Day-37: The Roof is Coming Up...

I have been pleasantly surprised to see that the roof is coming up now. I had a call from our SM as well who mentioned that there will be quite some activity this week regarding windows, roof plus Hebel installation. At the end of the week, I am sure the house will look like a proper structure. He assured me about various inspections on the way as well. We organised a meeting on coming Friday early morning to see how the things are going on. Also I was advised that there will be our next invoice as well for the frame work.

Here are some more photos about the progress made till now:

Day-35: Tiles Selections...

We had an appointment at Dilorenzo today for our tiles selections. This was pretty easy exercise as we had been to the place a few times earlier on and we knew what we wanted. The tile colour selection fits well with white/gray colour scheme combination. For the entry we chose creamish colour tiles with a black border as it seemed to be quite homely. Also, we were convinced that it looked good as we had seen it at the Display Home as well. 

Here are the details of the tiles that we selected for our  internal/external tiling at Dilorenzo on 27th April 2013. The tiling will be done in the ENTRY, FOYER, LOUNDRY and all the ENSUITES (Wet areas). 

Features:

• gloss finish, Signature design (upgraded) tiles.
• spacer between the tiles will be 1.5mm. 
• grout in the gray tiles would be neutral and on the white ones, it would be white. 
• aluminium strip which will run between the outside floor area and the ensuite areas. 
• floor wastes will be square chrome. 
• master ensuite (ENSUITE-1), the nische will be done by the black blue tiles (small tiles embedded in the 300mm tiles) and in the rest of the ensuites will have a vertical line.
• skirting and showers walls in white.
• kitchen splash back in glass tiles.
• entry will have a border in black (NERO) 300X600mm.

This will be used in the entry and gallery with a black border around. 
Size 600X600mm

Details about the entry tiles.

This will be used in the ensuites. Size 300X600mm.

This will be in the skirting of the ensuites and the top black blue tile would be used in the niche and as a vertical border in the ensuites.

This is going to be used in the kitchen and pantry splash back. These are glass tiles in white colour (WATERCUBE). Size 100X100mm.

This is the border in the entry. Size 300X600mm.

Name of the NERO (Black tile) for the border.

Day-34: Second Floor Coming Up Nicely...

It is good to see that the second floor is coming up nicely. I think that it took only two days to erect the ground floor and it is the third day on the first floor. When the structure goes up, there seems to be a lot of progress made, but I am sure that when the roof is all done up, things will start looking all the same as things changing will be inside. Also, perhaps the progress might seem a little bit slower as well...

Here are some of the photos that I took from outside from the front of the house:

Day-31: The Frames on Ground Floor in Progress...

The frames have started coming up now. And this is exciting now as we can see some structure coming up. We are hopeful that within a week the frame work will be done. Tomorrow is Anzac Day and will be quite quiet on the site. It is putty because the weather will be just perfect for the building work. The whole April has been been very wet. This has been the second wettest April month in the last 14 years and out of the last 24 days 16 days have been wet. Inspite of that there has been some significant progress on the site and that is commendable.

Here are some photos:

Day-27: Frames Have Arrived...

On Thursday last week, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the frames had arrived on the site. So as suggested by our SM, Jerome looks like the frames for the house will start coming up next week. So this might take may be another two weeks and we will have all the frames done. Looking at the progress, we are positive about our experience, but you never know when the things start getting sour. Only time will tell...

Here is the recent photo that I took of the frames delivery. The thing is that it has been raining in this week and we are worried that it does not damage the delivered frames. Hopefully there is sunshine today so may be it will dry up sooner that we think.

Looks like this is the exciting time when we can see things happening at the site...

Day-26: Hydraulics/Pipes are Done...

On 16th April, all the drainage pipes were laid and a pit in the front of the house was installed as well. The sewage pipe to the back of the house easement was also connected. Last time we had some issue with the connection to the easement and I wonder that is resolved because of the new PVC pipe connection. I could not locate the front connection to the street rain storm water drain system. There is a road opening application which has been already approved. I wonder when that would be done soon as well.

It has been raining too much and I can see that the progress is a bit curtailed this way. In April out of 30 days the prediction is that it will rain almost 23 days. Isn't that too much rain?

Here are some of the recent photos that I can share:

Day-17: The Slab is Done...

So here is the good news...

The Piering was done day before yesterday and the preparation was carried out for the Slab concrete pouring yesterday. This morning we got the slab done on the site.  The weather was just perfect for it. The coming 4-5 days are going to be sunny as well so that way it would be good for curing of the slab. The next week we are expecting that the frames will arrive and in the next two weeks, frames will be done hopefully. This is the first stage of the building as a matter of fact. I am sure we will get the invoice (20% of the cost of the build) for the same by tomorrow!

I met the SM (Site Manager), Jerome Mills in the morning who explained about all the upcoming schedules. He seemed to be very pleasant and understanding. He emphasised that he makes sure that the quality of the house is maintained and because of that there is delay sometimes as well. Looking at our site, his observation was that there should not be any major issues. The good thing is that he is running another project just near our house so we will be able to watch the progress on that house and understand what will happen to our project. As he suggested that if everything goes as planned we could have our first inspection of the house sometime in the early Oct. That would be fantastic. But I know there would be hurdles and quite some as a matter of fact so we just hope that we do not happen to get to any big issues.

As part of the slab concrete pouring there were only four guys and it took approx. 6 truck loads of concrete and may be 5-6 hrs to complete the whole process. I am surprised how quickly all this could be done these days...

Here are some of the photos:

Day-15: We are Starting...

We got the email from Metricon on 2nd April advising us that they have completed the excavation on the site and  will soon start the Piering. But looks like mother nature had different agenda. It started pouring the very next day and it did not stop for three days in a row. Piering was to start on 3rd April, but we all had to wait because of the bad weather. Anyway, Today things started moving as the Piering was completed. Hopefully the slab will be done soon as well in the coming one two days. We are happy as we can see some progress now on the site.

So as part of the excavation, they have carried out cut and fill. I remember sometime ago, there were a few Metricon people on site carrying out the measurements on the site. The objective was to streamline the area of the house build and also deciding how much the cut would be made to make way for the slab to sit on.

As part of the Piering, we do not know as to how much linear meters and cubic meters the Piering was done. I could see quite a few spots where the ground was drilled to  make the Piering. But these are things I will be discussing with the SM when I meet him on Wednesday morning. As per the contract we have opted for 1200mm Piering, but there is no mention of as to how many of them would be put though. But my gut feeling is that there is some standards to be followed depending on the area of the house. There should be around 50-60 piering done on the site in total I presume.

So what is Piering after all? Piering is a form of reinforcing the foundation of the building that might suffer subsidence or settlement due to instability in the soil substrate. It involves the installation of a number of vertical support columns or posts, in conjunction with a series of horizontal cross beams, otherwise known as capped beams. The piers or columns and beams are made of reinforced concrete or high strength steel and are attached to the existing building or its foundations. These supports penetrate through the problematical strata of soil to a solid foundation of bedrock or more stable strata, and are designed to halt further instability.

We have got our first appointment with the Site Manager on Wednesday morning i.e. 10th April. I had a phonic conversation with him and he seemed to be quite good. We have been advised that we are lucky to have him as he carries pretty good reputation as a Project Manager so we are happy about it. After all a lot depends on him as things will revolve around him only.

Here are some of the photos that I took in the evening when I was at the site: