Getting back on track, or should I say ‘in’ track? Underfloor heating pipes now firmly placed in the Lithotherm tiles and connected up to Ruby the pellet cooker boiler. And also on track, an experiment in orderly queueing – my own milk train, thanks to the amazing Tara Wright!
I’m going to have to stop apologising for not updating this blog. We’ve been doing lots of boring, unphotogenic, slog repetitive stuff. Filling holes, mostly. But this week, warmest this year, we’ve been doing some new style cooking – getting ready for our future! More
You would think that building a house off-grid using solar panels to make our own electricity would be renewable and innovative enough, but our latest renewable is probably the most innovative and possibly the closest to the leading edge we’ve come, to date.
Our Solar PV is angled to optimise winter sun. It is fascinating to see how it performs, now that our daily cycle of sunlight is so short. Today was a great example. First day of sunlight, after 3 days of murky grey.
This week was always going to be tough because we are now on the first floor and need to move the blocks one by one onto the slab and then up onto the first floor. Yesterday we threw Manpower at it – Mike Roberts + 2 of his guys + me and it took us an hour and a half to get two pallets of blocks unloaded onto the first floor.
I had mentioned to the Wrights (who are helping me with the sheep and sheep milking), and this morning: More
My Nephew dropped in for a few days – first trip to the UK and what does this American Tourist get to see? Lots of clay blocks. More
We have had generator problems for the last few months. The Hyundai generator died and I lost faith in the brand. Not in the people – Genpower and Just Generators have acted honourably and fairly – but I suspect I will never buy anything with a Chinese motor ever again. So skip forward to the next generation, our new generator looks very promising. More
Unbelievably, we are pretty much on schedule! More
It’s not ALL work at Easterdown. Our first visitor! More
So why is the dishwasher out of its built-in lair? You may be wondering if we’ve really had such a trouble-free, smooth time during this project, but things do go wrong and not to plan.
Everything before Easter has been on a go slow, but there’s a very important light at the end of the tunnel
Telephone and Internet installed yesterday. Didn’t expect to feel quite so different, but now that the telephone is in and the place is warm and cosy, I want to start living there. RIGHT NOW!
Our first Zero Carbon system is in and IT WORKS!!!!
Thank you, Thank you, THANK YOU Jamie Burnham for having the courage and the brains to design our brilliant wood range thermal store hot water system. It works perfectly and has already out-performed expectations. More
Arrival of the Esse Plus 1 which will provide heat, hot water and cooking. All in one very pretty package. Comments on the cabin from the installers “What an amazing place! Fantastic wood frame” (pointing to the Belfast Truss) to which the other answered ” I only take you to the best places”. Everyone who sees the Cabin, loves it.
When we embarked on this project, to replace a house that is off grid and remain off grid, people close to us said, “Why would you want to do that?” They’ve been asking whether we will be living in a Victorian past. But we think that living “off grid”, or at least with some system of electricity generation and storage, is the future. More
After getting a few quotes to test the flow rate of our Well, the ‘mean gene’ kicked in and we did it ourselves. More
Little rethink about off-grid electricity consumption. Dare we assume we can always ‘be good’? More
