Pete Goes Cottaging

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Thu Feb 24, 11 11:41 pm

Well, not quite

Was not sure whether to put this in the "workshop", but I will settle for "General stuff".....

As I have bored many people, we bought a dilapidated cottage a year ago, and since then its been like indoor camping. The house was built in about 1690 and has gone through many changes. originally 4 families lived in it, with ladders to the upstairs rooms and the livestock lived downstairs.

The House sits on the roadside in a small village. The front is north facing to the road, and the land to the right is where they are now going to build 8 affordable homes.....

Trigger_Andy · Post by **Trigger_Andy** » Thu Feb 24, 11 11:48 pm

Nice!

Id love to live in a house like that, and yes, I realise it has lots of problems modern homes dont but still.

Anonymous · Post by **Anonymous** » Thu Feb 24, 11 11:55 pm

Fantastic Pete, shame about the impending neighbors did you see that one coming?
The garage looks circa 1940

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Feb 25, 11 12:05 am

The back of the cottage clearly lays due south, which is nice from a sun-bathing perspective, but the bleaching sun has taken a heavy toll on the wooden beams.

The previous owner partially rendered over the beams and this has created problems, as the water has got trapped and consequently made the beams rot. This situation is the case across all the rear of the cottage.

This is where I got some advice from that Mopar-loving Dave Dick, who is a master carpenter and is used to working on old buildings.

He explained that I needed to undercut all the rendering, scrape all the beams by hand with a chisel to remove the oxidised wood (and in this case bark!!!), then stain and treat the wood, before re-pointing; and at some point paint the house......smashing

Also, the "lean to" bit on the end has been condemned by the Architect as structurally unsound............

Anonymous · Post by **Anonymous** » Fri Feb 25, 11 12:32 am

OMG Pete thats looks like fun, I bet you cant wait until those sunny days come along.
Can you legally demolish the lean to that is declared unsafe, in a listed building or do you have to make it safe?
To think I complain to Wendy about decorating a
few rooms

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Feb 25, 11 12:33 am

Here you can see my deft skills with a diamond tipped angle grinder - I can tell you I have had LOTS of practice. I would rather be cutting up an "A" body....

I bought a scaffold tower and spent much of the winter hanging off it with a gale whipping down from the spectacle that is Wimpole Hall and freezing my taters off.....This has taken months...........

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Feb 25, 11 12:47 am

Another example of finished pointing.
This has been a bit of a Chinese puzzle in that you have to work out the sequence for cutting back the rendering so that whole slabs of render does not detach itself.

Thanks for your comments, Lads.

The lean-to is part of an ongoing debate, and the architect is preparing proposals that I then have to jump through a series of hoops with the planning community....

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Feb 25, 11 12:58 am

The cottage is typically about 4 inches thick, and many places you can see daylight in the gaps between the beams and the rendering from the inside

I have often stuck chisels straight through the house and everywhere inside is covered in layers of dust.

It was incredibly drafty and freezing in the winter, usually 12-14 degrees during the day

The worst moment was finding that they had routed the ring main on the OUTSIDE of the beams at one point and then rendered over them - i just skimmed the cables with the Angle grinder......

Given that I work from home, then I spend most of the time in about 6 layers of clothing, but it is slowly getting better.

Lastly, I include a shot of the barn...it's about 36 feet long with 4 toilets (one for each family) and again I can't touch it without permission. Roydon has helped me restore this, he has been a great help...

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Feb 25, 11 1:03 am

I am sure this is not the "correct" way to restore the place, and Ivor and others are probably more acquainted with doing this professionally.

The Listed building team wanted me to rip ALL the render off ALL the building and start again in Lime. I declined......

More to follow if any of you are interested......

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Fri Feb 25, 11 1:14 am

I should add that Julie has been an absolute star.
She mucks in without complaint, and it was her up the tower in the winter painting the upstairs windows after doing all the tiresome preparation.....what a gal - can drive a 10 second car and paint as well

Cannonball · Post by **Cannonball** » Fri Feb 25, 11 1:23 am

good stuff pete i was going to say why did you not just knock all the rendering off and redo the lot,

any interior shots

RobTwin · Post by **RobTwin** » Fri Feb 25, 11 2:03 am

Thanks for the pics & info Pete, very interesting. Tho I expect some members wont be renewing their m'ship as a result of this thread

Surprised to see Dave Dick mentioned. Last I heard he was helping Elo at his London Motor Museum, building his weird & (mostly not so) wonderful creations, and filling footballer's cars trunk spaces with huge speaker cabinets etc

Good to hear he's been using his talents on some more worthwhile projects

jerry · Post by **jerry** » Fri Feb 25, 11 6:52 am

Now that really is some project Pete.Worked restoring timber framed houses, really interesting but hard graft especially if you are replacing the timbers.The worst part though was all the rigmarole with the with the heritage lot every time you want to do something.

Nick · Post by **Nick** » Fri Feb 25, 11 8:16 am

Hi Pete,

Looks great! Please send me a brouchure on the affordable housing next door when its published

morgan · Post by **morgan** » Fri Feb 25, 11 8:17 am

Brilliant thread Pete - and what an undertaking.
The house itself looks great and will bring joy and frustration in equal measures - our last house (thankfully un-listed, only 1875) was a flint cottage - I spent a whole year hanging off a scaffold tower chiselling out the crumbling mortar and repointing the entire thing... so I have some empathy

The impending neighbours is seriously annoying though.

More pics as you go please.