Archive for the ‘builders’ Category

Final inspections that wasn’t

Thursday, November 5th, 2009

We had the final inspection last week. The builder was away – the junior builder came.. six pages of reconciling inspection notes not followed through later we await paperwork ….

My questions around this are as follows:

Where is the clear and concise instruction from counil that inspections  are our responsibility – when I asked the builder for a schedule of these he told me they’d look after them…

How does it happen that they can proceed without them being checked .. what to notes like “ok to proceed once… ” really mean?

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The end?

Thursday, June 25th, 2009

Retrospect is such a great teacher…. the lesson I am learning at the moment is to  move on from errors of judgement that have meant the house is not,  perhaps in its detail – possibly in some parts more  major areas – what it could have been … should have been. I have learnt much about people through this process.   There have been some great interactions and some ludicrous and frustrating ones.

Last week I slithered to a place where any further decline would have resulted in “going past cracking point”. This was how Murray described it when he stepped in to deal with builders and sub contractors.

“Final meeting” today.

In Brief : the fire was completed yesterday, the manifold is ALMOST finished…., the diswasher doesn’t fit under the bench despite the designer having the specs early,  the splash back reflects not only the potential for  wonderful efficiency but installation issues that need to be rectified by an onsite meeting of four… men.

Men – while woman no doubt have the propensity to pick over the emotional trappings – men have astounded me with their ability to pass the buck and revolve a problem beyond any level of  non productive ‘problem solving’ I would ever have believed possible.

And that’s what sorts the trustworthy from the idiot. No matter how well intentioned, if they can’t give you clear detail in short space of time , based on informed and appropriate confidence in their field … send them packing. If you get even a whiff of bluff or bravado – take a big step back.   The good ones are rare.

Now we are near the end  subbies are telling us they “know a good builder” … where were they at the start?

Well.. onwards to the garden and the promise of spring and summer.  I pruned the hydrangeas on Sunday and reminded myself why we live here.  The shortest  day is past so moving in before winter is long gone.  The cat moved in briefly to the bathroom.   The underfloor heating is amazing ( the bill…well wait and see!) . The views out of the  house restore our faith in what we are about.

Oh … I think I hear the cutter coming to cut the tile under the dishwasher hole …. no doubt more standing, looking, wondering going over old ground followed by more dust …… Me, I am off to an auction of show home furniture for a housing company that went under.

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( the drawers are not in due to another untold story of poor management on the part of the vanity maker)

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The island top grain is gorgeous… not quite the colour we specified but splendid none the less…. Craft … that is THE ruling principle which ought to be honoured.

Posted in Kitchen, art work, builders, cladding, delays, heating, views | 1 Comment »

progress

Tuesday, April 28th, 2009

As I write Murray Nick and David are out shooting a possum that was keeping Dave awake.

Progressing towards the end now. Digger has been here clearing the drive way to the garage, back filling the deck space and clearing the eastern side for preparation to build up that part of the site.

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out from the old to the new - a digger where no digger should rightly be!

Murray came home to check on the detailing of the outdoor fish pond. It is always an odd thing when the suit and tie world meets the dust and work clothes practicality fo the building world.

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Having the digger working where the finished and painted surfaces are was nerve wracking.

The weather has been amazingly dry and hot and this has helped manage this last stage. Gib stopper has pretty much finsihed and painters due tomorrow. It does seem as though every tiny step is fraught with error but we can see the end.

Co-ordinating the tiler who is on a tight schedule at another job  and painters is causing some issues. The kitchen install looks set to be my birthday.

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The Outside

Thursday, April 16th, 2009

Serious action in the last week has seen the house take shape.   I am starting to get a little excited though still finding managing the details of it all and all the deciding very tricky  being at heart a perfectionist.  The house has been such a long time coming and we will live here  for so long to come, choices must be compromised between two people’s taste… and as the choices are made the budget inevitably rises. No wonder Grand Designs is our favourite TV programme.

My favourite photo so far!

My favourite photo so far! The dark is the finished colour.

The hebel guys have been here working for the last week or so. This has involved screwing the hebel panels to the wall and layering plaster and rendering over it. You think it looks good at each stage but the final coat , a finely textured layer, renders the coating into  a lovely finished form.  Unlike many of the practices and materials being used in the build, the tools and skills they use are essentially those which  my father had when her was apprenticed. I have them  stored carefully in the shed. ( Of course the light weight concrete panels and the gib panels internally make a huge difference to his day of lathe and plaster).

The final coat is then painted  – Murray chose Half Masala , the colour specially formulated from a  sample, painted on a test pot,  sent to Dunedin and recalculated into the Hebel Supercoat .  Its looking well with the old house and looks good with the window colour. We have been wrapped up but today I stepped out of the house just as the plastic came off the living room windows. It was a nice moment.

Plastering has also been going on inside and I especially like the reinforced palster corner papers.  Again, layers of varying plasters are being layered to get a good finish.

Yesterday the concrete guys came back and ground out the high bits ready for the tiler to come after the painters. Yes, it’s beginning to come together.  The grinding would normally be done with a water system but these guys don’t usually have to come back and they were using small hand held thing.   Understandably the gib stopper left !

"Fog" in the lounge.

"Fog" in the living room.

Things progress in the kitchen refinement but the subject is a tad raw as the joiner is not prepared to start without all in place and there are a few bits nad pieces – like what is going on the top cupboards – stillin flux. Check back soon!

Oh… and I found the perfect tap @ $1299 plus gst…. Regretfully I think it is better spent on the deck.

