Lessons Learnt

One of the biggest lessons of this project is in how much 'rubbish' has been removed. We have so far had 2 skips and 9 Grab lorries with 2 more booked for Monday. We have recycled as much soil and hardcore as possible , but in digging footings etc we have had to remove mountains.

 Before we even had laid a brick on the extension we have had to pay for rubbish to be cleared, for concrete footings to be poured at a quoted cost of £95m3, Skips at £300 per time and for Grab lorries at £300 per load (depending on material). It really does all add up, and I think many people overlook this as an incidental cost. When you are building an extension of this size it's a massive cost.

Another point to mention , which designers often place on drawings as a caveat. Is, Footings to be tested on site or such like. We have found in our little house that our foundations have been far in excess of what would have been required for this little house. As such we have had to dig for longer in order to remove. Resulting in the plant being on hire for a longer period of time which could not possibly have been foreseen at the start of the project.

Also that Bl**dy Eucalyptus tree meant we had to dig footings at 2.2m as opposed to 1m!!!

2.2m Footings due to Eucalyptus Tree