Off grid house build Orkney

I earn a UK salary but live in Valencia, currently the no. 1 city in the world to live in in may polls, with 1/3 to 1/2 the cost of living. All because I realised exactly this ... why live somewhere I don't want to/why not live somewhere I do want to?

And we have a newborn and no support and it is tough but not impossible.

@russmeyer haha well you got dark with that one, I really hope it never comes to fruition..

@Soul yeah we were kind of at that point before we moved away, paying a lot of rent for a shitty flat in Glasgow, working a truck driving minimum wage job that left me waking up grinding my teeth with anxiety and still just scraping through most months.

@Arducius @skinny I’ve been very fortunate that through my partner’s work and salary we’ve been able to access what we need for the set up, but I think once we’re in we might be able to manage our outgoings on one full time or two part time salaries so we have time to look after ourselves and each other. We’ve also chosen not to have any children which makes it easier as the three years in a rental with no space for things and the uncertainty of consistent power and the risks and stress will only impact us, as well as reducing our outgoings significantly.

You’re right in terms of all the life stresses still happen here but as much as I found rattling around on a bike through Glasgow worked to take my mind off things a walk to the shore and 5 minutes of just looking out seems to do the exact same up here. Life is slower and lacks the constant rushing which helps an awful lot.

We call it a workshop, but a large part of it is going to be battery storage and the inverters. We’re putting a wee dark room in for if we get back into screen printing and will split the rest between bikes and tools and a big worktop for art and things right in front of the big window. So it’ll be multipurpose but full of fun uses.

We’re having a hell of a time getting solar panels and the mounts are even worse. Any time we put an order in or think we have things finalised we get an email through a couple days later to say they’re out of stock. Talked to our sparky who does a lot of renewables fittings and should be able to get some through him, fingers crossed as we really need the mounts for the same time as the roof is going up..

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They fair chucked it up today! The loadall driver was over on the mainland so didn’t expect much today. The two of them did the gables and trusses between them by hand! Lovely surprise to come home to!

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@MTB-Idle sorry about that, figured it was ok seeing as it wasn’t full of blood or anything, wasn’t sure of a trigger warning or not for the squeamish.

ha, not a problem. Glad you are ok

if you're still struggling for solar panels, drop me a DM. A close friend used to run a solar installation business in NI and he still does the odd installation when required. He can get all the hardware you need.

That’s really kind of you to offer, thank you. I’m hopefully confirming everything with the sparky in the next day or two, but if that falls through again I might be getting in touch with you!

My partner bought £2k’s worth of panels from a website renugen who then said it wasn’t in stock but didn’t propose a refund. We’ve sent emails asking for one every day for almost two weeks with no response and reading trustpilot fills me with dread.. fortunately she sent a strongly worded one mentioning solicitors and some legal bits yesterday and they replied ten minutes later to say we should get the refund within 7 days, fingers crossed!!

@MTB-Idle yeah healing up nicely thanks, kept a plaster on just to remind me to go east on that hand but will be all set for another round of painting in the house tomorrow. The workshop going up means we’ll finally be able to get all the ply and plasterboard out the house which should allow us to start on finishings soon so want to get as much done as I can before that starts.

It was looking rather pretty this morning and seems like it will be a good day for them finishing the roof off as it’s meant to be a bit breezy here this weekend

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The last few days I’ve managed to get a second coat on everything in the house and get round all the windows and doors which feels nice!

We got the refund back on those solar panels (phew!) and have hopefully managed to order some through our sparky, but are still waiting on the order confirmation. Fitting as many as we can on the south facing workshop roof so getting 14 all black longi 365w for a total of just over 5kw on the solar pv.

The guys have thrown the workshop up and are putting on the steel roof today as the wind is back down a wee bit, and then about an hour ago the turbine showed up for installation!! ☺️🥳🌬

Long time coming but a busy looking site today with some huge steps forward!!

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Looking great. Super excited to see the turbine. Assume you're hoping for it to provide the majority of your power?

Yeah uh huh, it’s a 6kw and we’ve got about 5kw of solar panels going on too but imagine the wind will be the more consistent generation of the two. Can’t believe how quickly everything happened yesterday, both sides of the workshop roof went on, which on any other day would have been THE most exciting thing, but Windsey (as we’ve decided to name her) topped that pretty effortlessly!

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Nice!

But your partner must be quite unimpressed with that turbine! Boringly padestrien.

