Relaying the Hall Floor (Part 3 of 3)

Just realized that I never finished off this story! Doesn't time fly when you get older?
The hall was laid by my friendly professional - I knew that I would be lucky to achieve a job half as good as he has done, so it was well worth it. We used some stuff that I had not encountered before, called "AdhereCal". It comes in powder form like NHL but, when mixed, it looks like a fine lime plaster which is sticky like normal tile cement. It has certainly done the job for us, although there was a minor panic when he ran out and I was 25 miles away. Luckily I knew where one of the few local stockists was and was able to get there before they closed.
These photos show the finished result, with which I am very pleased - and so is t'other half, which is probably more important.

This is a close-up showing the corner of the hall in front of the front door.

The photo left shows the view after entering the front door and turning right to see the way through the arch, while the one below shows the view back from the stairs towards the front door and the arch, with the hall window behind the arch.

I have often been asked when the house will be finished. My standard answer is that, as far as I am concerned, the house moved from "restoration and landscaping" to "maintenance and gardening" in about 2013. However, now that the hall floor is finished, I really do hope people stop asking me that question.

The only things to be done are things that I have done before! The bathroom fan has been replaced, we have a new fridge, we had an new washing machine about 5 years ago (don't buy a Haier - there are no spares available), I have re-decorated the hall and lounge walls, I have re-built the cheap shed which I bought in a hurry in 2011 to keep things dry.

Relaying the Hall Floor (Part 2)

The new limecrete (NHL5) screed is laid (left) over the recycled foamed glass, and I have done a scratch coat on the lime plaster (below) where the old concrete skirting board was.

But things do move on slowly at times, like when you are waiting for the NHL to set completely, or when waiting for the scratch coat of lime plaster on the wall to go off so you can do the second coat.

The English limestone flags arrive today, I hope, but they cannot be laid for at least another couple of weeks, but it's more like three weeks - first it's the wait for the floor to be ready then - guess what? - the contractor has a planned commitment for 9 days on September 6th which means we are waiting until almost September 20th.

However, with a small delay the water pipe was fixed two weeks ago now. I am really glad that it was noticed as it would have gone sooner or later. The cost was probably an additional £750 (plumber and builder together). I can only guess at how I would have felt if, in a couple of years, the new floor had suddenly become very damp and we would have to done the job, cursing, at even greater expense.

I have also sold the Staffordshire Blue tiles for a reasonable price. They went to a flooring contractor who was going to lay them in a couple of days time in a house in London. Sadly I could not interest him in the collection of red quarries I have.

One job I can do is to paint the skirting board which has already been delivered. The profile matches what we have in the lounge which was made for us in 2011, so t'other half is very pleased. Result!

Relaying the Hall Floor (Part 1)

Well, I have finally taken the plunge: the 6" square, 1" thick, red and black (Staffordshire Blue) quarry tiles in my hall have been lifted and I am laying a limecrete floor.

The current floor is (I reckon) the original from the conversion of the school to a house in about 1861; the photo (right) shows it as it was in 2010. We left a small part of the old floor near the under-stairs cupboard (left of the stairs in the photo) as it's not in bad shape.

The limecrete floor will be constructed with a base layer of "Geocell" Recycled Foamed Glass (RFG) (see www.mikewye.co.uk/limecrete-floors/) as opposed to the Light Expanded Clay Aggregate (LECA) which I used for the kitchen floor (see entries in March/April 2011).

The RFG (being loosely laid, left) has several benefits (compared to LECA), one of which is that the depth of the floor is less and hence there is less to dig out! I have already been caught out by the volume of the removed floor - it seems to have expanded massively (like, doubled) in volume and so is filling more bags that I expected! It was very well compacted.

We have also removed the horrible concrete skirting (which was painted BROWN before we moved in! I re-did it in white) which will be replaced by some pretty profile in pine to match what I fitted in the lounge.

The removal of the old floor left a huge hole between the door to the lounge (at the front of the house) and the door to the kitchen/diner (at the back). I solved this by fitting a bridge using two 3 metre bits of 75mm x 50 mm C16 covered with bits of old floorboard from the firewood pile.

As an added refinement, I have covered the boards with a piece of carpet (as laid on the stairs and landing); the stairs are easily accessed from the bridge.



An unforeseen problem: in one corner of the hall we uncovered the mains water supply (which I knew was there but had ignored for the last 10 years) - photo below.

