Digging The Site

The site dig and moment we had waited for since Oct 2003 began am on 22 April 2005.

Our new next door neighbour Sean took on the job. We were unsure of the state of the ground but soon realised that is was very dry and very stoney and rocky, something that was great in one respect but bad as regards the geothermal

Sean spent a number of half days doing the dig.

The pics are below.

ReQuotes

As you can imagine since we had our plans changed we needed a requote. This was a bit of a pain but something we had to go through again unfortunately and in fairness to all the companies there was not an issue.
I sent off our plans to the TF, UFH, GEO and tradesmen again for quotes.

Timber Frame - It eventually came down between 2 companies but in the end the easiness in dealing with Clarke Homes LTD http://www.clarkeltd.com gave them the advantage over the rest and also the fact my mate was an engineer for them also gave it a serious push.

The cost is of course a major fact and the difference I found between the cheapest and dearest was 15k Euro which as you can imagine is a big difference.

Also what is included in the kit varies - What we are getting is TF kit, plasterboard, doors, stairs, architrave, skirting, felt, battens and insulation.

• For each of the above there are also upgrade options. We upgraded:
  Felt from bitumen to Pro-tec,
  Doors from hardwood to pine,
  Stairs from mdf risers and steps to red deal,
  Insulation from Fibre Glass to Rockwool

We also got Clarkes to supply the plasterboard.

Another issue is the centres in the joists and rafters, standard is 600mm but there is an option for 400mm centres, Clarkes gave us these for free.

Under Floor Heating - This was an option that was running from the start, it appealed to me on a number of fronts,

a) Warm floors allowed for snug floors which would be warm to the touch.

b) Effiency of the floors, UFH runs at between 18 - 21 degrees C where rads run at between 45 - 65 degress C so as you can it take a hell of a lot more work to get your heating supply to the higher temps.

c) Rads can be ugly and used for clothes horses! can be a danger if young heads bang against them and they eventually need maintenance and replacing.

I had it that we were going for a supply and install option so I sent off plans to circa 30 companies, the differences were laughable ranging from 8k to 14k for the same setup. With UFH really there is not a lot to look out for, the type of Thermostats would be one as in whether or not they are analog or digital, manual or programmable all trivial issue but maybe major for some.

Then one day I was on a UK forum and it was mentioned by one lad that he installed his own and been the noisey git that I am I emailed him and enquired and luckily for me he was very helpful.

I got a company name off him and another set of plans were sent off. A few days later I got a quote back, 4100 euro delivered to our door with installation manual, support line, Danfoss TP5 programmable thermostats and CAD drawings. I was pleasantly suprised.

The supply and install quote was excellent at 8k euro from a crowd called WarmFloor based in Tyrone but www.underfloordirect.co.uk was no going to be beaten. So I set to and got our CAD drawings sent and set myself up for the unknow. It was going to be a nice warm house or an indoor swimming pool!!!

Alternative Heating - This was again another must have option that we were going to have. I first came across it when I was at a mates house in Gallaimh in 2001. To say I was impressed was an understatement.

So the investigation began and little did I realise that I would turn into the unofficially geothermal consultant for www.boards.ie !

To explain quickly your heat can be retrieved in 3 ways.

1. Air Sourced Heat Pump (ASHP) - fans are put out on the wall and the heat is extracted from the air.

2. Ground Sourced Heat Pump (GSHP) - your lawn is laid out with hydradare or plastic covered copper piping in a loop similar to that found in the element of a kettle at a dept of about 3ft. The heat in the ground at that dept is absorbed by the liquid (brine which is water and antifreeze or a refrigerant) in the pipe and returned to the heatpump

3. Water Sourced Heat Pump. (WSHP) - this can be from a lake, river or bore hole well. Again for the lake and river loop of hydradare are laid for the bore hole a pipe is put into a hold about 15o ft deep

Each source is returned to a heatpump which will increase the heat to the required temp for UFH or domestic water. The increased temp is achieved using electricity.

Some system have tanks or buffer tanks or cylinders or vessels, different names for the same thing installed in the house to store the hot water. These can range from 100 litre to 800 litre, some are pressurised to achieve a pumped hot water system and this eleminates the need for pumped or electric showers, other tanks are standard.

The HP is rates based on its COP - a rating of 3.5 to 5.8 is what I have found from different companies, this means for every unit of electricity the heatpump uses it produces between 3.5 to 5.8 units of heat. The higher the COP the better.

Also beware of what is involved in quotes, some companies supply the cylinder others do not.

I will go into the Alternative heating systems in more detail when we choose a supplier.

