We have offically commenced the preparation of the building site.
So far this has involved hiring a local excavator (Rod Patton) to clear the top soil and to arrange to have this taken away (approx 60m2!) and Richard Playne our plumber who is a qualified green plumber and brother of Alycia's work colleague.
Richard installed a water meter and three taps onsite.
All of this has involved lot's of digging in wet clay soil and with this incessant rain it has all fairly quickly softened up, and our block is now a very muddy place to be!.
I have arranged for a fence and toilet to be delivered on Teusday, and at present the construction side of things is on hold untill we can source three 200x200 6 m posts.
These posts are massive and have to be sourced especially for the job which could take upto 1 month to arrange. These posts are a case of over engineering and will require a crane to install!.
The engineers seemed ultra paranoid about the straw bale thing and consequently have over engineered the house framming which means that we will have something that is pretty much cyclone proof!, but it also means that the build is more costly and time consuming.
If we were to do this again I would ensure that I arrange for engineers who have specically worked with straw bale houses to do the engineering as they would have a much more specific knowledge of the particular capacities and requirements of a straw bale house.
