Security | Marsh Flatts Farm Self Build Diary

Completion of the reconstituted stone steps forming the External Staircase. It will be getting a custom-made traditional-style steel balustrade and handrail that will be left with a galvanised finish, to match the other unfinished galvanised steelwork (such as the ‘stable’ window).

Completed reconstituted stone steps and landing for the external staircase – in need of its handrail

The photo above also shows the black ventilation pipes, with their spinning cowls, for the Biorock sewage treatment plant. They’re black powder-coated aluminium, the same as the guttering and down pipes, just a larger diameter (100mm). The vent pipes were only ever temporarily installed previously and were always destined to be fitted either side of the new building. The spinning cowls are Biolan Wind Fans, which have aluminium blades; some other Biolan ventilators are made from plastic. These were sourced from UK distributor Plastic Solutions (Aldridge) who offered good pricing and are fairly local.

Today was also the first day of second-fix for the combined intruder and fire alarm system, which progressed well despite some of the components not being available until they are delivered direct to site tomorrow.

Also a little further progress on the groundworks, with only one person working, and only for part of the time.

Area to the North of the parking area by the Garages more than half cleared and levelled

Week 49, Day 4:

Mostly completing the commissioning of the intruder- and fire-alarm systems
- Some issues getting the CSL DualCom GradeShift unit to connect to the monitoring centre (EMCS) using an analogue telephone line in parallel with the mobile phone network in order to ensure a reliable connection
- The unit is connected to a Cisco/LinkSys Analogue Telephone Adapter (ATA) which in turn connects to a Voice-Over-IP (VOIP) service which was expected to present a good-enough analogue telephone interface but something isn’t working right
- It’s not currently clear whether it’s a simple configuration issue or whether it really does need a “proper” analogue telephone line (in which case it might be best to swap over to an IP network connection for the alternative communication path)
More work on the lighting drivers, connecting up most of the remaining circuits
More work on the finishing touches on the inside – e.g. skirting boards in the Open Plan area