Worktop installation in Hook

Yes. Hook is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are KT9. It is worked on our south west London run, along with the rest of Kingston upon Thames. Where the drive is shared, the half-hour the van spends in the way is agreed with the neighbour in advance rather than apologised for at the time. The fitting slot is set around it, which is why we ask about it when the date is booked and not before we leave the yard. Where there is no space, the plan starts the night before. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

A minority of these are non-traditional precast types, and in those the inside face of the outer wall is a panel between columns rather than a masonry wall. The carry is the constraint. What the building will take decides how it is fixed. Where two pieces meet over a fall in the floor the join has to be flush to the hand as well as true to the level, because the eye reads the join and forgives the room. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. It is the slow part of the day and it should be.

Grass and gravel will not take a loaded trolley, so a boarded track gets laid from the gate to the door before the first piece moves. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. We would sooner lift a gate off its hinges than force a piece past it. A step up from the drive to the threshold turns the last two metres into a lift, and a lift is where two pairs of hands become the minimum. A van that has to move mid-fit costs the best part of an hour and takes a man off the tools to do it. The van does not stay on a main road once it is empty.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop replacement. Extension kitchens are usually specified long before they are buildable, so the run lengths on the drawing and the run lengths in the room are different numbers. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Lease hours decide when the noisy part happens. Extension work runs late far more often than it runs early, and the worktop is close to the last thing in, so the date agreed at the start is rarely the date that happens. One visit, with the sink and hob seated and sealed before we leave. A tenant moves in on the date on the contract.

The joint where a peninsula meets the main run wants a gable directly under it, and where the units do not offer one, steel goes in to carry that joint instead. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. Mitres are pulled together, never pushed. Material sits between £110 and £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted line by line.

Floors settle, and once base units are packed and levelled properly the stone sits true while everything else in the room admits it is not. The back edge is eased in progressively rather than offered up once and forced. Offered up twice, bonded once. Reserve a space as close to the block entrance as possible and clear the landing and stairs of prams, bikes and stored items. Residents are given written notice before anyone attends, and that notice period rather than the workshop is what governs the earliest sensible start. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. Notice periods decide the date more often than the workshop.

The template produces a drawing, and the workshop cuts to that drawing once you agree it. Nothing is measured until the sink, the tap and the hob are in the room to measure against. The same firm templates and fits. Nobody else is brought in to install. The balcony door frequently opens off the kitchen, which puts a threshold, a draught and a well-used route through one end of the run. Almost everything that makes a fitting day hard is a property of the building rather than of the stone. Packers under the carcass, not shims under the stone.

What decides between them is usually the wall: what it is built of, how flat it is, and where the sockets ended up. The joint between splashback and worktop is siliconed, never grouted, so it can move a little without cracking. If it is a decision for later, say so at the template: the match is a question about the batch. Windows and doors were replaced across whole streets on one programme, so the kitchen window is a plastic frame in the old opening with a deep lined reveal. Deck access or a single narrow staircase with tight half-landings means long pieces get walked up on edge, and the landing turn is checked before we commit. The age of the house sets the pace of it.

Disposal means it goes in the van, not into the garden to wait for a collection. Take the old tops off yourself if you would rather, and the quote simply carries one line fewer. Old laminate is light and awkward rather than heavy, so it is usually the easier half of the day. Where the van cannot turn on the plot it has to arrive already facing the right way, so the approach along the street is part of the plan. We aim for the first slot of the day where parking is tight, because that is when the street is emptiest. Time lost at the kerb never comes back later in the day.

Slabs come in finite sizes, so a long run needs a join whatever the room looks like. Join count is a question about slab size and run length, nothing else. A join cannot cross a cut-out, so a sink mid-run takes away the position you would have used. A breakfast bar on the outer side is an overhang like any other, and the support under it is sized for people leaning on the end rather than for the weight of the stone alone. A layout that has been packed and levelled run by run instead of to one datum shows as a step where two pieces meet. Levels are checked across the walkway, not along one side.