Browse Forums Owner Builder Forum Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 41Mar 07, 2012 11:19 pm You're right, it's a pale sage green colour called gentle calm. It's kind of a grey-green and it's very ummm, calm! I'm really happy with that, it looks great against white. We're having big (20cm) colonial white skirting boards, a white mantle over fireplace, and white blinds with matching sage green pelmets over them with a gum leaf pattern on them in a slightly darker sage green. All the doors will be white too. I do like the combo of jarrah floor boards, pale sage and lots of white trim. Totally different to most people though as most people seem to have neutral. I hate choosing stuff! You're right though, once you've lived in it for a while you tend to forget about the stuff you stressed over. Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 42Mar 08, 2012 12:20 am I think it looks beautiful - your house is more of a traditional style so your colours are pretty spot on... the neutrals will be more suited for a more contemporary/modern house. Don't follow trends - go with your heart - you are the one living in the house... 10 years ago I painted my old house with feature walls in aubergine and terracota red - looked good for that time but trends change so quickly. Now I have one neutral colour throughout the house and I like it... When I go to the color cards at Bunnings I'm always attracted to the greens like sage - it is a restfull, calming colour and looks good in a large area with a lot of natural light - not too stark and not too olivey - it has a nice tone and will go perfect with white trim and dark floors... I'm assuming you are going for traditional rugs and furniture to complement? I like both styles and when I pass a nice traditional/colonial house I like looking at it, then I pass a modern/contemporary house - I like it as well - in 20 years time people passing my street will say - that's so 2011 Preliminary agreement 23/11 Contract 22/03 Prestart 06/04 - finalised on 30/04 Unconditional approval 10/05 Demolition 05/07 Slab 26/08 Brickwork 13/09-06/10 Roof frame started 07/10 viewtopic.php?f=31&t=32292 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 43Mar 08, 2012 7:53 pm I'm the same Bags, I like a whole range of styles. My DH calls our house 'modern country'. I'm not sure if it is, but it's definitely us! It's got more of a country feel as we've got a long front verandah and having decorative verandah brackets on the posts. It fits in with other houses in our area. A lot of our selections came down to the fact we live on a bush block and it's REALLY dirty. We tried to chose things based on their ability to conceal dirt. Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 44Mar 08, 2012 7:55 pm Hey I posted this on the Building a new house forum but thought I'd ask here too. Does anyone know where to buy those temporary paper blinds in perth (I think they're called redi-shades or something?). We just need a temporary blind for our games room as we won't be finishing that room for a while. I've looked in Bunnings but no go. Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 45Mar 08, 2012 10:33 pm There are none in Perth - got some online when we moved in and still have some at the back of the house another thing on the list to do I have a few spares if you want - have to find them in the garage. I can drop them around your place sometimes in the weekend - just PM me if interested. Preliminary agreement 23/11 Contract 22/03 Prestart 06/04 - finalised on 30/04 Unconditional approval 10/05 Demolition 05/07 Slab 26/08 Brickwork 13/09-06/10 Roof frame started 07/10 viewtopic.php?f=31&t=32292 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 46Mar 29, 2012 1:37 pm We've had a very busy yet up and down ride over the last 3 weeks. Is it just us, do we do something wrong, or do all businesses stuff up your orders?? First of all we had our shower screens and mirrors installed in our ensuite and bathroom. We wanted them done before we had our floor sander in to sand and polish our jarrah floor boards to limit the number of contractors scratching them. First of all they forgot our order, and hadn't made them by our agreed installation date. So then they came a few days late to install them and they'd made the ensuite shower screen out of the wrong glass. We'd ordered satin light glass for the kids bathroom as we wanted to provide a bit of privacy in the shower as it's a communal bathroom. We'd ordered clear glass for our ensuite shower and it was clearly marked on all the paperwork. They made the ensuite screen out of the obscured glass as well. Expensive mistake for them as it is a huge screen (we ordered it extra height 2.1m high) and the obscured glass is more expensive. It then meant they had to come back after our floors had been sanded/polished. They've now installed both screens and we're happy with them. We're not so happy with the mirrors though as they stick so far