Grand Designs

[HappyHammer]

Is that the one where the guy carves the staircase support out of a tree trunk with a chainsaw? I also like the OH&S on the job when he was lifting the timber poles into the corners with his tractor.

HH.

[pharmaboy2]

LOL - last nights was the first one of watched that when they described the house at the beginning I thought yuck and the result at the end was fantastic - totally at odds with my expectations.

The windows were just hilarious, i mean did those architects think their job was? spec on the run?

To me there seemed to be a post in the glass wall anyway in which case the glass didnt need to be structural except for self support - given the stuff you see in commercial all the time, I'm absolutely amazed they managed to use up 2 months on 'calculations'? calculations of what?????

Nice guy - sounded aussie to me, but with penchant for wasting money - all the lighting was LED, and would have comfortably cost 20 or 30k - imagine how many trees he could have had planted for that kind of money and used a more mature technology for lighting.

The other bad planning aspect was the height, when I built a house with a view, i calculated the height off the plans, and brought a stepladder to find the view from floor height - seemed a rather basic concept to me, spoke to the buidler about cost per brick height, and changed it before we had turned a sod
.
Mind you, i still want to know how the hell those stairs worked!

[ptc]

Damian
re last nights one
How do they clean all that Glass (long ladders ) ??

[bitingmidge]

To me there seemed to be a post in the glass wall anyway in which case the glass didnt need to be structural except for self support - given the stuff you see in commercial all the time, I'm absolutely amazed they managed to use up 2 months on 'calculations'? calculations of what?????

The poms do make heavy going of glazing, but we don't use double glazing of that size either and we don't have to worry about the thermal calcs.

In those courtyards, sometimes the solar load was reduced by four or five thicknesses of glass as the sun entered, left and re-entered the building. If you are fairdinkum about properly designed heating and climate control, and no-one here is, you'll do the calcs.

Don't forget the sun is constantly moving, and the heat loads/cooling effect will be different at different times and different seasons.

I'm surprised that the architects could even do them. I'll bet there was a mech engineer there somewhere scratching his head. Here, most people would just bung in a bigger air-conditioner (which would cost more than the architects fee anyway) and blame the "bloody architect" when they came home and the house was hot/cold, even if as most don't, they didn't have an architect do the work!

Nice guy - sounded aussie to me, but with penchant for wasting money - all the lighting was LED, and would have comfortably cost 20 or 30k - imagine how many trees he could have had planted for that kind of money and used a more mature technology for lighting.

Please inform us what a more "mature" technology is that's going to use less 'lectricity? I'd love to know.

Also tell us how he wasted any money? Seems to me he ended up with a free house worth 800k, that's close enough to 2million Oz. I wish I could waste money like that.

The other bad planning aspect was the height,

You've lost me there? The house was two stories, and obviously flat roofed to get around the planning regs to keep it below the heights of the adjoining slums. The windows were really carefully placed to frame views, but there was no overlooking of the daggy bits. What was bad?

Just curious.

P

[bitingmidge]

Damian
re last nights one
How do they clean all that Glass (long ladders ) ??

When you own a couple of million's worth of house, you get a chap in to do it.

Most glazing installations of that type (and cost) use a derivative of

If you were building anything with large glass panels, particularly in roofs, you just wouldn't do without it.

cheers,

P

[pharmaboy2]

more mature technology?

well, I didnt put int he previso that it needed to lose less energy, so cf's would be a good start, and maybe even some IRC halogens for task lighting. I just speculate that at over $100 per sqm lights, that a much cheaper option could be had, with a better outcome for the environment if you bought carbon credits so someone plants trees somewhere for you., no?

The wasted money was how abudget that starts at 450k somehow gets to 800k - cant possibly be ALL sensible spends can it??

The height revolved around the first over spend of 10k quid - it was after they had put the foottings in and then decided the floor height was 500mm too low for the views to work (assume lower floor looking into the fence rather than over it) - when you know the ground level, thats a pretty bad mistake after you've done the footings at a specified height.

[davo453]

I am a keen watcher of Grand Designs.

Having been in the UK for 8 months now I can tell you that the houses you see on that show are far from normal. Most of the newer estates are built with the same type and colour of brick, same roof tiles and you can choose between no more than a handful of floor plans. One builder will build a block of 100-1000+ homes.

It makes for a very dull horizon. We have built several homes in Perth and the choice there is mind boggling, if not quite cutting edge.

Doing it the UK way might solve Perth's building problems, but I wouldn't recommend it.

As they tell you in the program so many of the grand design projects are built on oddly shaped blocks, in difficult locations. The building laws here are very strict and it's very hard to build a new structure anywhere.

The towns here are very densely populated, making a lot of people miserable. Then 5 mins down the road (not in London) you hit open farm land with loads of space but none you can walk on. Its all a bit odd really.

Often people renovate barns etc at huge cost. I watched an episode yesterday were they renovated a barn it had no foundations and was on a slope. Cost £400,000 (Aus $1,000,000 ish) not including the land. All very nicely done too but not what I could call a home.

I'm looking forward to going back home to Australia and building again in a couple of years.

Cheers


Dave

[bitingmidge]

more mature technology?

well, I didnt put int he previso that it needed to lose less energy, so cf's would be a good start, and maybe even some IRC halogens for task lighting. I just speculate that at over $100 per sqm lights, that a much cheaper option could be had, with a better outcome for the environment if you bought carbon credits so someone plants trees somewhere for you., no?

No, in my view planting trees is a nonsense. Like changing your nappies after you've pooped in 'em. Learn to use the loo and you'll never have to use nappies again.

The wasted money was how abudget that starts at 450k somehow gets to 800k - cant possibly be ALL sensible spends can it??

But the selling price started at 400 and ended at 800 so yes, it can. If you are doing it to make a profit, then he's made double what he set out to do.

The height revolved around the first over spend of 10k quid - it was after they had put the foottings in and then decided the floor height was 500mm too low for the views to work (assume lower floor looking into the fence rather than over it) - when you know the ground level, thats a pretty bad mistake after you've done the footings at a specified height.

missed that bit. There are an awful lot of appalling mistakes made on that show, just like in life really!

Cheers,

P

[myla]

hello,

for those interested grand designs is also being shown on Tuesday 11am ABC at the moment,

they are old but havent seen them

thankyou

myla

[chromis]

...

It can be different but it has to be thought through, and since nearly all Architects are arts fags who couldn't hammer a nail straight they tend not to consider the practicalities.

...

Damien...That's a bit rough.