All Activity

Reminds of a story my late Father in Law told me. He was a builder up in Manchester for many years before he retired and ran his own, successful business. Many years ago he found an old railway line, at a tip I think, and used it as a lintel on an extension he was building. The BCO at the time was very unhappy but he got his structural engineer to prove that it was OK and (as far as I know) it is still built into the extension! Not sure you you would get away with that nowadays!

Definitely a job to for a structural engineer to go look at. Perhaps not a full report just a visit and his thoughts on feasibility of removing it? Go back for a design report if he's optimistic?

I kind of think back to when I first joined BH. I took me a while to get my head around how it works. BH is not like some woke Blue Sky place, but I can't really think of anyone who is deliberately horrible. @WisteriaMews post more info with lots of details as I said before and loads of folk will rally round.

Great thread this, all different points of view, appoaches and innovation going on. One could conclude there is no perfect solution... but that is the joy of design, you do the best you can.. so long as you can live with fact that there is no perfect answer. An element that flags up for me is that many posts are a personal view, some just do this as a hobby which is fair enough. Few, if any recognise, (rarely mentioned on BH) that they are just a custodian of their house which one would hope will last for more then 60 years. My mindset is... lets build stuff that is pragmatic and look at the maintenence costs over the life cycle of the building while retaining its market value. My own view is that a sealed house that relies on mechanical ventilation alone is not a long term solution as ownership and use will change over time, the systems become degraded and costs rise.. it gets worse if no one understands what you did in the first place. At last.. well done you! An OH cowl is the best in my view. No moving parts and requires no wind to function in terms of passive stack ventilation. If you want more passive ventilation you just increase the diameter.

Wise words. But seems to the way of things, let's missed out the key steps and try to short cut, then end up spending more time and money to get yourself out of a self dug hole.

If you want more targeted feedback then suggest you post your drawings. The key here is to recognise that folk on BH have never seen you project so rather than making them guess just provide as much info as you can. Take title boxes off drawings and identifiable marks if you wish.

If you do have bigger gaps cut down each side of the joint to the base of the PIR, so you have an open V with the wide (not that wide!) part on the top of the PIR, facing you. Then it is quite an easy job to start foaming at the bottom of the V and slowly bring the nozzle up till you have filled to the top. Of course you can stop before you reach the top as each squirt expands, but knowing when to stop takes a bit of experimentation. The tape over as VCL. I prefer to use air-tightness tape rather than foil tape.

It is indeed a puzzle and interesting. It does indeed. Now @saveasteading knows his way around buildings as do many on BH. I took a step back and looked up at the roof. Up there is a historic roof truss. I can't see enough detail to try and date that without risking embarressment. Now I'm totally guessing here.. but the roof is sitting on old walls that will have moved about, probably spread. I wonder if the railway line is acting as a tie beam (in tension) rather than a vertical load bearing element. Don't forget folk would put in anything to hand in the past to solve a problem. If you look closely the railway beam seems to frame into a beam at the edge of the first floor stiff diaphragm floor. I'm just speculating of course.. but if the railway beam is working as a tie then you could maybe swap that out for a steel rod or stainless steel wire. You need to check you can clear the line of the stair by 2.0m. If you struggle then you could spend a bit more on some fancy catilevered steel connection to raise the height a bit. Don't chuck in the towel just yet if you really want the place.

Or get some solar and an immersion - nice hot baths/showers unaffected by global energy costs.

Cold showers are what you need. ♫Rich man sweatin' in a sauna bath Poor boy scrubbin' in a tub Me, I stay gritty up to my ears Washin' in a bucket of mud♫

Indeed! Breaking this down a bit. If you are going to get a choke in the pipe then most common is someone putting the wrong thing down the bog. Your soil vent pipe (SVP) that runs up above roof eaves level needs a hand hole, say 300 mm above ground level. This lets you rod it from top down (while standing at ground level) in the direction of the flow. The rodding eye I marked at the end of the line let's you rod any blockage to the chamber at the top right corner of your drawing, you catch nasty stuff before it make its way down the gable wall. In terms of sinks / wash basins. If you take the main drain pop up just above the floor (110 dia pipe) and then connect the smaller diameter pipes into these then any blockage is usually as a result of a blockage in the sink traps for example. You can take the smaller diameter pipe up, into a tee piece with say a 40 mm rodding eye at the top of the tee. But that needs to be inside kitchen units. What about revising your drawing and asking BC? In some ways it looks like you are over complicating things, making the design harder and over spending.

We've turned the oil off for CH. Down to 150 gallons. Only using for HW now.

I'm not sure how it goes back down for a while unless Iran announces it's surrender (or that it will not hinder ships transiting the strait). It's going to be very hard for the US can defend the 100+ ships a day moving through. Even if the Americans packed up and went home tomorrow, what is the incentive for Iran to reopen the strait? Maybe they'd get a taste for being the troll under a vital bridge and start charging a toll - after all, what will the America's be able to do? Bomb them?

There are short, and long staples, so I'd get the longer ones as they don't want to pull out so easily. Used the short ones once, never agin.

Especially if you paid nearly $120/br for oil.

I would have thought that explicit time-limited state guarantees would be possible until a the private insurance market can restablish itself Regards Tet

A rotating cowl on a chimney is said to create a significant suction. The bearings are impressive as they spin for years except in exceptionally calm conditions. I've got one on a woodburner outlet, but mainly to limit downdraughts in gusts. It keeps most rain out too. How much suction I have no idea, and there is going to be some on an open flue anyway.

How quickly things can change!

Today I had a call from a mate who was going to install an oil boiler and now wants to talk heat pumps!

Time to plan the change 😀

Scottish heating oil doubled in cost over the last week or so. Was the cheapest, now the most expensive way to heat.

Texas petrol prices rose by about 10p a liter or 20% due to the supply shock caused by the recent stupidity. A state that produces over 5m barrels a day but consumes less than 3m in total (all fossil energy Inc coal) in c country that is the world's largest exporter of oil and gas... is still not insulated from a war on the other side of the planet interrupting oil supplies. So what chance does the UK have even if it could somehow increace oil production? Do you know what hasn't changed? The cost of producing a Mwh of electricity from wind and solar.

I came to same conclusion. Good enough for nearly all cases. If the pump can't cope or is close to not coping you will be installing an additional pump anyway, so keep.it easy.

If you are at planning stage and not warrant stage, just say ASHP, solar, MVHR? But the architect should be doing this form for you as part of the design and application process This form is nothing you should be paying for, until you get to warrant and then the information comes from as designed EPC.