out from the walls they look a bit odd, and our taps dont fit in front of them on the vanities. We then had our floor boards sanded and polished which we're really pleased with. He did a great job and they've come up beautifully. One thing I've learnt over the past 2 years of living on a filthy dirty construction site with 2 young kids is to try and be practical with our choices in terms of their dirt hiding properties. I love shiny high gloss floor boards but we didn't want to go solvent based due to the VOC's and wanted to go water based. I was also told that high gloss shows dirt and marks more and is more labour intensive to clean. Not sure if this is true, but as we live on a bush block with lots of sand we decided to go for the Bonna Traffic Satin finish. It has a slight sheen and does look lovely, but I still do love a really glossy floor board. I think we've made the right decision though as it's meant to be really hard wearing. Yesterday we had a busy day with the carpet being installed in all the bedrooms, and the blinds being installed in the Kitchen, Living, Meals, Laundry & bathrooms. Well carpet installation went without a hitch. Unfortunately the same can't be said for the blind installation. The bathroom blind didn't turn up and they can't find it (today found out they have lost it and it will need to be re-made). The kitchen blind was too big so couldn't be installed (even though the woman had come back a second time to do another check-measure on it). The centre bay window blind was too big and couldn't be installed. Two of the blinds over our double sliding doors were about 4cm too narrow and don't cover the glass, and the first time we tried to lower them the installer hadn't clipped them into the brackets and they fell down. The 3 blinds over our big living room windows were also made out of the wrong fabric - we ordered light filtering but they were made out of total blockout. To top things off I asked the installer straight up if he vacuums as he drills as we had just had our floorboards polished and he assured me he would be clean. He has left metal shavings all over the floor. Pheww, I think that's all the things that were wrong with that one! Today we're having the curtains installed in the bedrooms so I hope that all goes smoothly. On Monday and Tuesday all our shelving is being installed in the WIR, robes and built in cupboards. I'm expecting that to all go pear shaped! Hopefully I'll take some photos of the bedrooms once the curtains are up. Don't much feel like taking photos of our areas where the blinds are right now! Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 47Mar 29, 2012 4:01 pm Oh nooo - that's terrible - I sometimes wonder how some of these businesses survive with so many mistakes. It seems that nobody is using the old method of “measure twice cut once” these days Sorry I didn’t get in touch with you re the temp blinds – I can’t find the box – I was so sure that I had another full box of them - I only have the two which will not be enough to cover your window. Did you find any? Preliminary agreement 23/11 Contract 22/03 Prestart 06/04 - finalised on 30/04 Unconditional approval 10/05 Demolition 05/07 Slab 26/08 Brickwork 13/09-06/10 Roof frame started 07/10 viewtopic.php?f=31&t=32292 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 48Mar 29, 2012 4:39 pm We had to laugh at this one. The curtains have been installed and I love them. Love the fabric and they've been made beautifully, installed carefully and are great quality. When the installer got me to check them before he left I went to open the sheers and then realised that they'd made them as one solid piece of fabric and you can't open them! We really wanted to be able to open them down the middle the same as the curtains. The lady at the curtain company was extremely apologetic and they're taking them back and splitting them down the middle. She's coming to collect them tomorrow and we should have them back by the middle of next week. I figured that something wouldn't be right but wasn't expecting that one! Do love the curtains though, they're gorgeous. Now I'm really dreading our shelving installation as heaps of stuff can go wrong with that one and it's expensive. Edited to add - I'm so happy with the curtain company that we went through (as opposed to the blind company ). The staff have all been so helpful and professional, they had an absolutely massive range of fabrics and the finished product is such good quality. I would happily recommend them if anyone in perth is looking for curtains. Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 49Mar 29, 2012 4:41 pm Bagheera Sorry I didn’t get in touch with you re the temp blinds – I can’t find the box – I was so sure that I had another full box of them - I only have the two which will not be enough to cover your window. Did you find any? That's ok, thanks for looking for me anyway. No, I haven't managed to find any other temp blinds and as it's only the one big window it's not really worth ordering them over the internet as they seem to have a minimum order or expensive postage. I think we'll just use a sheet for the time being. Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 50Mar 29, 2012 4:51 pm oh my Lord.... let's hope that the trend of mistakes doesn't continue..... fingers crossed you are almost there Preliminary agreement 23/11 Contract 22/03 Prestart 06/04 - finalised on 30/04 Unconditional approval 10/05 Demolition 05/07 Slab 26/08 Brickwork 13/09-06/10 Roof frame started 07/10 viewtopic.php?f=31&t=32292 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 51Mar 29, 2012 5:39 pm Quote: To top things off I asked the installer straight up if he vacuums as he drills as we had just had our floorboards polished and he assured me he would be clean. He has left metal shavings all over the floor. Pheww, I think that's all the things that were wrong with that one! Builders pay someone to clean a house after the tradesman and before handover to the owner. You as owner builder are expected to perform the duties a builder would do on a job. That means its actually your responsibility to clean this floor after the tradesman, that's the money your saving by owner building, you accept the headaches that you otherwise pay a builder to accept on your behalf as the owner builder. Most tradesmen try hard not to mess up or damage the work done by another trade, and yes you have a right to expect that your newly polished floor boards won't be damaged by the trades mans work. With that said - would a builder necessarily have completed the work by the trades in that order - or would he have left the floor boards polishing top last after the blinds guy had been and gone? Did you as owner builder take any steps to cover the newly completed polished floor with a drop tarp etc to protect the floor if YOU decided to complete the words in that preferred order? As a "tradie" - when quoting on "owner build works" the cost is always 30 - 50% dearer to cope with unrealistic expectations by obsessive compulsive disorder owner builders with no experience in order of trades, as to cleanup afterwards and doing the job they way THEY believe it should be done and not how a builder or tradesman would do it! This is likely why you get such a wide variation in quotes from various trades. There are jobs I have quoted at 300%above what I reckoned I could do it for - just because i reckoned the owner builder would be difficult to work with - and didn't really want the job at all - and yet often times such quotes would then be accepted. If the owner builder turned out to be a great customer I;d discount the job back to what it was really worth but if they turned out to be as expected then they paid the full 300% for aggravation factor alone. Many owner built homes end up costing more than a builder could have constructed it for due to wrong order of trades programming thru the job and unrealistic expectations by owner builders. I'm not suggesting that you fall into any or all of these categories - you have a lovely house on a lovely block in a lovely location built with much love by your hubby and FIL. I'm just saying that all owner builders seem to blame their tradesmen, (especially when they sack them) and yet in reality many such trades are GLAD to get off such a site at any cost to get on with their job of making a living... It's just important that people hear the other side sometimes... Not every problem on a building site is a tradesman's fault. Sensing someone who's going to be a problem as an owner builder is a survival skill for tradesmen, some just have a policy they don't work for owner builders... and others in order not to be "impolite" just treble the quote for owner builders hoping they won't get the job..... but allowing for the fact if they do there's sufficient padding to allow for any unrealistic expectations by owner builders especially those on their first build. I guess its all a learning curve. Monet can't buy the experience you are gaining! Typically a builder working for a major building co will be supervising somewhere from 20 - 30 such houses at one time...imagine the headaches he has as yours times 20 or 30... Your builder if you choose one earns every cent.....often he takes home far less per week than any of the trades he is supervising! Cheers! Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 52Mar 29, 2012 6:13 pm I get your point and we have been very careful in the order in which we have scheduled things to minimise damage. Don't worry, we haven't expected any trades to clean up after themselves and have spent hundreds of hours cleaning everything throughout the build. I would expect that EVERYONE would have their blinds and curtains installed AFTER the flooring has been completed, and after the builder has handed over posession. I wouldn't expect you need a cleaner to clean up after a blind installer and would think anyone would expect an average level of care to be taken considering the amount of money we were paying for the blinds and for them to be installed. We decided to have the blinds installed directly AFTER the floors were sanded and polished as the floor sander advised us that the floor sanding would generate a fair amount of dust and it would be difficult to clean the jarrah dust off the blinds. He was right! Although he did an excellent job and was very careful vacuuming up after himself (we were wrapped with his work), the walls were covered in a fine layer of dust. We spent the whole of last weekend cleaning the walls windows and window frames ready for the blinds and curtains to be installed. We also waited 2 weeks for the floor boards to be fully cured and hardended then covered them in Ram Board which is specifically for protecting floor boards. The metal shaving were all over the Ram Board but could easily get on the floor boards so it still irritated us that he told us he would try and be clean but wasn't. I probably wouldn't have mentioned anything about it but it was the fact that our whole experience was soured by the number of blinds that were incorrect sizes and the fact that they even fell down the first time we used them. The curtain installer in contrast was so professional, did a fantastic job and left it spotlessly clean. In fact I think that we've been very relaxed with our expectations of our tradies, we just managed to pick a particularly terrible roof carpenter (we weren't being OCD, he completely stuffed the job. We could've taken things futher but decided it wasn't going to help anyone so that's why my DH took it over). Also our original plumber laying our drains above the footings was something that I think we were entitled to be unhappy with. We also found him very difficult to talk to and as the plumbing was going to be an on-going job throughout the build I think it was best for everyone that we found a new one. The plumber that we changed to is absolutely awesome and I'm so glad we changed. I do admit that we have done things in a completely different order to what a builder would do, but that is because of our situtation living on site. We can't have our services connected until the old house is demolished as it's in the way and this has confused the he** out of most people!! I also fully agree that most people who are owner building don't save any money. We never started on this venture with the goal of saving money. We mainly did this as it has always been my DH's dream of building his own home, and also given the restrictions we have on our building site and us wanting to live here and do things in a weird order, owner building was the perfect fit. We have not really used that many tradies throughout our build, preferring to do the work ourselves for a range of reasons, however I have always said that the majority of our tradies have done a fantastic job (just not the roof chippy and first plumber!!) We always expect to have to sort out issues, but it does still amaze me how businesses seem to make errors and have to re-make stuff all the time. It must lose them a lot of money! PS just had to add this bit as it's pretty ironic that you wrote on my thread about our duties to clean. I have spent months worth of weekends cleaning cement off door frames and window frames and most of it was put there by my husband!! Most of our tradies have been far cleaner than my hubbie! I pitty building site cleaners who do that job for a living, it's hard work scrubbing off cement! Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 53Mar 29, 2012 6:22 pm To quote: "There are jobs I have quoted at 300%above what I reckoned I could do it for - just because i reckoned the owner builder would be difficult to work with - and didn't really want the job at all - and yet often times such quotes would then be accepted. If the owner builder turned out to be a great customer I;d discount the job back to what it was really worth but if they turned out to be as expected then they paid the full 300% for aggravation factor alone." My comment - we don't all start out as pains in the arse.......it's the dissallusionment of decent human nature and the dissappointment of constantly being overcharged that send some of us that way...just saying -it works both ways! Owner Building on 1800sqm Sanity Intact so far Locked up March 2012 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 54Mar 29, 2012 6:45 pm Well said Lynny-jane!! Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 55Mar 29, 2012 9:06 pm I've been both sides of the fence, and don't disagree at all! Quote: we don't all start out as pains in the arse And not all end up that way either. There are definitely tradesmen I would not be happy with working for me, and no doubt some wouldn't want me doing their joinery or cupboards... Builders have a lot of trouble keeping their good sub contractor teams, other builders are always looking to poach the good ones. Many just as a matter of principle don't do owner build work, they stick with their usual reliable builders so that they always have ongoing work... Imagine if you will that your a brickie or roof carpenter etc - if a builder is happy with you and keeping you in paying work week in and week out as they try too - if you drop out to do a owner build job - then maybe by the time your finished the builder has found another tradie he is happy with and suddenly you've lost a good gig with an established builder to help out an owner builder you might never see again... Builders do crack the craps at tradies who aren't available for jobs because they are working for another builder or worse an owner builder. Rightly or wrongly builders see owner builders as a detriment to the industry in that sub standard work can and does find its way into cottages - that in the end reflects badly on the building trade especially when it end sup on national TV current affairs as a dispute between owner builder and tradie. If everyone can and does owner build why do an apprenticeship and study builders registration exams - to be a professional master builder? Lots of tradies in the building industry owner build and sub out the work to their mate and fair play to em.. It's sometimes when office johnny's start to try n do the same thing that it usually goes pear shaped. There are pros and cons to all building projects they seldom go completely to plan. Builders can also get saddled with the clients from hell... I've sen it happen...some unimaginable stuff... but as long as the owner is paying for the variations.... I recall one place when I was 17 that my old man built - it took more than a year - 3 stories upstairs and downstairs kitchens with electric dumbwaiters etc and 7 en-suit bathrooms! The architect gave a list containing one defect reported by the lady owner to the porcelain of one of the loos. Dad went in and ran his hands all over this new porcelain loo looking for the reported chip...and couldn't find it, so he got his partner to do likewise - and he couldn't find it. Then he took his wife in and said can you find it? She being fastidious cleaned the new look completely from top to bottom and inspected every aspect of it... and declared it fault free. Next week it's on the defects list again, the lady owner saying a new porcelain loo hadn't been installed, due to the seen chip... Another round of inspections...then finally called the architect in....who also couldn't find the reported chip... So the architect arranged the lady owner to come to the site and point out the fault coz no one could locate it! She gets there - and says "Oh no you have to lay on the floor on your back and slide in under the Toilet Pan to see it - which she then proceeded to do - pointing to a spot up underneath with her finger. So dad got down and laid on his back and slid in, and saw what she was referring too and far fr0m being a chip in the porcelain it was where the pan mould had a air breather hole to let the air out when the liquid porcelain mix was poured in before the pan was kiln fired! So he said so and showed the architect who agreed - it was a part of the manufacturing process. To prove his point dad took them all into the other 6 bathrooms that had 6 matching porcelain pans and sure enough they ALL had that particular feature. She was gob smacked and ran out in tears - couple days later a variation order comes in via the architect - remove all 7 porcelain pans and source a different brand that doesn't have that manufacturing feature AT THE OWNERS COST! So that's what happened. The pans were imported from Italy That was just the start. The architect specified a "3 story off form white concrete staircase" that was the centerpiece of the house. It cost back 30 years ago now more than $100K to build just the staircase - today's money about a mill or so... Dad got in a big team of the best finish carpenters he could find and they worked straight for 6 weeks to form up this feature white concrete staircase. Essentially all the pine form work boards were sandblasted to leave the grain exposed so that the grain patterns would be visible in reverse as proud of the white concrete, apart of the feature. To pour such a white stair case - all white sand must be used, along with white cement, and crushed white quartz as the aggregate. In order to batch enough a whole readymix batching plant had to be stopped from production for days and all the materials brought in but before they could so so - all the mixers etc and trucks that would carry the precious white concrete had to be sand blasted back to clean bare metal - couldn't afford for any grey concrete to contaminate the mix if it would be visible in the completed product. So the whole batch plant machinery and trucks took days to prepare before mixing could actually commence. Once it started it had to go 24/7 for 3 or 4 days non stop because the stair case and balustrade walls etc all had to be poured in