Jerry's renovation blog

[Jerry_Atrick]

Yes.. I quite like this shed (though a bit out of my league): https://www.realestate.com.au/property-warehouse-nsw-tocumwal-151477276

 

[nomadpete]

It'll be a weight off your shoulders when the job's finished.

 

[facthunter]

I think that's been on the Market for a While. A lot bigger than I need. Be hard to air condition, also. You would need insulation. It's HOT sometimes. Geelong is not a bad Place. to live. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

The fact it is still on the market means it is overpriced. I follow a few Aussie real estate and commercial real estate sites, and this popped up on those about a month ago. One I am looking at a few "doors down" has been on for a long while@ https://www.realestate.com.au/property-residential+land-nsw-tocumwal-203580220

 

Any of these properties on for more than a few weeks is overpriced. There is also a new subdivision on the airfield: https://www.realestate.com.au/property-residential+land-nsw-tocumwal-204059628

 

Geelong is a lovely place. I bought my laptop in Geelong in my last trip and the centre of the city has really been freshened up. I am not sure Octave would want me close to him 😉 And, although Ford has gone, the old factory looks fantastic and has a hotbed of tech startups. 

 

Tocumwal gets hot - I have spent many a summer for long times gliding there with my terry-towel hat on. But the heat is, by Melbourne standards, dry and very bearable.. As a young bloke, I much preferred the cold, but as I get older, I enjoy the heat much more. But one of the drawbacks is of course, it is a bloody long way from the coast. 

 

 

 

 

[old man emu]

14 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

where the new plaster doesn't seem to have been mixed properly and is flaking away..

I've been watching a video of a renovation being done to a house somewhere in England. I think it is in the London area. However, they had the same problem of the plaster not adhering to the walls. My thought is that since the temperatures have been unusually high over the English summer, the plasterers had no experience of mixing plaster in such conditions. They maybe mixed it as usual for temperatures and humidity of a normal English summer and the plaster dried out before forming a strong bond. 

[facthunter]

REAL plasterers would  be rare. It's usually something like sheet Gyprock where you just Plaster the Nails, Joins and Cornices. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

We're edging closer to completion, but of course, there are still battles to be had. The builder and I took a look at the dilapidating render on the "front" wall. We picked a little bit of it and a lot came off. He has already done a bit of work (covered up due to assist drying without too much moisture or direct sunlight apparently screwing it up. But you can see the patches that still need work:

    

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

       

 

Has to put the above in a second post as the first was putting them in upside down - like the first picture in this one.

Edited Monday at 01:44 PM by Jerry_Atrick

[rgmwa]

Hope you make a bit of money on this palatial residence one day. 

[Jerry_Atrick]

I doubt it at this rate. We should break even though. 

 

Anyway,the builder ordered 14 bags of red sand thinking it was more than enough.. We have to get another 10. Here are some photos of today's progress: 

 

Notice he is recreating the original fake brickwork in the render.. pain of a job!

 

The sparky is in today moving the broadband and industrial virtual access points so we have full wi fi coverage through the house. They will look a bit like smoke detectors in the ceilings. 

 

 

[nomadpete]

6 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

Has to put the above in a second post as the first was putting them in upside down - like the first picture in this one.

Blame A.I. for that - it can't work out we're in southern hemisphere where everything is downside up.

[nomadpete]

Oh what an endless task! 

 

4 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

broadband and industrial virtual access points so we have full wi fi coverage through the house. They will look a bit like smoke detectors in the ceilings. 

Well how do the heritage experts feel about that? I hope you make them look like 18th century smoke detectors?

 

 

[nomadpete]

Just out of curiosity, what is the building made from? It doesn't appear like it was stone or bricks. And I would never have guessed they would use lime plaster on outside walls. 

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

Parts of the building date back to the 1200s, but the part in the photos above is from the 1600s. The render is over stones and mortar. Some of the stone is cut to look like brick, but it is mostly stone. The render is a sand rander of some sort to give it the colour. I personally don't like it and wanted to take it all off and expose the stone, but the cost to do it was astronomical. In shoirt, some of the building is original stone, some is cut stone, and some is your bog standard red brick (or the Somerset equivalent). We do have lime render on the walls of the front door. We originally had damp all through that wall in the living room until a plasterer noticed it was a concrete render (put there by builders fixing a wall that was crushed by a fallen tree). So, we had the cement render taken off and lime render put on.. and in about a week, there was no more damp!

