The second fix electrics and plumbing are now in full swing and things are really starting to take shape, which is just as well because we move in in NINE DAYS time!! The place feels marginally less like a building site and more like somewhere you could call ‘home’ with a little imagination! (more…)
15 weeks and 5 days after the original staircase was removed, we have finally replaced it with a custom-made, solid oak staircase and full-galleried landing and it looks great!! Trevor and Noel managed to get the carcass and the quarter-landing in yesterday and made a start on the gallery by getting the newel posts in place – they actually hold up the original (and new) cross beam that runs from the front to the back of the old house, so pretty important structurally speaking! Today Bob helped Trevor finish off the gallery. The newels and spindles are stop-chamfered so a nice, simple design. We managed to get all the different parts treated with 2 coats each prior to fitting, and we worked out that altogether, it took around 35 man-hours to complete, so ages in other words LOL. It is good to know it’s all protected though. They are also now a much gentler incline of around 42 degrees as opposed to the original stairs which were more like 45 degrees and felt like you were falling backwards when you went up them 
A major milestone arrived today when we took delivery of the oak stair case and galleried landing. Scary thing was it was in 77 different pieces!!
We now have the unenviable task of getting it all sealed before it gets fitted at the end of the week … I sense a lot of late nights coming up.
Well all of that might seem a mouthful, but it what it means is that our hot water will be ‘blasted’ out of the taps without the need for a pump! Mains pressure means the hot water comes out of the pipes at the same pressure as the cold water. Unvented means there is no cold water header tanks in the loft waiting to fill up with all sorts of nasties from your loft.
We went for a Range Tribune HE 210litre cylinder and it really looks the business!!! 
Always important for us that quality of design and feature is also matched by it looking good!
I feel like wooping for joy as the floor finally is going back down in The Farm! It has been a really hard slog:
But at last today the floor screed started to go back down!
