Happy New Year.
December was spent preparing drawings to submit to Building Control, following a meeting Jaimin had with them about obtaining a Building Warrant. Normally these are obtained before work commences but in our case we wanted to get water tight first.
The drawings are a significant investment in time and usually cost £000's when done by an architect, so Jaimin had to expend a lot of effort to get them done. In parallel we're waiting on the structural sign off for the roof, after which we can apply for and obtain the Warrant, and then proceed.
It's also been one of the wettest Dec/Jan period's in history, and this is evident on the hill. A call yesterday from the farmer alerted us to "rushing water" behind the cottage, but we were in a supermarket car park on the way back from Shropshire.
The water tank spring has over filled and the stone drain and land drain combination has been unable to cope, causing a lot of surface water to cascade down on to the forestry track. Unfortunately it followed the track and managed to cross the road, and flow down towards the cottage, where it disappeared in to the grass bank and then re-emerged out of the stone wall and flowed straight in to the corner of the bathroom.
The persistence has caused water ingress in the bathroom and the east gable floor, despite the gravel in place around the side of the building. Not as bad as in Ballater...
Jaimin went up this morning to assess it and has managed to divert the water off the hill to the drainage ditch, which should ease the problem. The longer term plan would be to install a drain at the base of the forestry track.
In the meantime, we wait on structural drawings and building control...
December was spent preparing drawings to submit to Building Control, following a meeting Jaimin had with them about obtaining a Building Warrant. Normally these are obtained before work commences but in our case we wanted to get water tight first.
The drawings are a significant investment in time and usually cost £000's when done by an architect, so Jaimin had to expend a lot of effort to get them done. In parallel we're waiting on the structural sign off for the roof, after which we can apply for and obtain the Warrant, and then proceed.
It's also been one of the wettest Dec/Jan period's in history, and this is evident on the hill. A call yesterday from the farmer alerted us to "rushing water" behind the cottage, but we were in a supermarket car park on the way back from Shropshire.
The water tank spring has over filled and the stone drain and land drain combination has been unable to cope, causing a lot of surface water to cascade down on to the forestry track. Unfortunately it followed the track and managed to cross the road, and flow down towards the cottage, where it disappeared in to the grass bank and then re-emerged out of the stone wall and flowed straight in to the corner of the bathroom.
The persistence has caused water ingress in the bathroom and the east gable floor, despite the gravel in place around the side of the building. Not as bad as in Ballater...
Jaimin went up this morning to assess it and has managed to divert the water off the hill to the drainage ditch, which should ease the problem. The longer term plan would be to install a drain at the base of the forestry track.
In the meantime, we wait on structural drawings and building control...
