It's taken about 4 months, but the roof is finally finished. Weather has been mostly hopeless. I love my fire so much. How did I ever live without one?
Despite having cleared out the massive birds nest in the roof when I moved in, in a little over a year, the starlings had managed to rebuild their home to massive proportions. At least another large rubbish bag worth of nesting materials came out of the rafters, including a turkey feather.
It took the roofer and his assistant 2 separate days to get just the iron on. I say separate because the weather packed in, and we had to wait a week for it to clear. The second day was spent on the difficult front section. He had to come back for a third day's work a month later. Why? Because the barge boards (also called fascia boards) needed to be replaced. So I called a builder and got a quote. $5,500. Ah. NO. I don't think so. If the roof cost $8,000 then I'm pretty sure there is no way in hell that replacing some bits around the edge should cost that much. We did it ourselves in the end. It was tricky, and time consuming, and I ended up buying a new ladder that cost more than the materials, and borrowing some equipment off a neighbour. In the end it was about $250 for wood, nails, and paint, and $280 for the ladder. We also ended up replacing only a small section of the sofit (that's the bit under the eaves), since it makes more sense to do that when I do the weatherboards.
So here is my lovely new roof, with lovely black guttering across the back (extra large), very stylish.
Here is my lovely new barge boards and flashings installed. They are narrower than the old ones, since the price difference was $13something a meter, or $5something a meter. You do the math.
So there we are. Although I have the guttering for the front of the house, (a freebee leftover from someone mum works for), it's not going up for a while, because there are powerlines in the way making it difficult. I have to investigate having them put underground. $$$.
Goals for the summer: Bank balance recovery. And getting some boards on around the bottom of the house. Maybe renovating some windows too. Dad got one out of a renovation across the road in exchange for some beer, so it might go in the kitchen.
Also, I should mention, I got insulation in the roof. I bought it at a cost of $830 (10 bales), and it was installed for a box of beers. It is awesome having an insulated roof! I should get on to doing the floors too.
