Mortar progress

A picture of the mortar while it was drying.

It hasn't had the top on it for a few weeks now. Lots of rust, but nothing terrible.

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Back wall repair

Image
The first major repair is underway: a stainless steel sheet has been cut to fit and is being pop-riveted on to the original back wall. this will seal up the rust holes and provide a new lip for the top cooking surface to be bolted on to. Tomorrow I need to pick up more drill bits as I've only managed to get two holes done and riveted. I will do the oven section next, then look into insulating the firebox with high temperature ceramic wool.  
Read more

Internal Repairs on the wood cookstove

Image
This morning I spent time rebuilding the interior air baffle that "turns on the oven heat".  When open, smoke goes directly up the chimney. When closed, it forces smoke to go around the oven, heating it up before going up the chimney. The fire box got a new layer of high heat ceramic wool insulation, the same kind used in metal working furnaces. The shiney metal sheet side is towards the steel walls. I have placed some recycled brick in it to see how it will look when done. With the bricks I'm choosing, it will give a deeper fire box so we can use longer pieces of wood.  
Read more

Rebuilding the solar set up

Image
Our first big job was emptying out the van and setting up the (new to us) secondhand solar panels. We got these off marktplaats for 400 euros. We brought 10 panels to Portugal and left 4 panels at home to put over our small garage. These are 145 watts, huge and heavy. Today it is easy to get a 455 watt panel the same size as one of these, but for our penny-pinching Portugal project, these are great. For speed, we set them up against the concrete wall and use bricks and a wood beam that was in the garage. The cost of setting them up against the concrete wall was less than five dollars of concrete mix as all the rest was recycled from the barn.  We got to limewashing and cleaning up the corner where the solar set up was going back to (it has been moved a few times) In the morning the sun hits the 4 panels on the right of the picture. Mid-day the sun hits all of them and in the evening it hits the four on the left of the picture. There is a cork oak planted in the corner that will som...
Read more