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I've only ever built stacks with the sockets at the top of the branches/pipe, one on top of the other (photo on the left). Never used a branch with the socket at the bottom as well, going "over" the stack as on the right in the picture. How trustworthy is the seal on the one on the right, as that's the situation I'll be in once I cut the socket off the soil pipe to reduce it.

WHOA! Please define "vent", and DEFO post some pics before you begin doing anything

Eh? These are bomb and bullet-proof! I've been using (therefore trusting) them for nearly 35 year You are perfectly fine using the 'push-fit' 110mm stuff, so relax a bit Gives you a bit of flexibility and wiggle-room vs the concrete solidness, and lack of forgiveness, of solvent weld.

Do you trust them? Seemed like not having the socket around the outside of the bottom of the branch is asking for leaks.

This is exactly what I have just designed for one of my current clients. Sizeable property, >400m2, so 2 units needed here. Beer is helping sooth the brain ache, after beginning the install today.

Yup. Or just a regular double socket connector needing zero glue?

It may be that the percentage of Olivine in good Scottish Bassalt is around 5%. Us up in Scotland would welcome the investment. But we might get a bit naffed off if you destroy the environment and wreak our tourist industry.

It's more the cutting off the socket on the stack and then how to convert that "back into" a socket really, not sure if trust myself with a branch welded on incase I need to adjust the direction slightly. Would you recommend a solvent weld-to-socket? https://www.screwfix.com/p/floplast-push-fit-solvent-weld-single-socket-pipe-coupler-grey-110mm/13738

Fixing insulated platerboard directly to stone walls is likely to give you a pile of problems further down the line. Fixing to concrete blocks has similar risks. Best thing you can do it to post more info. Just draw a sketch on A4 paper, photograph it and post. You won't get tested on your drawing skills.

Sorry for slow reply Iam fixing insulated plasterboard to stonewalls mostly and some on concrete blocks. The fixings i have used in the past created tiny black spots from condensation from cold bridging.

You make a strong argument at a 5:1 difference. One basic question I have at the moment is why are we in the UK trying to drive this at the expense of our economy and national security when China and the US are contributing to most of the emissions. Brits seem to have gone soft / woke.. they talk about carbon emissions, but our government are not investing in the research and building factories to make the stuff! Now to fund this we need to get rid of this woke fad. We need in my view to start drilling, exploring and selling our good sweet oil, to fund UK renewables. To make a point. The UK has never been bombed since the second world war. I was born in the 60's, my mum who is 95 remembers getting evacuated. We have been very lucky in the UK to have avoided that to date... so far. It's going to come as a major shock to the woke if Putin cuts our undersea internet cables!

We have UFH downstairs and no heating at all upstairs. We got the £7500 grant last year when an Aerotherm was installed.

Old news. My comic mentioned it 12 months ago, and it wasn't new then. Environment Carbon-negative cement can be made with a mineral that helps catch CO2 A process to dissolve the mineral olivine in acid could provide a plentiful, energy-efficient material for carbon-negative cement James Dinneen 1 May 2024, updated 22 January 2025 A sample of cement made from the mineral olivine, which can also help sequester carbon during production. A sample of cement made from the mineral olivine, which can help sequester carbon during production. An abundant mineral called olivine can help make carbon-negative cement. This process could help tackle cement’s large carbon footprint – the material contributes about 8 per cent of global CO2 emissions. Olivine is one of the main components of Earth’s mantle and reserves sit on every continent. “It’s one of the few minerals that is available at the gigatonne scale,” says Sam Draper at Seratech, a UK-based company that has patented a process to turn olivine into cement. Dozens of start-ups like Seratech are developing low-carbon methods to produce cement, such as supplementing with steel by-products or recycling the CO2 released in cement production. Most emissions occur when heating limestone to produce clinker, a binder in cement, along with burning fossil fuels to generate the heat. Net-zero living: How your day will look in a carbon-neutral world Draper and his colleagues looked to the more abundant olivine to find a replacement for some of the usual clinker. Olivine contains silica, which makes cement stronger and more durable. Magnesium sulphate can also be extracted from it, and this salt reacts with CO2 to form minerals that sequester the gas. The researchers extracted these compounds by dissolving powdered olivine in sulphuric acid. After separating the silica and magnesium sulphate, they bubbled CO2 through the magnesium slurry to form a mineral called nesquehonite. To scale up the process, Draper says a cement plant would use CO2 captured from an emissions source or from the air, rendering the entire process carbon negative. The leftover nesquehonite could be recycled into new construction materials like bricks. Replacing 35 per cent of the regular cement in a concrete mix with silica from this process would produce a carbon-neutral cement, the researchers estimated, while subbing 40 per cent or more would make it carbon negative. Draper says current building standards allow this type of material to replace up to 55 per cent of cement, although he says they haven’t yet made enough of it for robust testing. The process utilises well-known reactions, says Rafael Santos at the University of Guelph in Canada, but offers a novel and “reasonable” way to combine them. However, some of the chemicals involved may prove tricky to recycle, he says. Journal reference Royal Society Open Science DOI: 10.1098/rsos.231645

