Tag Archives: stone wall

Friday 24th August 2012 – WELL, FOLKS …

collapsed lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome france… here it is. The wall’s all finished!

I was rather optimistic about my “couple of hours” – in fact it was more like 3.5 hours before it was all done.

But the hardest part of it was of course the clearing up afterwards that took the time – I don’t do clearing up as you know.

Anyway, there you are – all done and dusted. The tools have been put away and the araa has been cleared of rubbish the best that I can do.

As for the bits of old cement and so on that I dug out of the wall, they are on a tarpaulin at the side of the house. Soon I’ll be doing some concreting and I’ll be needing hardcore.

As for the weather behaving itself, the moment that I finished putting the last trowel of mortar into the wall, it started to rain. Bang on cue, you might say.

Anyway, seeing as it was 18:10 when I finished, I called it a day and boiled up some water for a shave and a good wash.

Following that, I crashed out, to such an extent that I didn’t make tea. I’d probably be asleep even now if Radio Tartasse hadn’t rung up – apparently the music files for the radio programme are corrupted so can she copy them again?

That’s where I was this morning, in Marcillat-en-Combraille, recording the Radio Anglais rock music programmes for Radio Tatasse. That was fairly straightforward after last month’s debacle.

So tomorrow is shopping at Commentry and maybe even the swimming baths at Neris-les-Bains. A good soak and a good relax should do me the world of good, I reckon, after all of my exertions.

Sunday is the pellerinage at La Cellette and the pot d’acceuil at St Maigner with Marianne, followed by the Virlet brocante and then Liz and Terry’s for rehearsals for the rest of the Radio Anglais programmes, and that’s the weekend done.

And do you like my Sunday?

That, would you believe, is a day of rest.

-6

Thursday 23rd August 2012 – IF THIS WEATHER …

… behaves itself tomorrow then a couple of hours on that wall will see it finished.

Yes, you can always tell how much I’m enjoying myself by the time that I realise that it’s knocking-off time. Finishing time on summer hours is 19:00 (18:00 when I’m on winter hours) and tonight it was … errrr … 19:45.

But there’s only a couple of rows to do, and to do that I’ll need to rake away all of the rubbish that I’ve scraped out of the wall.

But I’m a little disheartened as there’s a horizontal crack appearing. It’s quite long but only a couple of thou wide and, surprisingly enough, not where I expected it to be (one of those three enormous cracks that were there in the wall).

Anyway, it’ll have to stay like that for now.

When I’ve finished the wall I’ll leave it all to fester over the winter and maybe two days next summer I can fill in any of the cracks and put another layer on.

And, mentioning the weather, we had a storm this afternoon. At about 17:30 we had a torrential downpour for about 15 minutes. That put some water in the water butts, which is just as well, and it soaked the garden too.

But it’s nothing like enough.

Right now there’s a tremendous light-show going on and someone nearby is taking a pasting. 4 hours of torrential rain through the night would be just what the doctor ordered.

As for this morning, Rosemary rang up for a chat and then a couple of hours on the radio programme took the total up to 32kb – it’s now nudging at the heels of the Post Office stuff that we did this time last year.

One thing’s for certain – when that is finished I won’t need to do anything else for the rest of the year.

And talking of radioing, tomorrow I’m doing the rock programme. Still plenty to do so I need an early night.

-3

Wednesday 22nd August 2012 – I HAD A …

… much better day today.

Or, at least, I think that I did but I won’t know until I compare the photo of today’s work with that of yesterday’s.

Anyway, this morning the issue of the chisel was decided by the fact that I couldn’t find the old screwdriver anywhere no matter how hard I looked, and so I fetched a metalworking chisel from the toolbox. I’ll be using that until I can buy a stonemason’s chisel on Saturday.

And it worked wonders too – first thing that I did after midday was to chase out a huge segment of mortar, and I was doing so well that I reckoned that I’d bung a bucket-load of mortar in before lunch.

I must have been so carried away though because a glance at the clock told me that it was 14:20 – a good 20 minutes after lunchtime and that’s not like me at all. You can call me anything you like as long as you don’t call me late for lunch

collapsed lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome franceAfter lunch I heaved another 6 buckets of lime mortar into the wall.

