Saturday, April 18, 2009

Bricking continues with some niggly issues...

It's been a few days since I have had a chance to update the blog, so I will do a quick day to day rundown of what has been happening!

Wednesday:

On Wednesday, they bricked around a small section of the front facade, which I was most excited to see!!



Niggly issue #1...I think they have used more orangy bricks than purply bricks on this part of the front facade. Comparing it to the back of the house which has a lot more purply bricks, and the ones I adore. I have been rest assured that no one else can see it, and once it's all bricked and blended, it will be fine...

They also enclosed the meter box:



The have also fixed the dent in the runner of the stacker door out to the Alfresco, so it now opens and closes properly:



I had to laugh at the foreign rubbish again in the rubbish cage! This time it's boxes for a kettle and a portable stereo!:



Still a long way to go, but making steady progress!




Thursday:

Thursday saw the brickies move higher up the 'long' wall, working on scaffolding, and also installing the first lintel above the lounge room window:





Niggly issue #2: I had a little walk around inside and actually looked in the powder room toilet outlet, which had been moved to the right. I noticed quite a large bend and 'shelf' in it. I'm just hoping that 'nothing' gets 'trapped' on that shelf and possibly cause blockages down the track. Being the downstairs toilet, it will most likely be the one that is used the most often:



I had to laugh again at the rubbish cage! It looks as though a cow had visited the site...2 nice neat mortar pats! ;-) Sick? Yes, but you have to keep up the humour when house building...



They installed their straight edges and string line along the garage in preparation of the next days work:




Friday:

Today they continued above the meals area window, installing the lintel, and around the corner into the alfresco:



As anticipated, bricking began on the other side of the front doors and into the garage:



Niggly issue #3: A complete oversight on our behalf. With so many other things to check and re check with the plans, we didn't realise there was no lintel and brickwork above the stacker door and windows from the meals into the alfresco. It will consist of a painted cement sheet infill. "Too late!" she cried...



Niggly issue #4: A delivery of more brickies sand for the mortar...in a completely different colour to what was used previously. Now before I jump the gun too much, it may be that the new pile of sand is 'wetter' than the existing, and the existing has 'weathered' more after being in the rain for a few weeks. I'm not sure, but as I paid for 'off white' mortar, I expect to have consistent off white mortar. As the mortar is flush with the brickwork, any colour discrepancies will be clearly visible, and I will not be very happy if this is the case!! I'm hoping it's nothing to worry about...



Niggly issue #5: The mortar joins between several courses of bricks and along most of the long wall (that I can remember) do not line up! See for yourself:



Further investigation and photograph taking tomorrow, and we'll decide what course of action we will be taking. I'll definitely be mentioning it to the SS on Monday. I am now looking at every house I know in the area that has Daniel Robertson bricks to see if their mortar lines are crooked. So far...nope.

I'll keep you posted.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

nope, that aint no "foreign" rubbish. It'll be trash from your builders. Been there, seen plenty o' that, only we didn't have a cage so it ended up in our bin, sometimes. Apparently it's very normal for a tradie to go buy an electrical appliance or 3 for a job. The stereo they were using at our job got left out in the rain one too many times and was replaced; and the pool guys bought a GMC angle grinder just for our paving job - the box, manual and other bits and pieces (extras and tools) ended up in the trash pile in front of our garage. Now you know where your hard earned cash is being spent!

The House That A-M Built said...

Stormy, you stay on it girl! Good to see you being so thorough. If it's any comfort, I have had so many "too late" moments they've just become "oh well" moments. We're beginning to refer to our project now as "The Shrine To Compromise".....which will make it emotionally easier to sell down the track! A-M xx

stormygirl said...

LOL Doogie! I was 'chatting' to another house blogger who had a whole couch off loaded into their rubbish cage! Now that would definitely be foreign! Funny how they throw this kind of stuff in, but cans, pizza shape boxes, instant noodle cups and tins of tuna are left flung around the place...anywhere!

I know there will be many more "Oh I wish I had done that" moments, but when there are thousands of things to think about and try and remember, it all gets a bit too much! I know once the house is completed and all the landscaping is done no one will notice it...except me! ;-). I just can't live with crooked brickwork, though...

I have to be thorough, it's my house!!I need to know what is in every square centermetre ;-)

Toni said...

Your bricks look lovely Stormy. I can't really notice them using more than one colour at the front of the house. they look great. I can see why you really wanted them!

Sorry to read about the issues with the toilet and cement sheet infills. Hmm, I wonder if anything will sit on the shelf or maybe the force of the water will force it down the pipe? Did your plans not show the infills above the doors/window? I'm sure once it's all done and complete it will look great.

It's too hard to remember everything :-)

stormygirl said...

Hi Tony,

Yes, it is very hard to remember everything. The infill is shown on our plans, but because they botched up so much of the interior electrical plan, this was overlooked. It was also partly hidden by the alfresco. It's no biggy, though, it'll probably bug me forever, but that's life! It's not structural, and it's not on the front facade so we can live with it!

On second close inspection, the bricks really aren't that bad...I'm just VERY picky, but I will still mention it to my SS that I'm not 100% happy...