Digging up the house - and yay for the mini digger

Last week Doug and team moved the fosse septic (or septic tank) at the back of the house. The previous owner put it in because it is too far from the kitchen sink around to the proper fosse at the front of the house. It is small and is really a grease trap (which usually then feed in to a septic tank).

It was placed right up against the house with the water flow out of it along the back of the house. Which means, because of the clay sole there, that the back of the house gets even more damp than it would just from the rain (and doesn't always smell great).

It sounds a pretty gross job as the water and fat (descriptions of how grease traps work describe a 'crust' which looks gross and smells worse) had to be emptied out before it could be moved.

It has been moved further away from the house and the existing perforated pipe along the back of the house replaced with one which is solid (ie no holes in it) until the end of the house and then the perforated bit which lets the water drain away.

The water supply needs to come in to the house at a different place (and the crappy metal bits replaced) so the new pipe will be laid in the same trench

In its new location, won't be filled in until the new water pipe is laid

Pipe all along the back of the house in its trench

Gravel in the trench

The awesome digger. Imagine doing all that by hand!

Some hand digging still had to be done

Flail mower

Finally we have managed to get the right hydraulic pipes delivered so we can use the flail mower for the mini digger - we have one for the tractor too - you can't have too much flail mower in the fight againt brambles, saplings and general weeds.

Most suspicious, which is good - don't want any animals ground up.

Mini digger in the house

This is what was the garage and will be our central heating room, laundry room and small workshop.

Doug and team have started digging out the floor in the garage so we can insulate then lay concrete and not reduce the head room too much. It is quite low in there so we don't want it any lower. 

Doug also dug up some concrete that used to be against the wall to the left of the photo with the hammer on the mini digger. Unfortunately one of the hydraulic hoses sprung a bit of a leak so there is more to be done in the garage still.