We were greeted at the start of the week by a steel frame leaning in a southerly direction after a particularly violent, gusty storm. (No this is not New York!)
There is not much strength in the steel frame itself, we need the MgO boards for strength. The plan, however, was to erect the walls after the roof. After a bit of deliberation, it was decided to part theory from practice, and rather protect against future imminent storms. Thus a very exciting week followed.
Firstly, the frame was pulled straight again (by brute 4X4 force). The site was teeming with engineers and important people who declared the resurrected “Piza” structure sound. Next, a bit more bracing and strapping was added, and then (drum roll) the walls started going in. In just two and a half days, half of the ground floor walls were in place. I must just qualify here that the FIRST layer of MgO boards has been installed and there are still two further layers to go on each wall, but we are starting to get a feel for the rooms and the layout.
As I mentioned last week, we have opted to go for the thicker (12mm) boards. The insulation properties of a single board are the equivalent to that of one brick. Our external walls, therefore, will have the equivalent insulation of a three-brick wall, and this excludes the cavity batt insulation that goes between the layers. The interior walls will be the equivalent of a double-brick wall with insulation between the layers.
The external staircase has also been built, so we can now access the first floor, and stare at the beautiful view, and dream of sleeping so close to the stars!
We have also made some minor changes in the design, which I didn’t realise would be possible. We decided to remove a large, south-facing window in our guest bedroom. With great apology we approached our foreman with the request, and the very next day a few extra pieces of steel had been inserted, and the MgO board was going up!!
I can hardly believe the progress at the site on a daily basis. The only snag is that we are building in the rainy season, and we find ourselves scanning the weather forecasts every evening to see if progress is going to be further delayed due to rain. So far, we are still more or less on track with our building schedule, and we are confident to have thwarted the storms for the time being, but I do recommend building during winter, if at all possible!
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