AN OBSERVATORY FOR THE GARDEN

Well, here's more of the pic diary on the building of the concrete base for the Observatory. The Landscaper, Stan/aka Steve, came on Thursday to complete the second phase which was to lay the second course of cobbles on the first outer ring of cobbles. So have patience, as there are a fair amount of pics, and get yourself a mug of tea or coffee, or whatever takes your fancy

The weather was "mixed", bright sunshine, dark grey clouds rolling in causing it to go dull, threatening to rain but not quite doing so

 

Don't finish your coffee just yet. The cobbles are natural stone and weigh a fair bit, so you have to watch out for squashed fingers You can see a square of cobble laid out just to mark where the steps will go.



Stan having a well earned mug of tea [weak, two sugars]

Back to work:

 

You could see that Stan was in his element and really enjoying the job, as he said "circles are an obsession with me!!" He said that this was definitely a "one off" job, doing it in a chaotic garden style garden and trying to make sure the circle blended in as much as possible, and then the depth of the concrete being 12" was something that was not the normal that was laid for bases, paths and floors!

 

The more I watched Stan working and seeing the outer ring rising up the more confidence I got that I was doing the right thing by going ahead with the project. It's strange in a way that, after 18 months of research, drawing up plans, deciding on a site for the concrete base and then rejecting it the next day several times, mulling over the whole thing many times, that I would still feel doubts about it but that's Life. As I said though, watching Stan create the outer ring using the natural look of Stone made the doubts disappear

 

Here's the finished ring with two courses of cobbles. Now all we need to do is cut the trench to lay the armoured cables to the rear wall of the garage and put the cable through........and then pour the concrete into the ring to make the base. That should happen towards the end of next week as unfortunately Stan will be off work for a week or two afterwards. Then it's a matter of keeping the Cats off the poured concrete for 3 days, after which the concrete will be hard enough to walk on. Then it's another 28 days before the concrete is fully cured.




Job done, time for Stan to go home for tea.

 

I was thinking along those lines myself, Sheal, but decided not to say that to Stan in case he decided to bury me in the concrete when it's being poured!!!

 

Looking good.

how are you going to keep the cats off?

 

You're right, Jiffy, the stone blends in well with the garden, softening the base. Stan told me that because he knew he'd be appearing on GC he was wearing new shorts every day!!!

Well,Jiffy I've thought about what I need to power,a computer for the telescopes, heaters for the telescopes, power for the rotating roof, LED lighting, and perhaps, later, a Laptop.......with some not being powered all the time. So there are 3 armoured 15 amp AC cables supplying 3 double RCD sockets giving me the ability to power six units at a time, which should be fine.

 

Well, I'll, hopefully, be covering the poured cement with a raised "tent" of a tarpaulin. At the moment both cats thinks it's great to be able to run along the rim of the cobbled circle and have been making a great game out of it.!!

 

I can see, with difficulty, you being able to get a raised tent effect so the pitch of the 'roof' will keep them off.

How will you stop them from getting underneath? Cats are almost as good as mice at squeezing into places you don't want them to!!

 

Well, hopefully, Stan will have the answer on how to do it because of his long standing experience To be honest, I'm more worried about how the armoured cable in the middle of the ring is to be kept upright out of the cement until it has dried

I kept the ring dry from rain when the mortar was still fresh by draping the tarpaulin over it and held it down with some spare cobbles, and the cats didn't get under it then and seemed to put them off going near it. So hopefully the same method will stop them. It only needs to be there for 3 days and then the cats can walk over it with no problems.

That's a good idea, I'll let Stan come up with some idea first though as I don't want to be given concrete boots