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We've nearly finished our lovely Somerset barn conversion. The parents in law and my 99 year old mother have moved into two separate annexes. It all started 8 years ago and we've been building ever since inspite of lockdown and a nasty bout of cancer.

Sorry to hear it OP, these houses can be such a massive emotional and physical heavylift.... But the shitshow will be temporary and the satisfaction and enjoyment is a lifetime. I promise you it is all worth it in the end, but you do need to smile and endure.

3 months since it was last attended to but it’s time to change the pre filter again, it’s fan noise that alerts me more than any diary considerations. When the fan speed automatically increases in the mornings and evenings it’s generally inaudible but as time goes by it starts to become noticeable. The pre-filter is collecting so much airborne dust! It’s also letting the tiny flies through, but I can see the route they are (involuntarily?) taking so I’ll endeavour to get that sealed up before the refit. (I ran the hoover over the centre section to see how thick the dust and dirt was).

I would say wrong saw for the job. You want a chop saw for that. A table saw is normally used with a fence for cutting a length of timber down to a particular size. The complete lack of a guard over the blade does not inspire confidence.

OK reporting back: after trying out lots of options, we cut the angle with a Proxxon Thermocut 650 and a home made jig. It lacks a bit of oomph and was fairly slow, but the flipside was that it didn't burn or smell much. We made the straight-through cuts with a big-assed circ saw - not crazily messy. You can get bigger hotwire cutters than the Proxxon and specifically for insulation, but we wanted to specifically cut 200mm deep. p.s. the wire is very thin and breaks quite easily. Although it comes with 30m of wire on a little spool, you might want some extra.

Don't do as I do - do as I say, comes to mind. Not much different from a multi millionaire pop star, movie stars, telling everyone to dip their hands in the pockets to give to charity.

Mainly watertight now. Almost finished the front section and one gable

I know there have been a few of these but I thought I would add our VAT reclaim journey to the mix. We moved in on 23rd February 2026. We received our BC completion certificate yesterday (18th june) following a painless final inspection. I reviewed our spreadsheet of project VAT invoices today: By comparing it with the spend spreadsheet I'd kept to manage the budget, I found an additional £1800 of VAT I could reclaim - not sure how I missed those before. Some of the paper invoice copies I had, proved to be no such thing - rather, sales orders or pro-forma invoices. A few calls and emails managed to secure real VAT invoices. 161 invoices in total, totallying £20.9k VAT to claim Plenty of company names on invoices didn't match the official HMRC company names for specific VAT registration numbers. For instance: Screwfix is really Kingfisher and Toolstation is really Travis Perkins (with the same VAT reg no.). I am not sure how much of an issue that is but I corrected them anyway. We had maintained a spreadsheet in the HMRC template format so populating their template was a simple cut and paste. I used the online HRMC form to submit the claim, guided by Google Gemini. I know AI gets a bad rap but I really like Gemini. I guess we'll see if my trust is misplaced. Some points about the online submission. There seem to be some trick questions, e.g: When did you occupy the property? Gemini advises making sure it ties in with what the Council know because HMRC can check (really?) But in our case that means three invoices since 23rd February could be discounted. I changed the spreadsheet description for these entries to make it clear we had to do this work to pass BC. We'll see whether HMRC allow those. How many kitchens or utility rooms do you have? In our case 1 of each. Gemini advise entering 1 kitchen, 1 utility room but you can only put in a number, so I entered 1 (as in 1 kitchen or 1 utility room. The risk in entering a number >1 is that HMRC assume it's a multi-residency project and will reject. I received an email confirmation of my submission straight away, will keep you posted on progress or issues.

That's what we do. We don't know the full background or your experience. We may have forgotten what you explained earlier. I've been in the design and construction business 50 years and get people telling me things I know or am even very expert in. I don't mind. Because there are some valuable nuggets in there. And because others reading behind the scenes might gain from the info. Looking forward to following your progress and teaching you how to suck eggs.