Mortgage Process - Part 2

We got a call at the end of February to say that the bank had an issue with our engineer, no one including our solicitor, engineer or broker had ever heard of this issue before but to cut a long story short, with the site cheque in our position, the land owner due to pick it up and everyone ready to rock and roll we had to pull the plug on the bank!
To say we were frustrated would greatly under estimate it, I was ready to be tied.
Luckily for us we were dealing with a very sound land owner who understood our situation and had no issue with us about it.
So off we plodded again, this time to the NIB who had been bought by Danska Bank and were now offering a new product, the Offset mortgage. It was identical to the First Active Current Account but the NIB manager was excellent to deal with . We got all our papers together again and within 4 weeks we had our offer and the site cheque passed over.
I contacted our plant hire man & neighbour to see when he could get started. He said it would be the end of April so sure enough he rolled in the 20th April 2005. Pictures are below are soon to be attached.

Mortgage Process - Part 1

Mortgage Hunting - From beginning of Novemeber to the mid of December I spent a good bit of time, on forums http://www.boards.ie and http://www.askaboutmoney.com
asking questions and then also reading their suggestions.
I was impressed with the First Active current account mortgage, liked to your current account and it meant the more you had in your current account everyday the less interest you paid.
I knew a lad of a forum who suggested I deal with him and he would sort it all out for us.
He works for Hasting Finacial Services in Westport. http://www.hastings.ie
To say he was helpful would be an understatement and his advice was invaluable. Also he meet us in his own house in the evening which saved us taking time off work.

We got ALL the paperwork together, talk about paperwork!! Letters from work, P45, letter of evidence of address, bank, credit card, loan, saving statements

So off it went, looked good from his point of view. I got another engineer as my own mate was building his own hut and could not supervise the build.
Got the lad Michael Conway, Cashel, Ayle, Westport, Co Mayo to oversee the job for me. Michael sent me his professional indemnity insurance certs, qualifications and estimate costings for the house.

Took until probably mid - end of January before we had it altogher, took longer than we thought!

Submitted the application and go pre-approval no issues at all, excellent, pencilled the timber frame kit in for the end of March.

We filled out the forms, got life cover etc in place and signed the contracts at the end of February with the hope of starting at the 1st week of March to dig the site.

Planning Process - Part 4

Two days really dragged, I rang the Planning Office at 11am to see if we had any news, nothing had been updated, "Ring back after lunch", barely eat the lunch with the worry but the determination to get back on the horse and start looking that weekend again, I had been on the internet and had a few potentials picked out to view at the weekend.

Got back to work and rang them about 3pm, the answer was a "planning granted but there are 17 conditions" Yippee!
Who cared, we had it now, how bad could the conditions be!!

So on the following Monday the letter, got my mother to read the conditions, some I took in others I had to read myself, did not seem to bad.

Conditions were standard,
5 year occupancy,
X percolation (no treatment system!!, don't ask),
X amount back from road,
1m above road,
"Crossed" windows, once vertically and once horizontally in the middle! (not happy about that one!!),
local stone on front of house and 60ft of front wall (no cladding),
hedging to ge planted between us and neighbours and the railway line,
government contribution.
Fill in the area between wall and road to allow parking.

The rest were standard so I was told!

So we had it conditions or not, big deal!

Next stage was to get married, have the honey moon and get ourselves together to apply for the mortgage.

Planning Process - Part 3

So back to the planning, after many extension requests and information going to and fro we were approaching D day.
We got a call a couple of days before the decision to tell us that the application was going to be refused. To say we were disappointed would have been an understatement, this was September over 8 months later, a month before our wedding and it really was not what we wanted to hear.

I have been critical of the Planning Authority, rightly so in some cases but in fairness to the planner we were given 3 days to see if we could submit changes that could push the application through.

I got my engineer to call the planner and after a quick discussion the only solution was to redesign the house over nite and come up with a new layout.
So we toyed with a few new ideas, the biggest issue was the the "L" of the house was too near the percolation area, and if we pushed the house forward we were too near the road.
So we had to remove the "L" and re-arrange the house layout and the house layout on the site.

After only about 1 hour and a bit of discussion we decided on a layout. We decided to sleep on it over night and I go to and started ripping through the numerous house books we had in our position. In one a design hit me in the face and we decided it looked top notch.

So we redid the cad drawings and I posted them into the planning office the next morning.

What we had now as a new layout was that the entrance and sitting room, toilet would remain, the door into the study was to go and double doors would now open into the old study, now dining room. Off the dining room would be a sun lounge with 5 windows and a door onto decking. The two side widows of the sun lounge were going to be triangular at the top to add a bit of character.

The kitchen now remained the kitchen but was now almost the same size as the old kitchen and dining room together! (Something we would find out to be an expensive change!)
The utility remained but now had a door out the back.

So we waited....

Getting the Quotes

During all the planning process I got to work on getting quotations, we had decided that we were definately building a timber frame house, we also wanted UFH ( UnderFloor Heating) and also a ground sourced heatpump (GSHP or Geothermal)

I submitted my plans for a timber frame quote to almost 40 timber frame companies. The price differences were amazing.

