend to complete. I did this fairly quickly once we had our shed plans ready to go, but was sweating for a while in fair trading as the guy in front of me was being told "sorry your license is from the old system, you'll have to go and do the new course". For whatever reason, I was called to the desk and given my permit with a smile. I'm certainly not complaining! All this really means is that I have to organise all the sub-contractors (concreters, carpenters, shed builders, plumbers, electricians, etc.) to get the sheds up. Then get them on site at the right time - current challenge is dodging the weather - and push the project through. It's rather satisfying - I can see why people do choose to do their entire house this way, but ultimately we wanted our children to live in this house while they were still children, not be in temporary accommodation for years while I built an entire house between a full-time job. Monday, June 13. 2011Why Build Sustainably?
My parents will be quick to tell you that as a teenager I was one to spend 10-15 minutes in the shower without much thought. Why not? There's plenty of water, and power to heat it, and besides I had more important things to do like adolescence and general self-indulgence.
I can't recall where it started (blog entries say attempting to stop phone book deliveries in 2004) but there was a true shift in my and Liz's thinking towards such matters when it became abundantly apparent that our existence here is transient, and we are but caretakers of the planet awaiting to hand it to our children. It did happen before we had children, but I've read stories of new parents who do go through this sudden understanding that they had best start looking after the world their children are going to live in. So we purchased a car that was amongst the most efficient on the market at the time, and could run on biofuels (it got me to the station this morning, and hasn't skipped a beat since new). We installed water tanks in our suburban home, plumbed to the entire house - almost unheard of at the time. We massively reduced our consumption of water and energy, I took the train to work on the days I wasn't cycling, and pretty much every decision we made became more focused on the future of the planet than just raw lowest cost. (Summary from 2007 here) Somewhere along the line we wanted a power meter. I found one online at the Alternate Technology Association's website, and while browsing there stumbled across two things that were to shape our future very strongly:
So, we went looking for and eventually purchased a block of land, and the rest is about to be (our) history. I'd had hoped that by 2011 all homes would be built to sensible standards, but in our discussions we still found most builders, and certainly almost all bulk package home builders view sustainability as just adding a water tank to the side of your 400m2 fully-airconditioned 100-downlight McMansion. That approach is going to look a little odd with the power price hikes we are all about to face. Saturday, June 4. 2011Architects and Builders
One of the reasons for us taking several more months than we expected to be ready to build is the loss of our builder.
Seeking Guidance During early 2010 we started talking to architects, with varying degrees of success. We roughly knew what we were after, and had a "brief" of sorts, and narrowed our list down to two or three which we had confidence could design us the house we wanted. However we couldn't escape the fact that there is a vast divide in the house building market. On the one hand, around 90% of the build market doesn't use architects directly - everyone else building in our street for example has rung up Masterton etc., selected the "Victorian Executive #3" or whatever, and made some small changes then signed up. Masterton themselves used architects you'd like to hope to arrive at the designs they peddle. This approach produces houses in the realm of $500-$1500 per m2. On the other hand, the remaining 10% of the market appears to be heavily skewed to the million dollar plus mansions in Sydney's Eastern suburbs. The figures we were getting back started around $3000 per m2 and some were up around $5000. Both of these figures we got the strong feeling were rather low compared to the clients they usually worked with. That's not to say that they weren't prepared to design a house to be built for lower costs, but given our strong sustainability brief we didn't know how well we could achieve affordable and well performing going down this path. Somewhere during this time frame, a colleague pointed out Viva Homes, based in Lawson in the Blue Mountains. Their packages were appealing - pre-architect-designed houses of varying sizes and shapes, using materials such as strawbale and earth (cob and render). To top it off, the houses were built fixed cost and time with a rough target of $2000 per m2. A Direction at Last! It didn't take us long to set up a meeting with Simone and Sam - the two person powerhouse behind the business. It rapidly became clear that they completely understood what we were trying to do - they don't use nasty glues or paints that off-gas, or fit the houses with airconditioning, and are passionate about sustainability themselves - living in a house designed to these specifications. Around half of the items on our architectural brief were already done - given how many ideas we had put down there this was quite an achievement. The fact that the look and feel of the houses are absolutely stunning (browse the site for more pictures) just sealed the deal in our mind. During late 2010 we got Sam on site, where he said that it didn't appear any of their standard designs were going to quite provide what we were after, and given what we had told him thus far he showed a sketch outline of house designed just for us to a "Boomerang" shape. The interior didn't meet many of our ideas, but the shape was perfect for our highly windy site atop Razorback - prevailing winds are directed along the house creating a usable oasis for our outdoor living area behind the house. I spent many many hours taking this shape and putting together a draft version as best as my non-architect brain could muster, then we handed it to the architect that already understood Viva's way of operating - Jamie Brennan from Six B Design in Katoomba. There were many details beyond my abilities, and Jamie added a huge amount of value for not a lot of money. Our goal was to get the accompanying plans into council before Christmas 2010, however the supporting engineering drawings didn't arrive in time so we missed this goal considerably. Back to the Drawing Board? It didn't end up mattering too much, because in early 2011 we got a call from Sam and Simone which threw us all into disarray - they were over-committed and had lost staff unexpectedly and as such regrettably weren't able to take on our project after all. By this stage of the project we'd been working with Viva for so long that the concept of starting again with another builder was deeply depressing. We had had some conversations with other builders basically to judge whether Viva's prices were realistic, but the feedback was that none of them were