Progress report - 3 beds and shower rooms now 90% finished - just waiting for the shower glass to arrive and will leave the final "snaggings" until later
Water, drainage etc., tested and good. Electrics in that part of the house 80% finished, have new "control box" which will be fitted when all electrics throughout the house are completed. We have a good "young" electrician who is doing really good work. The main man, a mate, is very good and my role is to provide an extra "pair of hands" - two people do, however, work a lot faster than one in this type of work, so I try to get involved as much as I can - plus I (we) have to identify what stuff we need and decide the order that things need to be done in
Now onto another part of the upstairs - 2 rooms which we will change to a bedroom and dressing room plus a bathroom that needs a complete refurb - this stuff is over where we are "living" part of the time, so we have to be a little careful not to get muck on my "wife's best antiques". First job is to improve the insulation as there isn't any in this part of the house and last night it was minus 6 degrees and never really rose above freezing during the day. This part of the house is "open to the roof" in part, with a mezzanine type corridor and a kind of gallery looking down on a living and dining area; there is no roof cavity, just roof tiles, joists and tongue and groove boarding. The only practical insulation material to use is this foil stuff, (maybe in the summer when we can get on the roof we can re lay the tiles ontop of some insulated roof boarding to give extra insolation - but this 22 layer stuff will make a big difference as it will keep the heat in in the winter and reflect it back in the summer when it gets into the high 30's) - as I said this foil stuff is very effective consisting of 22 layers of foil and other materials. It will then be battened and covered with the normal type "plaster boarding" - electrics need a little tweaking but the plumbing is fine - new "wood" flooring will then be put down to match the rest of the upstairs - we are off back to the UK next week - so I don't reckon that this will be completed until near the end of the month as the bathroom will need re tiling, new loo, wash basins floor and shower sides
A few quick photos taken yesterday
My next (thinking), pre occupation is the heating system - current thoughts are a big wood burning stove with back boiler built into one of the walls in the hall - this will provide heat throughout one part, (the main), of the house together with (hot water) underfloor heating, in much of the house with a few "wet" radiators upstairs in the rooms that we use in winter - in the other bedrooms we will have background electric radiators and heated towel rails, (already fitted). There are a couple of good "underfloor heating kits" that you can buy and I will look at these next week when I am in the UK. Another wood burner in the (big) main living area should finish the job off. The underfloor heating pipes will be laid in polystyrene, after first putting a good sheet of reflective foil on what is there at the present time. The final covering in that part of the house will be wood flooring - at the present time all the ground floor is tiled - some really nice "old stuff" but some not too nice, (according to my wife!) more modern tiles - the old stuff, 50% of the floor, will be kept.
There is plenty of (burning) wood in this part of France, mainly oak, it is reasonably priced and a lot cheaper than oil or electricity. We also have plenty of wood on the land at the front of the house - the only problem is keeping the chain saw sharp and myself fit.
That's it for now, folks, must get down to Ikea, (units for the utility room - I've not mentioned that), and LeRoy Merlin for a couple of doors and other stuff