By accident I stumbled over an Italian supplier for electrical parts... fixtures, switches, sockets, cable,... real old style and to my big surprise fairly affordable. In Austria or Germany something like that would easily cost twice that if no more. Now I'm absolutely drooling over that stuff.... I mean, who else still sells surface mount rotary switches made of porcelain, and porcelaine knobs for installing twisted cloth lamp cord on the wall surface?
Go to http://casadellaluce.skizzo3000.it/catalog/ and check that stuff out!
Monday, December 17, 2007
Friday, December 14, 2007
Nothing to report...
I'm in a pre-Christmas coma. Today is my last work day, I took incredible 4 full weeks off. Right no I feel like I'm just walking upright any more by a last straw... I need all my strength to keep my work schedule up. I hope that'll change with a lot of sleep though.
Planning has mostly been restricted to my favourite way ever since I've been a child - daydreaming. Whenever a project is coming up I play it in my head, like a movie, over and over. Doing that, I can identify problems and devise solutions. Besides, it's fun.
Right now I'm fiddling with a few details like electrical wiring. I want to make it looks as old as possible without violating current electrical codes, that will require great amounts of ingenuity. Most rooms will get conduit screwed to the walls and ceiling except for the bathroom and probably my brother's room (he wants "modern" wiring... I guess in turn I'm going to try something in his room... for the last few weeks I've been intrigued by the produtcs of a company named Elektrohaus. They are located in Austria but sell Italian style switches and sockets (both the Italian kind and the German/austrin to fit an Italian wall box). The system is very modular, basically you get a blank face plate and snap in whatever modue you want. A regular box (roughly US switch box size) is 3 modules wide, a light switch is 1 module, an Italian socket as well, a German receptacle is 2 modules. There are bigger boxes too - 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 14, 16 and 21 modules. Downside: as I mentioned, the boxes are Italian, so you're restricted to use Italian switches and receptacles or rip open the walls. Doesn'tmatter much as long as you stock replacements.
Planning has mostly been restricted to my favourite way ever since I've been a child - daydreaming. Whenever a project is coming up I play it in my head, like a movie, over and over. Doing that, I can identify problems and devise solutions. Besides, it's fun.
Right now I'm fiddling with a few details like electrical wiring. I want to make it looks as old as possible without violating current electrical codes, that will require great amounts of ingenuity. Most rooms will get conduit screwed to the walls and ceiling except for the bathroom and probably my brother's room (he wants "modern" wiring... I guess in turn I'm going to try something in his room... for the last few weeks I've been intrigued by the produtcs of a company named Elektrohaus. They are located in Austria but sell Italian style switches and sockets (both the Italian kind and the German/austrin to fit an Italian wall box). The system is very modular, basically you get a blank face plate and snap in whatever modue you want. A regular box (roughly US switch box size) is 3 modules wide, a light switch is 1 module, an Italian socket as well, a German receptacle is 2 modules. There are bigger boxes too - 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 14, 16 and 21 modules. Downside: as I mentioned, the boxes are Italian, so you're restricted to use Italian switches and receptacles or rip open the walls. Doesn'tmatter much as long as you stock replacements.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Pigsty once again...
The temporarily buried project is moving again... somewhat.
The verandah sounds like a nice idea, but it doesn't cope with what annoys me most about the house: living on the ground, in a moist house without a basement or second floor. I just don't care any more for rotted floor boards, walls that are stained half a foot up from the floor...
So we started to discuss the larger project once again.
The main concerns were that we didn't have the time nor the money. Since I now plan on quitting my current full job to attend university or something again, and prior to that have decent school-like summer holidays, i.e. 2 months. That sets the schedule, and it's extremely tight.
The second problem is the almost non-existant budget. We'll try to do as much as we can ourselves, but some stuff will hae to be hired out, like some of the foundation work, most of the plumbing, building the ceilings, roof framing and decking,...
So now the goal is to get the planning ready as soon as possible to get the drawings to my uncle (family architect). Hopefully he'll sign the plans so we can get a construction permit. Then we can start building.
So now we're deep into the planning stage.