But although it all went in really well and I was making some really nice and consistent mixes, this huge crack is being rather awkward and it isn’t really going how I want it to go.

None of the stones that I can find are the correct size and so it’s being a little patchy.

it’ll all stick together, that’s for sure, but it’s not as artistic as I would like it to be.

A good morning on the radio programmes too.

I’m now up to 23kb of our latest effort and it’ll be another big one I reckon, certainly overtaking the “load of rubbish” that we did in February and March.

But hark at me, hey? “Not as artistic as I would like it to be” – who do I think I am?

I’ll be starting to criticise other people’s curtains if I carry on like this!

-4

Tuesday 21st August 2012 – I HAD ONE …

… of those days where I couldn’t get myself started.

At least I had a good night’s sleep with the fan going through the night – so much so that I dreamt that I was back working at a job that I hated in a place that I hated with people who I hated.

Surprising isn’t it, what goes through people’s minds.

So this morning in the heat I stirred a few papers around – but I’ve managed 14kb of notes so far for the radio programmes and that should see us through the next recording session if I can’t summon up the enthusiasm to do any more.

collapsed lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome france>Outside this afternoon another 6 buckets went into the wall but it’s slow work despite me standing on the ground today doing the work.

I’ve been filling in two of the vertical cracks, and that has been time-consuming, and also it’s not been easy to move some of the old cement pointing that needs to come out.

The old metal screwdriver that I use as a chisel is giving up the ghost, I think. I shall have to buy a new one … “this heat really is getting to you” – ed.

Anyway, I reckon that if I can keep up this schedule, another 5 days will see this wall finished – and then it will be time to start on the long wall and point that.

But that should be easier … “famous last words” – ed … as I’ll be working off the scaffolding and you saw how quickly I did the house wall once I had a scaffolding up there.

Nevertheless, I’m impressed with what I’ve done so far. I shan’t know the place when it’s finished, whenever that might be.

Two phone calls too – one from Marianne telling me that our walk tomorrow at St Hilaire is cancelled as there’s a funeral at the church, and secondly from Rosemary who wanted a chat.

And I cooked a mega-aubergine-and-kidney-bean doodah to last for the next 3 days and just as I finished, the gas ran out. That’s over 10 months (8th October – I mark the bottles with the date when I connect them) that that bottle has lasted.

It just shows you the benefits of having the electric steamer and also the new woodstove. A far cry from when I needed to buy a new bottle every three weeks, isn’t it?

-3

Monday 20th August 2012 – I WENT TO …

… sleep last night with the new electric fan still working. First time I’ve ever left the inverter running through the night.

It clearly did the trick as this morning as it was quite overcast and there was even a hint of rain.

I’d had a decent night’s sleep too for a change in this weather and I think that I might try this again tonight. And I’ll need it too because the weather warmed up substantially again this afternoon.

collapsed lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome franceAll this afternoon I’ve been working on the wall again.

7 buckets went into it today and substantial progress is being made, although you would hardly think so from looking at it.

Nevertheless in one corner I can actually now work off the floor and not on a ladder, and that should speed things up. You’ve no idea how uncomfortable it was working on either a too-short ladder or a too-long ladder.

I had a visitor too – the young guy who rents the field at the back of the house came to check up on it. We had a chat and it seems that his response to my working in his field is that “well, it’s your wall” – which is a nice pleasant change from how things used to be.

In fact he told me that he didn’t even mind my working there when his cows were there, although he did mention that they might knock me off my ladder

But I’m glad that I sorted that out anyway – for a start it means that I don’t have to move everything out of the field in the evening.

And later on this year, I might even put up the scaffolding at the back of the house and finish off tidying the roof, seeing as he doesn’t seem too bothered.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that in 2009 we did the back of the roof by me hanging on to an overhanging ladder that was anchored to the apex of the roof.

There’s a tiny window opening in the back wall and I’ve reached there, and peering in through the window it’s definitely true – the back wall has been built in two parts – the outer and the inner.

