Delays

I knew there would be some delays during the build but I had no idea how frustrating it would be. Since the last post we haven't had a great deal of work completed on the house. We added gutter guard as a variation a few weeks ago which meant that the scaffolding had to remain up and would delay work on the lower roof etc. The problem we've had is with the gutter guard tradies - they showed up for half a day of work, installed it across the back of the house, and then...... nothing. So the build sat stagnant for two weeks until our SS had enough and ordered the scaffolding taken down. The gutter guard guy will now have to use harnesses etc at his own expense to finish off the install.

So, what progress has there been? Not a great deal until the past week:

• Upper bricks cleaned
• Eaves and drain pipes painted (well, mostly done)
• Garage roof installed (still needs finishing on the back of the parapet wall)
• Rear roof mostly installed (they ran out of tiles)

Being two weeks behind schedule is going to make handover interesting. We've been advised that handover is still scheduled pre-Christmas. Christmas Eve actually. This date will need to be brought forward slightly because some items are done at settlement i.e., oven, hot water etc. We can't live there until everything is working and I won't accept handover if there's no chance of getting it all done before Christmas. For now, I won't share the upcoming milestones but the dates we've been given for lockup and PCI seem reasonable. We may still make it in time!

What's happening over the coming week? We should see the installation of electrical rough-in and air-conditioning ducts now, lower eaves installed, and framing fixed/finished. Gyprock is scheduled for the 8th October, which means we should also see the house cleaned up inside, lower brick clean, the cladding, insulation and soundproofing in some walls installed.

This is all the gutter guard tradies could manage:

Upper bricks cleaned and eaves painted:

Garage roof:

How it looks today (bottom roof almost complete):

Upper Eaves

Bricking is done, the clouds have mostly cleared, Spring is in the air and the house build is going along pretty smoothly at this point.

The plan for this week is to complete the upper floor eaves (done), install cladding, painters to paint the eaves, remove scaffolding and upper floor brick clean, air conditioning tubing and electrical rough-in. It sounds like a lot of work - I will believe it when I see it! We also threw a spanner in the works by ordering gutter guard - the pricing was a little higher but I feel more comfortable getting it done during the build. That might delay things by a couple of days, but we're OK with that.

So today, the eaves were installed along with merbau balcony posts and additional framing in preparation for the gyprocking.

Eaves and posts:

Extra framing around spa for gyprock:

Roof

It's been a while since the last update because things got a little behind schedule due to the rain and it can get pretty boring looking at posts about bricks. So, mrskidsbuggingme and I have an update about bricks, fascia, guttering and a roof.

Even though it has been cloudy with a chance of meatballs over the past two weeks, The brickies were on site at every possible opportunity and almost finished the bricking. They would have been done, had they not run out of bricks again. Did I mention torrential downpours too? Arks? Swimming lessons anyone?

Only the rear corner of the house still needs to be bricked - I guess that'll happen over the next few days as another pallet of bricks was delivered today. Hopefully there's some good spares left over.

Anyway, the fascia, gutters and roof were put on this week. What a relief! It's starting to look a lot more like a house! A few of the roof tiles have chipped corners which seems a bit lazy to me. I counted three without walking around completely because I really, really, really don't like heights. Maybe they didn't think I'd notice? Well, I'm pretty fussy about things - they will need to be replaced. These things are minor in the grand scheme of things but they still need to be done properly from the beginning.

Also, there was a massive downpour again last night and the gutter above the balcony was still full of water this afternoon, so, they'll also need to adjust the fall of the gutter. Most people probably never check this stuff before handover? Like I said, I'm fussy :)

Anyway, pics: