Please compare these 2 - display home quality vs quality given to me

[rodimus]

due to the poor quality of the facebrick, im going to make them take out the odd dark ones from the front facade and also add the windowhead detail.
Then I'm going to ask them to discount the price for the bricks and workmanship.

The bricks doesnt look like different batch, it looks totally different quality.

The builder has already complained to Austral, but no reply yet.

 

[The Y-man]

due to the poor quality of the facebrick, im going to make them take out the odd dark ones from the front facade and also add the windowhead detail.
.

Do you think this is a good idea considering:
1. it is not your ppor, and tenants probably would not give a rats about it
2. I assume time is of essence - faster onto the market the better
3. the builders have stuffed things up so far - what else might happen (after the warranty runs out) if they go around knocking bricks out - could end up with cream bricks and black mortar!

Cheers,

The Y-man

 

[Aaron Sice]

don;t laugh, something very similar happened for a large building co i was working for a few years ago.

we had a display home going up and with display homes, changes are made ad-hoc on site and everything is sorted out at the end.

we had initially used a red smooth brick with white mortar (with some rendered highlights and features) but this was only for the front facade. the rest of the house was a standard Austral Telfer with cream mortar.

however, the brickie clearly didn;t read the plans and when we got the bill for the brickwork we wondered why it was so high. went on site to find the whole house was red smooth with white mortar (big big $$$). told him it wasn;t on and everything except the front elevation was austral telfer and cream, clearly there was a massive blue about it and the brickie thought he'd be smart and pulled ALL of the red smooth down and replaced it with telfer.

including the front elevation.

everything had to change due to this as we couldn;t afford any more delays so we left it telfer and changed colours to suit.

so, be REAL careful asking for changes on a complete job.

 

[Perp]

the brickie thought he'd be smart and pulled ALL of the red smooth down and replaced it with telfer.

including the front elevation.

 

[rodimus]

i dont know is it my eyesight, or the whole elevation looks colour faded and a bit tired?

Or its just this batch looking light and faded...

geez maybe i need to start wearing glasses.

 

[Georges]

Rodimus, looks faded

 

[rodimus]

Blue Card,

Yup, iam aware of that. Hence I'm not prepared to ask him to take out the whole facade and put back 50%gey + 50%red bricks. I think the brick colour is really bad.

If i did ask him to do that, then I would have to accept whatever comes out of it.

Currently, just asking them to do the windowhead, take out the 4 - 6 charcoal looking bricks out. If it still looks bad, let's see if they can gimme a compensation/discount, or render the whole front wall(if i can push for it)

 

[rodimus]

I am wondering if i should tell the builder exactly what to do here?

What if i said take out the grey bricks, and they do, and in the end the facade still looks sh1t?

I think as client I should inspect(judge) but not supervise (supervision means Im taking responsibility of the outcome).

The manager has asked me to meet with the supervisor and tell him what I want him to do. But looking at that brick quality, it is really quite disappointing. What if I ask them to fix and then later can;t claim compensation from them for the poor brick quality?

I have typed up a letter to the manager, but I havent emailed it:
________________________________________

(name),

I think it is unnecessary that I meet him onsite. There is nothing much I can do, but to tell him the facade and mix looks like a bad mistake for a facebrick wall. Seriously, you and him don't think the facade looks poor quality from the pics I took? I do not really know exactly how to fix this to make it right, the Builder and tradesmen are the professional. All I can say is whether the quality is acceptable. In my opinion, the bricks look really bad, and may even need a render finish in the end if the remedial job still can't improve it.

(name), we are in a position where I may even go into a dispute with the Builder, so i cannot tell you exactly what to do. The Builder is the professional. I am the customer, all I can say in the end is "good job, the facade looks great", or "I am not going to accept this, eventhough I dont know exactly how to fix this.Please compensate me or render for free or fix."

but here's my opinion where I think your bricklayers have gone wrong:

Basically with less than 10% greyish brick, it is impossible to make a composition or a presentable pattern for the front facade. The proportion of grey bricks put on the facade compared to reds, will only make certain spots look like mistakes (or a case of "ran out of similar bricks" or a patch up job). For this facade, "similar bricks"= red(>90%). "Odd ones out" = grey(<10%). Hence, take out all the greyish ash bricks from the front facade. We cannot have a 90% plain facade, and then try to slip in a few dark ones, and not to have it look like someone made a mistake. Furthermore the grey bricks quality are really bad.

Unless he wants to reorder a new better presentable batch from Austral to redo the facade?

I am even considering the option of rendering the whole front facade if it still looks unpresentable in the end.

Has Austral responded, and if they are giving any compensation for such poor grade/batch?

