A Problem

Although no action on the site today - thought we would raise a problem we have found.

We happened to be looking at the PD website today, specifically the upstairs "brady bunch" bathroom and noticed our home is different to the display! This upstairs bathroom is situated between two of the bedrooms and has cavity slider doors as access points from each bedroom. The interesting thing is the door openings have been placed a door width away from where they are in the display. If you look at the pic above, the door opening to the right is supposed to be plaster, with the actual opening to the right of that.

Of course our first reaction was "the door openings are in the wrong place"! However, closer inspection of our plans shows that our doors have in fact been placed correctly according to our plans. We find it interesting that this was not pointed out to us on signing- or maybe that is expecting too much? Of course, we didn't pick it up when reviewing our plans either :(

Anyway, this change in door position not a big issue - the issue now revolves around the vanity unit in the pic - it really is too close to the door opening on the right isn't it?

On further review of our plans, we have found the vanity unit has been installed in the wrong spot! It should be further to the left in the pic.

Wonder how we go about getting that fixed?!? Has anyone else had a similar prob?

Full Speed Ahead.

More action today.
Alfresco roof frame.
Vanities and basins.
Laundry Trough.
Stairs finished. (including S/S balustrades - worth all the pain)
Kitchen Started.

Lock Up

After a long break from blogging we thought we would share our milestone as our house has been officially locked up.
Our lockup invoice was followed by a concerned accounts department call saying he was worried about the amount (it was the largest he had seen. He hadn't been there long.)
After we had recovered from the shock we thought we would go and see what our money had bought us.
We discovered that the scaffold was down, the brickies were finished, the plaster cornice had been finished, the stairs were being installed and the kitchen cupboards and doors had been delivered.
Starting to look like a real house now.

Our SS believes we should set ourselves up for a February hand over given the three weeks off scheduled over Xmas - but we will wait and see.
Our build tends to go in leaps and bounds and then stops for a week which can be very frustrating.

So the next couple of weeks should see the installation of the kitchen cupboards, fixing completed and the framers returning to build the roof to the garage and alfresco. ..and hopefully a site clean as the place looks like a bomb has hit it!

We have also managed to put aside a hundred plus bricks for our letter box which DH will be building.

We will try to be a bit more regular with our blogs from now on...

We have plaster

After a frustrating few weeks waiting for the brickies to show up it has been full steam ahead in the past week.

Wednesday saw the return of the brickies - yeh! Since then it has been a flurry of activity with plumbing finished off, heating and cooling ducts installed, insulation installed, temporary doors installed, solar panels fitted and the plasterers doing what they do best. Very surprised to see them on site this Sunday morning and even more surprised that in one day they have completed entire downstairs area and upstairs ceiling.
Day 2 saw them finish off hanging the plaster and taping the joins.
All we needed was an interpreter to help explain that we had to install the HDMI cable in the theatre room ceiling before they hung the plaster.

We caught up with our SS during the week and despite the delay originally with the framing and more recently with the brickies we are only about a week behind his schedule.

Retreat. Insulation.

Theatre Room.
Family Room.

Day 6 Of brickwork.

Scaffold Is Up and More Wrapping

Now we wait for the mysterious and illusive brickies to bless us with their presence.(they are booked for Friday.)
Now the house has been wrapped we only need the insulation installed and plumbing finished off before the plaster is installed on the 10/10/08.
Wishfull thinking?????????

The Brickies Have Landed.

After a 2 week wait our brickies have finally arrived and made a start. Yeh!!!
Between a very windy start to the day and a very wet afternoon our brickies have stacked the bricks around the house and layed about 700 bricks.
On closer inspection we are very happy with the quality of their workmanship. Very straight lines, square corners and plum walls are a very positive first step to an important piece of the building puzzle.
Funny how the off white mortar looks so grey at this stage.

On the down side.... The plaster is getting wet every time it rains heavily.

Building Inspection but still no Brickies

We received our building inspection report and the overall opinion is that the frame has been really well constructed which is terrific. Well done Troy. A couple of minor issues to fix but quite happy with result. It will be good if all the tradies who end up working on the house live up to the same standard.

..of course the brickies have to actually arrive before we can judge their work. Has anyone seen one lately or are they some sort of mythical creature????

We also managed to look through the electricals on the house and found a couple of errors that we will be chasing up with our Administrator. Good idea if you can check electricals to plan prior to plaster going in.

Now the weather is supposed to be good tomorrow so no excuses with the Brickie, oh and look - there go those flying pigs again. :)

No news is good news?

Well they say no news is good news - so let us give you all some good news...

We have no news.

No brickies to be found, apparently they have all gone away, never to appear again.
Our CS has informed us we can now expect them on Monday, with that good old "weather permitting" clause. She has not let us down yet through the actual site construction so we will remain positive.

Our independent building inspector will be looking over the place in the next couple of days so will be interesting to see what comes up.

..and we hate to inform you all that Zoydberg too is no longer with us. There goes our theories that he was at the bottom of it all, more likely to be the latest batch of food??

Action Stations

Good News.

Plenty of action this week already.
Scaffold has been removed.
Remaining first floor windows installed
Ducted vacuum installed.
Bi-fold doors installed.
Plumbing rough in finished.
Electrical rough in started.
Plaster has been delivered and stacked in the family room.

Bad news.
No brickie.
Plaster delivery men knocked down the bracing on the alfresco frame.
Not happy with the position of the 3rd bathroom's toilet. It is too close to the wall. A picture from the display house shows it to be the correct position, but you don't notice some things on display.
It is only when you see them in a practical installation that you realise it doesn't look quite right.

We Are Wrapped

Well, the lower level has been wrapped. We also have had our bricks delivered.

And plumbing roughed in.

The next step is the removal of the scaffold, installation of the rest of the first floor windows and bricklaying to start.

Our house has a lid!

Well good and bad news for today.

The good news is that we met with our SS this am and all seems to be on track after a few delays in frame stage due to kinks in the Rowland 41 design. We are of course the guinea pigs so our SS is working it out as he goes along! Seems like a good bloke who is very keen to build a decent home on schedule.

The bad news is that we are down from 4 hermit crabs to 1 - don't know why we lost the three within a week or so of each other. For the kids' sake, we are hoping Zoydberg is with us for the long haul!

Our house got a face lift today with the roof tiles being laid - very happy with the colour and can't wait now for the next stages. SS said plumber and sparkie will start in next couple of days but we are likely to have delays with bricky as he has two jobs to finish before he starts ours. Apparently brickies are hard to find - as DeGaul would attest to!

Some pictures attached for your viewing pleasure...

FYI - we have noticed the frosted glass in the bathrooms is the wrong type - mentioned to CSC and she got SS to chase up. Subsequently, CSC has agreed glass in wrong type but no probs, they will fix prior to end of build - can't complain about that.

Fascia and Gutters Installed.

The Fascia and Gutters were installed bright and early this morning.
I had a call from our SS advising us that the tiles would be delivered on Wednesday and installed soon after.

The colour is Jasper.