That makes me feel an awful lot better – if the outer does fall down, the inner will still be there. Mind you, after the amount of extra stones and mortar that has gone into this wall, there won’t half be a row if it does fall down.

Apart from that, this morning I was on the computer – not doing the web site but doing the radio programmes. I’m way behind with them after yesterday and I need to catch up.

And while I was typing this, another bat flew into my attic – teach me to leave the doors and windows open, won’t it? Luckily this one I managed to move on intact, not like the one from last year.

Makes a change from the bats in the belfry – they are always there as you know.

-4

Friday 17th August 2012 – IT WAS A GORGEOUS …

… day for doing the washing. Loads of wind, a bright hot sunny day and plenty of hot water in the home-made 12-volt immersion heater that I use as a dump load for the excess solar energy.

And if I hadn’t have been so preoccupied I would have done a load too.

collapsed lean to stone wall repair les guis virlet puy de dome franceHowever, this afternoon I was back up the wall again.

6 large buckets went into it today, but again it doesn’t look too much like it as it’s all disappearing into the interior.

And I glanced into a hole from where a stone fell out (that’s another problem that I’m having) and the front layer is a good two or three inches away from the rear layer, with a gaping hole between them.

Rhys suggests demolishing the outer layer and rebuilding it, and that’s an idea that I haven’t yet discounted.

But it involves spending much more time on the neighbour’s land, fixing a scaffolding on his property, and also loads of time and loads of skill, neither of which I have

But I tell you one thing.

When I carried out the emergency repair on the long side after it collapsed I infilled the top of the wall with ferro-cement and then with concrete and when I rebuilt the top of the back wall (the one where I’m working now) I infilled the top of that with concrete too.

And I’m glad that I did because that ought to hold together even if part of the underneath should happen to fall down

But I’m glad that I’m doing it now. It wouldn’t have lasted for too much longer.

-2

Thursday 16th August 2012 – ONE THING …

gardening raised beds LES GUIS VIRLET puy de dome france.. that can be said about the weather that we had on Sunday is that the garden has really come to life.

The courgettes have finally started to flower, which is quite a relief as I was starting to worry about them, and then also the corn has started to push its tassels out which means that they should be starting to develop their cobs pretty soon.

I was worried about them for a while too.

But I do have to say that my potager has never ever looked so good and a huge thank-you to Rosemary who has motivated me, kept me going, and come to lend a hand on occasions too numerous to mention

But never mind the garden for the moment. I had the usual few hours on the internet this morning working on the website as usual.

I’ve also had to spend some time sorting out all of my photos from yesterday. Marianne wants a couple of the walk for her newspaper, and Rick the trailer guy wanted the ones that featured him on his poor ‘cello to pass on to the insurance company.

collapsed lean-to repairing stone wall LES GUIS VIRLET puy de dome franceBut after all that, another 6 buckets of mortar went into the wall.

And this is the difficult bit because firstly I’m working on the bit that’s bulging and dropping stones, and secondly I’m uncomfortably perched on the ladder.

it’s too high for where I need to be and any smaller ladder isn’t tall enough.

Not only that, I have to carefully chip out the flaking cement that someone has tried to use as weathering over the old mortar, and do that without disturbing too much the weak stones.

Those 6 buckets don’t seem to have done much – but then again these cracks are way deep and forcing in the liquid cement isn’t quite as easy as it might

But I’m making slow progress all the same and in another 10 days it will be finished.

I hope.

-1

Tuesday 14th August 2012 – I’VE HEAVED …

… 6 buckets of lime mortar into this wall today – with the 5 from yesterday that makes 11 and yet it’s hardly making any difference.

collapsed lean-to repointing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome franceYou can see near the top of the lean-to wall the light white mortar – that was the 5 buckets from yesterday.

If you look underneath, over the top and down both sides, you’ll just about be able to make out today’s mortar. It’s the sandy coloured stuff because of course it hasn’t dried yet.

The join between the house and the lean-to takes tons of mortar to fill it. I’ve been stuffing into the gap the old bits of cement that I’m pulling off the wall and then going over all of that with a very wet mortar mix, pushed well inside.

I’m hoping that that will help seal the gap and maybe bind it together.