 

[stumunro]

I personally think the best thing to do is to meet them on site, but ask the same questions. Generally you will get a less "ballsier" response in person, and you might get a fairer decision on what to do. Once they have made this decision, I would ask them to follow up with what they are going to do in writing.

 

[Aaron Sice]

good letter, fair, unemotional, to the point.

 

[rodimus]

If i were to render it (last pic is if i stick with facebrick for that wall)

 

[Glenn]

Inspection Zone

Rodimus,

I think that where the downpipes enter the pipe that leads to stormwater\soakwell does not comply with the BCA regarding termite control....there is supposed to be a barrier or an inspection zone between the building and the ground.

Glenn

 

[alexgsz]

I understand where you're coming from as building a house you want everything to be "just right" Note I don’t say perfect, as I believe it is unreasonable to expect a perfect house, you'd just be setting yourself up to be disappointed.

To borrow a dazzling term, I'd go and meet up with the project manager/building supervisior/whoevers the onsite boss and have a chat to them man to man. I would NOT bring up building codes etc. I'd explain your problem and work out a compromised solution. It’s easy to ignore an email, but much harder to ignore a person in front of you.

The problem with going straight for the book is that it can come back to fck you up later. When you run into your next issue (all buildings have issues) you don't want to have the builder pull out the book and quote you what is acceptable when you're not happy with the result.

I see this who issue as a communication issue here between you and the builder. You need to let them know you’re unhappy with it and give them a chance to fix it. But remember you need to build and maintain a rapport with the builder. Making their life hard is not going to win you any friends and I'll almost guarantee the rest of the build will becoming indefinably tougher.

However the above relies on the building supervisor being reasonable and willing to work out a compromise. If they aren't then unfortunately you'd have to look down the legal route, which others have already mentioned will be expensive and lead to no one winning in the end.

 

[TommyR]

I don't think you have got what you thought you were going to get, and this is a problem particularly when using large system builders. At the end of the day what you appear to have doesn't look too bad though, it may not be exactly what you thought you were contracting for, but IMHO I don't think you are getting a product which is totally unacceptable either.
When we built our home 16yrs ago we had similar issues with the builder, but sometimes you have to decide which battles you are going to fight to the death and which ones you are going to roll over on, and get on with the other things in your life. These days I never see the bricks when I come home, I just see home.

Hope this helps
Tom

 

[Glenn]

Hi alexgsz,

I may be too anal, but my position is that if a building is built according to the drawings, specification, BCA and relevant Australian Standards.....there can be nothing a customer has to worry about.

Glenn

 

[TommyR]

Hi alexgsz,

I may be too anal, but my position is that if a building is built according to the drawings, specification, BCA and relevant Australian Standards.....there can be nothing a customer has to worry about.

Glenn

Your right Glenn, but in my experience the drawings, specs, etc are never that precise, so unless you have a situation where they are, you end up having to accept something that is near enough but not exactly what you thought you were getting

Tom

 

[Aaron Sice]

unfortunately the BRB will view on

"is it of acceptable standard?"
"does it look like the plans signed?"
"is it the brick type chosen?"

etc etc.

i wouldn;t want to take it to court, because if you answer yes to all those then the BRB will say you have no case.

i agree with the above - see them face to face on site.

 

[alexgsz]

Hi alexgsz,

I may be too anal, but my position is that if a building is built according to the drawings, specification, BCA and relevant Australian Standards.....there can be nothing a customer has to worry about.

Glenn

I spose the question to ask here is are you happy to have a building that is built "exactly to standard"?

Now I don't know the stardards at all, but I remeber my builder taking me around to a few homes that were all passable "to a standards" but I wanted something that was better than standard. Not being anal about standards and working with the builder got me a better than standard place.

Now it was 3 -4 years ago since I built, but the example I can remeber is the plaster joins and paint on the wall.
The standard (as I remember dont quote me) was you had to stand 1 meter away from the wall and face the wall square. If you couldn't see the plaster join then it was passable. However the moment you looked at it along the wall all the joins were noticable. Obviously the "standards" weren't what I wanted, so I discussed with the builder, and we agreed to throw an extra coat of paint on. Sure I had to pay for the extra paint, but in the end it all worked out, which was lucky considering I have a long entryway/hallway.

 

[rodimus]

Guys,
I think I should save myself the headache, time and delay(of rectifying brick) and tell them to render the whole front facade.

If i tell them to fix the brick here and there, but the poor quality of the brick and unequal quantity of red/black bricks could still make it look like a dog's breakfast. Im thinking perhaps I shouldnt take the risk and just ask them to render, the end of all problems.

(see a few posts above my render test picsdone in photoshop)

 

[Aaron Sice]

why not just ask them to render the front facade only and leave the rest of the house brick...?