# Forum More Stuff Go to Whoa!  My owner build in the Southern Highlands

## ebf

Hi everyone, 
Okay, I'm a bit late here as I commenced at the end of January this year but as we're coming close to lock-up, now's as good a time as ever. 
Our house is located in the Southern Highlands on a 1250sqm block of sloping land with a NNW aspect. Our home is a Storybook Cottages kit home - feel free to PM me if you want my opinion on them. As a background, my experience in building is confined to renovating the kitchen in our previous house so yes, I was taking on a lot. But I couldn't pass up the opportunity to play outside for a bit.   
Above is the site prior to earthworks and my interpretation of profile hurdles...   
And here we have site works completed on 27 January, 2017. The southern part of the house is on slab, the northern part on bearers and joists. Not ideal but that's what the land dictated.   
A few days later we commence formwork for the slab. This was being done by a friend of mine who is a concreter with me being his labourer.   
Marking out locations for the piers to be dug. Yes, very foggy for the 1st of February.   
10 February. All piers dug for both the slab and bearers and joist with Mr Pumpy coming to fill them up with concrete. Steel adjustable posts were used here which I cut to length on site.    
16 February and all ready to go - a rather large drop edge at the end of the slab.  
17 February, the following day and an extremely hot one at that meaning the concreter had to really hussle.   
I call him son of slab - to be used for our slimline water tank.

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## OBBob

Big job! Good work taking it on.

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## ebf

Commencement of the subfloor on 21 February.   
Progress as of 21 February.   
24 February. Formwork removed and termite barriers installed. 
Unfortunately, for the next few weeks things got delayed due to the weather. Anyone who lived in or around the Sydney region will remember how wet March was.   
10 March - yellow tongue on!   
Bonus picture - our dog and rabbit.

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## ebf

Now, despite being a kit home the frames aren't pre-fabbed. Nor was there even any guide on how they should be built so it was all on me - an owner builder with zero experience. Should be fun!   
Here's a bunch of studs cut to length.   
29 March, a frame!   
31 March, bunch of frames built and a few stood (just for fun).   
1 April, first frame standing!   
12 April, i'm slowing working my way around the house raising more frames on my lonesome.  Stupid rain.   
21 April, all external frames raised.  Woop!

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## OBBob

> Now, despite being a kit home the frames aren't pre-fabbed. Nor was there even any guide on how they should be built...

   :eek:  :eek:  :eek:  :eek:

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## phild01

Great going, kit homes getting a bit slack just supplying timber!
See you are keeping wet area floors level with the slab :2thumbsup:

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## ebf

28 April and the first of the trusses go on. Some heavy bastards, one requiring five blokes to get it up in place.   
1 May, more trusses.   
3 May, all trusses are up. I should say that once trusses started to go on, I had a great carpenter helping me.  Frames were fine, the roof was way above my pay grade.   
Also 3 May, our double glazed timber windows arrived.   
5 May, all frames wrapped.   
12 May, in go the windows.   
19 May.  Cladding has commenced, as well as building of front pergola.

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## ebf

More cladding and pre-painting the fascia.   
26 May. All cladding on the rear done, as well as facia, finial and Mr Spotlight.   
Also as at 26 May, pergola progress, more cladding, wrap on the gable ends.   
9 June. Temporary front door hung, laundry door hung and more facia on. Begun painting the cladding here and there too.   
14 June. All fascia/finials on (save for above the pergola which will be done when the tin is on).   
First set of french doors hung.  ' 
As of today, 23 June, rough in of the plumbing.   
View from the top of the roof.

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## ebf

> Big job! Good work taking it on.

  Thanks! Thankfully all has gone quite smoothly, we're even on budget beleive it or not.   

> Great going, kit homes getting a bit slack just supplying timber!
> See you are keeping wet area floors level with the slab

  Hence my statement for anyone to PM me if they want opinions on Storybook - don't want to be done for defamation  :Biggrin:

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## DavoSyd

looks like a fabulous aspect you lined it up with  :Smilie:

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## SilentButDeadly

> Hence my statement for anyone to PM me if they want opinions on Storybook - don't want to be done for defamation

  They sell you a story...and you have to write the book? 
You've done well then!

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## sol381

Looking good mate.. first pic i was waiting to see kevin mcloud do his intro to grand designs. Like an english winters day.  One thing you southerners do as well as not scribing your ridge capping is i see most use timber roof battens.. Steel is so much lighter and easier. Any reason that isnt used much.. Every house up here uses it.

