Official handover of the house.

On 28th July 2014 the walls and roof the house were assembled on site. Today - 15th October 2014 -we were handed the keys to the house which is finished, as far as Hanse Haus is concerned, except for the kitchen which is being delivered tomorrow - pictures in due course.

At 1 p.m. the clerk of works, Frank Heilmann, arrived with two of his team - Lars and Florian - to inspect the house with us, carry out small repairs, and make a note of things that still need to be done. In our case the painters have to come again and fix a few bubbles in the wallpaper and touch up the paint where others brushed against it. We will also get a seal between the garage and the house - "safe is safe" as the Germans say. The reduction piece for the chimney didn't fit, so it will have to be set next week before the stove is delivered.

The whole procedure -inspection and signing of about ten different documents - took about two and a half hours. Wim was patient, rolling around the floor to mark his territory, i.e. the whole house...

Here are some pics from the handover.

Living room looking East

Livingroom from other side

Bedroom

Bedroom from other side

Main bathroom

Walk-in shower

Shower in guest bathroom

 Guest bathroom

Hallway looking towards bedroom

With the Hanse Haus team. Back left: Frank Heilmann, Clerk of works. Back right: Lars Hartmann, Foreman. Front left: Florian .... , Joiner and carpenter.

Tiling

This week the tiles were laid and grouted from Monday till Wednesday. Very fast, very professional Mr. Jens Hochrein and colleague. Say no more - here are the pics.

The kitchen floor:

The hallway from the front door:

The hallway looking towards the bedroom:

The small bathroom - shower at the back beside the window:

The bathtub. Nice idea with the grey tile surround and grey tiles on the sides of the tub:

Shower on the left, wash basins on the wall to the right:

The bog in the big bathroom:

Perimeter wall

Finally, the area around the house is starting to take shape too. We decided we wanted a terraced wall around the bottom of the platform the house sits on. A vertical wall - which was one of the suggestions made  - would have made the house look more like a fortress than a house. And health and safety regulations - yes, they are here in Germany too - would have meant having to put a fence around the top of the wall to stop drunken house owners or hapless children from falling to certain death...Then it really would have looked like a fortress!

We used 50 - 60 cm blocks of "Muschelkalk", which according to the dictionary is what it's called in English too. Don't believe it.... Alternative suggestions are: "shell limeston" or "lacustrine limestone" or "coquina". So if any of you happen to know which one it is, let us know... Anyway, the stone is typical for this part of Germany.

The patio.

The patio from the garden.

Looking up the hill towards the living room and kitchen.

Looking to the East across the kitchen and living room.

Wallpapering and painting finished!

Today the last touches were put to the plastering, wallpapering and painting which had been going on for the last two weeks. Here you can see our decorators, Ralf and Christiane, a married couple from near Frankfurt. They took a day longer than expected because Ralf took a sore back - I can sympathize with that ok!

Here's the living room which is actually apricot in colour, but it turns out a bit different in the photos:

The bedrooms are light blue, although they look a tad turquoise in these photos:

The rest is in plain white - the green bits in the bathroom will be tiled next week:

The garage dropped in...

Well, thankfully it didn't drop in - it was lowered into place. At 7 a.m. this morning a 40-tonne lorry and a 4-axled crane / garage transporter were on site. The garage, produced by Zapf is six metres long and three metres wide, and the adjoining shed is three by three metres. The garage weighs 12 tonnes and the shed 6. Both were on the lorry. First the shed was moved from the big lorry onto the small lorry:

After that it was moved to the house and lowered into place. Then the same happened with the garage. Watching it hovering on the end of a crane gib about 3 cm from the wall of the house is pretty disconcerting - it didn't seem to bother the man working the crane... Seemed as if he'd done it before.

Here it is in place. The garage door is sectional and electric.

Sauna

No, we're not having a sauna installed. The house is being heated up to 50°C - or rather the floor is - to dry the screed. Thermometer shows Fahrenheit and Centigrade for those who are still in the Fahrenheit part of the world.

At least that was the plan last week when the heating was switched on on Thursday last. Friday: no noticeable change in temperature. Phone call to clerk of works: "Don't worry, it takes a couple of days before you notice a rise in temperature". Saturday: error on the heating display panel, which I reported to the c.o.w. by mail. Monday morning 8 o'clock I arrived at the house to find a Hanse Haus van in front of the house and someone inside working on the heating. Now that is a fast response! As it turned out, the guy who turned the heating on forgot to turn on the electric circuit which is solely devoted to the compressor in the heat exchanger... I.e. no heating. The maintenance guy could barely hide his anger and embarassment.

As it stands the heating is most definitely working - airing three times a day in approx. 95% humidity is no fun. Temperature today 35°C, 40°C tomorrow, 45°C on Thursday, 50°C on Friday which is held constant til Monday when the heating is turned down gradually until the floor reaches normal (about 20°C at the moment). The plasterers are due on Monday, so it looks as if they will be working with all the doors and windows open...

The Pink Skirt.

And wearing a nice little pink skirt from Austrotherm... Finally managed to fit the remainder perimeter insulation today at the second attempt. Last week's effort was postponed due to rain and a sore back. Having tried mixing cement to do the job last week, I decided to resort to bitumen for the rest of the job. Much easier. The pink skirt will later disappear under a layer of gravel.

Blower door test

This picture explains in principle what a blower door test is. All the openings in the house (chimney, drains, vents for the heat exchanger etc.) are sealed off with tape. Then the house is pumped up to a certain pressure and the time is measured it takes for the pressure to drop. Then this is done in reverse: the air is sucked out of the bulding. All new houses have to have this done by law to conform to the high energy conservation standards. If leakage is found, then the builders have to put it right. If you want to read more about it in English, just click here. For German hier. Our house passed the test.

Now for the real pictures:
Bladders are inserted in the larger openings and blown up with a pump

Some of the equipment:

 Getting ready to blow:

Fan and sensors:

Exterior complete.

Pictures of the house without the scaffolding.

Underfloor heating

Yesterday was a busy day. The plumbers did the final work on the heat exchanger, set up the solar panels, then left at midday. In the early hours the plasterers arrived and plastered the outside walls  - pictures to follow when the scaffolding comes down. The underfloor heating was laid: three layers of polystyrene insulation, a damp protection material and the plastic piping on top, stapled to this bedding. Six cm of liquid screed is poured in on Monday. A week later the heating is turned on, the house heated to 50°C and aired three times a day for about 10 days. At the moment it looks like this:

Kitchen

Living room

Also living room

Hallway

Guest room

Bedroom

Main bathroom

Doorway/hall

Utility room - We thought 9m² was big, but when you see the size of the heat exchanger...