Diary of an extension – the walls come out and the final steel goes in

Work is really moving on at our job in South East London. Once we’d built the new side wall, we moved to the back of the house. Firstly, we prepared to take out the existing rear wall. This means we had to support the building above using vertical props and strongboys. They took the load while we took out the back wall and put in the steel at the rear of the house.

We also supported the building by putting vertical props inside as well.

Once the steels were in we could move on and begin to consider removing the existing side wall. This wall is called the flank wall, and again, we needed to support the building above with vertical props and strongboys before we could remove the bricks.

You can see on the photo above that there is a section of the original side/flank wall remaining. This is because the boiler was here. We prepared and plastered a section of wall so that we could move the boiler to it’s new position. Then we removed the remaining section of wall. The photo below shows the wall prepared for the boiler.

Next time you’ll see how we’re building the new roof and have put in the new drainage.

Diary of an extension – work starts

After planning permission has been granted for a project then work can begin. The plans were passed and we’ve started works on the extension in South East London. The first stage has been to dig out for the foundations.

The type of soil that your home is built on will impact on the depth of the foundations that need to be dug. In this case the house is built on clay and so we have needed to dig deeper foundations. The clay we discovered is wet and because it expands and shrinks depending on how much water is in the ground, then there is the risk that a building built on top of it can move if the foundations are not deep enough.

For any extension you will need to employ the services of building control and they will advise on the necessary depth of the foundations. It’s also important to note here that you need to factor in the cost of building control services to your budget.

For this extension, building control advised we should dig foundations to a depth of 2.1m and also that we should shore up the sides of the foundation trench. Of course the extra depth means that more labour is required, more skips and more concrete. All of these things impact on costs.

Here’s to show you how deep we had to dig!

   

Now we’ve poured the concrete, we can start to build!…more about that next time.

A place in your garden, a patio and the benefits of project management

An idea – Garden rooms are a great idea for people who choose to stay put and make additions and improvements to their home as an alternative to moving house. This garden room is going to provide useful extra storage space, as well as a home office/studio in one of our current projects.

A touch of inspiration – Over recent years, more and more people have been looking to bring the outside in. Kitchens and indoor living spaces with glass door leading straight to an outside living space mean that you can access your outside space easily and enjoy it even when the weather means you can’t be in it. Have the same or similar flooring inside and outside so the two spaces flow together. These garde tiles have a rougher non-slip texture for outside and we’ll be laying ones with a smooth texture in the kitchen.

Some information – Building sites are often busy places and co-ordinating all the different tradespeople can be tricky if you are managing your own building project. At Create we manage your projects so that work is scheduled and co-ordinated to ensure everything runs smoothly and efficiently. Not only that, we are aware of legislation and regulations and can advise you what’s needed so that you know you are complying with all the requirements.