Not quite the same one as on Grand designs... but close

Not quite the same one as on Grand designs... but close

Posted in Kitchen, Uncategorized, builders, cladding, delays, house, lining, planning, site, taps | No Comments »

Big Day

Friday, March 20th, 2009

Well – lots of action today at the site and around the town.

The final windows were delivered and installed, building inspector signed off, hebel guys mounted battens, sparky finished most of pre wire, Red Dwarf finished pre pipe.  The storm watere was done yesterday which meants asump in the back bit and windows for the old house that open onto the back section were planned.  The windows in the link were installed yesterday and it is going to be a great sun trap which may well feed warmth to the old house.  Plans for tree ferns in a garden out back took another step in the imagination.

leaning windows

leaning windows

sorting the back bit.

sorting the back bit.

Meanwhile in town  months of research came to fruiton.

1. I settled the kitchen design ( pics coming soon) . Ongoing battle over the undersink cupboard was settled with a $60 toe kick pedal.  I have transformed the colour palette to light and teh ever patient Steve and I spent the good part of an hour minutely disecting shades of putty, irish cream and designer white to get the precise colour for the bottom cupboards.

2. On to Red Dwarf and selected a heated towl rail from the, again, ever patient, Michelle.

Chat to Doug about whether the toilet will fit …

3. On to Spazio Casa ( turn off the music with the wee off icon)  where Angela and Gary finally extacted some hard earned $ for an oder of floor wood.  I came home with a botte of wine and a tile option for the bathroom.

4. Taps … I don’t like any taps I have seen. They all are obesessed with little stick handles, have odd try hard designs … maybe I should just design my own.

A visit to a bathroom reatiler yesterday was ecuational – everything we think would be obvious is out of the ordinary : two mixers for to showers turns out to be an odd request!   The solution is a worka round – converting one mixer designed for two shower heads to work two shoers .. but we have to have teh same temperature which defeats the purpose.  Somebody is missing something!

Still.. light emerges at the end of the tunnel….

Posted in Kitchen, builders, delays, house, site, wood floor | 1 Comment »

A better day

Wednesday, March 18th, 2009

The day started with Steve asking me if I was “out of the dark hole yet?” … Well I wasn’t at the start of the day but by the end a cloud has lifted somewhat…

845 am : Talk with another parent at school about nightmare awning experience of inlaws.

9.30am: arrive back to a digger, two drainlayers, a builder, a joiner and a kitchen designer ( Steve)

10.30 ish I have:

agreed on gully’s for the outflow ( dreading telling Murray – bound to be wrong)

checked on wing wall location for kitchen, moved microwave location, agreed island needs revising to accomodate pipes ( MUST get around to buying dish drawer. Probably missed the sale I saw! ) , asked to see big peice of stuff for kitchen, debated deep drawers versus cupboards and many otehr petty details.

BIG news is that after weeks – no MONTHS – of trying to avoin melamine with PVC edging because Murray believes it to be inferir Wayne , the joiner, pronounces it more hardy than the shrink wrap option ot two pot. What Murray has been afraid of all thes eyears in a stick on tape – hardely ever done unless some architect wants sharp as corners at the expense of wear and tear.

So lets be clear once and for all: In order of best performance, long lasting toughness :

1: Melamine and PVC edging.

2: Thermo – lam  – does allow you to do nifty shapes and details .

3 Two pot paint.

Of course it MUST be said that stianless would beat them all as the finsih to beat all finishes. But we left that port some months ago!

11.38: checked with sparky re the ommission of down lights in kitchen which I know we discussed. This was picked up by lack of wires

12.30 Finally made contact with colour consultant and agreed to meet next week She confrimed my desire to go all through with one colur and up and over with one colour!

1.15 Doug sends an email confirming I wanted fore in red right? Very funny!

1.30:  drains all over the place – new brackets getting fixed.

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a bit of a rework

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drain in fron of the garage

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a better bracket

3.00 – Noticed down pipe in bad place on living room wall – but only real option once reviewed. Got sizes for windows in old house and will shop for these tomorrow. Made time to meet builder and project manager toorrow night to discuss time frames and some other issues.

3.45 Picked up Nick back to meet heating guy – now have paper version of  boiler on wall – water and power in wring place, looks like bolt MAY have missed heating pipe , decided on heated towl rail size, shape and location. Discussed options for water, heat and light locations that may or not be in the right places….

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Old meets new yesterday

6.31: Vacuumed up dust from yesterdays punch through wall. Now fighting paper war with all the brochures , and details that are proliferating.

Must cook some dinner!  Kitchen smells dreadful … something dead under the floor… and David needs collecting at 8!

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If I was doing it again:

Friday, March 13th, 2009

If I was doing it again I would :

Choose a builder first

Have builder /designer meetings throughout the design stage and throughout the build

Employ an independant project manager who could act impartially but with knowledge ( engineer or inspector sort of person)

Utilise project plan software

Choose all colours before work began ( this is a toughie as it is difficult to “see” until the concrete space is formed)

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Rita

Friday, March 6th, 2009

A Goddess of Mercy

A Goddess of Mercy

For a day we had this image on the hall studs.

I think I dropped the poster – a promo for the exhibition at the CHCH Art Gallery – on my way back from collecting the paper one morning and one of the builders stapled it to the wall.   It was an odd and ambiguous ‘pin up’ but stands never the less as the first piece of art in our new house.

Its only lasted a day and gave way to band saw on the hall mounted workbench.

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