The scaffolding comes down!

At last, having had a nearly finished roof for several weeks, it is now complete (and is a thing of beauty) so the scaffolding was taken down yesterday - photo right (ours is the left hand half).  We have actually owned the house for only eleven weeks and a lot has been done, but I have really become fed up with ducking my head to avoid the diagonal scaffolding tie-bars between the French door and the front. I'll probably still be ducking for weeks, even though the path is now clear. 

Today it was quite a surprise to find how the left side of the house was now quite light, without scaffolding, undergrowth and leaves; working inside (with no electric light) is now much easier.  Also, we had not really remembered how light the house itself was, as we had only been inside it a few times before the scaffolding went up.  It was a real delight to find the sun shining into the front room this afternoon.

Apart from repairing ceiling laths in the two back bedrooms, we have been removing lime plaster in preparation for replastering.  Much has been damaged by water ingress from the roof, especially though a split in the lead in the box gutter. The two back bedrooms are separated by a lath and plaster wall, which also required to be stripped as the plaster was all crazed and had come away from the laths - huge areas moved alarmingly, and some had been patched with modern alternatives.  Don't ever assume, just because something is covered with lath and plaster, that it is not load-bearing.  Kirsty What's-her-name on one of those property programmes on TV loves to suggest that a wall will come down in minutes, just based on tapping it and saying that "it's only a stud wall".  It's not always true for plasterboard, and it is certainly not always true for lath and plaster!  This is the wall structure we uncovered:

Those two X frames which you can see are both made from oak beams, 4 inches by 3 inches.  Each X is about 6 feet wide and 8 feet high.  At the top of the central stud, pointing downwards, is a metal bolt which has a square head about 1.5 inches across.  The laths are in really good condition and even the nails are still shiny, not rusted.

This is a major piece of structure and not just a simple stud wall, although at first its purpose puzzled me.  There is no corresponding wall in the kitchen beneath; on the right of the picture is a major internal structural wall, about 18 inches thick, largely of squared limestone, and on the left is the external wall which is about a foot thick, in limestone rubble.  After mulling this over whilst going to sleep, finally it dawned on me: this structure is holding the external wall in place!  [Edit: a more learned friend says that it "to provide lateral bracing and stop any movement in your load-bearing walls".  That's what I meant to say...]

We now move to the next phase of work; the first fix electrics is almost done and re-plastering starts this week.  My groundworker will be in soon to look at lowering the path and drain, the gas supply is being arranged and the plumber will be giving me his quote tomorrow.  We are applying for various permissions (still) which I am afraid might well turn out to be the critical path.  Perhaps we might be in by June?