Problems I've run into so far: space restrictions. I want to keep changes to the footprint as small as possible not to waste precious space between the pigs and goats shed. (Quite a nice area for sitting and playing table tennis. That means the hallway and stairs are very constricted - 1m width is pretty narrow and the stairs will end up being fairly steep, so I need to check code about that. Unfortunately construction code doesn't cover specific things like this, so I'd need to check some kind of sub-code, unfortunately I don't know which one... looks like we won't get by without working closely together with an architect.
If I let the stairs turn twice the under stairs closet will get a fairly low ceiling and I wanted to put the boiler there... loks like bad luck.
That's my biggest concern right now.
The second biggest is cost. I know prices of stuff I deal with every day or at least sometimes, like electrical, but bricks, wall construction, lumber, framing,... are pretty much unkown to me. Without knowing these cost factors it's hard to decide on materials and emthods (concrete ceilings vs. wood,...) and this influences measurements... you see it.
The verandah sounds like a nice idea, but it doesn't cope with what annoys me most about the house: living on the ground, in a moist house without a basement or second floor. I just don't care any more for rotted floor boards, walls that are stained half a foot up from the floor...
So we started to discuss the larger project once again.
The main concerns were that we didn't have the time nor the money. Since I now plan on quitting my current full job to attend university or something again, and prior to that have decent school-like summer holidays, i.e. 2 months. That sets the schedule, and it's extremely tight.
The second problem is the almost non-existant budget. We'll try to do as much as we can ourselves, but some stuff will hae to be hired out, like some of the foundation work, most of the plumbing, building the ceilings, roof framing and decking,...
So now the goal is to get the planning ready as soon as possible to get the drawings to my uncle (family architect). Hopefully he'll sign the plans so we can get a construction permit. Then we can start building.
So now we're deep into the planning stage.
Problems I've run into so far: space restrictions. I want to keep changes to the footprint as small as possible not to waste precious space between the pigs and goats shed. (Quite a nice area for sitting and playing table tennis. That means the hallway and stairs are very constricted - 1m width is pretty narrow and the stairs will end up being fairly steep, so I need to check code about that. Unfortunately construction code doesn't cover specific things like this, so I'd need to check some kind of sub-code, unfortunately I don't know which one... looks like we won't get by without working closely together with an architect.
If I let the stairs turn twice the under stairs closet will get a fairly low ceiling and I wanted to put the boiler there... loks like bad luck.
That's my biggest concern right now.
The second biggest is cost. I know prices of stuff I deal with every day or at least sometimes, like electrical, but bricks, wall construction, lumber, framing,... are pretty much unkown to me. Without knowing these cost factors it's hard to decide on materials and emthods (concrete ceilings vs. wood,...) and this influences measurements... you see it.
TUB!!!
The tub is in!!!
We decided to involve a plumber in that action... he sent two guys who managed to wiggle it into the bathroom. They also replaced the entire drain assembly.
Then I spent a little over an hour with scrubbing sand and lots of elbow grease trying to get it clean. It looked like it hadn't been cleand and used for decades... but I managed to get it clean enough to use. The infrared heater worked too (first when I installed the 50 year old beast it kept tripping the FI (RCD, a main breaker that works like a US GFI)... took me two attempts of taking it apart, finally I found the damaged wire and made it safe again.
Wow, that was a feeling to soak in that tub!
Pictures to follow as soon as I find the cable for my dad's camera or buy a card reader (buying something new, even as cheap as a card reader always feels scary to me).
We decided to involve a plumber in that action... he sent two guys who managed to wiggle it into the bathroom. They also replaced the entire drain assembly.
Then I spent a little over an hour with scrubbing sand and lots of elbow grease trying to get it clean. It looked like it hadn't been cleand and used for decades... but I managed to get it clean enough to use. The infrared heater worked too (first when I installed the 50 year old beast it kept tripping the FI (RCD, a main breaker that works like a US GFI)... took me two attempts of taking it apart, finally I found the damaged wire and made it safe again.
Wow, that was a feeling to soak in that tub!
Pictures to follow as soon as I find the cable for my dad's camera or buy a card reader (buying something new, even as cheap as a card reader always feels scary to me).
