Works Pictures

As you all are probably aware by now, Lisa and I are living temporarily in Cyprus and so all work has slowed to a near standstill with only the garden being tended.

I thought as I had so little to do I would bring the blog completely up to date with the building work photos and everything.

Well I think you've seen how it looks at present but I never posted the pics of the Steal work so here they are in reverse order.

The roof used to be supported by the kitchen wall so I had to replace it with a steel I beam. You can see the roof support, the wooden block on top of it. The I beam only cost £110 (I think, it's been a while) from a local steel supplier, I've been so tight in the pocket I chose to do all the work myself with help from friends and family. These pictures show Clive and my Dad Reg lining things up! thanks guys! couldn't have done it without you.

This pic shows the pit prop used to temporarily support the roof whilst we installed the I beam on engineering bricks and a steel slab.

Video Before any work was carried out!

As we are temporarily living in Cyprus and cannot work on the bungalow I though I'd just add a video of the place which was taken on our first viewing after we bought it. We had not carried out any work at this point!

progress is being made!

Well the kitchen/dining room looks much better and brighter, hopefully when we get round to fitting a kitchen it will be a really nice family living space. We want to put in patio doors where the window is and maybe a conservatory at some point. The bungalow is looking so much better now the walls are painted and the skirting is in. 

The skirting is quite tall and nice and thick so looks nice, the door surrounds have also been done in matching trim. Still need to finish it off, hopefully the wood won't warp whilst we are away
We now even have curtains up at the front windows (all be it net curtains!) 

Sorry Folks! I've been neglecting the blog recently but fear not! all shall be revealed in this, the latest installment of DIY Bungalow.

After much painting and filling and painting and sanding and painting most of the walls in the house are now of a standard that I can comfortably live with and not be constantly annoyed at every time I walk past them. The fire places require a little more work....... or I could just buy a surround for them which would do but I would know what the hidden gremlins were and that just would not do! We'll see how I feel in the next couple of weeks.

Well I ordered a 6 Yard skip for the week with the plan of filling it up with the pile of junk which has accumulated in the garden and also the wall which seperated the kitchen from the dining room.

I also borrowed a Stihl saw from a friend of my dads which proved invaluable if a little unweildy to the uninitiated ie me! I recommend having someone who has a bit of muscle on them do it as it is tiring workand I definatley recommend buying a decent dust mask and not just the paper sort.

The wall in the kitchen was supporting a roofing beam which still needed to be supported after the wall had been taken out. To make sure it did not collapse I bolted 2, 3" x 7" beams into the roof support. These spanned accross the 2 adjacent joists and I then screwed 4 long screws through the beams and into the roof support so if it were to fall the screws would slow it down if not stop it. It's much safer than I can make it sound. That done it was time to take the wall below out.

After marking out 3 lines on the wall where to cut and making sure I left enough wall to support the steel beam that needed to go in I set about with the Stihl and made my first insision nearest to the outside wall. The saw would only cut half way through the wall so it was necessary to mark up on the other side too and attempt to match the cuts on both sides a bit like the channel tunnel. My dad could do it but I kept cutting off track and so i have to tidy up the wall with mortar and plaster! he he! It was necessary

to vacate the house whilst cutting due to dust and once a cut was complete the building was ventilated for 20 minutes or so before continuing. This was more for visibility than anything else. The dust was just so thick!

My next job was then to knock out the first section of wall making sure I left in enough to support the timbers above. Then I took 2 Pit props which were also loaned (permanently) and supported the joists that were now holding the roof supports on both sides of the wall, this later proved to be a little over the top and I ended up removing one prop in order to get the joist in..... a little more forward planning would not have gone a miss here. Still never mind every thing else went to plan. Once the props were in place I made a final cut with the stihl on the inner wall end and Lisa knocked out the remaining section of wall and all the bricks were thrown in the skip.

My steel beam had arrived the day before (7" x 4") and it took 4 strong guys to lift it into place. a little adjustment to a roof beam was required to give the necessary clearance over the pad stone but once this was done the beam slid in like............... well it fit really nicely anyway!

All that's left for me to do is fix the plaster board and skim it! then I need to paint it Damn Damn Damn! I'm fed up with painting.

Paint, Paint, Paint then Paint some more!

Damn and blast! I forgot my camera this week. Not to worry I didn't really do anything that can't be explained with words.

Over the past few days working in the house I have removed and burnt all of the Skirting boards and door surrounds. This was done with a claw hammer and a crowbar, the skirting was fixed to large wooden wedges which are built into the wall. Nice Idea but afterremoving the skirting some of these wedges pulled free of the wall and I now suspect I have a mouse living in one of the holes that are left. Each morning there is a fresh batch of cavity wall insulation scattered on the floor in front of the hole. Now either it's a mouse or I have weird drafts running through my cavity which spit out bits of insulation over night. I have no idea what the mouse is living on as there is no food in the house but I'll have the little bugggers head off next time I'm down there.

Anyway.......Skirting and door surrounds removed then all of the walls were filled with poly filla and with new plaster where necessary (this is still not quite fininshed due to my terrible plaster mixing ability). Once the plaster had dried I have sanded each wall so a smoothe base is achieved (I used a Bosch rotary sander) next a water/PVA mix 5:1 was applied to the walls with a roller to seal in any lose dust or particles and left to dry before painting. Each of the rooms has had 3 coats of white paint and will get a final coat just before I reinstall the new skirting and doors.

Next job must be plumbing for the central heating. Gonna be messy as I think I'm going to channel the pipes along the bottom of my newly painted walls.

Thought you might like to see the 'tree' in bloom, it looks beautiful, full of bees mind, but a real head turner. Shame it is not a few feet further into the garden!

The kitchen....in progress!

We have removed what little there was and taken up the vinyl tiles, now we are left with horrible black gooey bitumen. Need to get the heat gun on it next week.