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No, uPVC needs additional insulation to beat timber. Timber just starts off with an advantage, but can be enhanced too - for example with cork inserts or with foam insulation between the timber and an aluminium external shell. However uPVC is often chosen as a cheap option and, as usual, you tend to get what you pay for.

Does anybody have a recommendation for an architect or architectural technician in the West Surrey/East Berkshire/NE Hampshire area, who’s capable of producing construction drawings for a BuildHub-quality house that’s air tight with MVHR, please? I’ve just sacked the guy who was supposed to do this for me, after more than a year of low quality work, constant excuses & missed deadlines. I think this time, I want somebody who’s close enough to me for face to face meetings & affordable site visits.

Thanks all. Just to reiterate, I'm not thinking of just growing ivy on the wall of the house. I am thinking about painting the wall of the house in a silane-based, nanoparticle paint, as per the spec in my original post, affixing metal mesh proud of the wall, and growing ivy on the mesh. I am aware if the need this will generate for me to trim the face of the ivy yearly and to cut it back at the edges. My uncertainty is over whether this paint can actually prevent the plant from attaching itself to the building as advertised. I have considered various other climbers instead but, even though some flower beautifully in summer, many die back in winter. I'd be looking at a bare wall half the year. Or, they seem to grow quite slowly.

I know my way round ls engines in great detail. Im using the donor vehicle for whole drive line, suspension, subframes, wiring, dash etc. Know nothing about vipers, nor are donors cheap!

This. It needs support wires as it climbs by twisting around itself, but it doesn't cling to brickwork. Will look bare in winter, but you get the pay-back when it flowers.

+1 for not ivy, there are plenty of less problematic alternatives. I'm still trying to remove one the previous owner planted and it's relentless.

stuck. pushed the turbo "fable" button.... here's hoping...

@craig I was talking about small joinery manufacturers. They aren't getting testing done on their system if the bulk of their work is bespoke. Decent upvc beats timber then? Even without any special glues for the units or filling in the chambers. I honestly haven't seen alu spacers on newbuilds in over a decade. I reglazed some of a 30+ yr old timber conservatory the other week and that was 4:6:4 aluminium spacer

find a doge viper lump and drop that in it get some more cubic inches

sorry did not read close enough sounds like shell and bp it will all be down to deals and volume of sites and what terminal they deliver from --and drivers hours --without knowing all details its impossible to tell certainly fuel suppliers have no problem in dumping dealers if it don,t fit with what they are planning come end of contract

it will be the deal they were offered or maybe bp would not renew there deal

This old garden wall had ivy growing in / on it. It did not do it much good!

The FCA banned dual pricing at the start of 2022 Insurers are no longer allowed to charge renewing customers any more than they would charge a new customer for the same policy. https://www.cuvva.com/how-insurance-works/dual-pricing-insurance-fca

It depends where you are sourcing your products, alu spacers are still fairly common unfortunately. Regarding timber beating uPVC, a good quality uPVC frame with 4/5 chambers will beat a timber aluminium window on performance. They will have testing done on the system or at least they will be using the tested performance of the profile from the supplier. The program they use (excel, winpro etc) will perform the relevant calculation and supply the Uw, some won't even display it and just say AA Rated for example. From recollection, the lambda (λ) are pretty similar across the relevant timbers With oak being slightly higher.

I think most units for new windows are specced with warm edge spacers nowadays aren't they? Interesting that timber normally beats upvc. How do the smaller manufacturers (particularly timber with big profile manufacturer back up) calculate their u value? From my experience they just quote the unit u value. I know the accoya performs well thermally. Are other timbers the same?

The annoying game of luring in customers who are then too lazy to move. I'm one of those customers, if the bump was 20% I may well swallow it rather than faff around finding another company but when the quotes come in 2x that motivates me to move. Feels like there is an opportunity for a company to come out and market on the basis 'we aren't the cheapest but you'll always get the our best price and we don't play games with you', but I'm not aware of anyone who does that. If Aviva is swallowing up all the competition, soon enough there won't be enough competing quotes to make moving make sense.

But how much of that £5,000,000 is land cost. Wouldn't be anywhere that in Scotland - land is way cheaper and so is labour.

That is really nice. only $750,000. Over here it would be £5,000,000

Definitely not ivy. If its a shady wall, you could look at Hydrangea Petolaris which is a climber

This guy is going to be looking at his home cameras now, just in case it is!

... and logic does not necessarily seem to apply, anyway. I moved to Churchill as the renewal premium from the last insurer was silly-high. After 2 years with Churchill the price creep was not insignificant. I looked on Compare the Market. The best balance of cover and cost (not identical cover, but v close) came from the company I'd left 2 years before because of their silly-high quote!

Interesting listen https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m003011r

@Roger440 Just did my maths for this year to date Imported £450 (4500kWh at 10p) of energy, while exporting exported £200 (1700 at 12p), so cost so far is £250. Plus since May earned £92 from Axle, so really cost is £158. Have used 7000kWh which at capped rates would have cost £1800, so far this year I am up £1650 already.

This is the way. With most vehicle service businesses still tuned for ICE vehicles, repair options for EVs are limited (and partially artificially restricted by manufacturers anyway) so lots of EVs get written off when fairly new with minimal miles. Pick a model that the DIY EV community has really dug into and you have a great starter kit for a similar price to a chunky crate motor. Having said that, this is still the preserve of very technical people with electronic/computer skills and even then the newer rules about battery safety means that packaging the battery might still require independent certification (which I saw might cost something like £5k).

Think the only cost effective way to do an EV conversion is to buy a crashed or low mileage but older EV car and use it as a donor. Kits are stupid expensive, you may as well sell the car.