Lots of brick in a week

All that brick is one week's work. They will finish the first one meter today and next week will start on the second meter. Then they put forms around the castillos (rebar) and pour them. Too bad they can't work for a few more months but the Canadian owners leave at the end of the month.

Coladores and marquesina supports

The guys that put up the wooden supports for a cement roof are called coladores even tho colador mean a strainer. Guess that will remain a mystery for awhile. In the foto below they are only half finished but had it completed in one afternoon. 5 guys working and they only wanted 1000 pesos. We keep the wood in place for about two weeks while the cement dries.

My workers are starting on the rebar network that will sit on top of the wood to hold the cement together. We needed another load of sand for the cement mix and his price was only 180 pesos

Coladores at work

Sand delivery

Slinky in a Tube

The guys that worked for me last year have been busy with other projects over the winter and I told them when other work runs out I would have a project or two. This project is to build an awning (marquesina) along the whole side of the house. We built one but lower and it's only about a foot wide. I wanted more shade and rain protection. This will also be above the air vents which leaked in the past.

The circular support columns will be four with a diameter of 25cms which should give good scale to the house and the awning will be at least a meter and a half wide. I was surprised the footings will be the size of house footings -- a meter deep and filled with rock and cement. I was also surprised to find the Sonotubes were not that expensive. These were only $145 pesos and 3 meters long.

The most interesting thing is that they can't use the normal rectangular rebar design in a round tube so we bought a bunch (40 kilos) of wire that's about a 1/4 inch thick. They form it by wrapping it around a 6" drainage pipe until they have a slinky that stretches to 3 meters. Then they wire wrap 4 pieces of rebar inside. I imagine this will take the better part of a month.

Filling up the yard with sand, gravel, cement and next - rocks

Three of the column supports made - and holes where they will go in the grass

Wrapping rebar inside the slinky

Form the slinky on a tube

How much does all that weigh

Two loads of sand, one and a half loads of gravel and 100 bags of cement. Of all that we had about a half load of sand left, a quarter load of gravel and used exactly 100 bags of cement. There is also about 120 pieces of six meter rebar under the cement on a 120 square meter roof.

No cement pumpers used here - it was the bucket by bucket brigade up the street side of the house. Street was closed to all but bicycles for almost 4 hours. The roof foto only shows the beginning of the pour but it is all up there. My job now is to water the roof at sunrise and sunset so it dries slowly.

Sand and gravel in the street

100 bags of cement

About a quarter of the way thru the pour

Cement crew in the street

We have roof (supports)

When cement roofs are poured they require lots of support to hold the weight and also just something for the cement to sit on (obvious). Well here we needed three loads of flat lumber and support posts to hold a 125 meter roof. Took the crew a day and a half to put it up and the wood will remain for a little over two weeks while the cement cures and dries.

The roof actually got poured yesterday (Saturday) and I've begun the twice a day watering (sunset and sunrise) to let it dry slowly. So far the crews have been great and priced under estimates. Next will be about the roof pour and preparation.

One load of lumber

Filling rooms with support posts

Roof is about half done

All wood supports in, rebar in along with plumbing and electrical

Cement roof in Mexico

Finished another 2 weeks work

Got the same good crew back that built the bodega and plan to finish the plumbing, electric and roof in the next few weeks. Made a lot of changes of windows and doors, opened up the inside of the house, added another room off the front side. Extended the bathrooms a few feet so everything is inside. No sink in the bedrooms (motel style). The roof also had a 20mm pitch and we decided to level it for future construction above. I eliminated the back bathroom and will just use the old bedroom area as a bodega and workshop.

Next week will be the wooden supports for the roof pour and then installing the electric and plumbing on top of the supports along with a large amount of rebar. We also decided to run a beam the length of the house that will be hidden inside the cement (not showing above or below).

Foundation of new room

Walls almost up on new room

New doorways through the house

Building a swimming pool in Mexico

This Pool project is shown from start to finish. Sadly Barbara and I had to move out of this place due to landlord problems after she paid for the entire construction. Another lesson to trusting gringos new to Mexico. There is a link to a complete foto set of the project at the bottom of this page. Not sure if we'll get around to a pool on our lot some day but we should have the room for a smaller one

Cement floor directly on the sand

Double rebar around the sides and in the second floor layer

Side walls getting finished

Grounting in the tiles

Link to more fotos of this swimming pool project