Building a flame zone house in West Pymble on a steep site

Gee concreter involved in important decisions!

Can hebel be considered “light”?

How high are the drop edge beams on this one and how do you plan to tackle the suspended section?

Hi Everyone

We finished the second slab pour yesterday.

No issues other than a small blowout at the back of the pool coping, and we are very happy with the results.

The next stage will be external plumbing, but as we need to drive a machine onto the slab we will let the slab rest and cure for 9 days. 7 days should be fine but we have a weekend in the schedule. So plumbers are booked for the 23rd.

Following that we will jump straight onto framing.

A couple of semi interesting things to note:

1. As we poured the slab in 2 stages ( upper and lower) there is a joint where the upper slab meets the lower slab. So being overly cautious, one of the this we worry about with a slab that steps down a hill is water that comes under the slab that might one day penetrate and come inside. So we are doing two things to combat that. Firstly we used a waterstop strip that was placed on the lower slab under the joint. It starts at roughly 10mm wide and when concrete hits it, it expands and seals the gap. Then as a back up we will waterproof that entire drop edge beam.

2. One of the things that adds to costs on a steep site is scaffolding. Rather then running 2 sets of boards as the site steps down they need to run a 3rd set. So scaffolding for this site is costing $7,000 more than it would for a similar sized home on a flat block. We messed this up in our estimation so that is a hit from our pocket.

3. One of the best features of a home on a steep site is the ability to have super high ceilings on the lower level. This home will have 3.5m high ceilings in the living area which will look spectacular. They also have a large window overlooking the pool and the bush beyond with a ton of privacy. I am absolutely loving the way this design is coming together.

We have the most awesome concreting crew. I would be happy to pass on their details if anyone is in need of a super professional crew.

Here are some photos of the finished slab.

Enjoy your weekend

Simeon


 Finished slab from the frontLike  ⋅  Add a comment  ⋅  Pin to Ideaboard  ⋅  Share

 Living room overlooking the poolLike  ⋅  Add a comment  ⋅  Pin to Ideaboard  ⋅  Share

 Drop edge & StairsThe recess on the RHS of the stairs will be a storage cupboard. The stairs are a bit steep but we were constrained with the design of the floor layout.Like  ⋅  Add a comment  ⋅  Pin to Ideaboard  ⋅  Share

 Drop edge looking down into the butlers pantry Garage is on the left with a hobLike  ⋅  Add a comment  ⋅  Pin to Ideaboard  ⋅  Share

 WaterstopYou can see the green/blue strip. This expands when it comes into contact with the concreteLike  ⋅  Add a comment  ⋅  Pin to Ideaboard  ⋅  Share

Looks nice! It really looks like a lot of concrete has been used. I think $303 is really fair for the slab of this complexity.

Hi Everyone

I am experimenting with some new signage on some of our more high profile builds.

This one was installed yesterday. What do you think?

This is an image of the actual house so the idea would be to include an individual facade shot for each home.

Simeon

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Knockitdown

Thanks for your feedback.

For this job we haven't used temp fencing. We have built a hoarding with steel posts concreted into the ground and then covered in plywood. We also have built two gates for access at each end of the property.

So this fence should stay in place until the end of the build.

This wider photo might make more sense

One of the reasons we have started the experiment here is that we are very close to a public school and all the parents park in the street for drop off and pick ups so we get a lot of car and foot traffic.

Cheers

Simeon


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Thanks

Hi Everyone

Quick update from site.

Saturday we stood all of the lower frames, today we are waterproofing the internal drop edge beams and then we are waiting on the delivery of the structural steel. Once that has been installed we can do the floor joists and flooring.

You can see from the photos the extremely high ceiling height in the living area, 3500mm which looks stunning.


Here are some photos from the weekend.

Cheers

Simeon




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Hi Alex

Honestly I had never heard of it.

Shall take a closer look

regards

Simeon