Tagged? Shore Enough

Yes, we got tagged again -- except this time it was a friendly neighborhood graffiti artist, not the evil building inspector, and the work can continue.



In response, the crew did a little tagging of their own. This is the schematic drawing of the Lifebreath air exchange system that is to be refreshing the air in the Grotto:



It feels like we have come back full circle to all the digging that started this project and all the shoring that preceded the digging. The only difference is that the earlier digging was in the back yard and there was nothing above the big dig except the fog-shrouded sky. No, that was too easy. This time we have all four stories of the newly built house over the trench being dug directly below the existing rotten foundation.

Here's the extra shoring that is keeping the house from "settling":



And here is the part of the house that should not "settle:"





At the same time as the digging and shoring, the plumbing for the laundry sink was added. I am hoping that the sign on the wall is a noun, not a verb:



Another improvement was that the wimpy 8'' exhaust pipe for the kitchen vent was replaced with a much more formidable 10'' pipe. With this pipe, the vent can exhaust 900 cubic feet of air each minute, or putting it another way, when the vents are going at full speed, all the air in the kitchen is removed every 2 minutes. This should be sufficient even for my cooking.






Another great step ahead was the installation of the call buttons at the elevator landings. The buttons are not in yet, and for that matter, neither is the elevator, but it's great to know that someday soon we can press a button installed in this electrical box to summon the elevator to our location.



While we wait for the elevator to arrive, we can listen to music coming from speakers installed in these speaker holders. Sorry, no elevator music.



Next week, more of the same, some reframing, and concrete for the footings.

Water, Fire, Air, and Earth

The house grows keeps growing from inside. The outside of the house has grown as large as it is going to get, but the inside of the house is a beehive of activity with different trades working their respective magic seven days a week, bringing the four ancient elements together to bring life to the house.

First, there is water and we are delighted that the laundry room is finally framed and almost completely plumbed. Jenn is pretty stoked about this, as can be seen. I think she is still unhappy about my suggestion to use a combination toilet and sink to save space.



At the same time, the plumbers finally came to their senses and decided against the Alpine location for the water heater and decided to move it to the ground level; no more rappelling gear needed for lighting up the pilot light. Acrophobic plumbers everywhere rejoiced at the news. Here's the new home of the water heater and the 120 gallon stainless steel storage tank, plus all the other gear. Heating the water for this house is no longer a tankless job. Here's where the boiler and tank will be housed in the back patio. The blue tape marks the location of various components.



And here is the plumbing to the new boiler/tank system:



Of course this would not be our house if it were to be simple. This is the schematic drawing of the hot water system that includes 4 pumps, one of which does nothing but circulate the warm water to the various faucets and taps in order to save the cold water we would have to run before the water warms up at the bath or kitchen, by having instant hot water pumped to every tap in the house continuously. We strive to be very Green and save water wherever we can.



Another water-related addition to the house are the manifolds used to control water flow to the radiant heating system. The big red hoses bring hot water from the mini-refinery we are building in the back patio and the manifold distributes the warm water to the different heating zones in the house.



And once the hot water makes it to the bath, the Electronically controlled valve will mix it with just the right amount of cold water and send it to up to six shower heads for our showering pleasure.



And finally at the boundary between water and fire, there is the fire suppression system, or as they are commonly called, the sprinklers, have been installed throughout the house.



and here is a close up of the sprinkler head. Let us hope we never have to figure out if they actually work.



Moving on to fire, we found the fireplace we want to install in the bedroom. Here is a montage of how the fireplace and the flat panel TV will look like on the bedroom wall.



Another fire-related addition is the vent that will take out the cooking vapors from the kitchen when we cook. We do not anticipate using this device very frequently, but it nice to have a way to get the smoke -- I mean cooking smells -- out of the house when we do use the thing with flames for cooking.



As for air, the Grotto is getting equipped with a device than keeps the air inside the concrete enclosure clean and pristine by exhausting the stale air and bringing in fresh air at the same time. Visually, it is pretty boring, basically a big white box, but functionally, it's pretty cool. It's called "Lifebreath." and while exchanging the inside air with fresh outside air, it can filter the air and recover the heat or cooling applied to the air being exhausted by transferring it to the incoming air -- that green thing again.

In the earth department, we are ready for reinforced concrete for the footings, but in the meantime, we have discovered old, fragile concrete in the garage that needs to be carefully buttressed rather than removed for the same reason one does does not attempt to remove the wings of an airplane, even for necessary repairs, while the plane is actually in flight. Suffice it to say that we would like the house to retain its current stature and not be reduced by a couple of floors by sinking into the ground.

These are the trenches lined with rebar waiting to receive the new concrete:




And here is what concrete gone bad looks like:



And in non-elemental news, the data wiring continues:




The interior doors are delivered and are waiting to be hung:



And the massive jack that will make the elevator go up and down has been carefully put in the elevator shaft, although at the moment it is basically a 2000+ pound paper weight. You don't see any paper flying around this house, not on Elevator Jack's Watch, no sir.



Finally, in the structural news, very impressive metal connectors are being installed in the house to tie together the wooden skeleton into a single stiff frame that will resist, the motions of earth, wind, and fire.



Next week: Doors, more windows, even more plumbing, and more elemental news.

There's no place like home

Jenn and I went on a brief vacation to Spain and Morocco while the house construction continued the last couple of weeks. If you have not traveled overseas recently, here is what it looks like most of the time:





Basically, globe trotting travel involves trying to sleep in very uncomfortable places, but eventually you get there and get to do interesting things like watching America's Cup matched from the a boat off the coast of Valencia.





I even got to visit the CUP itself:



Speaking of famous cups, this church, also in Valencia, has another cup that some people may have heard of, the holy grail.



Another reason for visiting Valencia was to get inspiration for the next house. I really liked this design, but Jenn may need some convincing:




As long as we are finally on the topic of construction, I should mention that while we were gone, the construction team made some significant headway on the project.

The most visible change in the house, is the addition of the windows. This is a huge step forward and turns a plywood palace with holes in its side into the shell of a real house:




The skylights also went in:




Sliding doors and French doors for the bedrooms also went in:





The team also started installing the radiant heating system, basically a system of tubing installed under the floors. When warm water is circulated through the white tubes, the heat is transferred from the tubes to the metal brackets holding the tubes and from there to the floors, gently warming the entire house without the need for a furnace, ducting and all the noise and dust of a forced air system.

Of course, warm water does not get into the tubes without the other part of the system that consists of a gas-fired boiler that can provide the hot water needs of a small hotel, a large stainless steel tank to hold the hot water, and enough pumps to operate a small refinery to circulate the water, all of which will be installed later.





Another addition to the house in the last couple of weeks is wiring for data, TV, and Speakers. Rather than pulling individual cables for each system, the team installs what is known as a "structured cable" that has all the individual cables, including optic fiber, wrapped into a single Orange bundle that can be installed in a single run. The A/V& Data team still needs to pull a few individual wires for speakers and analog telephone lines, but the structured cable handles pretty much everything else.





The team also started putting in the new drain pipe (partially buried black pipes shown in the center of the picture) and connecting the individual drains pipes to the main drain. The old drain shown on the left of the photo will be removed.



Here's how the individual drains from the kitchen and bathrooms above are connected to the new main drain:




In the meantime, the electrical wiring also continues:



And a large load of Copper pipes just showed up that will become the fire suppression (sprinkler) system for the house.



Next week: Keeping the house on a solid footing, putting in the sprinklers, the water heater, more windows, more plumbing, and building bridges.