one contiguous pour so there were no visible joints between batches. As the center piece of the house it was like one of those 1920's houses you saw in old US Films of the period - where it curved and swept up toward the ceiling - an absolute work of art. My dad slept at the site for 6 weeks we never saw him at home as he supervised every aspect of the form work - you couldn't slip a ciggy paper between the form work board the joints were that tight! When the pour was finally over there was a big celebration on site with all the finish carpenters and grano workers etc involved as well as the guys from the batch plant who made it all happen to thank them for their efforts, at that point (and probably since) no such project had been attempted in Perth so a couple kegs were put on and a sausage sizzle etc.. About a week later the big unveiling, as the form work was removed and everything swept over etc Th architect had pro photographers taking pics that he would have put into home of the year magazines etc etc of this his masterpiece signature stair case and it was indeed a thing of beauty... The next day a Sat Morning the lady owner walked in thru the front door to inspect her new masterpiece white concrete staircase, took one look and exclaimed "Ohh no - I could NEVER live with that!"..... Yes she ordered the architect to have workers with jack hammers come in and remove 1 inch it was back then of the feature wood grain relief surface of the white concrete removed with jackhammers all over every surface.. of the 3 story staircase! Then she chartered a jet from Italy for 80 grand it was in those days top fly out enough pink Italian Marble to coat every surface of that magnificent white concrete off form staircase!. Again this was at owners expense... so no biggee except that the efforts and time of all those tradesmen to create something truly unique was totally wasted - and ordinary grey concrete staircase would have been much easier and quicker if it was just going to be covered in Italian pink marble anyway! That's but one or two tales of building for impossible owners...there were many more on that one job... Back then no one used brick or tile lifts for multi story builds - the tilers put 6 clay roof tiles on their shoulder and climbed a ladder with them, and brickies tossed bricks up one story at a time from scaffold to scaffold which is how this house was built back then (~ circa 1976)... The lady owner one weekend got a sheet of graph paper, and sat on a chair below a 3 story parapet brick wall, and using binoculars marked a little square on her graph paper showing every brick she wanted sawn out of the wall and replaced because one of the corners had been chipped slightly when being double handled from floor to floor/scaffold to scaffold, to build 3 stories high! That was all at builders expense... Some owners should have been drowned at birth....if truth be known! Its funny how you remember the bad owners to build for yet the many who were great soon fade from the memory. Cheers! Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 56Mar 30, 2012 11:50 am [quote="Ian Moone"]Its funny how you remember the bad owners to build for yet the many who were great soon fade from the memory.[quote] That's so true - and it is the same for the owners - we remember all the bad stuff because it does affect us more than the good bits Preliminary agreement 23/11 Contract 22/03 Prestart 06/04 - finalised on 30/04 Unconditional approval 10/05 Demolition 05/07 Slab 26/08 Brickwork 13/09-06/10 Roof frame started 07/10 viewtopic.php?f=31&t=32292 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 57Mar 31, 2012 8:28 am Hi TamK - do you mind if I pick your brain a bit? We're also laying hardwood floorboards over a slab and have had different people say to lay them on battens (like you did) and others say to lay them over ply sheets. I don't know if there are any benefits either way and was wondering what your experience has been over the battens. I'm thinking that you'd get a more "traditional" sound from the battens - clip clop stomp....and that maybe the ply would muffle the sounds and you'd end up with a floating floor feel where footsteps aren't as loud (persoanlly I like the clip clop stomp you get from floorboards!!) Owner Building on 1800sqm Sanity Intact so far Locked up March 2012 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 58Apr 04, 2012 12:15 am Hi Lynny-jane. We've actually laid our floorboards on battens in the living/kitchen/meals area and direct stick on the concrete pad in the 2 passages and entrance, so our house is actually a really good experiment to demonstrate the different feels and sounds. In WA it's most common to lay boards direct stick to the concrete, hardly anyone lays them on ply (I'm not sure why??). My DH has a really bad back and he has trouble standing on hard floors for any length of time. We chose to lay on battens because it produces a much softer, springier (sp?) floor. It's