More on those once I've got this blog up-to-date - for now here's Bales part1.
James Herriot maneuver. Kuba stuffing loose straw twisted together into any spaces between bales
Joe modelling a hazel staple, used to bind the corners together on each course
Staple hammered home
A notch cut in the window posts at the height the window sill will be (ideally, a height divisible by bale depth: eg, one bale high)
Coralie using the window sill (fitted into the notches) to compress the bale underneath by hammering in folding wedges.
The wedges are then cut flush with the post
Coralie and Kuba
Marcin and Joe debating
More sill fitting and compression
Fairy cakes by our friend Penny, rock cakes by my mom. All scrumptious.
Kuba bashing a stake in. The fourth layer of bales is pinned to the rest with long hazel stakes.
The first wall-plate sections arrive from Darren's workshop. Aksel, Joe, Mark and Kuba (and me behind the camera) take in how big and heavy they are, and contemplate how to get them up on top of the walls. Cursing of structural engineer's over-engineering begins.
Walls! They weren't there when I went out to buy screws (at least, that what it felt like)
Marcin and Civita battle it out
The first week's team (a good number stayed for second week and were joined by more). Front row: Darren, Kuba, Anna, me, Julia, Civita, Tim. Back row: Luke, Marcin, Aksel, Mark, Joe, Robert, Sam, Jonny, Mike.
Meanwhile, over on the wrap: timber baseplate fitted ready for bales (timber for all baseplates, wallplates, window/door posts and sills, is UK Douglas Fir - good durable timber that will take a long time to rot even if it gets wet.)
Walls at full height
window-containing boxes for the wrap, so that the new windows can sit in the line of the bale insulation (windows will be fitted flush with the outside edge of the timber)
Kuba setting up his time lapse camera.
More wall plate, squeezed in to Darren's workshop. It's a big workshop but the wallplates only just fitted. He said moving them around was like playing Tetris.
packing strap, passed through eyelets in the wall...
...the strapping passes over two verticle hazel poles which are slotted into the ends of a horizontal timber, forming a big 'H' which is clamped back toward the wall using the ratchet tensioner on the strapping. This secures the bales to the bungalow wall and helps compress them.
The baseplate is (intentionally) set up so the space above is slightly less than the number of bales we need to fit in. The penultimate row of bales is then compressed downwards using jar-jacks and a steel plate, the last bale is squashed in, resulting in a dense, strong, compressed bale wrap.
Joining the sections of insanely unwieldy wall-plate in situ.
The wall plate was resting on temporary bales above the height of the window and door posts, so we could join it all together. Here we're starting to lower it into place (lots of people on scaffold lifting, other people pulling or pushing the support bales out, then all lowering it down)
Kuba finally turns into a bale
A tricky moment
The dog poses while in the background we try to get the window and door posts to slot through the holes in wallplate
The last door post is slotted through, signifying complete walls for the extension. Everyone clapped and cheered, which surprised me, but was lovely. Mum said it was a proud moment, and Dad would have thought so too. We both got a bit weepy for a brief moment then pulled it together.
Pleased and relieved.
Look at my lovely bale walls