Monday, October 22, 2007
Clawfoot pain
Ouch, produtive weekend!
On Saturday my dad happened to stumble over a free clawfoot tub for the farm.
The original plans for the bathroom specified a wooden or steel basin which was supposed to serve as a shower and mainly look rustic. It never got installed and when we bought the house we only found a drain and a shower fixture. We always wanted a real tub there, so we started looking for a clawfoot (looks great and saves us from building a surround). My uncle gave one to us for free, but it had a few flaws. The outside was extremely rusty from having sat upside down in a garden for years and the inside was well worn and rough showing some rust stains through the glazing. Refinishing is darn expensive here (let's say it costs you roughly 10 times the price of a cheap new tub) and involves nasty, stinky, toxic chemicals. We had one refinished and it stank for a year. So we never got around to do it and the tub has been sitting on the verandah, covered with a door to serve as a table.
Besides, the entire drain assembly was missing.
Now a block from us in Vienna they're cleaning out an apartment, tons of trashy 70s MDF furniture. However, my dad suddenly noticed one of the guy throwing a bucket of broken glass, porcelaine, bottles and whatever into what looked like a well-kept tub. So he asked the guy what was going to happen with the tub. "Want have?" was the answer... of course!
So on Sunday we planned an extra trip to the farm and started cleaning out the tub. we found: broken dishes, glassware, shelves (MDF and real wood), a sink and countertop (one pice) made of some heavy terrazzo-like material, bottles of liquors, some half full or full, various drugs (asthma drugs for example, but also a lot of stuff we didn't recognize by the names),... oh yeah, almost forgot the huge wallet like waiters use... empty of course.
That part was easy, wearing gloves.
The interior finish was in almost perfect condition give a fingernail sized chip near the drain. Outsideit had a rustic but ok beige paint job. And most of all it had a full drain assembly (only the overflow drain line was cracked from carrying it down the stairs)!
Only downside: two feet were cracked, one still useable, one shot, but the shot one is in the back so wo could always use a brick...
Now we had to get it into the car upside down. Our family car is a Mitsbishi van with wooden storage boxes in the rear. So we had to hoist the tub up about 1m or even more to get it in. Yuck!
Then we drove out to the farm and first did some maintenance, like the last mowing of the year and the first ever with the new mower. Then we hoisted the tub out of the car... it is HEAVY! We decided to put it on the verandah and either wait for more people or call a plumber to get it inside.
Now when I got up today every single muscle in my body SCREAMED... arms, legs, back... no matter how hard you try to lift with your back, at some point it will hit your back. Yeouch!
On Saturday my dad happened to stumble over a free clawfoot tub for the farm.
The original plans for the bathroom specified a wooden or steel basin which was supposed to serve as a shower and mainly look rustic. It never got installed and when we bought the house we only found a drain and a shower fixture. We always wanted a real tub there, so we started looking for a clawfoot (looks great and saves us from building a surround). My uncle gave one to us for free, but it had a few flaws. The outside was extremely rusty from having sat upside down in a garden for years and the inside was well worn and rough showing some rust stains through the glazing. Refinishing is darn expensive here (let's say it costs you roughly 10 times the price of a cheap new tub) and involves nasty, stinky, toxic chemicals. We had one refinished and it stank for a year. So we never got around to do it and the tub has been sitting on the verandah, covered with a door to serve as a table.
Besides, the entire drain assembly was missing.
Now a block from us in Vienna they're cleaning out an apartment, tons of trashy 70s MDF furniture. However, my dad suddenly noticed one of the guy throwing a bucket of broken glass, porcelaine, bottles and whatever into what looked like a well-kept tub. So he asked the guy what was going to happen with the tub. "Want have?" was the answer... of course!
So on Sunday we planned an extra trip to the farm and started cleaning out the tub. we found: broken dishes, glassware, shelves (MDF and real wood), a sink and countertop (one pice) made of some heavy terrazzo-like material, bottles of liquors, some half full or full, various drugs (asthma drugs for example, but also a lot of stuff we didn't recognize by the names),... oh yeah, almost forgot the huge wallet like waiters use... empty of course.