Below the tile level it was badly corroded and so it has to be done NOW, not later; so now outside there is a large hole and I have a plumber coming on Friday to fit a plastic pipe through the wall to the mains supply outside the house (photo below - note how the water pipe comes out from the wall and goes under the rainwater drain at an angle). More expense but it's worth it (as I keep telling myself).

The original plan was to re-fit as many as possible of the existing tiles supplemented by similar ones bought at local reclamation yards. Sadly, yesterday I took my other half to a reclamation yard as I needed to buy some more reclaimed tiles - the re-useability of the lifted ones is just over 50% (even worse than I had gloomily expected).

This visit was a mistake - first I was gently told off by the owner for sorting out suitable good condition tiles (!), so I didn't buy any at all. Then, second, once the other half had seen for herself the difficulty of finding acceptable old quarries, she decided that we should buy some proper stone flooring instead. Aaargh!

So I now have available a large number of mostly one inch, good clean reclaimed quarries (a variety of red, red/orange, proper Staffordshire blue and other blue/black), plus a lot of good ones waiting to have their grouting etc removed, plus a lot more of rejected ones (suitable for outside use only). At least I don't have to do any more grouting removal and also the retained small part of the original floor will now be done as well.

These are actually the old tiles in 2010 - the ones I have now are not quite as bad!

Reflections on the Last Two Years

Now that I have a bit more time for activities other than building work, I've been thinking about what has been acheived in the last two years and two months.  Specifically, I've been thinking about two aspects of the work, namely the things I've done which have really pleased me, and the things that I would rather had been done differently.

Under the latter heading come a few things which still bug me:

• The attitude of the Conservation Officer - this relationship seemed to have gone wrong near the start, but I still don't really know why, other than because (just possibly) the CO really IS an unhelpful person.
• The fact that Highways at the County Council told me that I could not widen the existing gateway to make a single driveway entrance for both houses as it was too close to a junction, but then (after I had made an entrance in the old wall) they allowed my new neighbour to make a new entrance even closer to the junction!
• A newly laid slate has slipped from the roof to the gutter, but the roofer has yet to come and fix it.
• The new kitchen sash window is four over four, not two over two as the rest of the windows.
• There is still no vent to the kitchen...
• Thames Water fitted an external meter in the pavement and this has been found to be a joint supply. Now we have to get an internal meter fitted, but that would have been so much easier if done before the new kitchen was fitted, as I intended.
• My new loft hatch is not quite square, because the joists were not parallel!
• The new extension is not exactly as intended - the roof is higher, the chimney lower and the plasterer gave me incorrect answers to two clear questions, with the result that the internal work I did is not perfect; one window cill has thicker render than he said, so it's almost level with the top of the lower window frame, and a plastered stud wall is thinner than the rendered blocks that it rests on.

Looking at the good side, there are lots of things which make me smile:

• The stone wall where I filled in the bottom of the old doorway
• The wall which I lime-plastered myself (the stone wall which is the join between the old house and new-build extension)
• The new 6' stone wall beside the front door, and the attached gates
• The new sash window which cost just £95 from a reclamation yard
• The front room floor where I replaced bits of joists and re-laid most of the boards plus some reclaimed ones
• The stud wardrobe frontage which I built for the master bedroom
• The wood-burning stove in the kitchen, in the alcove which I "found" by removing the old tiled fireplace
• The recently fitted secondary glazing (we are cosy, and it is quieter now)
• The limecrete/black limestone floor in the kitchen (laid by Chris, Shane and me)
• The black limestone floor in the new extension which I laid entirely by myself (on concrete...)
• The extension roof on which I laid over half the slates in just over a day on my own, much to Chris's surprise
• The casement window in the new extension which I salvaged from the old extension and did a major repair job
• The 1800+ Imperial bricks from the old extension which Jane and I salvaged and were re-used in the new extension (I only had to buy about 200 more)
• All the other little bits and pieces from the old building which I laboriously removed, kept and re-used
• Buying my own mixer, instead of hiring one
• Deciding that I would manage the entire process myself, instead of paying a builder to project manage it

Actually, the whole place makes me smile - it just feels so safe, solid and secure, just as a home should feel.

