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Ducted forced air heating systems are the norm in North America, even before air conditioning became common. We lived in Canada in the 1980s and '90's and every house we lived in had forced air gas central heating. When we wanted to add air conditioning in one of the houses, it was a doddle as it just meant putting an extra heat exchanger in the ductwork downstream the furnace, as well as the outside unit of course. In fact I chose to install a heat pump and used it for heating instead of gas when it wasn't too cold outside. I'd be a little cautious about choosing it here though, because it's "non-standard". My parents' house, together with all the houses on the estate built in 1965, had forced air gas heating. But over the years, as the furnaces started to need to be maintained or replaced, other houses on the estate switched to boilers and radiators. Except ours though, because my Dad was good at fixing things 🙂. It still had the original furnace in it working perfectly when we sold the house after he died in 2008, although he'd replaced a lot of parts, especially fan belts and bearings.

It is only a small area. A physical DPM is going to interfere with getting a good bond. Not very likely to get any damp but would prefer to use something rather than nothing. People must want to liquid damp proof floors and then use tile adhesive all the time - what do they use ? Mapelastic AquaDefence ?

I have sunflex bifolds installed by ID Systems. I think it is very important that installation is done very precisely - everything needs to be exactly plumb - that takes time and extreme care by experienced installers. ID Systems did provide that. I don't trust a builder to do that TBH. All my window seals are very good. I did have an issue with a seal at the bottom edge of a door but it was put right. I did have some issues with wrong parts being supplied, and with my builder screwing up the opening, but that is a different thing. Drop on your doors could be install issue, or might be a 'design feature'. Yes I was told to open them as you describe, doesn't seem too much of a problem. Mine do slide right across the opening to hang at either side. I don't have a any cut ends exposed. Opening was surveyed by the fitters and dimensioned manufacturing drawings then provided for buy off before manufacture.

Why not tank the surface?

If you are doing liquid dpm, do yourself a favour and use a 2 part epoxy based system. Easy to apply, chemical hardening, so sets in a predetermined time. Apply one day time the next. None of the tacky nonsense. Not cheap but works well.

Sorry, forgot to say it's wet plaster, on mortar scratch coat. No plasterboard.

You can cool the house down using UFH and ASHP. A2A will only cool the air, not the slab. If you get your calculations right and make sure it doesn’t overheat, the amount of cooling you gonna require in a typical year will be minimal.

So I want to use tile adhesive on a horizontal surface after applying some kind of damp/waterproofing to it. (Yesterday AI recommended DryBase Liquid-Applied DPM saying I could apply tile adhesive while it was still tacky. Today it says the Drybase has to dry completely and then I may need a primer. Useless thing) What can I use and still get a good tile adhesive bond (Using Mapei Super Flexible Tile Adhesive - powder S1) ?

Depending on the amount you buy direct, 5% of total cost sounds reasonable to me. 👍

You need to go three.js .... man stuff 🙂

Heat pump cylinder

@Benpointer Nice one thanks for the spreasheet info. Yes, I've read the whole of the VAT reclaim thread but was just wondering if my 'back of an envelope' figure was roughly within range. I get that it's oranges and apples though. Cheers

Hi Square Feet, Here's an empty copy of the spreadsheet I created. VAT invoices template.xlsx It's based on the format of Table A from the reclaim form https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65858474fc07f300128d46e8/VAT431NB.pdf The total VAT we're reclaiming is quite a small %age of our total spend because most of the spend was on zero-rated build and install work where the contractors supplied the materials. The big ticket items of groundworks, timber fram, windows, zinc roof, solar PV and electrics, were all in this category. Our main materials spend items were timber cladding, floor tiles, kitchen units, doors, lighting, insulation, plus lots of timber and fixings. How much you will be claiming back depends on how much you put through contractors and how much materials you buy yourself. Hope that helps. Ben

It really depends on the unit you choose. For example, selecting 2 completely random units - Midea multi-split with a Panasonic multi-split, both on R32: Midea heating output nominal 6.59/ cooling 6.15 kW Panasonic heating output 6.80/ cooling 5.20 kW The Midea lists an SEER of 6.5 A** on cooling and SCOP of 4 A* on heating The Panasonic lists an EER of 4.48 A on cooling and COP of 4.79 A on heating (yes, I know SEER/SCOP is different from EER/COP but that's the published data and the Panasonic is as a kit with 3 room units with multi-room control whereas the Midea is the outdoor unit). These clearly demonstrate a difference between heating and cooling modes - e.g if not on output, then on efficiency. But also something I think is relevant in this kind of decision is the proposed phase out of refrigerants with a GWP of over 150 from 2027 in the EU (the UK will probably follow course). This means that a whole house system using R32 is on a time limited trajectory - and what happens a few years down the line with maintenance?

Well I had a play today with my old surface pro - it has a GTX 1060 GPU with 6Gb of RAM, its about 9 years old! I thought can I get Gemma4 4b into that and drawing. SO I gave it a try and after some messing about I ended up with this - some HTML code output at about 25 tokens / second. Using an un-quantised Gemma4 4b model - not bad I thought without any flooding into CPU memory.

