The Hokey Cokey

We had a bit of bad news recently. Recalling that the fireplace started like this:

Was demolished, and put back together like this (note sturdy wooden lintel):

Was plasterboarded, plastered and decorated to look like this:

Then we had the man around to quote for putting the planned log burning stove in. 

"Can't do that", he said to my wife. 

"What?" said she.

"I can see a wooden lintel in there - they change the regs last year. And you can't have that plasterboard there either."

"Eh? That plasterboards the fireproof stuff - look, it's pink"

"Doesn't matter - can't be there. And if you want that wooden lintel, the stove would need to be tiny - there's minimum distance it can be from the top of the stove"

"Balls".

Hence the Hokey Cokey. Not in celebration - but with lintels.

Having put yer wooden lintel in, take your wooden lintel out: 

Concrete one in, out, in out (it wasn't the same size at the wooden one, and wasn't going in without some more surgery on the hole) ... anyway, you get the picture.

Of course, this necessitated another visit from our friendly plasterers (and we got the floor in too):

And this is how the fireplace is today:

It's a clearview stove - very controllable, and very warm. It's sitting on a couple of pieces of black-ish granite (one at the back, in the chimney opening, and one going across the front). And that's where we are now!

Front of house

We got new gates. So front of house has gone from:

Through:

To:

Sitting Room (again)

The sitting room has been subject to something of a blitz. I often get asked 'why don't you just do one room at a time - surely the rooms don't take that long?' Well. We started from here (this post inevitably repeats earlier ones):

The fireplace:

The double aspect room. The curtains are doing a fine job of shielding the paintwork on the shutters which is so yellow that it's getting on for brown...

Smash the place up:

Fireplace and glorious 70's lighting effects out:

Supporting beam for fireplace in:

 Room cleared and ready for plasterboards, holes cut for first fix electrics:

Plasterboards up over fireplace, also hearth cast in concrete:

More first fix electrics and data points for CAT5E:

Random 'floor up' pic:

This bit I didn't do - lack the skills - but plasterers in, and plaster on walls:

You can really see the browness of the wood work in the above pics. We've also now taken out the old electrics and filled the holes in the skirting boards where the plug sockets used to be.

Starting to paint, but find damp patches on the wall. This is what you get with old houses - surprises. Often unwelcome.

That damp patch corresponds to the chimney on the other side of the house, so exploratory work starts. The little circle of filler in the pic one above this one is where I drilled through the wall. Duh.

Another brown woodwork pic above.

First coats on:

 Picture rail up, sockets on walls. These three pics are where we are now:

Random garden pics

Took some pics today as was in the garden:

Grass has got so long, I've needed to use the lawn tractor to cut it. Scalpage the result!

Out of view, but on the left of the first shot are the chickens. There are 10 now. All happily clucking and chickening about.

Greenhouse yet another project!

Out front

With a digger on site (see previous post),it seemed a good idea to try to make a bit of progress on the front garden. Well, the path at any rate.

You might remember this:

That load of hardcore leading to the front door is the path! Well. Kind of. The idea is that there'll be a path, and then a circle at the end. So you'll go up the path, and then instead of a right angle bend left to the front door, there's a circle. Anyway. It'll eventually be York sandstone. For now, it just needed the circle digging out and level with the start of the path. Digger in, and this was the result:

Much of the hardcore is from the fireplace in the sitting room!

That earth bank isn't against the new wall, it stops just at the foot of it, which emphasises how much higher the road is than the front garden. It needs raking out properly, but as the digger's on hire, I did that and not raking. Garden is going to need lots and lots of work!

Stinky poo poo wee wee

Ever since we had the house, we've had problems with the drains. It's been frustrating as the system that this house has is the same as the one in the last house, down to the installer, and that system was 100% reliable.

The only difference is that this one makes use of an existing system, and just modernises it, where the previous one was purpose built as the system in that house wasn't big enough. In any case, there are two tanks, the first is where the business really takes place - the digester tank:

Don't worry, wasn't going to give a proper view of the whole inner workings, but basically there's an air pump that aerates the 'mixture' and gives the bacteria in the tank that live off the contents oxygen so that they can process the waste efficiently. The waste is broken down in to water, which is clear-ish. The water is gently pumped to another tank, which is a settlement tank.

Any solids that remain drop out of the liquid, leaving the top layer of water clear and fit to join the nation's watercourses (so we have a license to discharge into the pond, basically).

As I said, we'd always had problems. The installer came back time and again, blaming builders for putting plaster down the outside loo, the washing powder we use and so on. We'd told him that there was another tank, but he waved us away, and as he'd installed it, we believed him. This time, though, we were fed up, and as we are on holiday (ha-bloody-ha - who spends their holidays like this, for crying out loud?) we had time to investigate more thoroughly. I remembered that the previous owner of the house had provided a diagram of the drains, and so dug it out. Hey presto, two tanks. Lifted the manhole from the 2nd tank - it was so full of solids that there were slugs crawling on the top of it.

Off to our local Machine Mart to get the blue hose pictured in the above, and pumped out the tank. It was at this point I wished that I'd bought a longer hose, because instead of giving our rose bed a good feed, it's clegged up the lawn like some sort of environmental catastrophe:

That is what lives at the bottom of the settlement tank. Because there's no air pump, and because I doubt it's ever been emptied, it's black because the process of decay is anaerobic. It also stinks. A clean up operation is pending.

Having pumped the tank out, the outlet pipe was visible, and so that was rodded. It was clear that there was a blockage. I assumed at this point that the old clay pipes had collapsed, so bought a plastic pipe and an adaptor to get onto clay. I also  ordered a little digger for a day's hire (that's Jem on the right - he's our helper on the weekends, and as it's the summer hols, he's also doing a couple of days here and there)

Digging up the exit pipe revealed a couple of things - one the clay pipe did have a small hole in it, but it wasn't collapsed. There was a concrete disc, and under it was this:

It's a valve - the exit to the pond is to the bottom of the photo, the tank to the top. So, if the weight of water is sufficient, then the water will push that round trapdoor open, and the water will exit into the pond. However, if the pond is flooding, then the valve will shut, preventing a backwash of water into the sewage treatment system. It's very clever, and we didn't have one of these at the last place. Needless to say, the valve was jammed shut. A bit of digging and poggling later, the valve was fully operational again. Jem and I also fixed the broken clay pipe:

And we also put back the concrete disc, for now. It will need a proper manhole cover in case this happens again, so for now, it'll have to stay like this until that arrives and gets fitted.

For now though, we have a fully operational sewage treatment plant! Exciting.

What is incredibly annoying is that the installer (who also services the plant annually, and empties the tank) has obviously never emptied the settlement tank. He's also been happily taking our money to investigate the problems we've been having, and never actually found the root cause of the issue. He's basically been taking the mick. In addition, if he had actually diagnosed the issue, he might have gained some business fixing the thing, and in doing so would have gained our trust and recommendation. Instead, we'll never use him again.

A set of well used drain rods!