Quite right, there are a number of factors that change the numbers. A PV farm in Madrid, New York or Toronto, will probably outperform a similar sized on in the UK, and the Sahara. So the embodied energy/CO2e payback time (when compared to global averages) will be shorter. Perversely, the lower the global emission become, the longer the payback becomes. We are a long way off that at the moment. When gas, coal and oil are combusted to generate electricity, the carbon costs of fuel extraction need to be taken into account. This is not always done correctly as there is a difference between open cast and deep mine mining. But I think you will find that RE generation is sub 50 g/kWh and FF are greater than 250 g/kWh. That is a 5 to 1 difference, and you don't have to drill, dig, transport or processes the wind and sunshine.

Or this... https://www.screwfix.com/p/floplast-solvent-weld-3-boss-double-socket-short-pipe-grey-110mm/17138 ....if you need to glue it and push it down from above.

Something like this? https://www.screwfix.com/p/floplast-push-fit-3-boss-single-socket-pipe-grey-110mm/18246?msclkid=842481fd35ec11702792ebfa4ba05dd8&utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Bing_UK_Shopping_PMax_Heating %26 Plumbing&utm_term=2331720565763883&utm_content=Heating %26 Plumbing&gclid=842481fd35ec11702792ebfa4ba05dd8&gclsrc=3p.ds&gad_source=7&gad_campaignid=22478593832

I had a quick skim over, thanks for the post. To quote: "Acid can be used to leach elements like calcium out, then a chemical or energetic process precipitates that calcium as calcium hydroxide. Toss that in a kiln with additives of your choice, and with less heating than you need for limestone, you’ve got Portland cement, with only water vapor released." We are going to need a lot of acid? But what kind? Remind any of the raves for older members of BH? The music was great, some great Scottish bands like TTF came along at the end of that period just at the end of the 1980's (The time frequency). The acid (catalyst) is the key possibly, plenty Bassalt in Scotland.

Post a photo and you'll get loads of ideas.

Turbines, even small one, are mature technology, with the majority of the price being the tower, blades and inverter. The actural generator is the cheap bit. PV, while when understood technology 25 years ago, was a minor player, but as it initially rode on the back of the semi-conductor industry, and could use silicone billets that were not good enough for higher end computer 'stuff', there were opportunities to cheaply get all the rest of the components (glass, frame, backing and a little wiring) in place, before extra expense of silicone was needed. The engineers with vision, soon realised that PV produces more energy per unit land area than wind power, even with the technology for the early 2000s. This may seem counter intuitive, but you cannot cluster wind turbines too close together, and with all things 'energy', the larger the better. The other big difference is that it is a global market, so the USA, Canada and Germany soon outsourced the PV technology to China. China wanted to increase its domestic energy production, were willing to subsides the industry, and more importantly, take a 30 year view on it. The rest is history. Just had a look at the price of a Britwind 5kW "Please consider a budget of between £35,000 and £40,000 + vat for a fully installed H5 wind turbine, depending on tower type (there is currently 0% vat on new domestic installations)" So prices have doubled since I was involved with making them, which when I think about it, was 19 years ago. It is probably not that windy in real terms, and not a 'clean wind'. Height is the key. Then there is the distribution, which is not linear, it follows a Weibull distribution pretty well. Basically the higher the mean wind speed, the more often you get even higher wind speeds, and as power from a turbine is proportional to the cube of the wind speed, you need to start with a high mean. A quick look at my local satellite data shown that over Land's End, at the moment. with wind speed is 6.7 m.s-1 at the surface. Now when studying weather, especially wind speed, it is more normal to use air pressure than altitude. It is currently 1003 hPa. Going upwards a little to where the air pressure is 1000 hPa, the wind speed is 7.4 m.s-1 , a lot higher to where is is 850 hPa, the WS is 9.3 m.s-1 (that is about 1500 m high). So to get a good yield out of a small turbine, you need to put it at the top of Ben Nevis, on a 300 m tower. Small turbines have dreadful efficiency, probably no more than 30% (efficiency is based on the maximum energy that could be extracted, Betz Law). Larger turbines are around 50 to 55%. Don't get me wrong, I like turbines, but you would be better off spending the money on a diesel generator.

