Week 5, Day 5:

• Back-filling the northern GSHP collector trench with a layer of sand and the excavated soil together with a green polythene marker tape about half way down.
• More work on the below-ground cavity walls.
• Fixing the last piece of steelwork, the post for the corner window in the north-west corner of the Living Room.

Week 5, Day 5

North-west corner post

Completed below-ground cavity walls on the southern side; 100mm blocks and a 250mm cavity. The steelwork is deliberately in line with the inner skin of blockwork, allowing for a full-thickness layer of cavity wall insulation (which will be Ecobead Platinum) to prevent thermal bridging.

Steel column attached to blockwork using Ancon Teplo-L-Tie, with a much lower thermal conductivity than a traditional metal cavity tie.

Week 5, Day 2:

• The underground pipework for the Ground Source Heat pump was terminated at the house end, filled with its anti-freeze solution and pressure-tested.
  • With the pressure-test passed it’s safe to back-fill the trenches containing the pipework.
  • There’s a pressure gauge which will be left in-place in the manifold chamber so that the pressure can be monitored during the rest of the build.
• The main steel frame got completed, extending around the south-west corner of the house.

Due to technical difficulties I don’t have a photo from my normal camera to show the end-of-day status so here’s one that Steve kindly took on Wednesday morning, showing the completed main steel frame. It’s mainly only the south and south-west aspects of the house that need “help” from the steel to augment the cavity wall structure, because of the big sliding glass doors in those areas removing so much of the blockwork structure.

Week 5, Day 2

Capped-off 50mm GSHP brine pipes which will rise through the floor of the Utility Room

GSHP manifold chamber, pressure gauge reads 2.5 bar