Not a chance. I used to work as ground crew on one of the Goodyear Blimps (considered the second most dangerous job in avaiation (after test pilot), as it is the only role where you are required to run towards a turning propellor!) The Zepellins NT and Airlander are a world away from the crappy old balloons we used, but they still have most of the same problems: Helium! this is a finate resource, and desperately needed for medical and manufacturing purposes. Won't be long until we have a world shortage. Airships (even modern ones) leak like a teabag and it get worse when they get older. The lightship (BC A-60+) we had was end of life (the ballon was condemned and patched with aviation duct tape all the time I worked on it) and it leaked more than 90m3 per day of Helium per day! Speed Unlike our blimp, Rigid and Semi-rigids like Airlander can make headway in higher wind conditions, but that ballon is a huge wetted area to drag through the sky and top speeds will always be limited. Think of it more like a seagoing vessal than and aircraft. Air lander is a lift-body design with better aerodynamic controls, but even they cannot fly in the same conditions as a standard aircraft. Handling/Landing Even the latest airships struggle in high winds, and once they are staionary they are effectively just kites. Zeppelins and Airlander cannot land in higher wind speeds, or gusty conditions, despite their vectored thrust nacelles. Unliked fixed wing aircraft, loading/unloading (or just removing engines for maintenance) is an issue and needs careful ballasting. Boyancy also changes with air pressure. Putting them 'on-shed' is easier with these, due to their mast vehicles, but is required every time you do major maintenance, unlike fixed wings. (Hands down one of the scariest things I've ever done in employment was try to put our blimp into the Friedrichshafen hanger) Airspace Airports shut when airships land due to the handling issues. They have priority over all other craft except for emergency landings. They have limited ceiling height due to gas expansion (around 300 feet), limited by lift, air density, and envelope strength so airspace and landing slots will be vastly reduced. I've seen concepts for giant solar powered airships proposing emmissions free travel. You'd still need to find a replacement for the Helium to make this true - nothing wrong with Hydrogen of course. It was the airframe and fabrics that burnt on the Hindenburg, not the gas! But try and convince the public of that... You'd also need vastly more efficient flexible PV panels and lightweight batteries. It won't happen in time to help with the climate emergency.

If I'd done no research and just listened to 90% of my installers, we'd have ended up with worse outcomes in just about every area of our build. I think it makes good sense to get an understanding of anything technical before taking advice from someone whose job involves maximising profit from you.

DON'T PAY ANY MORE! Write to them explaining that the work is not satisfactory and you will be withholding all further payments. Attach the photos. Reserve the right to claim all expense to rectify.

So assuming this is without all the plasterboard etc fitted. Going better than 0.64 is chasing numbers, to say look at me. Further gains aren't worth the cost. Get a couple of tubes of air tight mastic if needed.

You're already in the top 0.1% of air tight homes, spending £2,000 (and £2,000 of TF money for use elsewhere...) to enter the 0.01% of homes is not worth it IMO. Future sellers won't care, friends and family won't care and realistically you'd never notice the difference even if you really really tried on a really windy day. The second anyone opens a door you've undone several hours of airtightness anyway. Ours is at 2.7 (no sniggering at the back...) as a hugely volumetric bungalow with several sliders everywhere... And despite wibbling about it for years, and being obsessed with trying to seal everywhere that I could.... Its fine...

Minor set-backs my friend! Seriously, I'm sure half of us have had that 'wtf did I start this for' feeling when waking in the small hours soaked in sweat and dreaming of -insert current snag here -. It's hard to keep perspective when it's your life/money/sanity, but it will be worth it when it's finished and the PTSD subsides 🙂

Thanks for the photos. So it can be done, just doesn’t look as tidy as a collar, but needs must. Brickie two is not returning. An ego the size of England, unable to understand who the client was and seemed unable to read plans regarding door openings and lintels.

We didn't have as many internal walls (open plan), and being timber frame /no radon barrier /different construction may not be helpful , but we did exactly that....popped off some of the internal walls to allow slab/insulation etc to be much easier and then rebuilt internal walls off slab (we did check it out with both our SE and timber frame supplier). Felt like a backward step at time, but was worth it for later simplicity... self build unfortunately does feel like a steps forwards can be followed by steps back

He said yes.

That's the structure completed now. All that remains is to cut the excess off the top of the supporting posts, and choose then order the roof sheeting.

A table saw is for sheet material, or trimming down timbers lengthways, not for cross cutting etc. You'll just hurt yourself or the saw. You'll be able to do mitres etc with a chop (mitre) saw too.