But you can see where I’ll be having the real trouble – just in from the left-hand edge lower down. That’s bursting out a little and the cement binding that someone has put in at one time has long since fallen out.

Some of the stones are loose and others are missing. It’s going to be quite a job to fit that all together.

It’s a good job that the wall is double-skinned and that the inner skin is holding, otherwise that all would have been down long ago.

But it won’t be done tomorrow – it’s a bank holiday here and I’m technicianing for Marianne in the morning;

And then in the afternoon there’s a walk around Pionsat and Durat – where the Dark Age fort used to be – so I’m going off on that.   

-2

Tuesday 7th August 2012 – WELL, I’VE FINISHED …

collapsed lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome france… the rebuilding of the wall.

Well, to be honest, of course I haven’t. What I do mean to say is that all of the stonework and all of the infill has been done. There’s still the pointing to do of course and that’s not going to be the work of 5 minutes, I can tell you.

And then I’ll need to do the woodwork for the window frames, paint it all and then fit the glass

collapsed lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome franceAnd there’s also the inside of the stonework to attend to, but that’s nothing like as important as the pointing.

But there’s a reason for it all being done today. That is that I didn’t have any sleep at all last night – clearly my guilty conscience or something like that.

Anyway at about 07:45 I was fed up of just lying there and so I got up and about breakfasting. And then, seeing as how I couldn’t concentrate on the web site, I went out and resumed work on the wall

I had a lovely interruption for a couple of hours though, because Liz came round. She was after my blackberries, which I gladly let her take. And we also had a good old chinwag too.

And after lunch, it was back up the wall.

I said that once the wall was finished I would knock off, no matter what the time. And that was what I did – although 18:54 represents only a 6-minute bonus.

And now I’m far too shattered to do anything else and so I’m off to bed

-1

Monday 6th August 2012 – I HAVEN’T POSTED …

collapsed lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome france… a photo of my wall for quite some time, and so this is where I currently am.

You’ll notice that all of the breeze blocks have gone, except for the ones reinforcing the corner (and I’m not taking those out at any price) and I’ve also put in the base of the second window.

As for the rest, you can see that the outside stonework is proceeding apace, as is the interior stonework.

The infill, which consists of those very lightweight hollow bricks smashed into smaller pieces and mixed with a very lightweight concrete mix (I found some more gravel) is also up to the level that it should be.

Another couple of days on this and the stonework will be done. I’ll then have to turn my attention to fitting the guttering and then doing the pointing.

I’ll be glad when it’s finished because it really is driving me up the wall, but it needs to be done.

And what else? There was the working on the website of course this morning, and this evening down at the pub with Arno, Bill and Marianne.

That was it, really.

-1

Friday 20th July 2012 – WHAT A SHAMBLES!

And, just for a change, I’m not talking about anything to do with the Open University Students Association.

At 10:00 I needed to be at Radio Tartasse in Marcillat-en-Combraille to record the rock music programme and thanks to a 07:30 start this morning I had everything ready and so I was there on time.

15 minutes it takes to record the programmes – I set up all the music at home and copy them onto a memory stick – but it was blasted flaming well 11:50 before I managed to leave.

It seems that someone has been messing around with the computer there and there’s a file running in a kind of algorithm that is stopping the sound card working correctly.

They had the manager and two technicians trying to fix it and in the end Yours Truly was so fed up that he imposed himself in the office and managed to free off the sound card by disabling the background program via the Task Manager so that we could make a start.

Then, they managed to lose the program that we had recorded and so after they gave up, I searched all of the hard drives for it and it wasn’t there at all, so we went to re-record it, with much GRRRRRRing.

And then the program wouldn’t open as “an instance of this program is already running” – seems that the Manager had entered a file name but had forgotten to save it and had then minimised the window.

No wonder it took so flaming long.

At lunchtime I took Bill to Montaigut-en-Combraille – he had bought a new bed and needed it transporting home and that was not as straightforward as it might have been either, for reasons that I shan’t go into.

But to cut a long story short, it was 15:00 when I finally stopped for lunch and I was dismayed.

lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome franceSo having been driven up the wall all this morning it was only natural that I was back on the scaffolding this afternoon.

