Silicon Bog

Year: 2017

  • Caught up in your wishing well

    The verdict from the pump engineer was that the well wasn’t Wet Wet Wet enough (an appalling reference to the post title), and they were keen for us to look into getting another one drilled.  I’m a lot less enthusiastic about spending more money that we don’t have on something we might not need.  The pump is rated at 30 litres / minute, and runs out of water after about 30 minutes.  I think average water consumption per person is supposed to be around 150 litres / day.  Consequently, the best course of action seems to be to see how we go.  Oh, and I’ll make sure I get the first shower each day 🙂

    I’ll be doing more measurements over the course of the weekend to see what the actual flow rate and recovery time is over more samples, but I really don’t think it’s as bad as they’re making out.

    We’ve now got this weekend and the one after to complete the move – I did some more painting this evening in between well testing, so we’re getting closer to it looking habitable.  Flooring is a nice-to-have, as is a proper bed.

  • Not very well pump

    It’s a surprise to nobody that we still don’t have running water. I took the morning off from my current client work to meet the well engineer at the bog house.  The pump itself wasn’t as bad as it looked – it did actually run without making weird grinding noises or anything. Unfortunately it didn’t lift water up with enough power to be useful for anything much, so the engineer decided that the pipes would have to come up so the end of them could be examined.

    Two thick, heavy-duty pipes, mostly full of water.

    We now know that the well is 100ft deep, as we hauled that much pipework out, conscious that letting go at any point would mean losing the pipes down the well and ruining everything.  The engineer had warned me that it was a three man job, but the two of us managed it just about – I ache like I did after competing in a bungee run some years ago now, but can’t even blame alcohol for my stupidity this time.

    The engineer will fit a new pipe and exciting new submersible pump tomorrow – thankfully my presence isn’t required.

    Hoping for gravel to be laid on Saturday to get things looking a bit saner. I did some more painting this evening but tiredness stopped play in the end. I also chucked a litre of Milton sterilising liquid down the well to ward off any nasties.

  • We’ve got the power…

    The electricity got connected on Thursday, a mere three weeks after we paid them to do the job.  Of course, as soon as it’s done, all is forgiven!  We were so relieved to get to that point, albeit with not a great deal of time to spare before we need to move in.

    I started the dehumidifer working that very evening, and it’d collected over 10 litres of water in about 40 hours.  It has shown no signs of slowing down either, which is handy.  I’ve included a photo of my earlier setup for it where I had it perched on top of a washing machine with the collection tank below – I’ve refined this now so that it sits on the outer shell of an old gas fire instead.  Much easier to move between rooms that way.

    We’ve borrowed an oil-filled heater as well, so it’s getting a bit more homely.

    I spent the long weekend (Friday was St. Patrick’s Day) stripping old paint and filling holes in the walls, in preparation for painting once the rooms are dry enough for it to be sensible.  Old paint layers include: dark green, light green, scarlet red, pink, pastel blue, and of course magnolia.  I started to wonder about how it would have looked in its various guises, but became horrified at some of the imagery, so gave up.

    The kitchen was completely re-done, with plasterboard and skim throughout, so I was able to paint that today.  The first coat went on fine, and I’m hoping to do the second during the week.  We got some cheap mould-resistant paint in Lidl a couple of months ago, so that’ll be put to the test.

    Lidl has been a great provider of other things too – I picked up a wet and dry vacuum cleaner for €49 this week, along with a detail sander and other bits and pieces.  They’ve all come in very handy… I’ve pushed the vacuum cleaner hard but it’s been very cooperative in clearing up all the mess.

    There are a couple of big items left to sort out.  The first is getting some gravel (‘pencil’) for the driveway.  I’d spoken to someone about that a couple of weeks ago, but they’re obviously not keen to do it right now.  When the time is right, I’m sure they’ll be in touch.

