Listen to the low quality version now
Listen now with the below audio embedded low quality version or click HERE to go to iTunes to get it or subscribe

[audio:http://www.montpillard.com/wp-content/uploads/ep5.mp3]

Episode 3 podcast covers

• Why the delay
• Waiting for quotes
• A book recommendation

and much more of me getting stressed at the whole situation

Listen now with the below audio embedded low quality version or click HERE to go to iTunes to get it or subscribe

[audio:http://www.montpillard.com/wp-content/uploads/podcast_episode3_stream.mp3]

What we’ve done is now made an mp3 streaming version available at the end of each post (example below). This mp3 stream will play straight from your browser just click the play icon.

[audio:http://www.montpillard.com/wp-content/uploads/slogger1.mp3]

At present these streams are only available to listen to online and not available for download but these will be available soon for you to add to your Zune, MP3 player, phone etc etc for you non iTunes users. It’s also noting that the iTunes podcasts are “enhanced” with artwork, links and chapters which isn’t available on the embedded version.

Also you’ll now notice that the “AUDIO” page at the top of the blog now has been populated. This is going to be a consolidation area for our audio streams, so if you think you’ve missed something or just want a 1 stop page to get to all our audio then THIS PAGE is it.

It’s London Marathon day in London so we did what all sensible Londoners do and that’s LEAVE LONDON

So we used the time in the quiet countryside to record episode 2 of the Montpillard.com Podcast where we talk about our process of finding and buying the house.

This Podcast is a little longer at 15 minutes but there is a fair bit to cover. We are getting the hang of this and the quality is improving and there are less “errrms” than before but we are still working on it.

Episode #2 is now live in iTunes, so either subscribe HERE (iTunes link), or go direct to the current episode HERE

We discussed the websites we used and the mortgage options very briefly in this episode and those links will appear here shortly and Dawn will be doing a full write-up of the mortgages we looked at.

Embedded Low Quality Online Version
[audio:http://www.montpillard.com/wp-content/uploads/podcast_episode2_stream.mp3]

Enjoy.

WE DID IT!

Episode #1 is now available in iTunes (link) for you to download and it’s already getting downloaded at  rate i just had to “top up” on bandwidth with our current ISP

So being episode 1 it’ll be a little rough around the edges and this one really just introduces ourselves, the house, the area and why we purchased where we did. The Podcast is 10 minutes long and this is the maximum time we want to keep these at as the idea is not to have some long 45 minute rambling Podcast but some quick, concise & info packed Podcasts for you.

As for now we have no show notes for you but going forward when we talk about products, suppliers or services we’ll be detailing them in the post related to the Epispode. The episodes will be coming thick and fast over the next few weeks so make sure you hit the subscribe button in iTunes.

LISTEN NOW – Online lower quality version.
[audio:http://www.montpillard.com/wp-content/uploads/podcast_episode1_stream.mp3]

Enjoy

Misc Info
Recorded on Zoom H4N
Processed in GarageBand

The latest Google SketchUp model has arrived so as usual we thought we’d share it with you by clicking HERE (500k)

The model is not yet complete to the new specifications but we wanted to see a before and after, so they’ll be a newer version posted shortly. This will include extra Velux windows, the internal balcony overlook closed up (maybe – opinions please) and the bathroom removed and placed where the 3rd read bedroom is.

We are also changing the design of the master bedroom, and these changes will all be reflected in the final model as we are now close to submitting for final planning approval.

As always this model is free for you to use and chop and change around. We’d love to see what you come up with, but as with all of the download this will be under a creative commons share alike with no commercial use.

Enjoy.

Your rights of use ( please read )
We are releasing this model under the CREATIVE COMMONS rights management. The copyright we are releasing this under is BY-NC which basically means :

This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

Finally after weeks of customs delays, parcel force loses and sitting on my hands today the Zoom H4N finally arrived! I’m dying to try it out so brace yourself for some very rough and ready recordings, the actually podcasts will come a little later when i know what i’m doing with it.

With the Grand Designs show coming up in a week we’ll be taking it with us to get some interviews with suppliers that we have lined up. Top on the hit list are Velux who we have a meeting with, also the guys from http://www.rainwaterharvesting.co.uk/ to clear up the myths of rain water harvesting.

So we are very very nearly there…

UPDATE 13 April: I’ve had to correct some of my figures the the “Grange” isn’t the same size as house at all (sorry i rushed my calcs) so this has reduced the figures by at least 1/3rd however everything is still impressive and we’ll be pushing ahead.

It seems no matter if you’re in England or France then Good Friday weather is it the same. RAIN and rain of some possibly appropriate biblical proportions right now.

Hiding in the house i didn’t think much until looking out of the window i noticed the sheer amount of water running off of the porch roof (the photos don’t do it justice) and then there was the flash (that’s the lighting) and it struck me (not the lightning) that we’ previously been thinking about rain water harvesting but didn’t know how successful it would really be, and looking at this small demonstration from nature we could currently fill a bath with what has come off the roof.

Some quick maths says our house was a total area (front and back) of 126Sqm of roof and thus rain capture. The Grange has a less at around 46Sqm together. That’s a combined area of around 172Sqm which seems a total waste to not do anything with.

Doing the math
Here are some figures for the maths :

• Average rainfall in this area of France, 76cm (0.76m)
• Area of roof on the main house 126m square
• Area of roof on the grange 46.5m square

House Roof Only
So 126m2 x .76 = 95.76m3 of water
138m3 of water = 95,7000 litres of water for possible harvesting for the house alone.

Adding the Grange roof @ 46.5sqm
172.5m2 x .76 = 131.1m3 of water
131m3 of water = 131,000 litres of water for possible harvesting total.

These are crazy figures surely everyone should be doing this???

To give you some idea of how much water this is here is a comparison for you.

• Average pool = 20,000 litres of water. We could fill 6.55 pools (the pool we are looking at is 11,000 UK gallons or 41,639 litres so 3 times)
  
• Average shower use (8 minute shower) is 120 litres. We could have 1091 showers

Now of course I’m not expecting to be able to recover every last drop of rain but even if we were only to recover 50% it is still a vast amount of water.

Some very interesting figures
A 2006 UN Human Development study (available HERE) found that the “average” UK person uses 149 litres of water a day (France comes in at 287 litres per person per day!!! A French habit we WILL NOT be picking up) .

According to a BBC Water calculator my personal usage is around 111 litres (click here to get yours), these figures take into account all sorts of toilet flushing, showering, bathing & washing machine use. Using these figures i want to show how self sustainable we could be using this “grey” water and I’m going to reduce the rain capture by 50% to help bring the figures what i personally think to be a more “real world” scenario .

Rain water capture @ 50% = 65,500 litre
1 person @ 149 litres per day could last 439 days before buying in extra water
2 people @ 149 litres per day each could last 219 days (7 months) before buying in extra water.

Now if we use the BBC figures we get  different picture
1 person @ 111 litres per day could last 590 days before buying in extra water
2 people @ 111 litres per day each could last 295 days (10 months) before buying in extra water

For those who aren’t sure of what I’m on about I’ll post more in the tech section shortly but here’s an info graphic for you to give you a quick idea.

PS : This is the reference pool we are using for our calculations since this is the one we are look at, it’s from SunSoka