Walls and Weather

Well, I could go on about the recent weather, but you know what it's been like.  What I find really annoying is when the forecast is for weather which is a lot worse than the actual.  This can really mess up one's plans for the day, when you want to work outside, using cement or lime.  You find the day is unexpectedly sunny when frequent heavy showers are promised; yet when you check the current forecast on the BBC for your own specific local area, you find that it's still showing heavy showers.  So what will happen in the next couple of hours? Do you dare risk it?  I think that they are covering themselves with that symbol of a black cloud with raindrops and sunshine; basically they haven't a clue!

I have managed to out-guess the forecasters a couple of times.  I have started the garden wall foundation (parallel to the western wall of the house, about six feet away, holding back the higher ground) and have done the foundation and the first real bit of wall on the wall beside the front door.  There's also a new bit of concrete where the wheelie-bins will be stored.  Sadly, this is now the height of summer and I have barely started the major outside jobs that I had been "looking forward" to doing; apart from the walls and concrete leading to the patio area, there are a large number of sash windows which need refurbishment while it's warm (if/when?).

I've also done the promised run to the scrap merchant; the brass was £2/kilo (not bad...) but the ferrous stuff was down to 11 pence/kilo which was a bit disappointing considering I took 246 kilos in my car!  When he weighed it, the scale said 445 kg which almost excited me, but that weight was because it had all been put in a large (and heavy) metal stillage.  At least there is now a bit more room in the garden as I've also done a run to the council tip this week.

I mentioned (here) about the limecrete floor being laid in the church opposite; here's a photo of the finished floor.  This is just the choir vestry, where there was extensive damp, rotten floor joists and horrible smell!  The stone is Creeton Silver edged with Creeton Blue limestone (from Ancaster, I think).  Before you ask, no, I don't know why honey coloured stone is called "silver".  There's now a French drain and new soakaway being done outside in the churchyard, as well as re-pointing and leadwork.

It's all expensive but it's the necessary long-term solution to ensure the structural integrity of a Grade I listed building which will still be here long after I've gone. Once again, I'm reminded of the proverb "a stitch in time saves nine".  This is so true of old buildings - if you don't look after them properly then one day you (or your successors) will have to repair the unnecessary damage and pay out many times what you saved in skimpy maintenance.

Another Limecrete Floor

A slight diversion from our house, to the church across the road where they are in the process of laying a limecrete floor in part the church.  This is noteworthy as all too often ignorance wins and a concrete slab gets laid, or the flagstones are sealed (so why bother with a breathable floor underneath?). I found a year ago that there was very little detailed guidance on-line when researching the design of our limecrete floor, so I make no apologies for giving such detail here again.

The church architect got the design of the floor from Ty-Mawr, who are one of the main lime suppliers in this country (I used Mike Wye but there are others...).  The floor design is basically the same as the one I laid in the kitchen here (see this post last year), apart from using Recycled Foamed Glass (RFG) instead of light expanded clay aggregate (LECA).  In detail, from the bottom up, there is a geotextile membrane, 200mm of (lightly compacted) loosefill aggregate of RFG, another layer of membrane, then a 3:1 mix of RFG and NHL5 to form the slab (I think, 150mm thick).

The slab has now been laid by The Limecrete Company and looks impressive (right).  The edges have a vertical inch thick piece of woodwool, whose function I have yet to understand but it might be related to crack prevention.  There will be underfloor heating (UFH) pipes added with a 3 inch Glaster screed and 20mm Creeton limestone tiles on top, although this heating will not be connected until a new boiler is fitted in a later phase. This work is the second stage (of about four!) of renovating the church; phase 1 was electrics, lighting, sound and internal redecoration.  The next phases will also include installing toilets and a servery, and levelling the entire floor with the same sort of floor with UFH (and chairs instead of Victorian pews).

Useful Links

I thought it would be helpful to anyone thinking of undertaking a similar project for me to give a list of helpful websites of people I have used.  I should have done this a long time ago!  (You get a bit slow when you get to my age.)  I'll probably update this list periodically in future:

