This was a "do or die" day - I needed to completely install the supports, rafters, battens and sheet metal - or not at all.

So a bit of a high pressure day - I got chatting to a few neighbours and visitors but each time I had to excuse myself after a few minutes and get back to work.

I might have paused for a few minutes at a time to take a drink of water or eat an apple but apart from half an hour for lunch I worked pretty much continuously all day.

I was up at 4.30 am and out on site at 6.00 am.

For the next hour I tiptoed around on site avoiding making any noise.

I carried all my tools up to the work area and carefully removed the black plastic and all the weights holding down over the exposed floorboards.Also the loose sheeting that I was using to improve the water proofing.

As soon as it reached 7.00 am, and I was able to make a noise, I started installing the 3 front rafters on to the riser/support that was already in place across the middle of the floor.

This took about 2 hours.

Next I installed the 550 x 600 mm frames that I had prepared several weeks ago.

These needed to be bolted to the C purlin framing up one side of the stairwell.

After this I bolted a spine across these three frames to force them in to alignment and stiffen them up.

When I went to place the second set of rafters I found I had a mixture of mounting heights and rafter dimensions so I needed to pack each rafter up individually, as well as notch out 5 to 10 mm in other places.

This took me to early afternoon and I stopped for a short lunch.

Nailing in 7 sets of battens took me up to 4.00 pm and then fixing down the sheeting took me up to 6.00 pm.

This was followed by half an hour of filling in any nail holes in the sheeting with sealant and hanging black plastic down one of the newly created edges.

I was just too exhausted to protect the long sloping edge. This is under pine trees and only a bit of drizzle is expected on Sunday - so I am hoping that it will be ok until I can revisit on Sunday afternoon to install a run of black plastic.

Next weekend I hope to start working on a stretch of flooring that I call the "atrium area" - this connects the doors to the communal bathroom, communal toilet, and 4 different bedroom doors.