Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Creating habitat Building a garage-apartment with a pond view

Conventional, with a capital "C". No muss, no fuss.
The main leaves the house and dumps directly into the 1500 gallon tank. Solids sink/settle and the liquid effluent runs out of a pipe near the top of the tank. That pipe runs to a concrete distribution box.


One of those pipes is the pipe coming from the tank. The other 4 pipes are outbound from the distribution box and run for 100 feet long. They are perforated and set in a 3' wide trench that is filled with about 12" - 18" of rock. The filter fabric is placed on top of the gravel bed and the soil is dropped back into the trench to fill it back up.

Thanks for the explanation - that makes it all logical. This topic is becoming of greater importance to me as we may well be in a position to start building at our farm in the next year or two and things like a septic system will be the stuff I suspect we may begin looking at as part of the site prep. I know we just need to get the right folks out to look at the place and decide what sort of needs/options we have for this. At least we have city water, so that part of the equation isn't too bad.

Thanks again.

Thanks for the props, Todd.
This septic system flushed our bank account, so the water well is gonna have to wait. It's nice to have it in, approved, and ready for business....even if I gotta flush with buckets of pond water.

Wow, sorry to hear it was such a big bite, but I guess that's not too surprising considering the environmental issues that are involved.

As for flushing water, a friend of mine has a pretty cool rainwater collection system at his cabin involving 3 interconnected plastic 55 gallon drums connected to his downspout system. It's pretty nice and he uses it for flushing since they don't have a well on their getaway place. Might be worth considering for the time being.

I've got a 14 million gallon cistern waiting for a pump. I'm confident it can handle my worst Sunday morning.

That's true!

I have used a system like the one Todd described . It works well. For winter you can just get some snow.

Brettski, with the weather this weekend, aren't you happy that you have the place all buttoned up? It'd be fun working on the roof now!!!

brrrr....



Dski laid down the law a few weeks back in preparation for the coming winter. Temps below 20 degrees would preclude her from attending any LNP construction progress. I tested her resolve by scheduling a 3-dayer this past weekend, when the forecasted highs would be low 20's. Hey, heck...it's over 20, right? Single digit temps at sunrise weren't welcome, but she perservered...as did I.
My main job during these trying work conditions is to fill and fire up the kerosene heater. With no insulation and excellent roof ventilation, we retain no heat. Instead, the kerosene heater is used more like a campfire. Dski sets up a folding chair right in front of it. I keep waiting for the smores. Admittedly, I find plenty of quality moments warming my hands and face as we hope and wait for temps to rise into (and thru) the teens.
We move slowly, all bundled up and lookin' like the Michelin tire man....but we do move. I am pleased to report that we did finally complete framing in the entire upstairs. There is a bit of detail work left (blocking corners for drywall attachment), but the bulk of it is complete. Yeah, I know...it's just a bunch of 2 x 4's and 2 x 6's, but it turned out great and looks cool. I wait 'til the end of the day and Dski leaves before I walk thru the small maze and pretend to open doors as I walk thru the living quarters that I have seen in my mind's eye from day 1. It's stuff like this that inspires me to push on.
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A few pics to share our progress

the floorplan, labeled for reference


master BR, looking toward master bath


other end of master BR, looking back toward walk-in closet


view from master bath throne
(this will always be significant as it looks down to the tiny shed we have called home as this project was built)

guest bedroom, standing at entry door


standing between liv/fam and kitch/dine and looking down hallway (stairs & entry door just left of window)


standing against bank of picture windows, looking left to liv/fam


same spot, looking right to kitch/dine


from end of hallway

ice skating?

James, what is ice skating?

Dave and I had record temperatures yesterday. The high was 79 degrees.

Brettski, you'll have it insulated in no time. It's really coming along!

WOW, even the Throne room has a fantastic view!

Brettski: I look forward to your weekly posts. Great progress from a true craftsman.

I can't remember you posting an exact date, I know it was September or October 2011, but exactly when is the midwest Pond Boss mini-conference scheduled for your place? Seems like it was the weekend of September 17th wasn't it?

Bing

B'ski put up the roof insulation , even if in a temp mode, before the hammer freezes to your hand.

That is a beautiful blue in the pic.

Congrats on the septic with the letter "C" included. It doesn't apply in our current project. All I will say is the Price of a non "C" system is absurd. Can you say low dose system.

never heard of it...some details, please

I know about as much as you about it. This might explain it.

http://www.cleanearthenvironmental.net/septic-systems.html

I have chosen it over the the arobic system it is about 2k more but does not require a yearly service contract and also keeps the waste water below the surface. The current project does not have enough yard to desinate an area for the sprinkler system unless I allowed it to cover most of the front & side yards. It is suppose to be clean water but I still have my concerns having it that close to the structure.