• Lime products plus helpful advice
• Mike Wye Associates http://www.mikewye.co.uk
• Old House Store http://www.oldhousestore.co.uk 
• and there are lots of others if you search for Lime Mortar Suppliers
• Information about limecrete - http://www.limecrete.net
• Information and Forum for Period Property owners (excellent forum to learn about lime, dampness and how to look after old buildings etc) - http://www.periodproperty.co.uk
• Cast iron rainwater goods - http://www.rainclear.co.uk
• "Conservation" roof lights - http://www.therooflightcompany.co.uk
• Hardware odds and ends - http://www.ironmongerydirect.co.uk and http://www.screwfix.com
• Listed Property Owners Club (who have an annual show at Olympia each February) http://lpoc.co.uk
• Society for Preservation of Ancient Buildings http://www.spab.org.uk
• Tree felling and removal, supply and planting of new trees and hedge - Nicholsons of North Aston http://www.nicholsons.gb.com 
• Sash window manufacturer - Traditional Joinery http://www.traditional-windows.co.uk 
• Wood burning stove and chimney liner -  The Fire Place http://www.the-fire-place.co.uk
• Architectural salvage on line - SalvoWEB - http://www.salvo.co.uk
• The Haynes Period Property manual - http://www.period-house.com/
• Black Limestone flags, imperial bricks, cast iron fireplace plus various other odd bits - Burgess Reclamation http://www.burgessreclamation.co.uk
• NB There is another reclamation company near here who are very noticeable on Salvo which they seem to use as their main marketing outlet.  I ordered my front door from them and had great trouble as they couldn't deliver, because the manufacturer couldn't get wood that big!  Then I had trouble getting my money back which took over seven weeks.  I've never been back.

I can also recommend a plumber, lime plasterer, electrician and groundworker who are all small local tradesmen who did an excellent job.

I'll leave it to you to decide which is the best of the national chains who stock building materials, as I don't think they need me to advertise for them.  Suffice it to say that I think it helps if you can get known in these places to the extent that they don't ask your name but still give you your discount automatically.

[Edit 21 June] Here's a link to another blog which I have started.

The Limecrete Floor Part 3 - Laying Flagstones

I'm sure some purists will not approve, but we have bought and laid black limestone flags on the limecrete floor in our new kitchen.  These are imported from Spain but they might be from elsewhere as I asked the question but have forgotten the answer (an all-too-common experience at my age). There are some remaining questions about how to keep them clean and black, and what to grout them with, and sealing; I don't want to seal the flagstones as I want the floor to be breathable and also, our experience of sealing is that you have to do it often, forever!  I'd welcome any comments on these matters.  Otherwise the floor is finished; the kitchen is now off-limits for a couple of weeks (photo right above shows the first day's achievement).

The quantity of materials for the mortar bed again caused problems; I got a sufficient amount of NHL5, only by calculating for 5 or 6 bags and getting 9 for safety!  However, I calculated that we needed only about 600 kg of sharp sand, so bought a tonne bag from a local supplier.  Over the bank holiday weekend we ran out of both sand and time, so adjourned until I could get some more sand delivered - I got another tonne and I think we used about 300 kg. The issue (I think) was that the slab and screed were not actually level; I measured a 50 mm depth to be filled to be level with the floor in the hall, but at the far side of the room the depth was nearer 80 mm.  Also, the flagstones were of variable thickness some were only 18 mm but others were anything up to 38 mm; this made it hard to guess the average thickness in order to calculate the average depth for the bed.  I think I used 30 mm for the average stone thickness (hence a required bed thickness of 20 mm) but it was probably nearer 25 mm, so the average bed thickness needed was more like 40 mm - quite a large error.

Chris and Shane again did a sterling job.  Chris (left) did the actual laying and level checking while, apart from doing the mixes, Shane also did the required stone cutting using a hired 9 inch grinder (for which I bought the blade as the hire cost was over half the purchase price).  This is not easy - I had a go, and found that there is a good deal of skill and strength needed, as well as the ability to see the cutting line through the clouds of dust.  See Shane (right) cutting a bit of limestone coping for me.



My main roles were moving the buckets of mix, selecting the next stones and a layout which Jane and I had produced the evening before (it wasn't easy!).  What we wanted was a layout with no discernible regularity and very few continuous joint lines.  Unfortunately, we did not get the expected sizes of stone, and it was just not possible to achieve the second aim; we expected to get 60 cm stones in a selection of lengths - 30 cm, 45 cm, 60 cm, 75 cm and 90 cm.  These being multiples of 15, I thought that something would be achievable, but what we got we lots of 45s and 70s (yes, NOT 75 cm) and relatively few 30s and 60s, with only one 90 cm.  If you think you can do better, try to find a way of making a 6.1 x 3.6 irregular pattern rectangle with cut sides only at the edges (or else you have to dress the edge as well).  Of course, don't forget the chimney breast and the fact that the room is not a perfect rectangle...

