It’s been another of those weeks. What am I talking about? So far, it’s been one of those lives.
Needless to say, we’ve been busy with the house, diagnosing problems and instituting repairs.
The source of the recurring brown stains on our dining-room ceiling would now appear to be a leaking towel radiator in our bathroom. This was repaired yesterday, but I don’t dare have the ceiling repainted until we’ve been away on another holiday and returned to a ceiling that hasn’t acquired further stains.
Just in case the radiator’s not to blame, I’ve had our shower cabinet resealed with new, er… my dictionary tells me the word is lute, but I’ve never heard of it. A lute, to me, is a musical instrument.
Anyway, the grout in the shower cabinet was showing its age and cracks and tears were appearing in the corners, along the edges and wherever a join had been made. Apparently, the previous owner’s wife didn’t want any silicone-based sealant to be used in there for aesthetic reasons. Sigh.
Whether or not it was the cause of the current leak, sooner or later those cracks and tears would have presented problems of their own, so it’s good that they have been tackled.
At the beginning of the week, I was dismayed to come down in the morning and read an e-mail from Sarah that yet another leak in the conservatory had sprung during the night. We had recently had the conservatory glass resealed and, in so doing, had thought to have tackled the last of this particular kind of leak. Alas.
Yesterday, another possible cause of recurring leaks in the conservatory was identified and dealt with. It remains to be seen whether we’ve managed to nail it this time.
As if that weren’t enough for one week, yesterday finally saw the replacement of the largest window in our bathroom. The vacuum between the two separate panes of glass had been compromised, which caused massive condensation across the inside. Whilst this had no structural disadvantage, it wasn’t very pleasing to the eye, so we decided to replace it.
The window in question is constructed from thick, bulletproof glass and weighs 350 kg, so replacing it was not as simple as you might think. The factory that produced it needed no fewer than three attempts at manufacturing a replacement before they had one that passed through quality control. The previous two had dust motes between the panes.
Given the weight of the glass, it couldn’t just be lifted into place, either. A crane had to be hired to hoist the glass over the garden and onto the balcony, where it could be nudged and edged into place.
I don’t mind telling you that a certain amount of anticipation — no, anxiety — no, dread — preceded the day of the event.
With nerves aplenty and inquisitive neighbours observing the proceedings from behind their own glazing, I took photos as the glass guillotine of the old window was precarious manoeuvred from the balcony onto the back of the crane.
My jitteriness was largely unwarranted, it appears, because the new window was placed with nary a hitch. There was minimal damage to the window frame and, because I’d anticipated the need to repaint afterwards anyway, what damage there was will be effectively erased by a new paint job.
The cause of the moisture that had penetrated the old window’s seal became apparent as soon as it had been removed. The underlying sill was soaked in water, which the old sealant had let through and the narrow gutter atop the sill had failed to disperse.
To prevent the problem from reoccurring with the new glass, it was decided to drill holes through the sill to the outside. The exit point of these holes was given a lick of primer, but I’ll have to have them painted pretty soon to prevent the wood of the sill from rotting.
It took five men, including the crane operator, four hours to fit the new window, which included some time spent figuring out how to position the crane next to our garden wall, such that the window could be swung at an angle suitable for the men on the balcony to catch it and manoeuvre it into place. That was actually a large part of the work. When the previous window had been fitted, a similar crane had been used, but at that time, the garden wall didn’t yet exist, so the crane could get closer.
That’s enough maintenance for one week.
And in case you’re wondering why we need bulletproof glass, it’s because I like to stand at the window, giving passing motorists the finger all day long.
No, actually, it’s because our existing windows on the first and ground floors are bulletproof. This glass has a green tint when viewed from the outside, so to replace the bathroom window with normal glass would have resulted in a window that looked quite out of keeping with the rest. We therefore decided to bite the bullet of bulletproof glass. A normal window would have been much cheaper and weighed a lot less, so a crane wouldn’t have been necessary to install it. I just hope no further windows develop the same defect.