From Devon to Derbyshire.

I had an interesting solo trip to Devon to seal this very small water feature on Tuesday.

A day off to go sea kayaking in Brixham was followed by a two day installation in our home county of Derbyshire on an absolutely brilliant pond.

I visited the site about 4 weeks previously to snag (advise on the prep) the job for the pond constructors.  The build quality was so good that there was barely any snagging to do, just a sample of foam left with them so they could configure the 12 LED lights built into the walls was all that was required along with advice and reasons for a weatherproof cover.

Applying the PU foam to the pool was a straightforward affair but carried out in punishing temperatures.  This was completed by 2pm and I ruled out starting the grp work due to the excessive heat at that time of day.  We attended site early on Friday morning to start the grp proper.  By 2.30 and with temperatures at stiffling temperatures the grp work was complete with Lucy installing the majority of the surface tissue application on her own.  She has a great eye for this work, real attention being paid to the attention required to achieve the enamel like finish we pride ourselves on. It dawned on me then that Lucy is, as far as I am aware the only female grp laminator in the UK working on ponds!

We took some r&r away from the job allowing daytime temperatures to drop to comfortable levels and went back to site at 5.30pm, greeted with some more hot refreshing tea provided by the pond owners.

A 7.30pm finish left the pond waterproof and in immaculate condition just as the rain started, the cover holding up to perfection.

All in all we had relatively quiet week by our standards and worked on what is possibly one of the best built ponds we've been invited to so far in 2011.

Here are a couple of pictures from the perfectly built pond.

Foam lined and fully glassed, sanded down and ready for the topcoat.

One of the 12 LED light fittings, sealed, masked off to protect the lens and ready to be very carefully flowcoated around!

Here you see the complex shape of the pond.  Split level, lights, tangental returns, fillets and a surface skimmer ALL left in a 100% waterproof condition.

The header course of bricks are being fitted tomorrow and I'll pop a couple of pictures of this completed pond in due course.