Today was not a very productive or satisfying day - in contrast to the significant amount of work we accomplished yesterday.
We started first thing in the morning by lifting off the beams to check the concrete in the perimeter piers, and ended having to add some more concrete to secure the bolts as the mix yesterday was too dry to properly fill in around the threaded rod.
We cut most of the plywood (or more accurately OSB/chip board) for the underside of the floor joists - part of the structural box that will make up the ground floor plane. We are using more concrete than we had wanted to, but it was a choice between more plywood or more concrete.
Pat had to leave at mid day, leaving Bruce to start building the panels for the ground floor. This was definitely a case where 2 people would have been 5 time faster than one.
We will build 27 panels for the ground floor, each consisting of 2 sheets of ply screwed to a frame typically consisting of 2 joists which are notched on one end to sit on a bearing piece that wil be bolted to the perimeter beam, as well as blocking. These panels will be constructed upside down to make it easier to screw the ply to the joists and will be flipped over and slotted into place with one end fixed to the beam and the other end cantilevered over the bearing walls of the cellar. One set of panels will extend from the front of the house, and another from the back, and then joined in the middle, and additional blocking added. A slightly complicated process but it allows us to secure the plywood to the entire underside of the house, without crawling underneath and messing around with the bearing walls.
Before the OSB boards (more eco version of the dreaded chip board) can be screwed and glued to the joists, the top surface had to be scrubbed with a wire brush, primarily to remove the lime, but it helps to roughen the wood so that the glue can form a stronger bond.
Aoife and Leontien wait patiently.
The new wood slab sitting on the perimeter piers - this one at the dividing line between the two houses. By gluing and screwing the top surface to the timber joist and beams, the entire surface will act as one ridged slab structure, capable of transfering all of the wind loads from the walls through to the central cellar. The surface of the board on the underside of the slab is not structurally necessary, but helps to form a solid insulated slab that is ventilated underneath.
We fixed about 25% of the floor today
