Veranda, down pipes and solar hot water system

Another week gone and we have managed to get a bit further. The veranda structure is now finished, and the posts and beams have been oiled. The rafters and battens are also in place, but we have to wait with the colourbond roofing until we have done the strawbale wall. Of course we are also missing the floor, but this will come some time in the future. No point putting it in yet as we will have a lot of mess when we do the strawbale walls.

All the wood used for the veranda are green hardwood. This was rough sawn at the sawmill and we planed it down ourselves and then did a bit of sanding of the posts before it was oiled. The end result is quite good for the moment and we will just have to wait and see how the wood will react with the weather.

We have now also arranged for the plumber to come in next week. He will then install all the hot and cold water lines, the connection points for the taps, the showers, water points for toilets, the solar hot water system (see below) and some extra connections to the septic tank. In order to save time, we have made all the necessary noggins and drilled the holes for the pipes, so hopefully this will save us a little bit of money too.

With the solar hot water system we decided some time ago to go for an evacuated tube system which we purchased from Endless Solar. This has a 250 litre water cylinder and has 30 tubes in the collector. The main reason for selecting this type of system over a normal flat panel system is that it is supposed to be more efficient, especially if installed in a windy location. It has an electric backup which we hope that we won't have to use too much. The frame was relatively easy to installed and it is screwed down into the battens, replacing the normal roofing screws. The tubes will be installed when we are moving into the house, but the frame and the unit had to be installed now so that the plumber can do the pipe connections.

This week we have also managed to finish the down pipes for our rainwater collection. We will have 5 6 down pipes from the roof, but one actually comes down over the garage roof so we decided to combine the two. Once the roof over the entry way and the veranda are completed, these will also be hooked up to the system. For the down pipes we are using normal 90mm PVC pipes which are fitted into a 100 - 90 mm reducer near the ground level. All the water pipes under ground are 100mm PVC and these are linked up to our two rainwater tanks placed down by the cabins that we are currently living in.

Finally, today we have also completed the connection to our reed bed which will be used to treat our waste water. So far we have not been using the reed bed as we wanted to give it some time for the reeds to get established. However, with the plumbing soon to be completed and the prospect of actually getting a toilet installed in the cabins, we thought it would be good to start using the reed bed. The water will, as we have mentioned before in entry no 46, be collected in a holding dam and then later used for irrigation of our trees.

So that is it for this week. Next week we will hopefully have some nice pictures of plumbing pipes installed in the house!!!

Have a nice week !!

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