I took a couple of days between Christmas and new year's eve on a solo trip. Dski got the time off and boy, did she make a good decision. I knew we had some snow so I called one my pals down there. He said that we had about 5" and no drifting. Lousy estimation as I arrived to about 7" - 9". Although this difference is not alot by measurement, my front wheel drive car disagrees and gives it up at around 6". Anyway, I spent a good 3 hours digging and tracking in the driveway to allow passage. For those that will offer the advice of purchasing a tractor or something similar, I will proactively respond by providing an address to send me the money to purchase it. Not to worry; we have a 21 HP garden tractor dedicated that will receive a 42" snowblower (sooner than later, I hope).
I spent pretty much all my time setting blocking at all the interior partition framing to allow every corner a place to attach drywall. The upstairs partition framing is complete.
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This leaves only the downstairs. We have 1200 square feet of one big ol' room that will serve as a garage and a shop area. I laid out the windows in the shop to allow the option of sometime later dividing it with a wall to create 2 nearly identical rooms (ie; bedrooms). Right now, though, a roomy shop with a terrific pond view is the goal. A mechanical room will also be incorporated into the wall that divides the garage area from the shop area.
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I decided to follow a similar framing method as the upstairs by setting all the upper and lower plates first; then fill in with the studs. This moves slower than just building the wall, lift it, and banging it into place, but it's easier for us to handle and it allows me to be anal retentive about fit.
We started by laying out the green treated base plates, attaching them to the concrete slab with 3/8" wedgit bolts. Since we have a garage directly adjacent to a space that might someday be designated as living space, now is the time to treat it so. This means adding foam sill sealer below the bottom plates.



In the pic above, the slab on the right has pex tubing (slabs are separated by 1-1/2" high density foam insulation, the top of which is visible). Using 3/8" wedgit bolts that only require 1-1/2" penetration assures me (somewhat) that we came nowhere near the tubing embedded at the bottom of the 5" thick slab. We had to move the wall over onto the pex slab in order to create a suitably sized mechanical room. It should work just fine.



The other end of the wall is a bit simpler and runs along the edge of the garage slab (no pex in this slab). The wedgit bolts are installed into the edge of the slab and the same sill sealer is installed between bottom plate and slab.



It was a fairly short weekend for us, and the cold does take it's toll. We woke up Sunday morning to 9 degrees. We finished all the base plates (including the funky base plates that follow the concrete curb at the exterior walls) and the corner studs at the exterior walls. Top and bottom plates are set perfectly plumb to each other and ready to be filled in with studs and door framing....next trip.

So is the heat working and power ? What about water - using buckets? Any new upstairs pics? A good winter pic of the pond from the upstairs window would be good.

Brettski:

I've got a cheaper option for you than the tractor. Buy 4 cheap rims and 4 of these

Toss 'em on around Thanksgiving, and take them off around the first of April.

My VW Jetta Wagon (front wheel drive, 4.5" of ground clearance) drove thru about 3/8 mile of 20" deep snow on a gravel drive. FMC67693's wife had a heck of a time getting her car into their garage due to snow/ice and I pulled right up to it without slipping the tires. Once you have them on for a winter you'll never go thru another winter with summer shoes on again. He's been in the car a few times. PM him how they do in the snow/ice.

They'll last you about 3-4 winters depending on the miles that you drive. I average about 40K on a set before they need replacing. I don't run them all year long, they don't like the heat of summer.

The place is shaping up nicely! Be thankful that you aren't in the lake effect snow belt. South Bend this weekend got whacked with 38" of snow between Friday afternoon and Sunday morning.

Wow...3 weeks off! Between lousy weather, some previous committments, and a promise to Dski to get a few honey-do's done around the principal home, I've been AWOL from the LNP project. It felt good to get back...really.
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It was a short weekend for us, but we managed to finish all the partition wall framing. We have a small amount of blocking to finish, but it's pretty much done.





This creates the framework to separate the garage parking area from the shop area. It also sets a couple of benchmarks for the project. First, we are done with all the framing...period. Kinda sad...NOT. There will plenty of other wood-related projects to help me forget this sad day.
Secondly, this opens the door to pulling the rough electrical. This step is a big deal. I am very anxious to get it knocked out and inspected. With that point behind us, we can focus on finishing out this shop area that we just created. Although this kinda sounds like I have mal-adjusted priorities (by putting the actual upstairs living space on hold), there is a method to the madness. If we can get the shop area all buttoned up and drywalled, it gives us a 400+ square foot area of protected living space to move in to. After nearly 2 years of living in 120 square feet, this is a significant upgrade that we are both anxious to achieve.