Once during the recent winter, when the wind and rain were vicious and rather horizontal, I noticed some drips of water trickle down the outside of the stainless-steel wood-burner vent inside a bedroom. So this summer I intend to get up on the almost flat dormer roof which is close to the stainless-steel chimney and fill any small holes I can find around the vent. I imagine it needs to be something flexible, but also something that won't react badly when the metal is warm (when the fire below is burning). What product should I use, please?

OK thanks. Yes, I think they call it SR1 and google AI seems to be saying max 3mm over 2m stright edge...see below. He has said several times - we may not achieve SR1, and of course made reference to this would be because of our 'bad' floor. This makes no sense to me, because it is/was just a concrete floor requiring levelling, fully dried and heated for 2 years, no cracks, kept clean using covers, and any odd bits of plaster wire brushed off and vacuumed by yours truly. I cannot see how you can blame the floor for not being able to level. Anyway will have to check over myself. It is likely SR1 or thereabouts. SR1 would seem to allow say an 8m floor to fall say 6mm from edge to centre, then rise again by 6mm from centre to far edge - that don't seem too great to me. The guy doing it has obviously done a lot of floors over many years. However when you don't have a professional spirit level, spirit level is just 1.8m, don't use a laser level, don't use more than two large mixing/pouring tubs, spread by hand trowel, block my drain, run out or rob other orders to have enough leveller, seem reluctant to use more than the minimum number of soldiers, can see a few soldiers sticking up by 1mm ish - it is difficult to believe that is top of the flooring pro league. I guess most domestic floors are more like 16-20sqm rather than my 40sqm and you can get away with limited precisian. Building standards are often not defined to be all that high, seeming on the basis they are what even below average trades people should be able to easily achieve. Experienced and conscientious pros will be capable of much better than the standard - brick laying and plastering being two examples. Looking at levelling compound specs does make me think they might be more designed to appeal to busy trades wanting to get on, rather than end customers wanting the best possible result. Emphasis seems to be on relatively rapid curing, walk on, and floor-over/tile-over times. I'd personally be happy to use a compound that was runny as water and took 2 days or 3 days to go off if it gave an outstanding result. But nobody is going to make it, because that is not what the trades will ever buy - they want to pour it, come back in a few hours and carry on working.

Ok to keep the conversation light. I designed a lightweight cold formed steel building that went on top of one of the cooling ponds for the Bradwell decomissioning. You need to carry out all the due dilligence that is highly demanding in the nuclear sector. Below is a photo of the cooling ponds when they were getting built. When I went to uni at the age of 40 I worked for MacAlpine one summer so for me it's nostalgia. Check out the guys at the bottom left. When they were building this stuff they had no idea of the clean up costs. But at the time the UK needed energy. These cooling ponds are highly toxic. That said you have to be pretty miserable not to admire the skill the Engineers had, the photo is date 1959. @LnP Please forgive me if I don't take your figures at face value. I'm too old and experienced to take any figures at face value. I have been a developer, am aware of how accademia works and common funding mechanisms. On a macro level we in the UK need energy security. We are threatened by the Chinese on many fronts. Domestically our political system is changing rapidly (more polarised) , some may argue along religious lines and we have political actors who are not, let's just say "deep thinkers". As an Engineer (my primary quailification is in Civil Engineering, for the public) I tend to think strategically on a macro level. That said we can still go about our day jobs, have fun and appreciate Buildhub, even though at times we disagree. I can say that I learn loads from folk on BH. I'm not that old / entrenched that I'm not able to change my mind when folk put forward valid aguement.

If you already have the UFH why are you going MCS route. A direct cylinder excludes you - regs state the DHW has to be heated via the heat pump to get the grant. Upstairs emmitors are not needed as long as the UFH gives enough heat to the house. This is a confusing statement - who said you weren't eligible? Your heat pump needs around 20L per kW at min modulation. So should only need about 40 to 50L in your system. Running a single zone that should be easy to achieve without the volumiser. Not a fan of the MCS fan, many people seem to get royally ripped off. I am using a Haier R290 4kW heat pump (but fiddly setting up for best efficiency) but runs great, £2400 including vat from Wolsey plump centre. Pipes through wall direct to UFH manifold is a simple install add a couple of antifreeze valves and isolation valves plumbing all done (expansion valve and pressure relief in ASHP), comes with the correct strainer to add to the return line.

I am on the top of a hill and get lots of wind there is a 125kw big turbine on the farm just behind me so it is the right place was looking for any real world experience if anybody has any this winter i spent alot of time in cloud --so solar had no chance the original house was not built with a front door of any sort as it faces south west and the courtyard at the back had walls and doors to keep wind out

Stop asking difficult questions! That's why I'm sitting on the far left trying to keep out of view while still trying to keep my job, I was still in my probationaly period at the time.