All Activity

A few years ago the Tories hollowed out trading standards and bunged Citizen's Advice a few quid to handle most of it for them. The people at CA are volunteers who do a lot of good work but they can't go to bat in the way that TS used to. The net result is a massive weakening of consumer protection in this country. Add to that the fact that most online platforms are based in the US and it's a complete free-for-all. I recently tried to report a listing on eBay for being fraud and an AI bot decided it was all fine and let the listing stay up. Nobody cares. FB and YouTube are happy for these ads to be on their platform as they are banking the cash. Meanwhile your granny falls for a scam like this one.

Having just discovered a leaking flexi pipe on a toilet cistern, what is the general consensus on best practice here? Replace and set a 10 year reminder or fit something like https://www.screwfix.com/p/hep2o-plastic-push-fit-angled-tap-connector-15mm-x-1-2-/3036f to the cistern and go straight into plastic pipe, even if that involves a couple of elbows? This is all inside a vanity cabinet so not something that can regularly be inspected, it needs silicone cutting back from the toilet to even see.

It is from Facebook. Nothing can be done. BTW this machine seems to be about 350 x 100 x 75 and is fixed on a wall. Poor old Martin Lewis gets mentioned again as backing it, and I guess even he can't stop it.

We are concerned for you, perhaps unnecessarily. It's what you don't say. Can the lorry get close? Can its chute reach nearly all the way so that you don't have to move it? what quantity is it? Is the mesh already in and has the bco approved it? Are you both physically strong in handling the chute and moving it (it's very heavy esp with concrete in it. You'll be doing this while walking in wet concrete on a layer of steel mesh. NB the driver does not help! He turns the delivery on and off when you shout. Later he washes out. You've probably got 30 minutes from arrival to completion or they charge a lot. you are going to get messy. wellies, waterproofs, gloves. After the concrete is in and the lorry gone, have you asked how long it is workable? You have not got the time or luxury of using the laser. there wont be any break time or rest for these 2 hours. have you a contingency if one of you has a problem? Can you find a third person? what is containing the slab? masonry or a shutter? mark the finished level on there in advance plus some pegs in the middle. Have you worked out the quantity exactly? what is it? how much have you rounded it up? the leftover is all going on your ground. 1/2m2 is a lot esp when it spreads or makes a solid lump. and so on. expertise. I have supervised maybe 300 pours from 4m3 to hundreds. I seldom handled the shovel. But I've seen it go wrong often. I've especially seen it go badly wrong on other peoples projects, esp by amateurs and poor builders, and it is a shame, a waste of money and can have knock-on effects. to reiterate : It's what you don't say. If you knew you wouldn't be asking, and you haven't asked the right questions.

Just get them to hover over your tray and crap the contents out. It is a bit messy but it will be fine. Water dries up, concrete sets and can be broken up.

Ok, thanks. What about washout water from mixers and concrete readymix trucks?

Not as far as I know. Want to do better you start needing to get into things like stirling engines.

It is self compacting, not self levelling. No need to tamp but you need to place it to the correct level. Do you have a boom type pump lorry?

For concrete I use a sheet of 18mm OSB and some 4 x 2 to form a tray, lined with polythene. Let the concrete go off, then break it up and use it as hardcore.

To date, the bricklayers and myself included have simply washed mixers out and discarded the washout water onto the ground. I am curious as to what others do as most of the options available for capturing washout are for large sites where they can have dedicated washout bins and recycle the water. For a domestic self build, that approach is not obviously not viable. We don't have any water courses / drains in the vicinity and water table is 60ft below.

My main motivation for using SCC was merely due to the following. 1) Short of labour. It's just my wife and I 2) Due to the bricklayer rushing ahead and not being very accurate, we don't have the ability to tamp, plus tamping is hard going when only two of you. Why do you say SCC needs to be handled by experts. I'm very curious as the video below suggests otherwise. I appreciate that it's a marketing video, but I wouldn't say there's anything expert going on here.

In the short term that this might be referring to there will not be more heat energy moving about the planet. So surely more heat in northern Europe means less heat somewhere else.

Listen to @Nickfromwales. Believe me, you will save money. My Brink 400 was a little less than £2k on his advice. Which reminds me, and on the subject of thanks @NickfromwalesIf i forgot previously a huge thankyou for the tip.

At the time I wondered if it be simpler / cheaper / more reliable to use a TEG (Seebeck device) instead. Power output would be extreemly low, but with no moving parts, maintenance costs would also be low with an almost unlimited lifecycle. At the time, TEG were very inneficient (I remember 3% for one back in the 90's using a depleted uranium heatsource). Have they improved since?

Yes, lost freeholder. Neighbour now has her Freehold. As it happens i checked with the Land registry yesterday. I am meeting ' cheaper guy' again on Thursday but the fact Neighbour has achieved hers is what i was hesitant about. All systems go. Just got to find the not inconsiderable fee to the State now. You just knew they were going to want a pile of money. Cant understand why, they never owned the land.

Think about your dry verge system as well. The problem we had with a large kick up at bottom of roof was with the dry verge system on the gable end, that we had planned to use on our slate roof. We had planned to use a continuous dry verge, an aluminium pressed strip in 3M lengths , but it just would not fit because of the kick. Needed a straight edge.

I remember this was a big thing in the mid 90's (when all the real interest / progress in renewables kicked off). But then? Nothing! Open cycle OTEC was the really interesting version since you didn't need working fluids such as ammonia; they claimed fluid based was closed loop, but there is no such thing in reality, so there would have been some leakage into the environment. As a plus, open cycle OTEC produces desalinated water as a by-product, and in the next few decade that will probably become as valuable as oil. You'd think the Saudis would jump on it.

Trading standards?

We fitted Kidde wireless alarms and because of the vaulted ceiling on the landing we wall mounted the alarm. It was nine years ago now but there were no problems with sign off.

I think you need to put some tiles on there to see how they lay.

Magic air cooling. Squeeze all the tech terms you can think of to impress the gullible and charge a low price. A magic box that you screw to the wall, plug in, and don't have to vent. This is a small extract as the guff goes on and bonus. But I've spared you it. I've deleted the trade name to reduce its visibility. Facebook don't care.... About anything other than thing: money. And world domination. 2 things. The xxxxx Mini Portable Air Conditioner utilises an advanced hydro-thermal absorption technology. This compact device draws in the suffocating, muggy indoor air and channels it through an internally sealed cryogenic cooling chamber. There, a specialized nano-honeycomb matrix strips the thermal energy from the air molecules, instantly converting the oppressive heat into a refreshing, crisp, and ice-cold breeze

They are guidance - MI are what you have to follow if any different from the guidance. It's the same for all equipment you add to the house - manufacturers instructions trump building regs. Fire detection - it's there to save you and your families life, follow the manufacturers rules - so they work as expected. Cut a small slot in the plasterboard to get a wire where you need it. You will be plastering anyway, not seeing the issue. Could have fixed quicker than posting on here. Your electrician should know all the rules and ways to get cables from A to B as needed.

Equally, my question was whether anyone had achieved BR sign off 🤷‍♂️ I’ve been finding a difference between guidance rules and MIs - many MIs saying only ceiling (including on AICO’s site! 🤦🏻‍♂️). It’s the lack of consistency that’s frustrating, hence asking about actual lived experience (I’ve done a lot of manufacturer searching). @Nickfromwales have you had any signed off with wall mounted detectors?

Yes - we’re in England

Your name always throws me, Scottish BR do allow sealed battery powered. English mains only