Utilities

Gas Pipe Adaption

Visit by Contracts Manager from Pollard (Main Contractor) who advised that the gas pipe would be OK if it is tucked close to rear of footpath with protection over, bedded in sand and is clear of the foundations.










I dug a narrow, curved trench  and surrounded the pipe in sand and covered with a very heavy pre-cast reinforced concrete coping stone.

100mm thick concrete coping stone protecting the gas pipe with closest foundation marked in timbers

Virgin Communications Cabinet
First stage of the very expensive relocation of the Virgin cabinet, a distance of about a metre for about £4,000.  Unfortunately it is blocking the new driveway position so it is essential work.
First the new cabinet was installed in the new location to the left and ducts installed to the existing junction box. The guy at the rear is leveling the new base for the cabinet. Noticed that cold cure 'tarmac' in premixed tubs is used to make good.

Bit of a mess inside the existing junction box

This will be followed by rewiring to remove the old cabinet and finally the existing junction box will be lowered by building a new brick surround at the same time that the new driveway is constructed and the dropped kerb installed.

















Open House
I have attached DPM polythene in 4 metre wide continuous strips about 12-15 metres long and 4M high to ground floor and first floor attached by battens screwed through to the wall battens.  These have been carefully positioned so that the contractor can flap up a top section when the roof is removed (working from the first floor while it is still in place) and make a horizontal lapped joint when the first floor and structure is removed.  I developed a system of unrolling the roll of DPM on the ground, cutting to length, marking the point of attachment with a white tip-ex marker, then rolling-up the polythene on a couple of cardboard document tubes.  This was then raised up on a step ladder and gradually unrolled while attaching lengths of batten, worked a treat.

The black DPM made a great backdrop to display the drawings (and blue-tack sticks to it !) at the 'open house' on Sunday afternoon, with friends, neighbours, cyclists and local freecyclers in attendance.   
Old Rosie cider, my favorite, was the most popular drink, which reminds me to finish off the flagon! Try some.