If you compare this photo with one of the ones from earlier this week you can see how much progress I’ve been making.

But the real proof of progress is the fact that you’ll notice the new-looking breeze block in the wall by the bottom-right of the photo – when I started to repair the lean-to, that breeze block was the first stone that I had to lay.

Everything from and including that breeze block is what I’ve had to put it.

Anyway, after a few hours on that, it was 18:50 when I finished a load of cement and so I called it a day on the wall.

That gave me 10 minutes to sow a row of endives ready for the winter. You can see how organised I’m becoming these days, can’t you?

So back up here to warm up and dry off because today we were back in winter – cold and wet.

Summer has been and gone, and that was your lot.

-1

Thursday 19th July 2012 – I DIDN’T QUITE MANAGE …

… an early start this morning.

I was awake for much of the night with had another bad attack of cramp and that wore me out. So it was 09:00 when I finally rose out of my pit.

We did the usual bit working on the website and then for the rest of the day I was outside.

We had a few minutes on the wall with the SDS drill but the day wasn’t really bright enough to run that for any length of time and so I fixed the solar water heater instead. You may remember me saying that the tank fell down on my head yesterday afternoon while I was having a shower.

lean to repairing stone wall les guis virlet puy de dome franceThis afternoon I was working on the wall again.

Long-term readers of this rubbish will remember that the other two walls that I built, I erected stones in the vertical position at the outside and inside, and filled in between with a very lightweight concrete – a kind-of concrete wall with stone cladding.

Anyway, that’s what I’m doing here with this wall now.

Part of the wall had been built with very light breeze blocks – real cinder blocks even – so I’m smashing those one-by-one to use as the infill and then pouring concrete over the pieces to hold them in.

It will be a lightweight wall, but it won’t ‘arf have some strength.

I’ve made quite a lot of progress and I reckon that given a good day on there tomorrow I shall have about half of the wall finished.

All I’ll have to do then is to point it, of course.

-2

Tuesday 17th July 2012 – NOW THIS IS ASTONISHING!

You are probably wondering what the photo below is all about – but read on.

Now to cut a long story short … "hooray" – ed … Rosemary came round today to offer me some more help in the garden and as I had no tinned potatoes for the salad I asked her to pick up a tin or two on the way round.

Instead of tins, she appeared with a bag of new potatoes – and these needed cooking of course.

potato 400 watt vegetable steamer les guis virlet puy de dome franceIt was a glorious day – probably one of the best I have ever had as far as solar energy goes (and doesn’t that make a change just recently?) and it came to my mind that ages ago I had bought a 400-watt electric steamer – cooker.

I’d never used it although I remembered a few weeks ago saying that I would like to give it a run out some time or other in the near future. With all of this solar energy right now it seemed that the appropriate moment had arisen.

Result – 15 minutes later one perfectly-steamed pile of spuds. I’m well-impressed with this. This really is Progress with a capital P.

I remember one of my best friends (an ex-best friend now as it happens) taking the p155 out of me behind my back with all of his friends on the Land Rover forum about my plans to try a microwave oven here.

They spent a considerable amount of time calling me a few choice names and so on.

And while an electric steam-cooker is hardly a microwave, it’s still up there with the coffee machine and the electric fire that we have had running during the winter as signs that home comforts are perfectly achievable with my set-up.

As you also know, I’m running a 12-volt TV-cum-video player up here as well.

Yes, I absolutely hate being surrounded by negativity – it drags me right downhill. One of the (many) reasons why I left the UK.

Rosemary and I spent a few hours weeding and I’ve never seen the garden looking as good as this, that’s for sure. We even started to pull up the new spuds but that was a waste of effort – seems like my crop has disappeared.

rebuilding stone wall collapsed lean-to les guis virlet puy de dome franceAfter Rosemary left, I carried on with the wall of the lean-to. You can tell how much I did by looking at where the mortar is still grey and not white.

I’ve accomplished quite a lot there but there’s still plenty to go and I’m wondering if I’ll have enough stones. If not, I’ll have to go on the scavenge and see what I can find.

