This is all about getting ready for rendering: getting Savolit boards up everywhere, getting scaffolding up, and getting guttering done. The guttering is important because lime render doesn't set as quickly as sand and cement, and would be vulnerable to rain for a few days after going up (in the case of putty lime, make that a few weeks). So, let's start with the guttering.
Because I have no fascias, the gutters have to fix to the side of the rafter feet, or in my case sprockets. Naturally, the brackets were all too long, so I had to cut them to length. I put the end two brackets in place (one at each end of the roof) and string a line between them so that the guttering doesn't wave in and out or up and down. We'll come to falls in a minute:
On the rear of the house, the new part, all went well. The roof is 10 metres long, and I laid it to fall 50mm in that distance. No problem. On the front of the house, the old part, it wasn't so straight forward. I wanted all of the water to end up at the north end of the roof, and set up a bracket at either end as before, then strung a line. I put the line 60mm lower down the bracket at the north end, but happened to notice that it lined through perfectly with the window head. I grabbed a spirit level and checked, and lo and behold, the string was absolutely level. In other words, the roof sloped 60mm the wrong way. To achieve the falls I wanted the gutter would have to fall 120mm from the eaves line, which would mean it would foul the windows, preventing them open. My 3 year old plan of taking all the water from this roof into the pond had come to nothing.
All I could do was put the outlet half way along the roof, and then I'll take the downpipe into the porch gutter. There is no other drain connection I can get onto:
As an aside, the long "tail" to the gutter brackets fouled the 3 front windows, unless it was fixed to a rafter foot directly above the middle of the window. In a lovely little piece of fortune, for no reason at all each window had a rafter bang in the middle! Sometimes luck is on your side.
So, that's the guttering up. Next, I needed to put up a proper gable scaffold. I had most of the stuff, but had to go and buy a bit more. In the yard I was stunned when the guy helping me picked up three 13 foot (4m) scaffold boards at once and popped them nonchalantly on the roof of my van! Three!! I didn't even try and compete, and just did one at a time. Anyway, the scaffold:
I finished all the Savolit boarding except for part of the back wall:
I'll take a close up of the leadwork over the future conservatory roof next time.
So, finally I was ready!! I had half a ton of lime render in the van:
Mr Reliable turned up exactly when he said he would, and apart from a funeral tomorrow will stay with me until the job is done. We experimented a little with the mixing of the render:
This shows all the fibre in the mix:
There is no sand in it at all. This is exactly what I found with the plaster I took off both inside and out on the old part of the house. No sand, but lime, horsehair and chalk. The modern equivalent is lime, poly-something fibre, chalk, and bobbly insulating something or other. It will dry just as flexible and vapour permeable as the original.
I could have lost a lot of money betting where the first float-full of render would go. I'd have said bottom right hand corner of the wall, as the plasterer is left handed. No, it was right at the very apex of the gable:
It went fantastically well! The boards were a perfect background for rendering, meaning a relatively thin single coat was all that was necessary, saving time and lots of money. You stop putting the stuff on the walls about 2pm, because you are then spending the rest of the day trowelling up, and working the surface as it dries, before finally, I went around with a damp sponge just rubbing up the surface a little. It brings the grains to the surface, leaving a slightly roughened rather than smooth texture. When I finish typing this I'll be going out to do the stuff that was put on later, which is still too wet. Plastering isn't hugely skillful, but is all about timing. Anyway, I couldn't be more thrilled with the result (remember, this will be limewashed in the spring, so the bright colour will disappear).
Because of the rounded corners, there is no natural stopping point on the main elevation of the house. I screwed a temporary batten in place to stop against, and the plasterer embedded some scrim in the plaster as he came up to it:
I "dubbed out" the bottom of the walls where there is a splay, using a drier mix. nonetheless, because of the thickness, the render at this location, and the corners, is still very wet and I'm likely to be sponging them up using a head-torch at bed-time this evening!
I took as much of the scaffold down as I could, to move it to the other end of the house tomorrow:
Now, I've got to go out and sponge away the last of the toolmarks.........