Selfsufficientish.com

Sorry,
just caught up with this thread now - I would maybe look at infill walls using what we call broccoli boxes here, the polystyrene boxes veges come in at the green grocers. They make fantastic insulated walls if you fill them with soil or cheap fill and build them like a brick wall. You can pin them with fencing wire or pickets for more rigidity if you want.
Cheers
Kaz

Christine wrote: The other shocking expense was guttering - jolly dear but I just couldn't make up a full set of old stuff in one size and what bits I did have weren't compatible with what is now available. The wood for the frame was a total of about £20, the galvanised wire (to suspend the bottles) a total of £24 and the bottles cost - nothing!

Just an after thought but couldn't you make the guttering out of the plastic bottles? Just top and tail them, split them in half and nail them to a length of wood under the eave (presuming you have one). You'd need an overlap on each bottle and it'd be more of a pain but I'm sure it would work...

You could put in a request via freecycle for guttering. You might end up with short pieces but I bet loads of people have odd lengths that would do the job.

Zoe

Picture - as requested (demanded, in some cases!) - but not very pretty!
Unfortunately, I don't have a website I can legitimately lodge pictures on, so one at a time as an avatar is all I can offer.

You'll notice the gaping hole on the back wall covered by plastic? Since then, I've done some dumpster-diving and added about three feet of bottle wall and should be able to add a further couple this weekend.

Huge thanks for all the ideas - yes, I did even consider using the bottles for the roof and gutters and this would be possible if split down the middle but I just couldn't face all the additional work that would entail for the roof and a quick trial on guttering suggests the half-bottles won't keep their shape under any sort of weight. If I were to do this again (and I might, I might!), I'd plan to add a sort of mini shelf to lodge the 'guttering' on. I could also have used plastic sheeting, rather than proper roofing, if the money had been a huge issue.

The bill for galvanised wire has gone up to about £40 now that I've hung all lengths required. However (another hindsight) B and Q sell lighter weight galnavised wire for half the price of Wickes' 2mm wire - and it would definitely have done the job.

TIP! I'm told that you can buy a sheet of heavy duty, clear plastic 20m x 20m designed for under-floor damp proofing very cheaply - the stuff you buy in smaller sheets is a lot dearer.

Shall I try to put all this together in a sheet? It'll be a bit of an apologetic record of mistakes made and lessons learned but I'll be able to email it to anyone who wants it.

Kaz and Zoe
Realised I hadn't answered your ideas - sorry, how rude!

I love, love, love the idea of using polystyrene boxes for walls - perhaps that will be my next project. Not sure where to get a supply of them at the moment but plenty of time to plot and plan...

Freecycle - I love Freecycle and do use it a lot and it would have been a good plan to try it first! However, for the same reason as I didn't ask for bottles on Freecycle (anti-greenness of driving all over the city collecting bits and pieces), I'd have had to say no to small pieces of guttering - and Freecyclers understandably get a bit peeved when you're too picky about requests.

Hi Christine.
That looks brilliant. I am really impressed with what you've done. Yeah I do understand about the freecycle thing. It would be a pain if they only had a foot or two.

Well done.

Zoe

Wow, Christine, that looks fabulous!

It sounds like a lot of work has gone into the engineering. Instead of emailing everyone with a check sheet of brainwaves and pitfalls, why not post a summary on here so you only have to do it once. I'm interested, have been given the go ahead to try and try something similar at school after september for the gardening club.

Can anyone tell us how to post pictures into these replies? I've seen some really cool pics in other threads, actually in the body of the message.

Paula

Christine, if you're looking to upload photos, there are many websites that allow you to do this for free. Photobucket is one example I am familiar with - but there are many similar sites.

If you use these sites, it is very easy to show the pictures here in a bulletin board.
Photobucket in particular (I'm most familiar with it) has a button that creates the required codes for you (just select which photos you want codes for).
One of the options provided is to display smaller images that link to a larger size - which is a kindness to anyone viewing these with a dial-up account.
But you can also edit what size the photos are shown in permanently.

Once the codes are generated, all you have to do is copy and paste!

Paula -
You can upload a picture as your 'avatar' (which is where the greenhouse pic comes on my messages) but there isn't the space on the web server for loads of other pictures, so those that are in the body of messages are linked from another site that permanently stores them - a bit like looking through a window, I suppose.

Mandy -
OK, I'll have a go at that as soon as the weather gets poor again (so I feel like staying in the house rather than on the lottie!) Thanks for the advice.