Two big holes

I want to fit two outside taps before the kitchen fitters get to work in a couple of weeks. I’d really like them to be next to each other and look neat on the outside wall. Trouble is the outside wall in the kitchen is 80cm thick stone – loosely infilled with rubble that tends to make interesting sounds when you drill it and then collapses internally when you remove the drill.

My plan is to line the holes with 21.5mm overflow pipe which I’ll pass back through the holes from the outside as I remove the drill. Like a tunnel shield. The question is: how do I drill them both that distance through the wall so that they’re parallel and vaguely level (I suspect I want them to head slightly downhill to the outside)? Do I need to hire a machine like in the bank job?

Do they need to be level on the inside, or outside only? Drill from outside to inside rather than inside to out, that way you should get them level outside. No idea about parallel-ness other than using mk1 eyeball.

They don’t need to be level on the inside, no. It might make me twitch a bit at it, but ultimately they’ll be hidden by a big fitted oven unit. Not a bad idea.

SDS drill, buy a new huge bit and spend an hour procrastinating then ten minutes drilling?

There’s some good vids on fitting outside taps on YT, eg this one:

For your specifics, I’d go for a long SDS bit and a speed square or similar to start off level and perp, or slightly more complicated route of rigging up a wooden jig.

‘SDS drill, buy a new huge bit and spend an hour procrastinating then ten minutes drilling?’

More like 5 seconds with an SDS, mine goes through decades-hardened concrete lintel like butter without having to push hard

Really depends on what they dredged up from the field to make it.  Supposedly there’s no igneous rocks here. Drilling into one of the walls at the other end of the building tells a different story.

Or…. Get the kitchen fitters to do it for you?  A competent tradesman should be able to do that without bother, and know all the parts and components required to make it work and not leak…

job jobbed. Drilled the first hole from inside then went back through next to it from the outside for the second one.  Thanks for the hints.

It might be level going by your level …. But it probably should have been eyeballed.

Or the timber has to go.

What did you drill it with in the end. Were the above right. Few seconds….. Or was it hours of sweating and swearing…… Been there with both at times.

Ten minutes in total.  The rubble nearly trapped the bit and the liner on one of the holes.  I think the out of square comes from the  wide angle lens on my phone.

Yeah there’s a lot of angles going on in that photo. I don’t doubt it’s level. But the combo of that drain pipe and the random angular stone plays a trick on the eyes

The weird downcomers will be going at some point when we get a new roof that hasn’t been equipped with guttering by an imbecile.

drill was just my erbauer sds and a 24mm /1m bit.

What’s two outside taps all about?

What’s two outside taps all about?

Why not? If you’re fitting one, fit two then each can be used for different purposes at the same time; one can be used with something like a sprinkler hose, while t’other’s being used to wash the car. 🤷🏼

Simples.

Why not? If you’re fitting one, fit two then each can be used for different purposes at the same time

Probably should have fitted three while you were at it, just in case.

Timber needs oiling.

What’s two outside taps all about?

Hot and cold innit

hot and hot going by the handle colour.

Hot and hotter

Hot and “oh **** i just poached the dug”

I fitted hot and cold taps outside, partly to fill buckets for washing bike/car, and partly for hosing myself off when getting home completely covered in mud.

Have since realised I shouldn’t have been stingy and it would have been better (although very difficult as there’s limited space inside) to fit one of those inline thermostatic mixers as although it’s great for hot buckets of water, it’s too hot for muddy legs!

Maybe I should fit a third… Cold, Hot, Warm!

Hot & cold. I’ll change the shrink wrap on the right hand one today and save your OCDs.

I’ll get to treating the timber. It’s old scaff board that I’ve* recycled so isn’t  going to go anywhere quickly.

I did also think about fitting a thermostatic mixer on the set at the other end of the house, but decided that frost protecting it would be a nightmare. When we replace one of the showers I might steal the mixer and make a detachable kit with some washing machine feed hoses (don’t ever use hoselock hose for hot water it’s properly dangerous)

*ok ok, I got one of the minions to assist.

You can get an inline mixer that would go on the internal pipework, not outside 🙂

Go the whole hog and put a shower curtain up

What’s with the pattern in the mortar work? I’ve never seen that before.

Some idiot scored the mortar in a bizarre way for inexplicable reasons. Compounding the idiocy is the use of regular mortar in a sandstone building.  So also on the list is full repointing with lime mortar. Eventually. When I’ve sold a child or three.

yeah the pointing is something else isn’t it.

That’s nothing. For some reason they decided adorn the big stones like this:

Holy sh!t, how have you been able to resist chipping that off?

You’ve seen the father Ted episode where Ted tries to fix the car? Yeah that. Everything I look at in this building seems to turn into a project 🤣