No someone has messed up. Using mesh internally would be unusual.

Bifold doors tend to suffer from the issues you have experienced. I am not keen on them. I have had bifolds in the past and would not again. Lift and slide is my preferred option.

Having been on site whilst AB ‘did their thing’ I can tell you for sure that AB do not fully mask off the doors and windows, and all they do is put 2” masking tape on the flat surfaces of the frames, and ZERO on the glass / vertical sections of the units. I asked why they wern’t masking off, and the very proficient team assured me “there’s no need, nothing will stick to anything other than the flat surfaces”. And they were 100% correct, even with tripods set up less than 1m from the £5k sliders, absolutely ZERO evidence of them ever being there. Flat surfaces were like a 1970’s nightclub carpet afterwards, like industrial fly paper, including all the screed. After a few days of foot traffic from trades and dust / sweeping other evidence was pretty much gone without trace. I’m still a huge fan of AB, and will be using them again soon for an ICF demo and replacement dwelling client.

Units designed and sized to be near silent in operation, without the wart on the wall or ceiling. Most of my projects (for clients) are planned out meticulously, using the slack in the sails during the 12 months before putting the foundations down, and this pays huge dividends. Ducts and service risers, MEP pathways, removal of boxing in and avoidance of conflict or ‘shit hitting the fan during the construction phase’ are all sorted well in advance. Makes life so much easier, and also allows cost savings and value-engineering a plenty; for example, MBC didn’t charge for the service penetrations to be made in both of the 2 steels in the GF ceiling / amongst the posi-joists, where 8x mvhr ducts, 1x soil pipe, and x qty of small bore plumbing and electrics will pass through with blissful simplicity. Condensate pipework to all locations, yes, on this atm. I discussed this with the client and explained why the pipework is not perfectly vertical; I explained that these condensate drains are constantly drip-drip-dripping and the sound of a water droplet landing on the rest bends in the GF ceilings would be like Chinese torture. My method for these is to put the rising 2.5m pipes in at an angle so the water runs down the pipe so it’s 100% silent. Every detail needs to be in check, ahead of construction, and LONG before they become missed opportunities / compromises / annoyances / outright feckups.

Hi All - I've been fretting about the Origin bifolds I bought last year pretty much since they went it. There were a bunch of issues with how they were originally installed that probably tar how I see the doors and overall I've been incredibly disappointed with the doors vs what I was expecting. That said before I go back to the company that I got them from I wanted a view as to whether I am being too particular about them and this is just fine. I've attached some pics below. The primary issues I have are. 1. One of the door leans over when opened by about 10mm. This messes with my flush'ish threshold. I can work around it but the bigger concern is that the doors are so large and heavy that they are pulling on the frame. The door was not installed plumb (see pic). 2. When opening the door I was given strict rules that the door must be open and set back fully onto its magnetic catch before attempting to open the rest of the bifold. That if I didn't do this the doors WILL scrape against the bottom of the frame and could pull out altogether. 3. Exposed unpainted aluminium cuts. This problem is pretty much everywhere, every time I look at them I spot a new unfinished cut. This just feels really low quality to me. I can't understand why the cut sections couldn't have just been sprayed when they were cut. 4. Gaskets and seals - I don't know all the names of the parts but essentially some of the external seals are hanging out. Again seems low quality finish that was cut after by the fitters. The gaskets that hold the glass in have issues where they appear ot be bent and don't have a clean finish. Not sure if this really makes a difference to the weather protection? Would appreciate any views on whether I just leave it now. Thanks, Paul

This post came up whilst I was doing some research for my Timber Frame notes after @Great_scot_selfbuild mentioned Broadaxe. Frame Technologies aren't just based in the same location, they appear to be based in the same yard! All the signage on Google Maps Street View says Frame Technologies, but the location also shows Broadaxe Timber Frames and Firth Construction on the general map and it is the location both companies list as their address (Broadaxe and Firth). And yet Frame Technologies and Broadaxe Timber Frames do not appear to share directors or any form of ownership of one another. Not sure whether anyone else has information on the links between the two companies? Perhaps @Great_scot_selfbuild?

Definitely not normal. If it's plasterboard then the joins should be away from any edges but that's what it looks like for me. When I first plasterboarded my front room I just stopped the board at the "easiest point" and guess what, cracked at all these places a year later. Maybe that's what's happened? For what is worth, since then I've cut my boards to keep away from any edges and it's been rock solid.

Hard to argue that it's not difficult. My own place is a refurb of a 30s semi so hardly a full build, although often I think that works be easier. I'm 4 years in and exhausted but it's just a bit by bit, what else can you do. The guys on this forum have been a godsend and it's been a real eye opener starting with practically no knowledge. Stick in there fella, it'll get better once you've got walls!

That would would indeed be a bad thing 😬

I think direct DHW definitely makes sense… we’ll have a decent PV array and batteries, so electricity should be mostly ‘free’ and worst case it’ll be off-peak.