Building work on the quinta has been progressing really well lately, despite us beginning to have to watch the weather forecast to plan what we do from day to day. Rain is forecast for next week, so today we removed one of the floors to clean and preserve the chestnut beams so we’ll have something we can get on with under cover next week.
No floor!
Yesterday the delivery of sand and cement we’d been waiting for arrived, so this morning we got started at 8:30am laying the lower slab for the log store.
While I fetched and carried buckets of water, Ema took charge of the cement mixer.
I was hoping to have shots of the progress on the second log shed that would show us much further on by now, but as usual we’re waiting on deliveries of more materials. Promised Monday and as of today (Wednesday), still not here. Sigh!
Having put the finishing touches to log store number 1 yesterday, today we got started on another one!
With all our heating and cooking to be fueled by timber from our woods, one thing we can’t have enough of is space to store firewood and keep it well aired and dry, so part of the renovations to the two buildings on the quinta include provision for a decent amount of log storage adjacent to each.
No. Not for the houses. STILL waiting on a delivery of more stone (over a month now) and the previous owner removing his stuff (over a year and a half now) before we can progress either of those …
The frustrations of waiting on a succession of Other People before I can get on with what I want to get on with were starting to get to me yesterday. Not only were there the ‘more schist’ and ‘less shit’ items above, I was also expecting a delivery from the local builders’ merchants, some parts of which were already a week overdue.
This post is a preliminary enquiry to see if there is likely to be enough local interest to make it worthwhile planning and running this construction as a series of workshops. The construction will be going ahead anyway. (If you’re interested, please leave a comment below rather than responding on eg. Facebook. Comments on this page won’t get lost or superceded by more recent news.)
Sometimes, when the number of Big Things needing done threatens to become overwhelming, it’s occasionally worthwhile to do a small thing, just for that sense of achievement, satisfaction and progress it can give. Well that’s my excuse at least.
Small thing in the foreground. Big Thing in the background
The next stage in the water wheel construction is nearing completion. Because the ‘engine’ of the system is a permanent magnet generator from a wind turbine, and a water wheel turns much more slowly than a wind turbine, the wheel needs to be linked to the PMG via a gearing system that steps up the number of revolutions. To work out the optimum gear ratio for this installation, we needed to measure the actual rpm the wheel produces at present water volumes. For that to be done, we needed to construct a chute to deliver the water to the wheel.
Present water volumes in the barroco. Not huge. About 2 litres per second.
The water wheel is now installed in the barroco, along with the framework for the permanent magnet generator. Next stage is to construct the chute to deliver the water to the wheel, measure the flow rate and to have the appropriate gear wheel machined.
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