Well, I guess it was inevitable given that we are digging up the top field.
We have come across probably 6 or so skeletons, mainly skulls. But all animals. Mostly sheep, but also what looks like a couple of dogs.
Looks like a sheep’s skull
Mmmm….I think this is probably a dog. Possibly the family pet.
Well, I am not an expert, but I think it is dead. The hole in the skull looks like a bullet hole. This could be the start of CSI Holmfirth!
We have installed 800m of ground loops for the ground source heat pump. The hole has been back filled and we are now excavating the other half of the field. This will hopefully enable us to install the remaining 1000m to pipework. The pipes need to be spaced 750mm apart, there we need a minimum of 750 sqm of space. We have EXACTLY 750 sqm, so this is going to be close, very close. We won’t know if we have enough space until we attempt to lay the pipework. This is scheduled to happen on Thursday, so we don’t have to wait very long.
There is a 1000m of pipe to be laid in this hole once all of the ground has been cleared. We reckon it will be Thursday before we are ready to lay the pipes – once the hole is flattened, there is 60 tonnes of sand to lay on the base of the hole.
Once the large stones in the bottom of the hole haev been dealt with (crushed), we will add sand to the base of the hole to protect the pipework.
The ground loops are going to go right up to the new extension as we need to use all the land that we have available to us. With 1000m of pipe to install, we require around 750 sqm. We reckon we have exactly 750 sqm available.
Friends came over at the weekend and brought with them an olive tree for the garden. It needs (apparently) to harden up in the polytunnel before being planted out.
Many thanks to Diane and Steve – next time you come over, I hope that you will be able to stay in the new house!
The new olive tree needs to harden up in the polytunnel before we decide where to plant it.
We have the first 800m installed and have a further 1000m to go. We have now back filled the area over the initial 800m and are now excavating the 2nd part of the field. However, we had to move all of the top soil first that we had piled up on the other half of the field.
This is turning into a lot more work than we first imagined, however, there is no turning back now.
This is the second part of the field that we are going to have to dig up to install the final 1000m of pipework.
Here we have removed the top soil and a strip of subsoil. This takes the soil level down about a 1m – just enough for the ground loops.
More of the field exacavated.
This is the heap of sub soil that we have excavated as the second part of installing the ground loops. There is a lot more to come out before we are ready to install the last 1000m of pipework.
It is difficult to get a sense of the scale, but this heap of top soil is around 8-10m high.
We have just started digging to install the second half of the ground loops and the spoil heap is pretty impressive. The top of the spoil heap is a great place to get a view of the overall state of the building work. The 3D image below, although taken from a slight different perspective, shows what the building will look like when finished.
The concrete slab is due to be poured on Tuesday – the concrete pump required to pour the concrete has broken down, but has now been booked for Tuesday.
In the meantime, working is progressing on installing the second half (the last 1000m of pipe) of the ground loops.
This is the current view from the top of the spoil heap. The concrete slab for the new extension is due to be laid next Tuesday.
New extension to the left and the existing cottages to the right.
It has been a busy couple of days and we have started to reinstate the field over the 800m of ground loops that we have installed. We have pressure tested these pipes and they still seem to be holding 1 bar of pressure. The good news is that we will know straight away if any of the pipes get damaged. I suspect that they are more sturdy than we give them credit for, but we don’t want to take any chances. No one wants to have to dig them up later.
The drains are now all installed ready for us to pour the concrete slab in the new extension. We have also connected up the drains to the septic tank. We have put a rubber bung into the drain and then filled all of the drains with water. If there are any leaks, they will show up straight away. The building inspector turned up towards the end of the day and signed off the drains. Tomorrow we will remove the rubber bung and let all of the water drain into the septic tank and then cover over the drains. There are just too many holes now on this site and it will good to get some of them filled in.
This was taken by Ricky (one of the guys installing the ground loops) while stood on the spoil heap. The stones have been used to weigh the pipes down while it is being back filled. They are removed as soon as the sand is laid down.
Sand goes down first on top of the ground loops first, then the subsoil is carefully put on top the sand.
We have started to fill the area where the first 800m of ground loops have been installed. We have also finished sorting out all the drains in the new extension (see picture left). The hose is filling all the drains with water to test for leaks. There aren’t any!
This is a manhole full of water. We have filled the drains with water to test them.
We have installed the first 800m of ground loops and have decided to pressure test them. This means filling the pipework with water and increasing the pressure.
We have put 1 bar of pressure into the installed loops and will see what happens overnight.
Of course, we had to repair the water supply to start with!
We have put 1 bar of pressure (water) into the first 800m of ground loops. If this goes down overnight, we know we have a problem.
While looking for the main drain to the septic tank, we seem to have found the water supply for the property. Unfortunately, it was all a bit late.
The good news is that it is easily fixed and we know how and where to turn it off.
While looking for the main drain to the septic tank, we seem to have found the water main. It is only a plastic pipe and easily repaired, but it means no cups of tea until it is fixed.
We have laid the first 3 ground loops and are now in a position to cover them back over. Each loop is 50m and there is a layer of sand below and above the pipework. The subsoil is then carefully reinstated avoiding any very large stones.
There is a flow and return for each of the loops. Each loop has a tap that controls the flow to and from each ground loop. This allows the flow to be controlled to each loop compensating for the fact that some of the loops are further away from the pump.
Each pipe is 100m long, so each loop is 50m. Each of the manholes has a 6 port manifold so that is 600m of pipe connected to each manhole. There are 3 manholes making a total of 1800m of pipework.
The first 300m of ground loops are being covered using some of the subsoil that we removed earlier in the week.
There is around 100mm of sand on the bottom, then 100mm of sand on top of the ground loops. Then the subsoil is carefully reinstated.
The first 300m of ground loop disappearing under the subsoil.
Installing the loops for the ground source heat pump is turning out to be a lot more labour intensive that we were expecting.
Rather than digging trenches, we have decided to take up all of the top soil and sub soil to a depth of about 1m. Digging 1 m deep trenches 1m wide and 1 meter apart is just to hard. It is easier to remove all fo the soil in one go rather than digging trenches. However, this approach has generated a lot of soil – and I mean a LOT! We have mountains of the stuff. We have even flattened the top of one of these mountains and are piling the soil on top.
The other problem that we have is that subsoil contains a lot of fractured stone. It doesn’t contain any clay. This means that we need to scrape the bottom and pack the subsoil down so that there is little chance of the pipework being damaged when they are laid. The ground is then “tracked” in. This means going backwards and forwards and using the tracks on the excavator to flatten the bottom. This also crushes a lot of the bigger stones. Since we have upgraded to a 14 tonne excavator, it really does crush the stones in the bottom.
All of this means that it is taking longer (and costing more) to install the ground loops. I am not sure that there is anything we could have done differently. But we probably could have plan and estimated the ground work a little more accurately. Clearly, the amount of effort involved in installing the ground loops will vary according to the quality of the ground. It would be wise to check this out before starting on work like this.
The other issue to consider is access – can you get machinery of the right size onto the site. Doing ground works on this scale requires big machines and getting them on site (or even to site) can be a challenge. If your contractor is hiring machinery, make sure that the hire company has looked at the routes to the site and agreed that the machine can be delivered. Then if there is an issue, this is down to the hire company and not you.
We have stripped the one half of the field and piled all the soil on the other half! We are now out of space!
We are starting to run out of space.
This is a 14 tonne excavator. We had to trade up from our 8 tonne excavator to try and speed things up. There is a lot of soil to move.
We are now starting to run out of space and are piling up the spoil.
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