That gap between the windows is where the rotten lintel was this morning. As you can see with the aid of a hammer and chisel and of course the chainsaw its all clear and ready to fit the new lintel and build back up again. Just need a few days where the weather is sufficiently above freezing to mix some mortar!!
I've also been cleaning off the remaining beam ready to fix the rest of the solives. Mostly this involved removing the old ledger strip and de-nailing. Sound easy but not as easy as you might think when the ledger strip has been there for 300 years. The aproach I took was to saw through every foot or so and then split with a chisel around the nails. All the nails were lovely old hand forged jobs. I almost thought about cranking up the forge and making a few replacements, but on reflection that seamed a little excessive even for me.
As you will notice that beam is a little on the skinny side so I'm going to build a colombage wall with oak posts to add some support. I reckon 150mm square should do the trick. When I'd finished up today I even had a little help tidying up!
Just to remind me what I'm aiming at with the upstairs I also taken the opportunity to look at the plans (not a bad thing now and again). Good thing I did because a few things are a bit different than I remembered. Also taking to Julia I think were going to do the main bedroom as the architect intended as a "room in a box" sitting within the space. I wasn't overly keen on the idea at the time but actually its quite simple and inexpensive to do, so its back in.
So you now have a blogger account, Facebook and Skype? its like you've run away from civilisation so that you can better embrace technology! just a handy hint you can get all of the above as App's on the iphone
ReplyDeletei..cough...ph....spit.....phone...choke!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteIt's only a short step from `iphone' to `hey nonny nonny'; and then, I'm afraid, I'll shall have to call the police.