    The second, and obviously it’s only a minor thing, is running water.  The well pump didn’t leap into action when electricity was provided, and I think it’s safe to say that a quick squirt of WD-40 isn’t going to fix it (as it’s probably been dormant for the past 6 years at least).  A man will be coming to investigate on Monday/Tuesday, depending on how the stars align, etc.

    Stay tuned…

  • Closer to fine

    So we’ve got until the end of this month (March) to get the bog house sorted now.  The builder managed a couple of days of work last week, which has resulted in the kitchen being fitted and the bathroom mostly done.  The plumber has also deigned to pay a visit, and has installed the hot water cylinder, along with most of the radiators.  He clearly improvised due to lack of water supply from the electric well pump, as there was evidence of sinks being tested, etc. using big containers of water.  I didn’t check the toilet – hopefully that’s either been left well alone or flushed properly.

    The main hold-up now is the electricity – the ESB haven’t been brilliant (which is a very toned-down version of what the builder called them), but after a lot of hassling, they’ve agreed to move the meter on Wednesday morning.  They said our electrician would need to be there, but there’s almost no chance that such a thing will happen (I believe that such a confluence is similar to Halley’s Comet’s visibility from Earth).  The electrician claimed that he didn’t need to be there again when I spoke to him once (he has since stopped answering the phone to me).

    The weather at the moment is brilliant – I’ve just mowed the front lawn at our rental property and am writing this sat outside in the heat of the sun, the smell of freshly-cut grass mingling intriguingly with recently-blended cat mess.  Apparently good weather is bad news for getting hold of the electrician, as he’s a mad keen cyclist.  Hoping for torrential rain next week.

    So, progress at least.  We went to the local post office and told them we’d be moving in soon.  Having covered the basics of who we knew and how, our details were duly registered.  We even got a leaflet about external mailboxes (ah, happy memories of moving into our rental place).  As it’s within our power this time, we might actually go crazy and get one.

  • File under ‘s’ for stressy

    So I’d contacted the estate agent we’re renting through on Friday morning to request another month’s extension to the lease in order to minimise stress.  No bother, she’ll let the landlord know, happy days.

    Lunchtime today, a phone call from landlord: “how do you get internet there, as I’ve got some AirBnB people coming on Wednesday from Brazil – are you taking your internet with you?”

    Me: “Argh.  But, but…”

    There ensued a discussion where it became clear that the estate agent hadn’t bothered to let the landlord know of our intentions, and had assumed that because she didn’t have any viewings lined up, it meant that we’d be grand.

    The landlord called back sometime later and said we’d be ok for another month, so hopefully that’s the case now.  The bog house isn’t finished yet, and the ESB still don’t have the wiring certificate from the electrician, so are refusing to schedule an engineer to come and move the meter (thus bringing us the wonder of electricity).

    We’ve settled on a kitchen layout with the builder, and hopefully clarified what we want doing with the sockets and switches elsewhere.

    Aaand relax…

    If anyone’s interested, my internet solution is pretty cheap and cheerful to run month to month (no contract).  I’ve got one of these Huawei boxes that I use with Three Ireland’s €20/month mobile broadband SIM, that provides unlimited 4G data (regardless of what the terms and conditions state).  Note that the same deal definitely isn’t available in the UK – they do check which device you’re using the SIM with there, and sharing it to provide home broadband is right out.  I did try.  Also, the “feel at home” thing that Three UK do to allow you free data roaming doesn’t apply to 4G, so that didn’t stay for long as a solution.

    In our rental property, I can easily get 40Mbps down (sometimes nearer 60) and about 10Mbps up.  If you compare that with something like TalkTalk in the UK, for £20 a month (and a commitment to 2 years of it) you’ll get up to 17Mbps down.  One of the few things that’s cheaper over here.

  • Bad news doesn’t always travel fast…

    No updates for a while as I was waiting to see how the house renovation played out.  It turns out that the builder leaving everything until the last minute has resulted in nothing being done in time.

