Pipes are in the ground (almost)

The channel is about 25m long

Today, Stefan (from Moosburg) arrived at about 10:30 with a digger. It wasn't a typical "mini-digger" - it was the next size up. It turned out to be exactly the right machine for the job. The job was to dig the channel between both houses (Harting 8 and Harting 10) - basically across the yard. The heating pipe and the empty pipe to carry network and electric cables were due to be dropped into the channel.

By about 13:30 the channel was finished. Uli and I had already bored a hole in the wall under Harting 8 so the pipes could go through the wall/foundation and up to where they are needed. We were relatively lucky that there was a hole in the foundation - else we would have been kept busy for much longer. We managed to get the pipes in with a lot of pulling and shoving - the heating pipe was extremely stiff and so it was hard to bend it around corners.

By about 17:00, Stefan had filled most of the channel back in again. The pipes are now covered with 1.3 metres of clay and gravel, so they should be fine in case of frost.

The silo walls are broken through

When Stefan left, I started digging the last bit of the channel - i.e. the bit from the end of the channel that Stefan dug to Harting 10. In a straight line this would have been about four metres. However, we need the pipe to hit the wall at 90° - meaning we have to take a big loop out to the right first. The minimum bending radius of the pipe is one metre - and to keep to this, we needed to almost go under the chickens. As it turned out, most of the digging was ok. There was an old silo buried under the ground and this had been filled up with old buckets, bits of blocks and steel. It was not easy to dig through. The concrete silo walls had to be broken through as well. That was about an hour's work. The next step is now to organise a "core boring drill" - which is a drill which can drill a 20cm hole through a 24cm concrete foundation. The reason for the 20cm hole is because of the special kind of wall "collar" that Niedermaier brought. The 130mm pipe goes through the collar and the collar seals the  place where the pipe goes through the wall. We'll also need a 80mm hole for the pipe carrying the network and electric cables. Sounds like it will take about three or four hours in total. Below are a couple of photos from the groundworks.

The channel is 1.3m deep

The digger was able to get right in next to the wall

The channel had to go around the side of Harting 10

Daniel had a go driving

...and managed not to knock the house

Luckily there was a hole in the concrete - otherwise we'd still be hammering away at it

Provisional rain capture

Stefan filled in most of the channel once the pipe was in

We had to leave about two metres for fitting the pipe through the wall

The channel had to go around in a curve so as to hit the wall of Harting 10 at 90°

At the bottom of the photo you can see the first intersection of the channel with the old silo wall

This is where we have to bore through the wall

The first intersection of the channel with the silo wall (looking south)

The thick pipe is the heating pipe. The other one carries electric and network cables