Category: F17

Everything to do with building F17

Update

Today Cornelia and myself met the structural engineer (Statiker).  The aim of today’s session was to look at some of his existing work, from before I bought the rooftop, and work out what would need to be changed. He is mostly concerned with working out how the roof will stay on and the building not fall down.

Key points:

  • We should avoid steel roof spans longer than 7m. While it’s possible to go much longer, a much larger I-Beam size is needed.
  • Steel bends or will dip down under the weight of a roof. For a 7m span, the steel will dip about 2cm.
  • The fresh water pipe comes up underneath the balcony and is routed through to the kitchen and bathroom. Cornelia had concerns about it freezing. The statiker mentioned that there is enough convection in the pipe so that warmer water from further down in the house would circulate and mean that the chances of freezing (after being insulated) are low.
The next step is that the structural engineer will redo the plan in January so that it can be submitted for building approval at the bauamt.
The existing plan looks like this
Each of the vertical lines is steel reinforcement

Meeting the structural engineer today

Somewhat undecided about this sloping passage
We’ve had many conversations about where to put the kitchen – unfortunately the waste water pipe is right where the kitchen island needs to be and running a longer pipe without a good gradient is difficult.

 

 

I lik the idea of somewhere to sit when coming home and taking off shoes. That said, there’s a large landing area at the top of the stairs that could also work so this might not need to be inside the apartment.

 

I’m still keen to have a single long strip of glass in the window. Also looking at moving the fireplace to the wall.

 

 

 

Until now

Some background


So it begins...

I have been looking at apartments to buy. In an ideal world I would be able to build something that matches my requirements and style. One option in Berlin is a Baugemeinschaft (a group that comes together to renovate an entire building or a larger area). And I started looking with a group of friends. It’s rare that an entire building comes up in in the right neighbourhood with the right possibilities but I didn’t find anything. But the search did throw up something that was much too large for me, but looked interesting.


July 2017


Right now we’re in the stage of the Notar dealing with intricacies of the apartment sale and their lawyer explaining how things could and should be. It’s not very exciting stuff for me. And I just hope that the sale can go ahead.


19 Sep 2017


  • Signed the contract


Weekend 23-24 September


Drawing diagrams
  • Bedrooms on the street side
  • Moving them to firewall
  • Opening up the terrace
  • Moving shapes around in Omnigraffle
  • Doing a design brief


25 September 2017


  • Received the buying contract
  • Received notification from N26 that money had been received. Needed to ask why so much money randomly arrived in my account. Sorted.


26 September 2017


First meeting with Cornelia
  • Discussed plans
  • Discussed process of getting a permit
    • Energy approval
      • Winter
      • summer
    • Surveyor approval
    • Structural engineering approval
    • Everything submitted to the city for approval


2 Oct 2017:
  • Received two proposed plans back from Cornelia
  • Plan 1:
    • Better use of under-roof space
    • Concerns about looking out onto the balcony and wall
    • Square island
  • Plan 2
    • Love the openness
    • Orientate the window differently?
    • Washing machine?


4 Oct 2017:
  • Pay for apartment/airspace
  • Pay Notary