But the wall underneath is in a bad way – there are three large cracks running down it. Seeing this made me glad that when I made a brief start in repairing it all back 10 years ago I had made that strip of reinforced concrete underneath where the breeze blocks are.

That strip of concrete is embedding the horizontal beams of the floor and thus ties all of the thing together. But once the new bit is finished I can repoint all of the cracks.

I’ve also been attacking the hole that I’m trying to drill out, what with all of this electricity we had today, and I’ve grounded out with the circular drill bit.

Of course, I lent out my other extension to Rob, didn’t I

We finished the day with the hottest solar shower I have had for a long time, and it was gorgeous.

But as for starting the day – how about 06:35 for breakfast? When has that ever happened before?

-2

Monday 16th July 2012 – BLIMMIN’ ‘ECK!

Yes, and for many reasons too. Probably the most important was that it didn’t rain today and we had bright blue skies, with just a few clouds passing by – the first time since I can’t remember when.

It didn’t take long for the batteries to be fully-charged, and then the excess solar charge was diverted into the dump load.

home made 12 volt immersion heater solar energy dump load overcharge les guis virlet puy de dome franceAnd with the data panel that I installed on the overcharge controller, I could see how it was doing.

28 amps – or 382 watts – currently going into the home-made 12 volt immersion heater. Already, 23.4 amp-hours have gone in and by the time that I took the statistics before going to bed, we’d have a grand total of 122.2 surplus amp-hours – over 1.5KwH.

By the time I was starting to slow down – at 18:00 – the water in the dump load was up to 58°C and still rising. And so cue a load of washing. That’s all hanging out on the line now.

I even changed the bed linen, having to peel the pillow cases off the pillows and the quilt cover off the quilt.

It won’t only be clean bedding tonight – it will be a clean me too, for the temperature in the solar shower reached 33°C and a couple of litres out of the 12-volt immersion heater pushed that up to a respectable temperature and so I had a nice warm shower – and how I enjoyed that!

Pure bliss!

That’s made me feel like a new man – although where I might find one around here is anyone’s guess.

But that’s not all.

The benefits of going to bed early saw me up and about and breakfasting at 07:40 and that was really astonishing. That meant that I had a good 4 hours on the website and I was still all done by midday.

So I mixed a load of mortar and made a start on rebuilding the stone wall on the lean-to. That kept me busy for a few hours.

Rob came round to borrow my 100mm hole-cutter so we had a chat for 15 minutes, and then I had another task to attend to.

Hardly any water seems to be entering the water butts so I also stripped down the home-made water filters. And as I suspected, bunged up to the eyeballs, they were. and cleaned out the water filters. No wonder there wasn’t much water reaching the water butts.

Anyway, they are all ready for the next torrential rainstorm.

And me? I’m ready to snuggle up into my nice clean bed. I’ve been looking forward to this for ages

-8

Monday 14th November 2011 – WELL, THAT’S FINALLY THAT!

puy de dome franceYes, I’ve finished the wall today.

And about time too if you ask me. Mind you it’s just as well because the weather is going to change on Wednesday so we are told, and we can expect rain. So at least that gives 36 hours or so for the chalk to set and to harden before the rain gets to it.

Of course with the rain it means that it isn’t going to freeze any time soon, and that’s good news too as it gives even more time to cure before anything serious can attack it.

It seems that I’ve finished just in time

Mind you, it was awkward up the ladder doing this last bit and it’s made me realise just what a good idea it was to buy this scaffolding. A very good move, that.

There was some mortar left over too and so for that I did some work on the inside of the rear wall. And that was interesting too because I was still out there at 18:30 with a torch working on that – not like me, considering that we are on winter hours.

It was pretty tiring up there too and I didn’t really feel like going to the Anglo-French Group meeting but I managed to tear myself off the sofa and go down to St Gervais d’Auvergne.

Tomorrow I’ll be putting up the wind turbine – not something that I’m looking forward to doing on my own but it won’t get done on its own no matter how long I stare at it. And when it’s done, I can move the scaffolding out of the lean-to and put it at the side, ready to start on the roofing of it.

Isn’t this all progress?

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