Withington Co-operative Eco-house - roof

Roof

Robert — Wed, 31 Jul 2013 20:40:20 +0000

The roof is nearing completion now. For a "belts and braces" approach, we've installed vents at eaves and ridge level, to ensure a good through-flow of air above the insulation envelope and thus reduce the risk of condensation/timber decay. The ridge vents proved difficult to source, being a special order item from the usual merchants - with lead-time and cost accordingly. In the end I found one in a salvage yard, and the builders offered to make others to match, by cutting up a spare ridge tile. The result is not great aesthetically speaking, but I'm sure will function OK.

Here's a picture of the reclaimed ridge vent, and the replica finial in position:

And this is the builders' copy:

Unfortunately, whilst working on the roof, a few slates have got damaged; obviously we need to ensure these get repaired before the scaffolding gets taken down.

Roof finial

Robert — Thu, 27 Jun 2013 20:13:00 +0000

Sprinkler guy came back to the house with a revised drawing, everything has now been agreed and they will be doing first fix a week tomorrow (Fri 5 July). He also brought sample ceiling- and wall-mount sprinkler heads, not just for me to see but also to be left on-site for other tradespeople to be able to look at. I have to say the communications and customer service from the sprinkler company has been excellent throughout.

Unfortunately I can't say the same about the window company. At the last meeting we agreed their joiner would make an appointment with me to come back on-site to measure up etc. I'd had no contact for 2 weeks, so phoned them on Tuesday - person I spoke to didn't know anything, person I had been dealing with was unavailable until today. Phoned again today asking for that person, he was unavailable to speak to me and neither was the joiner who has been assigned to my job. Later in the day I got a brief email giving next Tuesday as the appointment day (no time specified). I wrote back asking what time and also expressed my concern at the lack of communications, and why this is unsatisfactory for this project.

Meanwhile on the roof, all the Velux openings have been trimmed out now, but we're waiting for the windows to arrive. The builders asked me a question about how to fix the insulation (given its larger than average thickness), which indicated to me that they might need some technical support when we come to doing the insulation. So earlier this evening, I phoned Pete, the guy who designed the thermal envelope specification, to see if he could come to the house for a day to work through this with the builders.

At the front of the gable there was originally a ridge finial - still to be seen on neighbouring properties. Some Googling lead me to this website, where believe it or not this guy specialises in making reproduction finials - amazing what you can find online! This one is a close match to the one our house would have originally had:

People think I'm a little bit crazy putting so much emphasis on details like this, but what's the point of working on a Victorian/Edwardian house if you're going to ignore its architecture? You might as well do a new-build Passivhaus, and save yourself an awful lot of hassle.

Velux windows

Robert — Wed, 26 Jun 2013 17:27:42 +0000

With the roof fully stripped, we discovered a purlin running right behind the original skylight at the top of the stairs (which we couldn't see before because it was behind plaster). This meant that the larger replacement Velux window could not be accommodated. As this is a smoke vent window and part of our fire safety design, this was a significant issue. I phoned Velux customer support, and they helpfully suggested that two smaller windows and a separate control unit could be ordered (one window above the purlin and the other below), together performing as per the originally specified window.

Having taken up this suggestion, in order to avoid too many windows on the roof (for both aesthetic and structural reasons) I decided to change the two originally-specified windows in the front bedroom for one larger window.

In addition, the joiner had built the platform for the rainwater header tank whilst I was away at Redfield, and not done it exactly how I'd envisaged (serves me right for not providing a drawing!). However it will suffice, and the way he's done it means we can put the top floor bathroom MVHR underneath (rather than next to) the tank - still need to finalise the ductwork though.

All this was agreed verbally on-site with the builders over the space of an hour or two. Then I had a shock when I found out that the price of the two-window solution for smoke vent, as suggested by Velux, is significantly higher than the single window we were originally to use; this combined with the extra slates required has now pushed the roof works about £2k over-budget!

So I (re-)learnt the lesson: preparation is key, don't be making - or worse, changing - design decisions on the spot.

Meanwhile, we got a business card for yet another tradesperson claiming to do tree works - several phone calls and voicemail messages later, no call back.

Starting work on the roof

Robert — Thu, 20 Jun 2013 21:47:03 +0000

The builders have started work on the roof today. Straight away we've found out that we aren't going to be able to salvage as many slates as expected. Apart from that, it's so far, so good.

I finalised the Velux window specification, including adapting the internal studwork slightly to accommodate the 1m2 smoke vent window. I took the rainwater header tank to the house and went through the design of the tank cupboard etc with the builders, in the space.

The MVHR units arrived - physically, smaller than I was expecting (even though I knew the dimensions!). I'm still to figure out and then order the ductwork. I've pretty much settled on siting the top floor bathroom unit in the to-be-formed plant cupboard.

Meeting electrician and fire alarm guy on-site next Saturday (6 July).

Spoke to the letting agent for the house next door, having had no contact from the owner after the initial phonecall; he was similarly disinterested, and suggested I email the landlord once more (which I duly did).

I was considering a very impressive 1.5 litre vacuum flush toilet called Propelair, which I'd seen at Ecobuild. The downside, apart from cost, is that they only currently do a concealed cistern version - but if we are going ahead with the smaller top floor bathroom, a concealed cistern could be used. However, when I spoke to Propelair, they didn't seem to have a distribution channel set up, and the guy on the phone was quite short with me when I pointed out that neither accepting credit card payments nor offering credit yourselves was not conducive to getting business! Seemed like a startup company (apparently the toilet was only launched at this year's Ecobuild), and although I really like their idea, I was reminded of the risk of buying immature technology, and of buying from a startup company, who could easily go bust/discontinue the product/etc (I was told last weekend at Old Hall that they had to decommission their solar hot water collector because the company had gone bust and they couldn't get necessary parts).

Withington Co-operative Eco-house - roof

Roof

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Roof finial

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Velux windows

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Starting work on the roof

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