After the end of the begining, it's the begining of a new end

The euphoria of the previous week when we finished the foundations, carried us forward into the new week

It is certainly a better feeling, knowing that what gets constructed now is actually going to remain above ground.
The task for this week is to , assemble the timber frame for the outer walls, the wall posts are made from 150 x 48mm Pine or Spruce, the baseplate which it is fitted to is treated timber, again Pine or Spruce. A bonus job would be to get the floor layers in to do the garage and glass terrace area, that job is very much determined by the weather, if it's dry then we can go ahead with it, otherwise it will have to wait for better times.

First task.
This plastic membrane is to direct the harmful Radon Gasses from the ground entering the walls of the building, it is designed to either direct it through the breezeblocks to the outside, or to force them into the Radon gas pipe in the underfloor and vent them out through the roof.





Baseplate cushion.



This is a soft neoprene based seal, purpose of which is to make an airtight seal between the baseplate and the foundations, 150 x 6 mm, It gets compressed when the base is bolted down.


Ready for baseplate.



Neoprene seal, radon gas seal, (which also doubles as a damp proof course)


Closer view.







Baseplate in position, halflap joint for the continuation piece.






Halflap joint on baseplate.





Baseplate bolted down, now we can start on the construction proper.






You know, turn your back for 5 minutes and sure as anything, someone somewhere will just be itching to deliver something, Ok I blame myself for placing the original order, so it's my own fault
In this case it was all the timber requirements for the first part of framing the house, this consisted of,
150 x 48mm planed timber for the uprights. About 300 metres
48 x 48mm for roof battens and also internal battens. About 1500 metres
300 x 51mm kertopuu (thick construction plywood) support beams 12m
200 x 51mm same stuff 24m
315 x 95mm massive timber beam, roof support at glass terrace, 12m
95 x 95mm massive timber pillar posts, supports for roof, 27m
100 x 22mm sawn timber for general use in supports etc.
2500 x 1200 x 25mm weatherboard, for cladding the walls after assembly.
This is only the first installment of timber, enough for the completion of the shell.

Frame timber





Battens, pillars and weatherboards




First order of business, check the measurements, as I am about to start cutting all the wall posts, in this case they are 2.65m long, the load bearing walls require about 20 each side.


Chopping the posts.



I started with ten fingers, long may it continue.



First posts chopped to the required length




Next part of the process is to cut the rebate line on the posts, this is 200mm long and 51mm deep, inserted into the rebate is the ´kertopuu´´ plywood, this is to give the structure it's loadbearing capability.


Sawing the rebate. the rebate will be sawn out in situ when the walls are up. using the laser building level I can mark on each post the exact cutting point, this alleviates the worry about the foundations not being exactly straight and true



rebating





Start point.

Started off with doing the long straight wall, any measurements to be taken we will use this wall as the guide.



Up and supported, in this case I used about 8 nails per post length of nail 95mm, not done by hammer but by the use of a compressed air nail gun


Joni (Our son) and Ari fitting the posts for the gable end, using the nailgun.


Checking it is straight and true before attaching it to the temporary supports



Cutting out of the rebate, the kertopuu will be fitted into this part.




Kertopuu fitted and upper plate fitted on top, the wall has all the strength it needs now to support the roof trusses.



Detail, inner kertopuu, 200 x 51, outer kertopuu 300 x 51. the larger kertopuu is only fitted over extremely wide openings, in this case the living room window and outer door.




Internal corner, kertopuu is nailed to the gable ends corner post, giving extra stability.



Long back wall and northern gable wall attached together.




Well, I guess we got lucky, the weather stayed fine and the floor specialist arrived to do their thing. Which in our case was to lay the concrete floor in the garage and in the houses glass terrace area


Pouring out the concrete floor mix, altogether floor and terrace will take 6 cubic metres of mass.






First he fills in the corners, setting the height using a laser level. then works his way all the way around.




Using his ´´Linjari´´ it's an aluminium tool for levelling and checking surfaces are straight, he proceeds to level out the floor, you need a good sense of balance in this job, too much pressure on one side will entail you digging holes in the floor, not the desired result.




Garage floor, finished and smoothed, it has to be kept wet for the next few days, as the concrete dries and squeezes the water out, it can shrink, to slow the process and avoid cracking we keep it dampened down, this is most important in the garage, as we had a special finish applied to it, a concrete topcoat of hardened material, this allows us to drive with our winter tyres without damaging or digging out the surface of the floor.







The terrace area, not so worried about shrinking or cracks here, as later on it will be getting tiled.



Terrace area




Threaded rod, 4 of these in the terrace pillars, it will be screwed down and the wooden pillars will be drilled and fitted on top, there is the mother of all washers and a bolt under the pillar, so it is adjustable, no unsightly pillar support in this case.




So another week and another dollar, next week we want to get all the window boxes fitted, door frames, roof trusses, final supports on the frame and make a start on getting it weatherproof.