Other progress this week has been tiling half the bathroom (so that the basin and loo can be installed), refitting the last skirting boards (so that the radiators can now be fitted), cutting the original quarry tiles at the doorway to the kitchen and re-fitting them (flush to the new floor), and stripping more brown gunk (not shellac, I am told) from all the internal doors.  Finally, Jane has rolled the walls of the main bedroom with white emulsion in her customary "it's OK to get it all over me as well" mode.  She was amused (I hope) when I offered to fetch the car rather than walk along 100 yards along the road with her in that state - well, what would our new neighbours think?

Laying a Limecrete Floor Part 2

This week has seen the completion of a major item on the critical path for us to move in: the slab for the limecrete floor has started to go off very quickly - as I was told that NHL5 would - so we have laid the screed.  Again I had Chris and Shane to help - Chris had done a few floors before (but not in lime), and Shane was expert at mixing (but not lime), so they relied on me for the technical input.  I relied on Mike Wye and the internet!

The screed uses NHL5 and sharp sand, in a 1:2 mix by volume, 75mm thick (as advised by Mike Wye). Be advised that a LOT of sand is needed!  For some reason I have had trouble in calculating the required amounts of sand and NHL5, and we ran out of both during the first day, so stopped with two-thirds completed (see join across the floor in the photo on the right).  I bought some more of everything and we finished the job two days later.  It was much easier to do than the slab, as we had a decent solid base to work on, and Chris now loves to work with lime.

Chris is a bit of a perfectionist and was slightly upset with the need for a join; he was then even more upset to discover that the last half tonne of sand was from a different supplier and so was a darker colour (although you can't see it in the photo).

This is me not Chris as I deleted the photo of him by accident

He was not comforted by my reminder that we are laying flagstones on top and so neither the colour change or the join will be seen.


The sand situation was not helped by my general lack of understanding about volumes and weights of sand.  I suppose I should not have been surprised as, after all, I knew how much stuff had come out of the ground in the kitchen.  We ended up using just over three tonnes for a 21 sq metre floor.  As I expected to use less than two tonnes, I had a one tonne bulk bag of sand delivered, and supplemented this with repeated visits to a local DIY store to buy their loss-leading bagged sand at £1.07 for a 25kg bag (in a quantity of ten or more).  The result of using more than three tonnes was that I made a lot of unexpected visits, and they ran out!

So far as I can tell, our floor must be thicker than designed - perhaps the slab sank a bit on the loose lay LECA?  We laid the screed up to a fixed level (as opposed to laying a specific depth), so it might have been deeper in places without us noticing.  Otherwise I do not see where all the mix went went.  The floor area is 21 sq metres and I was told I would need 21 bags of NHL5 (i.e. one per sq metre); we had four bags left from the slab (why?) so that made 25 to start with, and yet we ended up needing 30 altogether - so each mix only did 0.7 sq metre.

For the technically minded, we used a large diesel drum mixer on hire as we realized that my own mixer was too small - we would have been doing twice as many mixes!  In truth, the hired mixer was also too small, as it took 30 mixes to do the screed; if you overload it then it won't mix properly.  Each mix comprised one 25 kg bag of NHL5 (30-35 litres) and four and a half 25 kg bags of sharp sand (about 70 litres), and used about 15 litres of water.  Other people recommend a pan mixer for better mixing - we did not experience much balling, having followed the mixing method recommended by the manufacturers (although there was more balling with the LECA - see Part 1 - and we did have to stop it and scrape the mixture off the interior, which was tedious).    One unexpected issue was that my wheelbarrow is now on its last legs - two welds have broken and the sides have bowed out.

Then it was the weekend so I went to see my grandson:

Proud Grandad with sleeping grandson

This blog entry was late in being uploaded for various reasons such as tiredness.

Laying a Limecrete Floor Part 1

This might be a bit detailed for some of you, but I have been researching the use of limecrete as a breathable kitchen floor for some time and have found very little good advice on t'internet; hence I thought that some detail in the public domain might be found useful.  I shall publish another entry soon detailing some other events of the week.

This week, at last, I bit the bullet and engaged Chris and Shane to dig out the existing floor and help me lay the limecrete slab.  The general deal was that they would do the physical bit and I would provide the technical know-how (aided by desperate telephone calls to Mike Wye).  Of course life is not like that and so I am now absolutely shattered (as indeed they are, and they are half my age!).

