Makita tools for home repairs.

For those of you who are thinking about buying a decapitated palace and renovating it, it is worth factoring the cost of tools and equipment required. (If you're in the building game, then you'll be exempt from this advise!)



(Slate and Stone French Property)



I have seen over the years many renovation project fail, or take a very long time due to the lack of knowledge of what's fully required when renovating.

From a tool point of view, realistically I would recommend budgeting for a decent set of tool if you are thinking about buying an old ruin, especially if you are thinking about buying a Cottage in Brittany France.

Tools in France are very expensive, even the cheep DIY stuff like a common Black and Decker Drill. 5000Euros worth of tools (purchased in the UK) may seen excessive, but think about it this way; it will save you time in the long run when doing up your stone and slate cottage in the middle of the French country side. Also, if you buy a quality brand, like Makita, if they break, they are very easy to fix, and resell once you have finished your building project.

Just a note about some of my tools, in particular the cordless combi drills. My Makita BHP451 has technically died, (though I did manage to revive it back to life). In fairness the amount of abuse that baby has received in the last 4 years is quite astonishing. I now understand why Makita tools are coloured black and blue, it matches the colour of most things if you beat it hard enough!

Anyway, as I stated before, good quality tools can be fixed and spare part available online, for example, replacement parts for my combi drill can be found here - http://www.powertoolspares.com/tool/makita/spares-and-accessories-for-bga452/bga452/spares/, though my repair just required a loose wire to be replaced.



(Makita combi drill BHP451 - stripped and serviced)



However, I have invested in a replacement; Makita DHP458 Body only, (I have loads of spare batteries.) I chose to get a replacement as my tools are my bread and butter. When something plays up, I can't afford to waste time.

There is a big difference between both the Makita BHP451 and the DHP458, though not obvious straight away. The main highlights are length, DHP458 is shorter, power; 10% more; has a better hook and has reduce the speed options from 3 to 2. (Having 3 speeds on the 451 required a larger gear box, thus making it longer and not really a usful feature!)



(Comparing Cordless Drills -  Makita BHP451 and DHP 458)

 

SparrowLegs Renovates holiday Gite, Collar Beam - End of week 1.

By the middle of the week one, the first floor had been gutted. This gave us a clean canvas to translate the design done on Sweethome 3D to the first floor. This was a rough translation as the real world environment highlighted faults with the CAD design and the inaccuracies with the original measurement plotted on the CAD program. (Actually, this was only out be 30mm max.)



(SweetHome 3D CAD Software)

The existing Ergonomics of ceiling height was to low, sitting at 2.15 meters. Increasing the height was possible, but governed by the Collar beam.

The Collar Beam in this project is under compression rather than tension as it keeps the Common rafters from sagging. If the Collar Beam was a around a third up from the base of Common rafter, then this would have been under tension, preventing the weight of the roof pushing the walls out of possition or the Header Beam (Wall Plate) from detatching from the outer wall. This is also called a Collar tie, generally a misused name for Collar beams under Compression.

(Collar Tie)

 

(Collar Beam)
 

Also another point particular to this project and a factor regarding any decisions moving the Collar beam was the understanding of traditional roofing techniques in rural France. This roof spreads the load on the Wall plate by using a Hammerpost (or internal Sprocket) scarf jointed to the Common rafter. These where both then held into position using a Hammerbeam and some bolts.

(A - Common Rafter, B - Hammerpost, C - Bolt, D - Hammerbeam.)

By measuring the distance between the Ridge beam and the Hammerpost and knowing that the Collar beam in under compression, I was able to increase the ceiling height by 250mm by moving the Collar beam. This wouldn't cause any issues and increases the ceiling height to become standard. (Well, standard in the UK! - In the uk, the standard ceiling height is 2.4 meters, or 8ft - 38mm difference. This height is why plasterboard in the UK 2400mm * 1200mm.

Collar beams raised ready for the new ceiling studwork to be installed on week 2.

Central Brittany Holiday Gite Renovation - 10 Week Challenge

The 10 week Challenge!

What's the challenge I hear you say? Renovate 100m2 Gite Cottage in 10 weeks. And when the word renovation is used, I mean complete and utter remodelling of the abortion which was erected 20 plus years ago.

Two guys, a boat load of tools, to rip out and replace everything but the exterior walls and roof. To start off you need to DESIGN!

For a successful build it is important to have some sort of design work finalised, it will never end well if you try and make it up as you go along.

If you're on a budget and can't afford an interior architect, I recommend Sweet Home  3D - http://www.sweethome3d.com/. It can be used in conjunction with other software such as Sketchup, or solely for just mapping out the interior layout.

One key point about designing a layout for a future renovations is it will allow you to estimate to some accuracy the amount of materials one might require.

 (New Layout proposed.)

 

Carpentry and wood flooring Central Brittany and Finistere

Wood is a great material to work with; I just wish I got to use it more often. Well, soon the worm will turn as I have 65m2 of new wooden flooring to lay. Though this isn’t as demanding as cabinet making, there are many things to consider which affects the look of a room, price of installation and material cost.

(Bespoke Wooden Workspace made 2012)

From the material point of view, my flooring project is price dependent, so I will be using solid Pine boards. I have the intention of painting of staining them in the future, so using a solid hardwood such as oak seems a bit of a waste.

The way you lay the boards can change outcome of a look of a room as well as price. It may seem strange, but the difference of choosing vertical, horizontal or even diagonal lines on the floor really does matters.

The room in question will be the living room, currently it’s divided into a kitchen, hallway, toilet/shower room and a living room. The plan is to knock the walls down to make a large open planned space which will be used as a living space and kitchen area. The space will be long and thin – 13.5m x4m.

As with all jobs, I like to use the computer to design my interiors as it saves money in the long run, give you a feel of what the finished look will be and the proportions of the room.

With a long thin room, you have to think that the way the flooring is set out is not dissimilar to a woman. A more rounded woman would never wear a dress with horizontal stripes as this will accentuate the areas she may not want others to notice. This concept is also true for tall women. Though this time it’s the vertical lines which are generally avoided, as this would make her look monstrously tall.

So before any work commences, I have done a 3D diagram of the three options available to determine my final choice.

(Floor-Boards Length)

(Floor-Boards Width)

The last option is to run the floor boards on the diagonal, this is extravagant due to the extra time it take to lay, however, I have always loved the finish result, especially if you frame the boarders of the room.

(Floor-Boards Diagonal)

 The final consideration of which way you chose to lay my come down to price. As with the diagonal option, choosing a horizontal option is also costly due to the amount of cuts involved and the time it takes. As stated earlier, the room is 13.5m x 4m and the flooring will be 2m x 15.5cm. So on the vertical run, every row two boards will have to be cut, whereas on the horizontal, though it is true that every row to will also require a cut, you will get to lay five to six boards which don’t have to be chopped.