Completion of foundations

Did not wish to bore you with too much detail about laying breezeblocks, sufficient to say, job is done and we can move onto the next phase of the build.


detail of steel reinforcing for garage, 10mm rolled steel, put on every row on the garage door side, otherwise every second row.










garage foundations, breezeblocks completed








That is the majority of the breezeblocks done, next stage is to do the various pillars that we are putting, on the gable end will be a terrace, we are putting pillar foundations for the terrace to rest upon, on the other gable will be a small roof over the outside door, this requires a couple of pillars to support it.


Pillar supports for small roof structure







Pillar supports for terrace




house foundations and terrace support pillars




detail of pillar, this is filled later with concrete to give it the strength it requires to support weights





That is all the bricklaying done in the foundations, next phase is to finish things off, insulation on the inside and insulation on the ground outside,



A 20cm strip of styrofoam fitted onto the upper blocks





then a sheet of styrofoam on top, 1200 x 1000 x 50 mm





finally another full size sheet of styrofoam, giving 10cm's of insulation on the inside, upper part is 15cm's



Tarja busy cutting the styrofoam and fitting it










Insulation is everything these days, with the need to cut emissions and the carbon footprint the demands on insulation have soared recently, ofcourse a lot of it is in our own interest, as with the rising cost of energy, every part of the insulation keeps those ever so important heating costs down.

meanwhile, while Tarja was doing the insulation on the inside, we on the outside were finishing off the foundations, first on the agenda was to fit a dimpled plastic waterproofing sheet around the foundations, (Pato Levy) this is to stop moisture from the ground penetrating to the breezeblocks, the dimples ensure that there is air trapped between it and the foundations, any water that manages to penetrate will be able to evaporate.



Pato Levy, with the moulded list on top



once that was done, next up is to put a fine render on the blocks which are still visible, this is a water-resistant render, strengthened with the addition of fibre to give it tensile strength, it is done to a depth of 3 to 4 mm

fine rendering coat, gives a smooth finish for later on.


detail, showing depth



after allowing the render to dry thoroughly, (24hrs), it is now time to finish it off, glue is applied to the render and stone chips are pressed into it, this leaves us with a nice maintenance free surface

one side render, other side stone chipped, do this all the way around and never have to do any work on the foundations ever again.







next job on the list, we have to fit the rainwater drains, for obvious reasons, these are large tubs under each downpipe, it has a collector at the bottom, this is to enable us to clean them occasionally, all sorts of things can collect there, usually seeds from the birch trees as they are rather abundant in this place. rainwater is then allowed to flow out via a 10cm pipe to the main drainage system, (actually it is led away to a small stream about 100m away from the house) rainwater is not exhausted into the main sewers.


rainwater drain and pipe. the pipe is 1 metre deep to avoid freezing.





next it was the turn of the outer insulation for the foundations, this consists of 10cm syrofoam all the way around the house, this is to protect the foundations from the penetrating frost we have each winter, avoiding damage to the foundations, (don't you just love winter?)











terrace pillars awaiting insulation


All the insulation complete, drains fitted, stone chipping done, guess it was time to bury it for all time, this entailed getting the groundwork contractor to pay us a visit for a couple of days, at the same time he would arrange delivery of various grades of hardcore and filling materials, I hate to think how much of this stuff we will need, but the house itself takes over 100 cubic meters of hardcore and sand filling.



So it begins, a rather course grade to start the ball rolling 0 to 100 mm, quite chunky stuff, big is good as it has a better load bearing potential, in the picture Ari is using the packer to beat it down into a solid mass.

















After the initial filing to about 70cm, a finer grade is used, in this case sand as we still have to fit all the drains and pipes in the house, this final 30cmgives us a nice base with which to work with, using sand allows us to bed the pipes and not have to worry about any damage that stones could cause to the pipes, the black pipe in the picture is to collect Radon gas, this is classed as dangerous in Finland (seemingly a cause of lung cancer) and it must be extracted fro the ground and led via pipes to the outside, in this case, gas collects in the pipe and is vented through the roof. the pipe itself is full of minuscule holes that the gas can seep into.











All filled in






That is as far as we can go at the moment, next stage is to prepare the glass terrace area for a floor and the garage also, as I can use these places as working areas and storage for materials later


Glass terrace area, as this is on the outside and will not be heated at all, the requirement is only 10cm's of styrofoam, on top of this is a steel mat to give additional strength to the floor.


Now lets switch our attention to the garage

Garage, insulated and awaiting filling



that is that taken care off




Styrofoam and iron mat fitted










final tidying up of the plot





Anyone seen my pillars?




Final job for this week is to make the frame for the terrace, a bit cart before the horse, there is a method in my madness, it was not just to give the neighbours a laugh. if I do the framework for it now, it gives me a very handy level storage area for the timber I will be sacrificing to the Gods of home building in the coming weeks


50 x 200 bottom support, upper is 50 x 125


Sitting nicely on the pillars, well supported, do not envisage any movement or buckling of the terrace.














Would you belive it, roof trusses arrived on time, now all I need is a frame to stick them to, at least I have something to work on next week.



That's it for the last two weeks then, 430 hours went into the foundations, we can also count that it is 20% of the build done, the next 20% takes a bit more time and a bit more exacting work.
Stay tuned