DIY-Projects – Page 2 – Beautiful Chaos

Building in an underground cistern without digging a hole

We are not hooked up to the sewer and need a solution for our waist water. We are in a water protection zone and have been asked not to dig any holes deeper then 50 cm into the ground. We have not found any cistern with qualification for above ground, so we some how have to build in an underground cistern above ground.

We decided to sacrifice the corner in our barn directly beside the big door, so the cistern would be protected from the sun and easily accessible for emptying.

An underground cistern, obviously, is made to go under the ground. This means the cistern gets pressure from outside to withstand the pressure from the inside when it is full. If this pressure on the outside is not there, the cistern could get damaged. So we came up with the following way to build in this cistern above ground.

We started by building a wooden construction coming out of the corner about 20 cm bigger as the cistern is.

This is the cistern we bought.

We put in a thin layer of sand on the bottom to protect the pond liner, which is coming in next, against any sharp spots in the concrete floor.

We have laid out the entire basin with the pond liner, just incase there would be a problem with the cistern, the waist water will be contained and not flood our barn.

This would also have made for a nice pool.

After another layer of sand the cistern is put in place.

Around the sides is also filled with sand which we compacted.

Then we build a deck on top, so we can stand on it to empty our toilet waist in the cistern. The pipe going up is for venting. It has a filter on top, so it won’t smell bad in our barn. The metal pipe is for draining the cistern. The big black lid in the middle is where we can fill in our waist water. The hole in the deck is where we will connect the outlets of the toilet and the shower we are going to build in into our barn this year. Obviously that would not work by gravity, so we will put a waist water shredder pump in between, but that will be a future project.

Demolishing an unpractical office space in our barn

This office space was already in the barn when we bought it, but has annoyed us from the beginning

Since the floor space of the entrance of the barn is lower as the rest of the floor space, this space already takes about one fifth of the barn overall space. The office space was built in the opposite side of the barn which made the space very cramped. We only used the space as storage and for the washing machine. A workbench was also in there but this usually was stacked with tools and projects. Also the sealing was made at an angle because of the very high window, so we could not use the space above. Further more, we had put the caravan in the barn a few times and with the office space it was a very tight fit. We could barely fit trough between caravan and office wall and on the other side the barn door could just close with a few cm of space to the drawbar of the caravan.

We finally got a clear picture in our heads of what we would like to do with the space and decided to tear this office space down.

We used a full day to clear the space inside and all around and cramped all the tools, supplies and everything else that was in and around there every where in the barn. Some things are hard to reach no, but it is only temporary.

We started with taking out the windows and doors.

We could reach the first corner with our tractor and used it to tear down as much as possible.

My husband did the rest of the walls with a sledge hammer.

It was very convenient to have the tractor with its bucket to clear out the rubble.

Above the small space the sealing was screwed apart first, so the bigger part of the sealing could be pulled down. Working on the floor is more convenient then up high. Of course we save the rafters for reuse.

The kid’s are unstoppable in helping. They do understand danger and listen very well as to when they can come to help and when they have to go outside.

On our property is a big pile of rubble and some other things, we do not know what is underneath the rubble we can see, where we added the rubble of the office space.

And then the space is cleared and the starting material for the space we want to built is already inside to dry before the building starts.

Backing waffles on the gas stove top in the caravan

On our coming journey we will not always have excess to main voltage power, but we love to eat waffles, so we bought a waffle iron we can use on the gas stove top in our caravan.

It is easy to use and we find these waffles much better then the waffles coming out of the electrical waffle iron. Both sides of the waffle iron need to be preheated and a bit greased. After putting in some batter the waffle iron needs to be closed carefully without burning yourself. After one side is finished baking the waffle iron needs to be turned, so the waffle can bake on the other sides as well.