It’s taken a while but finally – three weeks into the build – those foundation drawings are beginning to make sense to my uneducated eye! Fortunately we have some very experienced people around who understood them all along and have been getting our site prepared in line with the drawings. And also fortunately they have been extremely patient answering my stream of questions.
Having dug out a fair amount of soil and rock in the first couple of weeks, week 3 has been spent waiting for lorries coming from a quarry near Fort William carrying many tonnes of type 1 to fill the hole in again. The result: a very solid, level surface that passed the plate pressure test yesterday with flying colours. So whilst we had been faced with potentially having to install more substantial trench foundations to ensure that our house didn’t slide down the hill, the compacted type 1 means the original strip foundations – using the least amount of concrete we can get away with – are back on track.
In addition to finally learning about foundation drawings, the reality of our location in terms of adding to build costs (£ and CO2) is also becoming very clear. Most materials have to come from at least Fort William, which for a lorry is a 4.5 hour round trip – with accompanying diesel and carbon cost. The carbon cost of transporting the type 1 infill is in fact far more significant than the carbon impact of the material itself – not sure there was any alternative, but there are often unexpected impacts and consequences of decisions.
This morning (Saturday 29th), the position of the house was marked out on the pad ready for the 600mm wide x 200mm deep strip foundations to be dug on Monday. Hopefully the concrete will arrive to fill them some time this week, but with a national shortage of concrete – added to the usual delivery challenge bringing things in to Ardnamurchan – there’s no certainty of delivery date. Drains can be dug in the meantime though, and septic treatment plant installed.
We continue to be impressed by the tidiness of the site – all credit to the expertise of Jimmy. It’s also really reassuring to see that despite how much digging and levelling work has gone on, the re-profiled area looks very natural in the surroundings and our house should nestle in nicely.
looking up the plot to the drive and garage 
the garage pad 
space for storing Steve’s (imaginary) boat…
(aka parking and storage area during build)
house all marked out for foundations