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Small Scale Engineering offers you the following services:

Engineering, fitting & turning on once-off and short run pieces
All types of welding including bespoke, metal furniture manufacture
Prototype manufacture
Home maintenance, restoration, repairs and renovations
General handyman

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Small Scale Engineering is also building a house out of shipping containers. Follow the project on our blog:

The Latest From the Container House Project

- Our 2019 Accomplishments
  11th Dec 2019Main Structure and RoofOur last post for the year seems like a good time to actually look back and see exactly what our 2019 accomplishments were. At times, for us, it does seem like the project is moving at a painfully slow pace, but the reality is that it has been galloping along quite quickly. So herewith a bit of a review and a couple of never-before-seen photos of our progress! Preparing for 2019 This time last year (December 2018), we began on the earthworks and we took one of my favourite photos of all time for this blog. It’s a real action shot. This was our first blog post update in January 2019. And of course, during the hottest time of the year, we found ourselves digging giant holes for the footings. 2019, Things Start Moving! In April we were finally able to cast the concrete footings. A lot of work went into this as they had to be just right to support the weight of our container home, and to be in the perfect position for the containers to sit on top of them. Then, after some huge headaches, we finally got the five shipping containers into position! A most exciting day. Once we were happy with the roof installation, we could start with the exterior cladding. To date we have completed: The east side The south side The last six boards on the west side (the front of our house) will be completed this week. (This is also where we finished our first 20 litre tub of paint, as you can see.) We’ve also started work on our car port, but more on that next year… We also installed many of our windows this year, and have perfected our technique. I think that the windows make our home look cheerful. 2019 Accomplishments Interior 2019 was the year of the exterior. We still have a few items to tick off our check list for the exterior, but I am sure that 2020 will see us posting more on the interior. In October we cast the first section of concrete floor for our interior “courtyard/communal” area. We have cast another two sections so have a full strip complete and are about a quarter of the way through the floor casting. The two slabs on the left are still wet after floating What Can We Look Forward to in 2020? We expect to complete the exterior cladding early in 2020. With only have the north side left to clad so it should not take too long. This we should completed along with the remaining windows. We are going to be working on the interior cladding and will soon be sharing posts as we complete our first “wing”, ready for habitation. All in all we are really pleased with our 2019 accomplishments and are looking forward to seeing how things progress as the months roll on. We’ll be back mid-January with some exciting new posts! PS: One more thing to end the year; we were very surprised to see Pantone’s colour of the year for 2020....
- Cleaning a Fire Damaged Shipping Container
  4th Dec 2019Prep WorkThis post is about our experiences on what was possibly the worst thing we have had to do so far, to build our container home. It is no easy task to clean a fire damaged shipping container. It was so awful, I couldn’t help myself but laugh when I was standing under a shower of sooty, soapy water. The work for this little chunk of work got us so wet and grimey I couldn’t take as many photos as I would have liked. The photos all show Kevin demonstrating the work, but we worked together to get the container clean. Louis, on the other hand, cleaned out the first container all by himself a few months ago, in winter, when it was a lot colder and probably even more unpleasant. A Fire Damaged Shipping Container? We have two fire damaged shipping containers, to be exact. The arrival of these two containers was particulary exciting because they were exactly what we were looking for. We wanted damaged containers that were no longer sea-worthy, from which we could make our house. These two had been used previously as buildings of some sort, until squatters got in and lit fires on the interior. Not too long after that, we had them delivered to site, still full of soot and ash, rubble, burnt out electrical components, bits of insulation, a lot of broken glass from the windows and a disgusting smell of urine. Did these two burnt out smelly husks still spark joy? Maybe not quite so much. We boarded up the doors so that our pets could not get in and hurt themselves. We let them sit for a few months. Thankfully the urine smell dissipated and we felt a bit more enthusiastic about cleaning them out. Louis had a bit of spare time one day and bravely tackled the first container. Kevin and I recently tackled the second. Removing Rubble Believe it or not, that’s a colour photo there on the left The first thing to do was to remove all the rubble and other detritus. We swept it as best we could into manageable piles. Using a shovel shovel, we moved the larger chunks into empty dog food sacks ready to take to the dump. We have a bit of a problem with mosquitoes on site. We knew that there were many living in this particular shipping container. This gave us added motivation to get to work and get the container clean. It is very disconcerting to have a swarm of mosquitoes fly up into your face after dislodging a pile of rubbish. I don’t know how to describe just how many mosquitoes were hiding in the container, in a believable way. I barely believe it myself and I start itching just thinking about it! Once the big chunks were out, we swept up as much of the soot as possible. Scrubbing the Surfaces of the Fire Damaged Shipping Container Kevin mixed up a bucket of soapy water and added some bleach. Using that and a broom, we scrubbed the floor, walls and roof of the container. “It’s a hard knock life for us!” The aim was to remove the loose dirt. Some of the soot has baked into the interior paint so we would only be able to get it clean to a point. Once everything was thoroughly soapy, we pulled out the pressure washer to wash the soapy water down the walls. From there we used the pressure washer and brooms to sweep the dirty water out of the container. We used as much of our collected rain water as possible for this exercise but had to use some municipal water as we only had a small amount of rain water. The pressure washer experience was one we will never forget. Of course, we used eye protection because we did not want the black soapy water in our eyes. We had water raining down on us from the roof of the container. This obviously dripped on our protective glasses so in about two seconds we were soaking wet and blind. And this is where I just stood there and laughed, probably looking something like a crazy chimney sweep that had got caught in a downpour. The absurdity of it all! Getting Rid of Those Mosquitoes Once the fire damaged shipping container was clean(er), we had to do something about the mosquitoes. They really are a huge problem (along with flies). We used a tactile poison that is especially formulated for mosquitoes. It doesn’t affect small animals or humans once it has dried. A week later, as I type this, I can confirm that we have seen a good reduction of mosquitoes in our current living areas. Goodbye mosquitoes! Once the container was clean we also could finally see the previous owner’s choice in vinyl flooring (mustard yellow). Later that day, Kevin and I were sitting and eating our lunchtime sandwiches. I asked him if he knew the container had a yellow floor, because I certainly didn’t as it was covered in such a thick layer of soot. “No,” he responded between bites. “It’s not much of an improvement.” I laughed again!...

Small Scale Engineering offers you the following services:

Our 2019 Accomplishments

Cleaning a Fire Damaged Shipping Container

Container Home Entrance