amazing to feel the difference between the batten floor and direct stick. The direct stick is definitely a lot harder, and not that different to walking directly on the concrete. The batten floor definitely is springier. There is a big difference in sound too. When we walk on the direct stick floor you don't really get any sound at all. When we walk on the batten floor in shoes you get the clip cloppy sound that you get from a traditional timber floor on floor joists. Our old cottage that we are currently living in has solid jarrah boards on floor joists and it has a similar sound except the old floor is a lot more squeeky! The reason we laid 2 different methods in the one house? Probably stupid but it was a compromise between husband and wife. DH HATES carpet and wanted floor boards throughout the whole house. Just before we ordered the boards I caught him at a weak moment and he said he'd do anything to make me happy - so I got my carpet in the bedrooms!! This then created a problem at the changover in the bedroom doorways between boards and carpet as the boards on battens would be way too high above the height of the carpet, hence we laid the boards direct stick in the passages. We used 19mm boards and chose beautiful thick carpet and underlay and the carpet sticks up about 1-2mm above the edge of the boards - perfect! That was a long winded response and not sure if that answered you question! Our owner-builder journey - viewtopic.php?f=38&t=45187 Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 59Apr 04, 2012 4:35 am A Technical reply, Depends on your floorboards - are they real wood i.e. solid wood or some kind of photograph of wood glued to a particle board or mdf backing board run with a tongue and groove? Its important to know what product your putting down to advise about the best way to lay it. In a previous life I sawed flooring kiln dried it and then machined it and sold it...i.e real wood. Timber technology 101 In the coastal areas of Australia - you need to dry your timber to an equilibrium moisture content of about 12% EMC. This can only be done in a kiln pretty much, as air drying won't extract the last few %age points of moisture i.e. the intra - cellular moisture within the cell walls - as opposed to the Inter cellular moisture which can be diffused as a vapor / gas thru the lumens (pores) in the cell wall by air drying...if you wish to have a stable product that will have minimum shrinkage and expansion between summer and Winter Autumn and Spring. There are some exceptions - far NQ where there's tropical moisture year round you can get away with 14% EMC or higher sometimes. Also - in central Australia (Alice springs) you might need to dry down to 10 or 9& even if the place has constant dry relative humidity. The snow country in Victoria's high country (and Tassie high country around Mienna and great lake etc as well) where you have snowfall - also creates an incredibly dry RH (Relative Humidity) where you need to have drier timber if you wish it to remain stable over it's lifetime (i.e. minimal shrinkage and expansion between seasons). Lastly refrigerated air conditioned sky scrapers where the air environment inside the building is always dry RH 24/7 requires a drier EMC timber board before being laid. Buildings houses with say evaporative air conditioning that put a lot of moisture into the air inside a house are notoriously hard on timber flooring in s far as expansions swelling. The thing is native natural timbers come from a living organism and they breath moisture between the seasons... and some species have greater or lesser shrinkage and expansion properties in such environments. So ask yourself this question if your buying expensive kiln dried T & G Flooring, made from real wood. How much moisture does a newly laid concrete slab in a new house give up to the atmosphere inside the house over the first 12 months as it hydrates / cures after being poured wet?. The concretes sloppy wet when delivered and poured - All that water has to come out somewhere! Why would anyone pay top $ for a real wood floor dried down to 12%EMC if your going to lay it 16 weeks later over the top of a green concrete slab - or worse glue it direct down to one? Flooring questions are thus one of those how long is a piece of string questions - the answers often are "it all depends"... On;- 1. The species of timber 2. How dry it was (%EMC) when run into flooring 3. What the potential shrinkage and expansion rates are likely to be in the environment in which the floor lives. 