    I’ve dealt with quite a few project managers in my time, and certain among them seemed to deliberately put projects in peril in order to pull off a triumph at the last minute (as they were quite good in a crisis).  That’s not the case now – the builder has been distracted by participating in the local version of Strictly Come Dancing, and seems pretty indifferent to our end of the month deadline.

    Everything’s apparently out of his hands – the electrician completed his work (last week, after many weeks of doing nothing on it) and the ESB need the wiring documentation before they’ll come and move the meter.  Once they’ve got that, it’ll take up to 10 days to do the job.  I phoned the ESB and they don’t have the documentation yet.

    The plumber is unkeen to finish his work until the water is available.  From the well.  That needs electricity to operate the pump.

    What the electrician has done isn’t entirely what we asked for, in that he’s placed sockets where they’ll be in the way of the dresser, a switch for the bathroom that won’t be possible to activate, and my favourite: the sockets where the curtain rail used to be in the sitting room.  The photo attached shows the offending articles, and where the curtain rail used to be fixed.  I wonder how he thinks we’ll be hanging the curtains – perhaps from a cable?

    Hoping to get another two weeks renting where we are now, but unsure how that’ll pan out.  The beatings will start soon…

  • Great progress made

    An up-beat post for a change.  The bog house has come along nicely, with the ceilings all insulated and boarded, and quite a lot of the walls too (more than we’d actually thought they were going to do).  There’s some plastering to be done, but our new bedroom floor is down, the doorway has been blocked off, and they’ve made good the parts where the dividing wall was taken out.  All the rubbish has gone from outside too – it really feels like we’re nearly there.  The major thing still pending is the electricity supply.  We need to get hold of the ESB (state-owned electricity supply company) to move the meter outside and put some fuses back in, then hopefully things will look even more homely.

    The eagle-eyed observer may notice an unusual light fitting in the main room… I suspect the builders are getting bored 🙂

     

  • Remain calm – we may be entering a pocket of turbulence

    A bumpy couple of days, but things seem to be sorting themselves out a bit more now.  Our rented house isn’t delivering a fond farewell, with a broken washing machine and running out of oil for the Aga being recent highlights.

    Thankfully I got some more kerosene from the incredibly nice and helpful people at Regional Oil in Mungret on the way back from work today, so we should have a warm kitchen again tomorrow.

    The landlord has arranged for a new (yes, I suspect ‘different’ might be a better description) washing machine to arrive tomorrow, which would be great if it happened.

    I wasn’t able to get hold of the builder today, so hopefully that’s because he was so busy putting the finishing touches to our house, but I fear not.  Down to 19 days before we need to leave our current residence.

    I did a bit more wiring work on the Bongo, so it now has this mini fan heater installed.  I fitted a 1000W inverter behind the glove box and connected it directly to the leisure battery with some fairly beefy cables, so it can take a reasonable load before melting wires.  Handily, the inverter’s fitted next to the recirculation vent for the air conditioning, so keeping it cool should be straightforward if the need ever arises.

    The dehumidifier arrived today, so it’s getting a trial run in this cold house before moving onto smaller, more humid, pastures soon.  I left it working away for a couple of hours in the hallway and it’d collected about 150ml of water, so it’s not doing badly.  It’s a desiccant model, so should perform well in the cold, and it’s relatively quiet and energy-efficient compared with the compressor-based models.

    Irritatingly, it doesn’t have a Relative Humidity display, so maybe I’ll deploy part of my weather station indoors to measure the levels for a while, as I haven’t got around to fixing the whole lot outside yet, but have at least wired up this humidity sensor to it over I2C.

  • Wide-angle shots of the house

    A fairly mixed day weather-wise… there was an impressive rainbow going along the coast road so I stopped along the way to get a few shots.  I then went on to the bog house, where I took some wider-angle shots (with my 12mm fish-eye lens) of the interior.  That field-of-view is commonly used in estate agents’ photos, but since my lens is more of a hobby one, it tends to show strong barrel distortion – in reality, at least a few of the walls are straight!

  • Kilteery pier

    I popped into Kilteery pier on the way back from the bog.