 

Re the wireless access points - they were approved by the listed building officer. For small things like that, it is a simple application, some photos and a yes or a no. There is no cost (unless you want to challenge their no). As the place had most of its original interior features sold off before it was listed, the listed building officer is very reasonable - well that and the fact we have restored a lot of the building to its former glory (e.g. taking out all the PVC windows and replacing with wood - can't remember the type but apparently what would have been used in the last extension of the place in the 1800s). 

 

 

[nomadpete]

Thanks.

It's a real time machine.

Following your work, I admire your tenacity.

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

That "tenacity" peaks and troughs. At the moment, it is in peak mode, but there are times where I have blocked it from my mind, tbh. 

[nomadpete]

6 minutes ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

That "tenacity" peaks and troughs. At the moment, it is in peak mode, but there are times where I have blocked it from my mind, tbh. 

Completely normal!

[facthunter]

" Don't think about  it and it will go away " doesn't work with Ancient Buildings. The Issues are still there when you wake up in the Morning. That is, IF you managed to get to sleep wondering what else will go wrong. Workers will think you MUST be RICH and will charge accordingly. Local Councils are never helpful. You have a very high VAT that sucks the blood out of everything.. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

I don't block it from my mind to pretend the problems aren't there..It's more I need the break from it. Often it is waiting for tradespeople who are not rip off merchants to come available. I have two tradies full time on it and they are very reasonable in their rates. Even so, it is costing me about £7k a month. We are probably two months from completion I think. 

 

Then the big clean up.

[nomadpete]

Progress!

Wish I lived closer so I could snoop around your project. All that history, all those different tradeskills, and design changes as the building evolved.

[Jerry_Atrick]

It is a lovely property.. but far more neglected than surveys uncovered. For instance the cottage has underfloor wet heating and we had a couple move in for a couple of months. Out of the blue, the u/floor heating shorted and three new manifolds later (and a few hundred pounds) it was fixed. It is the constant tending to things you're not expecting that wears us down

[facthunter]

Good luck to you but its a venture I would never take on for the reasons I've Mentioned. All things  Degrade. Those old buildings would be Hard to Make comfortable and have Natural light and effective Heating and cooling.. It's a free world to make such choices and you are very public with it  so I comment.  There has probably been a total of about 400 posts so far.  Nev

[old man emu]

I wtch a lot of English renovation videos and it strikes me that these houses suffer badly from moisture. Mould seems to be rampant. I don't think that their drainage systems work too well. It seems also that when their woodwork gets wet, the wood worm moves in to eat it out. Just as bad as out termites, in those areas where we have them. I suppose that using the same wood that the worms evolve with doesn't prevent attack.

 

The other thing that astounds me is the plumbing. There's plumbing for getting water to washing bathrooms, kitchens and laundries, but also for providing heating using fluid radiators. These places seem to have nearly as much pipework as an oil refinery. Then there is the way they handle waste water and sewage. It all seems so primitive to me.

 

I will say, however, they they have some really interesting tools and materials. I can't get over the fact that they will install plasterboard and then apply coats of plaswter render. And why would you render over brick work? All that does is prevent the brickwork from breathing. And I hate pebble dash.

 

Jerry, the sooner you can get back here to a nice brick veneer four-bedroom single storey place, with reverse cycle heating/cooling, plasterboard-lined internal stud walls and tiled roof, the better.

[facthunter]

Brick Venereal is a bit Passe these days. It's not  as strong as it Looks and there are much better cladding options with superior Insulation and draft excluding possibilities. Tiling roofs are becoming less desired also.  Consider Steel framing . There are some excellent systems. Conventional roof guttering is a fire risk. (Leaves and embers). Go Modern Modular with a lot of the Manufacture Off site. There is too much Labour in Most Houses.  Many houses are a lot bigger than they need to Be. It ALL has to be Paid for, Heated and cooled and furnished. Nev

[Marty_d]

Interesting article about AI and how it's probably not the best idea to be an early adopter.

What's this got to do with old house reno's?

The example they used was Greece being the first to develop flushing toilets.

However, in Greece now there's warning signs not to flush paper down the loo, because it'll stuff the plumbing.

Why? Because for some historical reason they use 50mm drains which is half the diameter of Australian sewage drains. 

Original is not always the best.