When we first saw the kitchen I immediately knew that we would have to sort the floor (photo right).  The red and black 6" quarry tiles, in a pleasing diagonal pattern, were damp and sadly neglected.  They were suffering from a variety of additional coverings (like rotted lino and bitumen), and many (mostly red ones) had lost their flat surface entirely, revealing a pitted face with a white bloom.  I tried various techniques of cleaning but nothing persuaded me (far less Jane!) that we would be able to live with the end result for the duration of our intended retirement.  Delaying this was not an option as there would be no real way of doing it once we had fitted the new kitchen and were living in the house.  Another issue was the strip of bare concrete (foreground on photo) which ran across the room where there used to be a wall; this pre-dated the tiles, as the diagonal lines on either side did not match! 

I made an early decision that what I wanted to do was to lay a breathable limecrete floor, and researched this on the internet.  It can be difficult to get Building Control approval for this material, but there is an exemption for listed buildings on account of the foundations usually being shallower than the required depth to meet Part L (Conservation of Fuel and Power).  I knew that the foundations were about 8 or 9 inches below the floor level, and the essential detail here is to dig down at 45 degrees from the walls at a point a small way above the bottom of the foundations so that the integrity of the walls  is not affected.  If you are cautious like me then that small way is about 6 inches.

I got the team at Mike Wye to do the materials quotation which also gave me the essential design of the floor.  It seemed to me that the quantities required were enormous (4 tons in photo left) so I asked them to do it again; the result was the same so I just had to trust their figures.  Of course, they were very accurate - see later. Their design uses LECA (lightweight expanded clay aggregate) which comes in various sizes but essentially looks like an unappetizing version of Maltesers without any chocolate.  A coated version of LECA is used as a loose lay foundation; this allows the floor to breathe but does not allow any water to rise by capilliary action.  On top of this the main slab is made of a slightly smaller LECA, uncoated (presumably to allow better binding), mixed with NHL5 (Natural Hydraulic Lime).  A breathable membrane is used both below and above the loose lay LECA to prevent migration between the layers.  On top of the slab a screed of NHL5 and sharp sand is laid, on which the chosen floor surface is laid.  Most of the insulation is from the loose lay so I chose to use 200mm of this, with a 100mm slab on top.  This was the task for the week, as we will let it go off before laying the screed and flagstones.

The first task was to remove all the tiles - only about 900 of them - and then Chris and Shane removed (in about three minutes) the old (1950s) fireplace - see result in photo left.  What I had not really bargained on was how much spoil there would be (photo right), and the sheer physical effort in getting it out of the house. Everything had to be lifted up a couple of feet  - well, we were digging down - and extracted through the fairly narrow single French door.

I estimate that they removed something like 10 tons of lime mortar and soil in three days, all by hand through that single doorway.  The end result was basically an empty swimming pool where there will soon be a kitchen.  I also removed about half a ton of rubble which filled the old fireplace - compare the photo left (after excavation, with membrane laid) with the one above.  I was expecting to build a rectangular alcove for the new woodburning stove, and it was there all the time! 

So we worked along from the far end, laying the loose lay LECA with the membrane over it up to a bit of temporary shuttering, then the slab mixture on top up to a couple of feet back.  Then we added LECA in front of the shuttering, removed the shuttering, unrolled the membrane and added more slab mixture, and so moved on.  The addition of the LECA in front of the shuttering is key as otherwise the edge would move significantly when the shuttering is removed and this might allow the slab mixture to drop down a bit.  Here's Chris (right) doing a bit of levelling with some marker stakes for the next bit of shuttering.

 
Finally, we had a floor slab.  I know it doesn't look much for the result of so much work, but I'm convinced that it's a good way of controlling dampness in such an old building.

We actually received 84 bags of the loose lay LECA, and 42 of the stuff to mix with the mortar; we used 81 and 38 respectively - a surplus is far preferable to running out.  The LECA totalled about three tons, and we also used almost exactly half a ton of NHL5.  All that remained was to clear up, including removing the remaining mortar (for the screed next week) from the lawn to the house.  I have to confess that I was surprised to see the entire lawn cleared in just seven hours, and I bet the neighbours were as well, considering that half of the lawn is theirs!