Garage, mirrors and shower screen installed. Internal painting complete

21-09-2012

Windows delivered for another job!

Mirror installed in WC

Still waiting on the liano
hand wall basin and tiles!

Look at all the leaves already in the gutter!

Water filter installed

Internal painting complete

The photo below shows the gap variation between the skirting and the gyprock, there are other areas like this but this one is the worst.

Outdoor trims complete, found the workmanship here a bit on the average side.

Nice little water stain from the weekend rain.
Since the scaffold has been removed this
shouldn't happen again.

Power pole installed

16-09-2012

Not much to update this week other than the power pole and the portico hand rail has been installed.

Water filter has been installed too, matches the main sink tap

Internal painting started

08-09-2012
Dropped on site to find the painters hard at work, and didn't get a chance to take many photos except for the ones below. As you can see skirting tiles isn't 200mm high,

Laundry tiling

Skirting height is 150mm high

I asked our SS about the skirting height and his words were the skirting height can be up to 200mm high, suggesting that it doesn't have to be to that specification. I think I have the right to argue that it should be built as indicated in the plan, but I actually don't mind it at that height and it matches the kick rail height. 

Scaffold has been removed from the portico

Plastering complete on the portico

Finalising flooring options with Carpet Call

01-09-2012

Went to Carpet Call today and finalised our flooring choices. As part of the Spoilt for Choice Promotion we get Timber Look Floating flooring 1 Strip board laid on 2mm underlay to the entry, gallery, kitchen, butler's pantry, family and dining room. We also get Carpet Call Catgeory 1 type carpet  in the sitting, study, rumpus and the first floor. 

We would like to have floor boards upstairs however there were several things which came into our decision making process:

1. The cost to upgrade from carpet to floor boards isn't all that attractive and 

2. They won't remove the skirting to install the floor boards and

3. We're not happy with the floorboard options available

So we are planning to choose the standard offering (which will cost us nothing as part of the promotion) and ask them to deliver the product and not install it. We did however upgrade the carpet in the sitting, study and rumpus to Salerno Nautica Pure Wool with 10mm underlay, we found this to be the best value compared to doing it our selves post  hand over.

We then have the option to sell/use what we have. For example we could consider putting some of the laminate in the roof for storage space, in the garage, and the shed floor. As for the carpet we will try and sell it on ebay, if there aren't any reasonable offers we could create little rugs out of it, use it for picnics, line the car boot, etc. 

So we'll have approx. the following for sale in a few months:
1. 100 sqm of Sandy Point Barrier 82 (100% polypropylene) carpet and
2. 100 sqm of Universal Flooring Laminate Authentic oak dark grey (UL1463)

If we decide to keep the laminate AND install it upstairs ourselves, this could potentially save us $5k which could be directed towards the outdoor deck or landscaping. "AND" is in upper case as I'll probably be the only one installing it while the other half is looking after our 3 year old. My back is already starting to hurt thinking about it.

I don't have any decent photos of the carpet and floor board other than these taken on the iPhone. Feel free to make us an offer if you're interest in buying this from us. If you need to see any samples I suggest you visit Carpet Call in Bella Vista.

Sandy Point Barrier 82

Universal Flooring Laminate Authentic oak dark grey (UL1463)

So this means we'll be shopping around for more flooring options, but for now we are leaning towards Quick Step laminate for the first and ground floor. Hardwood engineered floorboards is still an option for the ground floor but we're in two minds if we want to deal with the maintenance.

Ceaserstone installed, tiling still not finished

01-09-2012

Dropped into find all the Ice Snow ceaserstone has been installed and most of the sinks have been installed except for the kitchen and the bathroom WC. I have a feeling they have totally forgotten about this as the Bathroom WC sink it's non standard. 

Powder room
1.5mm off white grout for the floor tiling and white grout for the wall tiling.

Ice snow ceaserstone and Caroma Liano Vanity Basin

We optioned for tiled kick rail for all the vanities.

Bathroom

I'm pretty sure tilers use the floor waste point as a starting point for tiling. I mean how else could you line this up any otherway?

Bathroom WC

Anyone see a problem with the photo below? Off white grout has been used on the skirting, when it should be white. It was done correctly in the Ensuite WC but not here. In addition to this the tiling for the hand basin/mirror is not complete. Can't really see it in this photo but it's the wall on the left. Also the skirting should be 200mm high as specified in the floor plans, you can't tell from this angle but that definitely isn't 200mm. An issue I will probably need to take up with Di Lorenzo.

Ensuite

Really wished we changed this window, would have preferred to have this higher and have a layer of tiling between the bathtub and the window, similar to the pic below from one of their display home, sigh! 

 

Similar issue her in the Ensuite WC tiling isn't 200mm, however grout is the correct colour though.

Recess is shower

Gap between the bathtub and vanity. What should we use this space for? 

Bermuda Square Floor waste

Portico

Kitchen

Kitchen cearserstone installed, unfortunately we didn't have time to remove the protective foam to take any decent photos. 

Island bench has a 300mm overhang (breakfast bar) on both sides with water fall edges.

The hole we didn't ask for.

We ended up going for the free water filter as a result of the stone company's mistake. Settled for the square neck tap to match the main tap. We'll also be getting two Ice Snow chopping boards for free as well.

A sample floor board in the butler's pantry