Guest House Construction: Part 4

Forms & Plumbing

Things are moving along nicely this week as I think Bill (builder) is taking advantage of the dry weather to get the pad as far along as possible.  After the pad site had been packed down, the form setters went to work.  It took them a couple of days working in 100 degree heat in the direct sun but they set the outer forms of the house.

Still not terribly exciting I know, but it at least now shows the footprint of the structure.  If I had it to do all over again I would have moved it back substantially but it's going where it is now - no second guessing.

After the forms are set, we brought in about 8-10 truckloads of what builders call sand but is really like a fine, soft dirt to us normal folk.  A tractor came out this morning to spread it around and pack it down in preparation for the plumbers.  I wasn't expecting them until tomorrow or Monday, but they showed up and started setting pipes as soon as the tractor guy was done.   

Turns out that we didn't have nearly enough sand so 8 more truckloads were brought out and dropped in the forms while the plumbers had lunch.  Bill is supervising the drops in the picture above.

The plumbers finished up and I couldn't resist checking everything out.  I added a last minute sink to their plans but they took care of it without a fuss.  When we're talking about "plumbing" at this point in a build we are referring to just what goes through the slab - basically drains and vent lines.  All of the in-wall plumbing comes after the house is framed up.  That's it for now.  I'll call this a productive week.  I think we have to have some kind of inspection done before we call the plumbing good and that should happen Monday.  The weather forecast calls for rain so that may hold us up on the next couple of steps but we'll see.