That part was easy, wearing gloves.
The interior finish was in almost perfect condition give a fingernail sized chip near the drain. Outsideit had a rustic but ok beige paint job. And most of all it had a full drain assembly (only the overflow drain line was cracked from carrying it down the stairs)!
Only downside: two feet were cracked, one still useable, one shot, but the shot one is in the back so wo could always use a brick...
Now we had to get it into the car upside down. Our family car is a Mitsbishi van with wooden storage boxes in the rear. So we had to hoist the tub up about 1m or even more to get it in. Yuck!
Then we drove out to the farm and first did some maintenance, like the last mowing of the year and the first ever with the new mower. Then we hoisted the tub out of the car... it is HEAVY! We decided to put it on the verandah and either wait for more people or call a plumber to get it inside.
Now when I got up today every single muscle in my body SCREAMED... arms, legs, back... no matter how hard you try to lift with your back, at some point it will hit your back. Yeouch!
Friday, October 19, 2007
Sign of life
Just wanted to say I'm still alive... more or less. Never before in my life I had such an exhausting job, so I basically come home at 7 or 7:30 PM and feel close to dead. Subsequently, the weekends are exclusively reserved for some recreation.
I finally need to finish that endless WC poject (hardly even notice the missing paint any more ;-) ) and want to get started on the verandah project around Christmas. I'm severely tempted to put the window into the new wall facing the yard instead of the exterior wall. This will save us from whacking a hole in the brick wall, finding a window that matches in both size and style,... but will take some light (read: a lot, because the yard side is a tight, covered passage). Dunno...
Framing around christmas is going to be nice anyway - I expect temperatures around or below freezing.
However, it's the only chance to get done before next summer since I take 4 weeks off work in late December/early January.
I finally need to finish that endless WC poject (hardly even notice the missing paint any more ;-) ) and want to get started on the verandah project around Christmas. I'm severely tempted to put the window into the new wall facing the yard instead of the exterior wall. This will save us from whacking a hole in the brick wall, finding a window that matches in both size and style,... but will take some light (read: a lot, because the yard side is a tight, covered passage). Dunno...
Framing around christmas is going to be nice anyway - I expect temperatures around or below freezing.
However, it's the only chance to get done before next summer since I take 4 weeks off work in late December/early January.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Dream house continued
The next day (and following weeks) we continued digging through the clutter (when I first read House in Progress it immediately reminded me of this dream) and conquering the house.
We found: a formal dining room, formal salon (both fully furnished, with oriental carpets, chandeliers, beautiful tiled heaters and everything), several bedrooms, some of which looked like they hadn't been touched ever since WWI, and, by all means, a ball room. The giant yard was completely shielded from the neighbors and was mostly lawn with old trees and a swimming pool.
Just incredible...
I remember the dream well enough to draw a plan from memory...
While the house felt absolutely coherent, trying to draw a plan I found out actually the rooms didn't exactly line up... not even the rooms themselves were really coherent. I'll try to draw the plan anyway and post it, pointing out the flaws and inconsistencies.
I did realize the house must have been HUGE in reality. For the main part I got a foot print of AT LEAST 11x21m, probably more, (given the 21m the ball room would only be 5-5 1/2m wide which seems fairly narrow, in the dream it looked more like twice that size).
We found: a formal dining room, formal salon (both fully furnished, with oriental carpets, chandeliers, beautiful tiled heaters and everything), several bedrooms, some of which looked like they hadn't been touched ever since WWI, and, by all means, a ball room. The giant yard was completely shielded from the neighbors and was mostly lawn with old trees and a swimming pool.
Just incredible...
I remember the dream well enough to draw a plan from memory...
While the house felt absolutely coherent, trying to draw a plan I found out actually the rooms didn't exactly line up... not even the rooms themselves were really coherent. I'll try to draw the plan anyway and post it, pointing out the flaws and inconsistencies.
I did realize the house must have been HUGE in reality. For the main part I got a foot print of AT LEAST 11x21m, probably more, (given the 21m the ball room would only be 5-5 1/2m wide which seems fairly narrow, in the dream it looked more like twice that size).
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