really interested. However in our favour, we'd made it very clear throughout the process that the drawings Jamie did for us were owned by us, and as such we weren't completely buggered. The other major plus was that the strawbale and earth render part of their building was done by a subcontractor - Frank Thomas from Yesterday - Today - Tomorrow. This part contributes most to the finished feel of the building, and compared to accepted "normal" building practices is the most non-standard, so having Frank on board gave us the confidence to head off into the market. His advice was to find a good carpenter and he could look after the rest. Back to the Locals One of the "brief" items that Viva had sorta-kinda filled was to use local labour where possible. We decided to look more local, and contacted pretty much every local builder that Google and Jamie (via his contacts) could find us. Many conversations were had, promises made, but in the end many didn't bother to continue the quoting process. One however, has done. Mick Kennedy (and his son) from BenAyla constructions - based about 10 minutes from our site in Camden South - stood out from the crowd immediately. He's a country boy through and through, running horses when he's not building, and has the contract for working on the local heritage buildings like Elizabeth Macarthur's original Belgenny Farm. There he replaces original 1820s work with the same old hand techniques, and is clearly a skilled operator. That ticked Frank's requirement and into negotiations we went. Never once has Mick looked phased at the non-standard materials or our sustainability requirements like many other builders have - he's clear that if that's what we want, that's what we'll get. His quoting process has been very transparent, and we're happy with the figure we have arrived at. It even arrived just in time to allow our finance approval (secured just before Viva's fateful call months earlier) expired, which has reduced headaches. Since we signed the contract last week, the contract has gone to the bank to finalise the approval, and as at late last week we're all lined up to go. Despite building many houses over the years, he hasn't done any for some time now due to changes in the warranty system making it not worth his time. Plus with the cushy government contract just at the end of his road for Belgenny he hasn't had to bother. We feel somewhat lucky that our project has drawn him out of his not-quite-"retirement". Mick's start date is 14th June, just after the long weekend. Can't wait. Thursday, June 2. 2011Front Fence and Driveway
After planning, changing, planning and more waiting, on Feb 7 2011 the first big changes came to our land - installation of a driveway pipe crossing over the drainage ditch, and our entire front fence!
The first excavator arrived and wasted no time breaking ground. We marked a center line between two trees on the council strip, and asked the driveway and fencing teams to work around that. The driveway was simple enough, but for the fencing we had to work outwards from there - a four meter vehicle gate, a foot gate on one side and a matching panel on the other. We had chosen to have a feature entrance with the not cheap "colonial post and rail" fencing for a few panels either side of the gate, then angled fencing back towards the main front fence line, where it eventually returns to the more economical standard split post fencing. Our excellent fencing team from Glenn Mumbersons Rural Fencing who previously built and rewired our other fencing wasted no time getting out the auger and getting stuck in to it. The driveway was done faster than expected, although builders started turning up for a chat in the days afterwards and told us that the five meter-wide driveway we had opted four wasn't really going to be wide enough for them to turn their trucks in, and as such we later had to get council back to enlarge it to seven and a half (an extra pipe length). The following day the fencing was taking shape: And on the third day the finishing touches were going on, such as all the wiring and the chicken wire to keep the animals (ours and others) where they belong: More pictures soon of the finished product including the gorgeous sandstone walls a local mason built for us. Monday, May 30. 2011Children Growing
So last night we signed a building contract. Phew - what an effort to get to this point but it is all starting to feel worth it and slowly fall in to place!
This blog has been sitting, nagging at my mind for attention but the continued uncertainty has meant that I've not had any confirmed news to report for a long time - a series of major changes in plan and dead ends. But now, it's time to slowly open the flood gates. Starting first, and most importantly with family. Phoebe is now at preschool two days a week, and becoming quite the miniature-sized grown up. The phrases and concepts she comes up with every day continue to amaze us - yesterday she was concerned that some other cars (4x4s) have their spare wheel visible on the outside, and asked why our red red car (the Peugeot 406 "snail" station wagon) does not. Liz's reply of "it's in the boot, hidden away" has prompted much concern about the welfare of the wheel, and whether it will be capable of helping us when required. She's very clever - being a space-saver spare I actually share her concerns. Her sleep most nights is easy, with her last night asking Liz around 6:30pm to be taken to bed. She still comes in once or twice a night to lie down with us, which we've now accepted as at least it's all calm and relaxed. Then this morning she wasn't up until after 7. This is still unusual - my noise-making getting off to work around 5:30 each morning tends to wake at least someone. Our little man William is such a delight to have around, he's always smiling, poking out his tongue, climbing up to us for a cuddle, and chasing his sister or the dog around the house. He has a funny little "ha. ha. ha." laugh which never fails to make his parents smile. There's no stopping his crawling, and he'll climb up anything and push off for a second or two's balancing before falling down only to try again. Steps can't be far away now. And the quantity that the little guy can eat! His munching sessions can stretch to 45 minutes. Teenage boy in house will require overdraft, that much is certain. He too sleeps pretty well, certainly much better than Phoebe did at his age. Down by 6:30 or so most nights, but then often after an hour or less decides he wants to be up to see what's happening in the world for an hour or so. He was quite sick last week which mucked all our sleep up but that's now the exception rather than the rule. Between two parents getting two babies off to sleep, we have the routine working pretty well really and Liz and I actually get to have evenings together again. This has been extremely helpful with the huge amount of progress we've been making on the house and land design, at least on the nights when we aren't too exhausted to do anything other than flop on the couch to unwind. The house will be the subject of almost all upcoming posts... [More photos here on flickr]
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