I sent off the plans for UFH and GEO to almost 20 companies, once again the differences were suprising.

The reason we wanted a timber frame was 2 fold, 1st because of it's speed, the 2nd was because of it insulation properties and I lived in a timber frame house in Galway and it was really warm and easy to heat.

We wanted the UFH because it is a lovely feeling to walk on warm ground and the ignorant rads are not on the wall.

The Geothermal we had came across in a friends house in Galway in 2000. Himself and his wife must have been one of the 1st to install it and they were very happy with it.
The concept is that there is a constant heat in the ground at a dept of 2ft or deeper of between 9 - 11 degrees C.
A liquid, water and anti-freeze or a refrigerant (DX) is pumped around a loop of pipes which are buried in the ground, the liquid absorbs the heat and takes it back to the HP(Heat Pump),
Here the heat is extracted and pumped using electricity to 35 Degress C for you UFH or using a heat exchanger for instant hot domestic water.

For example it is suggested that for our house we should heat our house and provide constant hot water for between 500 and 700 euro, time will tell!!

I also sent off the plans to tradesmen and window providers.

Also travelled around to a few self build shows.. some good some, brutal!

Planning Process - Part 2

So eventually we got another letter, this time there were issues that the house was too near the percolation are and also too near the railway line, so we had to move it.

We attempted a number of positions on the site and settled on one where we thought would be sufficent, the big issue was that we needed to be 20m minimum away from the percolation area.

Another issue that came up was with the trial hole and the tests we carried out.
It was noted that the person who carried out these tests needed to have indemnity insurance for carrying out trial hole/percolation tests.
Since my mate, who is fully qualified and experienced, worked for another company, he did not have this insurance so I had to go and source someone else, after a number of phone calls I got the same name off a number of people rang him and got him to carry out the tests.
He came back and told us we would need to have a full treatment system, his T-Value was twice ours, meaning that he suggested that it took twice as long for the water he poured to drain away compared to the water we poured into the hole.......

We had no real choice but to go with him and resubmit the results.

So we passed in all our results and changes again. 3rd time lucky.....

The Planning Process - Part 1

The planning process as we discover is an "interesting" journey.

We furnish our local COCO with all relevant documents, letters from work, bank statements, plans, site layouts etc.
We assumed their was going to be issues but to be honest we did not think that it would first of all take so long and secondly redesign our house!

The first issue they had was the sight line of the house, a small omission by us, we fixed it and resubmitted.
The after 12 weeks we got our first set of conditions.

We had to, in writing, explain exactly why we needed to build, and why in the location.
We also had to sign a 5 year occupancy clause.
We had to move the house X amount away from the front of the site and X amount away from the railway line which ran along side.
We also had to get a letter from Irish Rail to state that they had no issue with us building close to the railway line.
We got the letter and they had no issues.

We then submitted all the new items to the planning section again and waited........

Self Build In Ireland - Mayo

We are based in Mayo, Ireland.
Having lived away for 10 years we decided it was time to return home to build our dream home.
Site finding started way back in October 2003. Little did I think it would be 17 months before we got a chance to clear back the site!

We saw a fee sites, price differences were strange, eventually after a number of calls we were informed of a possible site.

I rang the farmer and arranged to meet him, after a 1 hour meeting we agreed a provisional cost for the site, we were delighted and I think he was happy.

Little did he or I know that it would be March 2005 before money changed hands!!

Starting in October 2003 we designed our house, we felt that we had enough know how and confidence to come up with a design that we agreed would suit us until they wheeled us out in a coffin!

So after suprisingly little time we agreed on a design, breathed a sigh of relief and hoped to start in April 2004.

I think a few hours passed and we looked at the design and sure to what everyone told us we picked out issues with the design!
Unfortunately I don't have the originals but it would have been interesting to see what the house was like originally!

So we decided between myself and my mate to purchase "FloorPlan" software and to get a better 3D view of our designs, think we paid 40 odd Euro for it and sure enough it was excellent, we added our house design to the package and we could do fly overs and walk throughs no bother.

My Wife (then Fiancee!) and I then agreed on a new design which we were delighted with.

House would be 2510 sq Ft, would be L shaped, have entrance, study to the right, sitting room to the left, bedroom to the back left, bathroom downstairs, kitchen to the back left of the hall, where it spread into the L shaped, down 2 steps into the dining room then out in the octagonal sun lounge, there was also a utility room off the kitchen.

Up the stairs from the hall onto the landing, a bedroom, ensuite, walk-in wardrobe. Off the Landing was a main bathroom, then beside it was a walk-in hotpress.
Of this were two large bedrooms.

So we got my mate to draw up the plans on CAD, we did a site survey did the trial holes and sent in our application with our Fee.
It was end of Jan 2004 when we sent it in, hoped that we maybe able to make a start on the site in May 2004.