This just keeps getting better.
I will go on daydreaming about a house like this, maybe in a less remote location.

A bottle of homebrew there?!

Cool. I’m also a big metal fan etc etc

It’s a proper daydream for us too, still not feeling real.. although we’re remote we picked here purely because of how accessible things are. Most places we considered in rural Scotland you’re a couple hours of windy tracks away from doctors/supermarket etc and have the possibility of getting snowed in in the winter where here we can access anything we really need within an hour (as long as the boat is running!) which played into our thinking. Because it’s self contained as a community it has to be relatively self reliant which means there’s always jobs going up here compared to other small places that are dying off or becoming Airbnb/retirement havens..

@skinny Hahaha that’s it, if it’s not a 10 metre blade she has no interest any more!

@si_mon628 yeah uh huh, got a friend on island who makes all sorts, named this one after the start of our postcode. We were at theirs for gooseberry wine on Saturday.

@russmeyer hahaha yep, I’ll give you that one..

Feeling much less like a building site now as things are coming off the driveway and onto the frame now. I think also just seeing the finished skyline is giving me more of a finished idea of things.

We finally got word from the frame company that two of their window fitting team will be coming up when the workshop is up to carry out all remedial works needed on the windows, result!! Will keep everything ok warranty wise and won’t be putting the joiners here out or causing them unnecessary stress about it!

are you going to learn to sail/pilot a boat? Seems like it might be a useful skill

How often does Windsey need to be serviced? And how complicated is it to fix if bust? Can you do it, or does it require a specialist to see to it?

Yeah I reckon so I’m time, a little intimidating but know a couple older boat builders on island who could teach me a bit. The car park at the slip where the ferry lands can have seaweed halfway up it and the whole village Main Street is only a metre or so above that so I can see the slip having to be altered or not able to be used in the next couple of decades.. think knowing how to sail a wee rib or something could be useful, probably end up tying it up at the bottom of our road..

@ChainBreaker It’s got an annual maintenance thing with the guys who installed it. I’d get him out as I don’t trust myself but when they were putting it up there didn’t seem to be many complicated bits to it. The guy who put it up says he looks after about 400 turbines across the islands and that he’s never out for more than maintenance on these whereas some other models he’s out to repair quite often. This is the sd6, which is now owned by a Japanese company but was the kingspan turbine before they sold it off a few years ago. My thinking is they needed some cash when they were panicking about the Grenfell fallout from their cladding..

Spent way too much on paint samples but it’s been hard to make any decisions without seeing them in person..

We’re going to do a shade of pink in the porch with one of the greys for a bench seat we’ll make and on the wood for the coat hangers.
The greens and greys are for the kitchen wall and the gable walls in the main space. Thinking one of the darker greens on the kitchen wall and one of the others on the sides then a warm tone of white on the vaulted ceiling and the wall with all the windows.

Here’s some of the colours they need to go with, the green is the colour of a Franke extractor, the pink tile will be the splashback on both sides of the kitchen. Thinking the blue tiles in the bathroom and the dark blue swatch will be our bedroom.

Waiting to put a second coat on before making any decisions..

Also considering fluted glass for the shower screen?? I really quite like it!

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Coming along nicely.

Sod the shower screen, it's just one more thing to clean, what you need is a wet room.

@jontea we had considered one and I honestly can’t remember why we decided not to, think we wanted to feel quite tucked away in the shower or something? Thinking the fluted on the outside might hide some of the water spotting.

The last couple days the guy has been putting the dpc around the paper on the workshop and then battening the frame for the wood cladding. Got home from work yesterday and the special screws had arrived so they’ve started on the cement board on the house. I know I say it every time, but, each bit of external finishing really gives a better idea of how it’s going to look. This gets a mesh tape and then two layers of a silicone render to finish it off. Once that’s all done I’ll get the stone ordered for the mason to start on the porch.

@Cazakstan Also, what the fuck are these clouds?? Even made me switch to arty black & white!

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More clouds that look like the world is ending..

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https://cloudatlas.wmo.int/en/clouds-species-lenticularis.html

Do you want to swap houses? You'd like mine I'm sure.

Thanks for that link! It’s the ufo clouds!

Haha, it’s a kind offer, and I’m sure your house is lovely but after all the time and the stress when this one is done you’ll be hard pushed getting me to the ferry never mind another house!