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My new workshop at Ty Newydd is really making my life so much easier. I can lay out the gable ends inside now. So the storms of the past week didn't hold me back when I needed to work on these larger sections  And I'm sure that it's more productive having all this extra space. In the attached paint shed I have two greenhouses completely finished and one coming along well - the grey "Richard" for Scotland, the green one for Shropshire and the "Jill" in white is coming along.  At the same time I'm building another 3 doors in the workshop. I still have plenty of space to move about and now have permanent work stations - for cutting, lathing, sanding, routing, morticing etc. - without having to change anything around or move timber outside before it's fully finished.  Enough said, best get back to it .... there are customers waiting.
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This the "Jill" greenhouse - measuring 4m long by 2,8m wide - and this one will be built in accoya. My customer wanted the cold frames as long as possible so I've taken it almost to the ends of the outside walls, but leaving enough space for the downpipe. This time I've added a raised bed on the inside of this greenhouse as well - great for growing tomatoes direct into the soil which helps if you forget to water them.
Once the walls were up the interior ground level could be reduced down. Thankfully the soil was easy going.  On the photo below, I'm just about to lay the timber wallplates down. They are squashed onto a mortar mix to give them full support along the length and them tapped with a mallet to get them finished level.    Thanks Robin,
It was great to meet you too. We are really pleased with the progress so far, wonderful to see it take shape after such a long time on our wish list (since Feb 2012 according to our blog). Invoice all paid, look forward to hearing from you to arrange phase two! Kind regards Louise
You can see the undulating levels in the ground in the picture below. It's always hard to tell just how uneven the ground is until the foundation has been laid. Once I've built the walls up I can then dig out the interior to the level point.
After laying concrete edging stones in wet concrete I removed all the top soil from the inside and laid quarry stone and compacted that down with a whacker plate. The concrete setts were laid in a dry mix 5:1 ratio of sharp sand:cement and the kiln dried sand brushed into the gaps to finish.
* Opps - I built this one 4m long instead of 3.5m so the customers get the extra length for free. Luckily there is no shortage of space here and I hadn't built the long sections of the structure yet so everyone's happy. Aiming to return here soon.
A bit risky getting up to North Scotland in February but there was a small break in the weather and I made it up and back OK - travelling 520 miles on the return journey. The ground was so frozen solid my mattock just bounced off it, with the occasional spark as it struck rock - so I resorted to my SDS drill to chisel small sections out and brake through the first few inches. This is a "Richard" greenhouse - just 2.5m long by 1.5m wide but the sides are especially tall and there is a lot of detail in the roof having 3 finials, crested ridge, valleys and an overhanging canopy.  Dear Russell, It was great to meet you during my short visit this week but I look forward to a more relaxed visit when I return (early April?) and would love to take you up on the offer of a trip to the pub or bite to eat. I journeyed up the Cairngorm Mountains after leaving yours to see another job but gladly made it home again late last night before the weather turned again. I hope the base is to you liking - although, on it's own it's an odd looking thing. Thank you for asking me to build your greenhouse Kind regards Robin Green Bug Ltd From: Russell
Sent: 08 February 2019 15:46 To: Robin McGregor <robin@green-bug.co.uk> Subject: Re: Invoice 1080 from Green Bug Ltd You are a wonder -- we have never seen someone work so efficiently or magically -- glad you made it home as we were hoping you were safely away after your dawn departure. I love looking at the base -- and am so looking forward to your return. And definitely a pub dinner on us! April would be great. Let us know when you are headed back and be glad you are not here today -- it is a mess. All best, Russell This job took 2 visits to complete - one of 3 days, where I completed most of the greenhouse and structure of the shed (click here for earlier blog entry on that) and this one of 4 days - where I clad the outside of the shed in cedar, boarded the inside of the shed and the partition, completed glazing the gable end, hanging 2 doors and 5 opening windows, fitted a lead skirt / drip edge around the shed walls and lead flashings, hung the shelving, and laid the concrete plain tile roof to the shed and ridged with clay capped angle ridge and pointed up the gables with black mortar. It sounds quite a lot when you put it like that!
  It was 7pm Friday night when I eventually finished so the photos aren't very clear of the finished job.
Thanks for all your work and the process. Let me know when you are available for more bookings...best for now. Guy
It's so good to be back on the road again after all the time I have spent getting the new workshop ready. We only moved a few miles down the road but the new Green Bug workshop is so much bigger it's going to be amazing - more efficient and easier. This week I made it back to Southampton to complete a greenhouse Tim has patiently waited for.
 Customary for this time of year - the finished greenhouse photos have been taken in the dark. The light fades at around 4pm at the moment so I never end up getting good photos of the greenhouse once it's finished. These photos were taken at 2am though (after I'd had a bit of kip before the long return journey home again). Thanks to Tim and his family for letting me stay with them this week and for all the wonderful food and conversations.
 Thank you Sue and Barrie for your kind Xmas wishes and card.  A happy Christmas and wonderful new year to all my customers, past and future - and especially thank you for all those patient customers who've been waiting whilst I move to the new premises.
 Another great benefit of the new Green Bug premises - I can mock up bespoke greenhouses on site here on pillars which ensure the structure is level and square before doing the "take-off" for the glass order. The view's good too eh...
It's been like holding my breath under water. These past weeks I've been building the workshop but wanting to resurface as soon as possible to carry on building greenhouses again. Thankfully I'm back. Two greenhouses now sit ready to go out in the new year and I'm back on track.  Although this workshop is massive, in comparison to my old one, I added a removable hatch so I can cut down long lengths of timber. I've used up old pieces of toughened glass to add double glazed windows around the workshop unit.  One of the benefits of the added space is I can have permanent workstations - workbench, pillar drill, bench morticer, lathe, router are connected and ready for immediate use whilst the table saw can have an outfeed table which doubles as a sanding station.
I have been granted full planning permission for business use of the barn and agreed to sound proof the workshop. There is a large air gap (corrider) between the workshop building and the main structure and I insulated the roof and walls and the glazing is double.  On the right is access to the shipping container which houses the painting area and office. I clad the walls with dense foam insulation and osb boarding. On the outside roof I added 2" insulation and 2 layers of osb to make the interior comfortable and maintain a good temperature for painting.
I just need to add lots of shelving and storage and set up the internet but thankfully, with great relief and happiness, I am working on greenhouses again full time and with much greater efficiency.
And here it is after a few weekends of working on it....
Having made sure the building is water-tight I could start on the proper job of setting up the workshop - and I had to spend some proper time on this - taking this whole week off work to concentrate on moving the business workshop here.
Part of the planning permission for running the business here is to sound-proof the workshop so, after clearing out the space, I've built another structure inside which will be clad and insulated to trap noise.
And now to move my tools over. Here's a picture of my table saw being delivered on Friday, at the end of the busy week.  This workshop is in the garden of our new home so the whole family will be moving here in a few weeks time. I've changed my contact details in readiness - although my mobile and email address remain the same of course.
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