Renovation project - French plug sockets!

Renovation project - French plug sockets!

The rooms are starting to come together and it’s now time to get the floor and wood work completed on the back bedroom, I have finally finished scrubbing and sanding floors, I hope this is something I never have to do again!

The same colour stain is being used to make sure that all the rooms are in keeping, the difference is tremendous.  This is where you know the horrible dirty jobs have been worthwhile. The wood takes 3 coats of stain and time has to be given for each coat to dry, if you do not the stain seems to drag and go patchy, so no matter how quickly you want to do it, you must allow the correct drying time.

John has been changing the plug sockets, we had bought cheap surface mounted sockets that fit on the outside of the wall but these are all being changed for recessed plug sockets, this is not an easy job as he has to core through the stone with a specialist core drill, (this is a bit like coring an apple) but when finished the plug sockets look much more pleasing to the eye. This is not an easy job, coring an apple is easy, try to imagine doing the same to a lump of granite!

But he gets them done and the sockets are in place, John also wires in the heaters (all of the electrics had been put in place professionally, john is just tidying everything up) You must ensure that all electrics are up to French standards as if you want to sell they will be checked and signed off by a French electrician.

John moves on to the landing and asks where I want the plug socket, we look at it for a while and something is not right, we know where we want the plug socket but where is the heater going? There is only space for one socket, yet we know we had decided to have a socket and a heater on the landing.

You are only allowed so many sockets off each fuse, and we have the correct amount of sockets, this is when we realise that John has finished the wall and forgotten to leave the wire for the heater exposed, we have to turn each fuse off in turn to find out which one should have the heater connected to it.

It is so simple, the fuse for the heater in the kitchen and back of the house has only one heater on it, this is directly below where the heater is required on the landing, he really had just forgotten to add the landing heater.

Our problem now is that everywhere is plastered and finished! Bugger, bugger, bugger!!!!! We can’t leave it as we need the heater, we have no choice John has to knock a hole in the kitchen ceiling to find the lead, luckily he knows exactly where it is, we then have to remove a chunk of skirting board from the landing, connecting the lead is no problem, but refitting the skirting boards and plastering the ceiling is going to be a real pain.

John is now not speaking to me as I have told the world he made a mistake, but after 18 months of rebuilding a house to make one mistake is pretty good going, it is also a warning that even professionals can make mistakes, if you are doing this with little or no experience, mistakes will happen, so don’t worry about it (unless you forget to put your roof on, then panic!)