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## manofaus

fantastic effort. Its a shame that you were not aware about the 'onsite cut' frames, but you have pulled it off very well. Trap for new players. advantage storybook.What is that cladding?

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## SilentButDeadly

> Looking good mate.. first pic i was waiting to see kevin mcloud do his intro to grand designs. Like an english winters day.  One thing you southerners do as well as not scribing your ridge capping is i see most use timber roof battens.. Steel is so much lighter and easier. Any reason that isnt used much.. Every house up here uses it.

  Familiarity. Access to timber. Lower wind loads. Nail guns. Chippirs are less inclined to change their ways than a politician is inclined to switch sides.

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## ebf

> fantastic effort. Its a shame that you were not aware about the 'onsite cut' frames, but you have pulled it off very well. Trap for new players. advantage storybook.What is that cladding?

  James Hardie Scyon Linea cladding. Option was there for timber cladding, but the fibro looks good to me and a lot less maintenance. Giving them two coats of Dulux Weathershield so should last at least 10 years before repainting.  All the window trim and internal/external stops will also be fibro.

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## Uncle Bob

Looking great ebf! Soon you'll be doing the highland fling.     
Hang on. Sorry misread that. You're not in the Scottish highlands, it's the Southern highlands  :Smilie:

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## METRIX

When is the roof due to go on ? 
I would have had this up well before the cladding or doors are going on

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## OBBob

How will you do the corners where the weatherboards meet? I'm used to a block being used, are you putting a flashing over there corners?

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## ebf

> When is the roof due to go on ? 
> I would have had this up well before the cladding or doors are going on

  In 1-2 weeks. It couldn't be done another way. Design has no eaves, so cladding had to go on first for the fascia to go on top of it.    

> How will you do the corners where the weatherboards meet? I'm used to a block being used, are you putting a flashing over there corners?

  There's flashing underneath the weatherboard where they meet at corners. I'll be putting on corner trim over the top of the weatherboard at the corners - same for trim around the windows.

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## OBBob

Fair enough.  
I also noticed some of your trusses appear to sit on double top plates above an opening but without a lintel. I've never used trusses (so I'm probably wrong) but I thought you need to have either a stud below or add extra support. Perhaps it's a truss thing?

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## METRIX

> There's flashing underneath the weatherboard where they meet at corners. I'll be putting on corner trim over the top of the weatherboard at the corners - same for trim around the windows.

  How will you seal the small gaps which are left, and become spider havens ? 
Usually you either miter the corners, or put a block there and butt into the block to keep it all weather and vermin proof.

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## ebf

> Fair enough.  
> I also noticed some of your trusses appear to sit on double top plates above an opening but without a lintel. I've never used trusses (so I'm probably wrong) but I thought you need to have either a stud below or add extra support. Perhaps it's a truss thing?

  With the second top plate (ribbon plate), it removes the necessity to have a stud underneath each truss. I guess the theory is it distributes the weight around more. That's a good thing for me, because I didn't even get a truss plan until the day they were delivered.   

> How will you seal the small gaps which are left, and become spider havens ? 
> Usually you either miter the corners, or put a block there and butt into the block to keep it all weather and vermin proof.

  All right, here's the thought process behind all that. 
Because of the size of our window reveals (we stuck the windows inside the house further than normal because I'm using thicker gyprock), having the trim butt up against the windows and then having the weatherboard butt up against the trim just wasn't going to work, it would have looked weird. So we decided to have the trim go on top of the weatherboards. To keep things looking uniform, I decided to do the same for the corners as well. 
As you say, this creates its own problem of not being sealed against the outdoors, plus will make a lovely place for cobwebs to develop. What I'll be doing is scribing some timber and then placing it against the trim. Looking at the houses in the area, it was something that must have been done fairly often in the past, but doesn't happen anymore (probably because it's a lot of work). Seems common in NZ though from what I can see. 
Here's a picture I found online of what I'm talking about.   
I think it will look fantastic - just going to take me a good number of days to do that all around the house. Perhaps a "once we move in" job...

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## Godzilla73

It does look nice, but I'd cut those trims out first and use them as a jig to install the boards. You could just pin it top and bottom slide the boards in, remove trim and fix the end of the board and re install.

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## David.Elliott

> it does look nice, but i'd cut those trims out first and use them as a jig to install the boards. You could just pin it top and bottom slide the boards in, remove trim and fix the end of the board and re install.

  
great idea!

