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General

Spot the Pipeline

Those beyond a certain again will remember Spot The Ball, the competition on the sports pages back in the 80s/90s.   It was an action photo from a football match with the ball missing – you had to mark the picture with an X where you thought the ball was and send it in with your entry fee. If the middle of your X aligned with the middle of the ball, you won the prize.     Except, it wasn’t quite like that. What actually happened was that judges also guessed where th

Missing In Action

So, after a flurry of initial blog posts back in March and April, I went quiet. Real life (home and work) got a bit mental and I just didn't have the time to post more. And, my wife and I have also done a fair bit of reflection on the way forward.   I'd gotten about 2/3 of the way through the journey to where we are today. I've covered finding the plot, and the decision whether to buy it, initial view on wayleaves and servitudes, tweaking the design that came with the plot, clearing to

The house arrives & I get a real life Tonka toy!

Well, things, as I suspected might be the case, have gone from slow, slow, slower, to a sudden rate of knots overnight. After an initial bump where we discovered that the architect had drawn the SIPs to start at the beam and block floor level, (but with 2 weeks to go the SIPs designer pointed out that the soleplate must be 150mm minimum above that), we quickly got the builder to some blocks laid to give us the 100mm insulation, 75mm screed + stone floor height needed.    Building regs

Floors, plastering and time to recover!

Its been a while since the last blog and lots has happened.  We'd been busy with other things and planned to crack on with the house but while on the way to our house a couple of weeks ago, the OH was hit by a car which failed to give way at a junction.  He was riding his cycle, got thrown up and across the road, landing on his head.  Luckily, nothing was coming the other way, and he was wearing a helmet which took a lot of the impact and somehow, apart from lots of scrapes, his main limbs were

Part 21 - MVHR Silencer

I had intended this entry to be about our heating system and DHW, but due to the interest and debate on MVHR silencers, have brought this entry forward.   As reported in a previous blog entry, I’ve been aware of fan noise being emitted from the individual room supply and extract terminals.  The valves themselves do go some way of dampening down the noise, so acoustic valves may well be a good solution, but I decided to go down the route of building my own silencer following some discus

Part 20 - 2nd fix Plumbing / Sanitary Ware

As we approached our move in date, our tiler was unfortunate enough to come down with a bug that was doing the rounds.  He had to take a couple of days off (and I think probably came back before he really should have) but it did have a knock on effect on the plumber, who couldn’t get all the sanitary ware fitted before we moved in.  On the morning of moving in day (and to obtain our Temporary Certificate of occupation) we had one fully working bathroom.  At the end of moving in day we had both w

Part 19 - MVHR

One of the final significant jobs I had to do before we moved in was connect up and commission the MVHR.  All the radial ductwork and individual plenums had been fitted at first fix, however I had left installing and connecting the actual unit until the loft has been insulated, as I didn't want to risk pipe connections being damaged.   The day before we were due to move in, the insulation contractor having laid all the loft insulation, I spent a couple of hours in the loft space above

Part 18 - 2nd fix electrics

Working around the joiners as they completed the internal fit out, the electrician returned to complete second / final fix.  I won’t bore you with endless photographs of sockets and light switches, but will describe the most notable electrical installations:   LED lighting – after obtaining various samples and some electrical testing, I purchased a quantity of slimline 6W recessed fittings from   https://hartingtonheath.com/product-category/led-recessed-lights/non-dimmable/

Works start.

We started. In fact it was mid February so I have some catching up. Planning took a few years.... First job was to move the PV from the big shed to the little shed then remove large shed. The large shed took a week because I had help with the right kit. It has a new home to go to. We will miss it as it was the party shed but we get a replacement dwelling, the Bungalow has to go.  

The Wall Will Be Built!

How long can it take to build a timber partition wall? One that is only 16ft long, in a straight line, no curves, no fancy materials.   This one has taken me well over a week, which has become a little frustrating. The reason is partly due to the complex shape, and partly due to my design having changed significantly just before I started the wall. Having switched to a more open plan layout, the wall now has multiple different ceiling heights all tying into it which led to a lot of hea

Plasterboarding newbie and the lounge loses its floor.

Some of the plaster of the bedrooms was very loose and severl months ago, I stripped these areas, leaving any sound plaster.  However, this has left me with very uneven walls.    The plasterer suggested that we apply plasterboard to the walls and then he'd come in and skim over, making it all look nice (hopefully).  But before we could apply the plasterboard, I had to get the walls to the same depth or the dots/dabs would be huge in some areas.  So I decided to use the piece

Mains and drains.

We are now looking at getting the services into place before June when our SIPs should turn up. I've found both water board and electricity folks to be really helpful and approachable thus far when I've asked for advice or clarification.  I also think their charges are not excessive actually, which I know is not the experience nationally. That may also be because we are very fortunate in having the water running 1 metre away along one boundary and the electricity main running underground 1 metre

I have erected Cecil...

Rendering and all cladding completed.  Couple coats of paint on the render and we'll probably give it another towards the end of the summer when we hopefully finish the build.    Also Cecil the Lion is in place, this stone lion head is on every house that my family (my Grandad, Dad and now me) has self built, 4 in this town currently, 3 of which are still owned by the family.  The story of how this tradition began is a little lacking in detail, but I did enjoy placing it 50+ years afte

The Perfect Bin Store

I know there is no such thing, but this blog is supposed to be about Details.   How to build an attractive looking bin store to deal with dustbins that breed like Statutory Consultees in the Planning process?   Here is one option used locally. They have used traditional perforated blocks that we are all used to from the 1970s.     Here is something similar from Kevin McCloud's The Triangle development, using Gabions.   (Photo Credit)  

An Excellent Modern Terrace Plan

I thought I would post a plan of a terraced house I ran across recently.   The small estate of houses was built in 2004. Typical but pleasant modern houses, but this 2.5 storey terrace has a notably efficient layout.   In the overall footprint of 5m by 9m (including external walls) includes 1047 sqft, and includes:   Large lounge 12' x 16'. Dining room 8' x 10' attached to 10' x 7' kitchen Three double bedrooms (one ensuite) Family bathroom

Part 17 - Kitchen, Utility and Tiling

Having gone through the process of considering then discounting travertine as our floor covering of choice, we eventually settled on a porcelin tile to cover those areas (kitchen, utility and vestibule) that were not having oak flooring laid. Unfortunately for us, the person who we believed was going to be doing our tiling (and does virtually all of the builders tiling), at the last moment refused to undertake the work in our house.  Quite why I've not been able to establish, nor has my builder.

New floors and a new stud wall - shame about the ceiling....

We seem to have made huge strides in the last two weeks with both of us spending a good amount of time at the house.  The pipes have been laid ready for the radiator as well as the lights for the downstairs lights.     To try to get the rooms ready for skimming, we needed to sort out the bedroom floors.  they were a mish mash of old boards, some damaged where we'd lifted them (tongue and groove is hard to lift without lifting them all).  So we took the decision to replace t

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