The groundworks team have been busy in the last week excavating the spoil within the piled retaining wall. The weather was not great earlier in the week but it’s improved a bit with some light rain.

When they started excavation, there was a lot of water in the chalky spoil and some small flint stones. They’ve managed to pump the water out and the spoil is almost dry. They have to wait for lorries to remove the spoil every time they scoop them out to the side and also leave enough room for the digger, the lorry and the team to move around safely.

By tonight, 6th of November, they’ve finished the excavation and you can see all the piles holding up nicely. It’s an amazing feat of engineering. The two steel props are still in place to hold the wall up to avoid the retaining wall collapsing on the digger and driver. I couldn’t get a picture tonight as it was late. The pictures below and on the main feature images were taken yesterday.

I’ll update this post later. The exciting part now is that they can start preparing to pour the concrete that will form the floor of the basement before they start the waterproof Sika membrane treatment. Exciting!

Here is a photo from yesterday. I’m away for work for a few days so my next visit is on Wednesday. As far as I can see even with the heavy rain later in the week. The basement floor and the retaining walls was dry.

That’s a good sign for us before the waterproofing treatment starts. The groundworks team have a couple of electric pumps and a drain extracting standing water out of the basement. It’s exciting to see it coming together at last.