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## METRIX

Yeah that will work, and will look fine, only problem is looking at your place with all those windows and corners, you have created a lot more work by simply upping the gyprock size. 
Sounds like you went from 10mm to 13mm inside, I would have chosen to do it the other way, set the windows back where they should be then rebate the backs of the arcs around the windows to allow for the extra 3mm difference, lot less work for the same result.

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## ebf

> Yeah that will work, and will look fine, only problem is looking at your place with all those windows and corners, you have created a lot more work by simply upping the gyprock size. 
> Sounds like you went from 10mm to 13mm inside, I would have chosen to do it the other way, set the windows back where they should be then rebate the backs of the arcs around the windows to allow for the extra 3mm difference, lot less work for the same result.

  Well, why didn't you tell me that before I went ahead?  :Tongue:  
Here's an update as at 14 July.   
All the plumbing roughed in. Got myself a cold water tap and hot water tap for - the latter for washing the car!   
Speaking of timber scribers, here's the first lot. Has turned out really well - but it is going to take a long time to do them all.   
Water tank is in place.   
And as you could probably tell from the previous picture, the roof is now on. Hooray!   
All the doors are on...   
And while we're not quite at 'lock-up' just yet, we are fairly weatherproof at last.

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## r3nov8or

Nice looking place. Well done so far

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## Godzilla73

Looks great.

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## Moondog55

Thumbs up emoticon

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## NZC

> With the second top plate (ribbon plate), it removes the necessity to have a stud underneath each truss. I guess the theory is it distributes the weight around more. That's a good thing for me, because I didn't even get a truss plan until the day they were delivered.   
> All right, here's the thought process behind all that. 
> Because of the size of our window reveals (we stuck the windows inside the house further than normal because I'm using thicker gyprock), having the trim butt up against the windows and then having the weatherboard butt up against the trim just wasn't going to work, it would have looked weird. So we decided to have the trim go on top of the weatherboards. To keep things looking uniform, I decided to do the same for the corners as well. 
> As you say, this creates its own problem of not being sealed against the outdoors, plus will make a lovely place for cobwebs to develop. What I'll be doing is scribing some timber and then placing it against the trim. Looking at the houses in the area, it was something that must have been done fairly often in the past, but doesn't happen anymore (probably because it's a lot of work). Seems common in NZ though from what I can see. 
> Here's a picture I found online of what I'm talking about.   
> I think it will look fantastic - just going to take me a good number of days to do that all around the house. Perhaps a "once we move in" job...

  I would hate to think how many hours of my life I have spent making these.

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## METRIX

Looks good, but boy you have made some extra work with those scribes  :Smilie:

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## Petal84

Hi there. We are building a storybook too. Thrilled to come across your thread as I can't find much information of them online. We are still waiting for our design to finish. They said the end of July, oh the wait... We will probably have to modify as well, but hoping to start at the beginning of 2018. Do you mind sharing your experience with them so far.  
Impressed that you have done so much of your work yourself. Looks good! We just don't have the time and need to hire someone to at least get the house up to lock up stage. It's hard when you have 2 little kids and working full time.

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## DavoSyd

what insulation are you planning? 
looks great keep it up  :Smilie:

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## ebf

> what insulation are you planning? 
> looks great keep it up

  So my insulation requirements were twofold. One, temperature. Two, noise. 
Like many of the small towns in the Southern Highlands, we're near the railway so I wanted to minimise noise. That includes higher density plasterboard, double glazing plus acoustic insulation. So for the walls, I'm using Bradford Soundscreen R2.5. I'm also putting that in the roof. Obviously, R2.5 isn't going to cut it in the roof, so in addition to that we used Anticon 80 under the tin. According to Bradford's website, that should give us a total R value in the ceiling of R5.3 which I'm think should be sufficient. 
For the bearers and joists, I'm using Foilboard which according to them will provide R3.1 to 3.9 rating (summer/winter). 
Petal84, I'll respond to your PM shortly  :Smilie:

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## Petal84

Thanks ebf,
Did you send the message? Don't think I have received it .

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## ebf

Yikes, nearly two months since I last posted. Here's some updates. 
Last of the gables are clad and painted, as well as our HWS system in place (Bosch heat pump).   
Master bedroom with catherdral ceiling using EasyVJ MDF panels.   
Also Easy VJ boards in other rooms.   
Ready to begin tiling after waterproofing is complete, and Gyprock Duo cornice in.   
I've commenced the kitchen which I've built myself from scratch.   
Probably the main feature of the house being the living room with the catherdral ceiling.   
And a boring photo of roof and ceiling insulation.

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## Uncle Bob

Looking good  :2thumbsup:

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