Roughets House

Full demolition and soft-strip of a five-bed, three-bathroom bungalow for one of our very good clients. It consisted of concerns for animals a restricted area, tree stumps, tons of wood, a swimming pool and most of all rubble! In all, an enjoyable job for estates with a variety of interesting challenges that was soon overcome.

Stage 1: Water, electrics and scaffolding

The first job on site was to locate the entry points for the water and electricity supplies. Once located, our highly skilled team disconnected both supplies, leaving the house isolated and safe ready for work to begin.

We also installed scaffolding around the house to provide safe access to the roof and the first floor.

Stage 2: Soft strip demolition, part 1 of 2

We began by ordering a plasterboard skip, a metal skip, and two additional 20 cubic yard skips. (A 40 cubic yard skip could potentially have caused damage to overhead cables and tree branches). We used these to dispose of all the materials removed from the site. We rotated the skips throughout the project – removing them when full and then returning them – to ensure a continuous workflow.

First out were the carpets. We removed them in small sections which we could easily roll up, tape, and place neatly into the skip, thus saving time and money. Our second task was to remove all skirting boards, interior cladding, interior doors, trims, and any other material which we could easily pack flat.

Stage 3: Bat control

Our client was aware there were bats in the roof area, so she commissioned a specialist company to check their precise location. As bats are a protected species it is illegal to harm them, or to damage their roosts, in any building in the UK.

The consultants set up temporary roosts in bat boxes placed in various locations around the house, several weeks before demolition was due to begin. As a result most had already moved on before we started work on the roof, after completing the first stage of the soft strip inside the house.

Our first task was to remove all the tiles and lead flashing. A bat supervisor came with us to supervise our work as we slowly lifted each tile and pulled away each section of lead flashing. As a result we were able to complete the job without harming any bats or disturbing any roosts. We carefully stacked the tiles at the front of the house, ready for removal later.

Stage 4: Roof demolition

Once we had removed the tiles and the flashing only the felt and battens remained in place on the roof. We decided to begin removal at the centre of the roof, because there were three large dormers. These proved easy to work around, and once we had removed the felt and battens we could see an interior roof area consisting of Celotex insulation and plasterboard.

As we were already in position, we took the opportunity to carefully push through all this material. That left just the supporting timbers for the roof and the dormer frameworks. So once we had finished each section, and once we knew it was safe to do so, we began taking down those timbers one section at a time.

“In all an enjoyable job for Ash Estates, with a variety of interesting challenges – a rewarding project for a great client.”

— John French

Once that had been done we could safely stand on the first floor knowing there was nothing above us that could fall down. That gave us the freedom to clear out all the insulation material and the plasterboard we had already removed. A waste management company collected the insulation material as they had another use for it. In the meantime we removed the baths, showers, sinks and radiators, which we sorted into the appropriate skips.

Next we removed the plasterboard from the internal stud walls and dismantled the framework. Again we removed all cables and copper piping and put them in the appropriate skips. With that done we could carefully remove the main frame structure which had supported the roof timbers. We were able to reuse these frames for another job.

All that now remained at this level were the floorboards. Taking them up revealed all the timber joints to the ground floor ceiling – and once again we carefully pushed the ceiling plaster out as we worked our way along the first floor.

Stage 5: - Soft strip demolition, part 2 of 2

With the first floor completed we could begin work on the ground floor. Once again we took out the plasterboard and insulation material from the ceiling and disposed of it, so we could begin work on the kitchen and the two downstairs bathrooms.

After repeating the steps we had taken on the first floor to remove and recycle all the internal materials – and running a careful check to ensure we had not missed anything – we were ready to begin demolition.

Stage 6: Demolition

Starting at the front of the building, by the main entrance door, we used a 16-tonne digger to pull down the greater part of the building. We worked room by room, separating out brick, insulation material, metal, cables, rubbish and wood.

By using an Avant 750 – with multiple attachments – alongside the digger we were able to speed up the work considerably. The Avant’s grab attachment was particularly useful for picking up large amounts of mixed material quickly so it could be moved out of the way.

We put most of the wood to one side, neatly stacked, ready to be taken away. The joists and main beams were reusable, and the rest was skipped as rubbish. We put the rubble in a single pile for sorting, as we had planned to grade it on site. Sadly it was not possible to get the crusher down the access lane, so it was taken away by a grab lorry one load at a time, graded, and brought back at the end of the job.

Metal and cables were all put into the skip and removed, leaving us with only the footings to deal with.

Stage 7: Footings

To our surprise the footings consisted of a solid concrete pad, from one to three feet deep in places, which proved very resistant to the digger. It even broke some of the teeth on the bucket! We managed to remove it anyway, and after breaking out with an extra 3-tonne digger and pulling it up with the 16-tonner, we moved over to the swimming pool and broke that up as well, again removing the rubble as we had for the main house.

Stage 8: Tree roots

That left one final task. Our client had called in a specialist company to cut down the trees on the site for the new build, but the roots were still in place. Luckily there was no problem at all about removing the roots of all twelve trees with the 16-tonne digger already available on site, so with the client’s agreement, they were also lifted and taken away.

In all an enjoyable job for Ash Estates, with a variety of interesting challenges – a rewarding project for a great client.