4. What the individual species of woods potential is for shrinkage and expansion. Typically softwoods have 2 grain directions, lengthways up and down the tree and crossways which are the medullary rays, (which if you like Oak type grains accounts for the fish scale effect when quarter or back sawn) Typically such a grain arrangement makes for a more stable timber subject to less shrinkage and expansion. Species like our native Sheoke (Allocasuarina sp) have less than 1% shrinkage when kiln drying from green to dry and even less once dry - hence you will see them used in boat building where stability in a moist environment is a great property to have. As a floor - specially for parquetry applications a great material Yet WA Jarrah can have 6% shrinkage on ave between green and dry while WA Blackbutt will typically have 12% between green and dry. The difference between hard woods and softwood's has nothing whatever to do with how dense or hard the timber is as many will think to be the case (Ohh I don't want a softwood floor it will show dents and marks from shoe traffic). This is WRONG 100% The difference between a softwood and hardwood is how the tree the timber comes from reproduces! They are called Angiosperms and Gymnosperms, and one (The hardwood - Angiosperm) reproduces via flowers, nuts, & seeds, while the other (The softwood Gymnosperm) reproduces by cones, spores and corms. (Pine trees have pine cones and are softwoods - Jarrah Trees have flowers and nuts with seeds - hence a hardwood. There are some very dense softwoods - much more dense than common radiata pine...like sheoke, (~660+kg's/m3) while the Pine can be less than 400kg's/m3, and the Jarrah hardwood is around 980kg's/m3 So the "softwood" sheoke floor will be about 50% harder again than a softwood pine floor and yet 2/3 of the density of the Jarrah hardwood floor, yet the sheoke with 1% shrinkage against the Jarrah with 6% will make a far more stable floor! So the whole thing about choosing a floor and how it should be laid is something you pay your builder to advise on, because this is the kind of stuff he ought know. I will give you the clue that the salesman at the homemaker center selling you the bamboo flooring won't have a clue about the actual 'timber' (I use the term loosely because technically it isn't) property's or how it should be best laid. With the expense of real timber these days it usually only goes into top flight homes - and mostly the builder will have an idea of how it is best laid... It really isn't as simple as "on ply or battens or glue down, depending on how soft you want the floor to walk on and how clip cloppy it sounds"! Sorry - but I figured it cant hurt to inject a little technical info into the discussion - its a big topic....which type of flooring and how to lay it (and when). If your laying REAL kiln dried timber T & G boards and want a good result then allow the new homes concrete floor to hydrate/ cure for at least 12 months before contemplating laying the flooring and then on battens to allow it to breath both sides evenly between the seasons is probably best. before you lay a such a floor, you can test the concrete floor for moisture content with a non invasive Tramex brand moisture encounter meter designed specifically for concrete - they also make one you should test your floorboards with to ensure they are down to 12% emc before accepting delivery of them. http://www.tramex.ie/Our_Products_Details.aspx?ID=19 http://www.tramex.ie/Our_Products_Details.aspx?ID=13 These are the types of non invasive impedance and resistance moisture encounter meters that industry professionals will own to ensure your floor timbers dry and the concrete dry before the floors laid IF they are actually professionals in their field.. Maybe this will help someone out along the way one day if they find it with a search engine. No point having the knowledge & experience if it can't be shared. Cheers! Re: Another OB in Perth Foothills 60Apr 21, 2012 8:31 pm Thanks for the info in timber flooring Ian....it's lucky that this owner build of ours is taking so long as I would assume that our slab would be pretty well cured by now - of only we were laying the flooring after only 16 weeks, miracles don't happen here like that here . And we were lucky enough to source some great hardwood that had been kiln dried and then stored for 2 years at a local mill - we don't have the luxury of spare cash to pay top dollar at a flooring store unfortunately, so we did our homework and legwork to get a luxury flooring option. TamK - I can understand why you used the 2 different methods in fitting your floors because I'm scratching my head over the height difference between the carpeted bedrooms and the floorboards - hmmmm, maybe a nice high shag and no-one will notice !!! Owner Building on 1800sqm Sanity Intact so far Locked up March 2012 Building Standards; Getting It Right! Don't think they are designed for double brick. WA has a particular way of building and unfortunately that's the way a large amount of sills are finished. 3 4730 Hi, Apologies - I know there is plenty out there on this but struggling to put together the puzzle. We're planning our garage/external laundry to master bedroom and… 0 1184 I am not sure whether Perth has its own way of doing things in regards to this. Most of Perth has class A (sandy soil), except for some areas near rivers or hills. 2 8270 |