The top layer does a few things a very important one is stopping runny concrete getting under the sheets and floating it up, which would be a bloody nightmare. for £20 install it.

Can you move another 400mm away from your neighbour?! That would simplify things greatly.

Hmm, no. The logic defies me here. There is no possible means of producing a proper objective measure in comparison. Instead I'd hope that Rasmus et al would be making more sensible decisions around the necessity and means of travel and thus reducing it as far as possible, not trying to justify it on the basis of 'I do more for the environment so it's okay for me' which just gets us into more trouble and bickering. To affect change in behaviour there needs to be systemic change, because the system absolutely rewards air travel financially as a start right now - just think of the cost of a short flight from the SE to Scotland for example versus the equivalent cost of taking the train. The economics right right are shear insanity. But there are also other systemic factors that blind people to the environmental cost of activities and decision - so this becomes a societal aspect, but then there is of course the individual responsibility about taking a stand and making a statement, which in itself may affect the societal and systemic. But who is actually making this kind of stand in such a way as to shift the curve? Our politicians aren't, nor are other leaders, nor are celebrities really doing this to a great extent... but there are lots of more quiet people just getting on and doing it - maybe they're the ones that will eventually provide the gravity necessary to shift things from the bottom up? Who knows, but the winds are blowing in a direction that rather depresses me right now - it feels like taking a positive environmental stand is the higher risk path, both personally and professionally versus embracing and continuing with the status quo.

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others. Let them cut their 'carbon footprint' first and then us plebs can follow.

Here is a bit of a good news story. There are two common ways of fire protecting steels. We can box it in with steel angles and say Fire Line plaster board or we can paint with intumescent paint. But BC often ask up front for a specification on the paint system. I wrote this morning to Rawlins Paints the following: Dear technical Department. I'm seeking assistance with a paint specification for steelwork fire protection and certificate / data sheets for a building warrant submission. Attached is a drawing showing the proposed steelwork. The project is a single story domestic house extension with a pitched concrete tiled roof in Scotland. The requirements are: 1/ Level of fire protection required 30minutes ( short duration). 2/ Section sizes are 178 x 102 UB19 S275 or S355 and 152 x 89 UB16 S275. 3/ The load ratio for the 178 x 102UB 19's is 35% and the load ratio for the 152 x 89 U16 is 50% 4/ Exposure to fire: Three sides are exposed; bottom flange and sides. The top flange has a 145 x 45 timber wall plate shot fired to it to support timber rafters. 5/ The beams are orientated in the vertical plane (top flanges upper most), loaded vertically downwards about their major axis. 6/ Quantities:The steelwork lengths are shown on the drawing. 7/ Steel design code is BS5950 part 1: 2000 8/ Exposure to weather: All steelwork is within the weatherproof envelope of the building. Thus dry conditions. No chemical exposure is required. 9/ Application of paint is to be on site, ideally brush applied. This can be done before fixing of the wall plates. By the close of business today I had a paint specification and an undertaking to supply the certification certificate provided we use their product of course. That is a fantastic service! Now for folk on BH. I'm putting these steels in awkward places, thus to box them in is going to be very labour intensive and that is very costly. On a technical note in item 3. I refer to what is called the load ratio. The steel sizes on this project are sized on how much they deflect in service. That stops cracking in ceilings for example. But in a fire we just want to make sure they don't fall down. The load ratio is the load on the steels in a fire compared with the steel beam ultimate strength / buckling strength. Long steel beam design is often governed by buckling, it twists and distorts first. That is why we tie floors into the steel beams for example to prevent the twisting in normal use. But during a fire that contribution can get lost as the floor / roof can burn away to the extent that it stops restraining the beams. Thus the load ratio is based on the strength of the beam when say part of the restraining floor or roof burns away in less than the required fire protection time. But even so using a paint system can be very cost effective. If a beam is not fully loaded up to it maximum capacity during a fire then the intumescent paint system can be of real economic advantage. To explain roughly. If a steel beam is loaded up to it's maximum capacity then it will fail at a lower temperature. A beam can still carry a bit of load at a higher temperature and that is where the load ratio comes in. The paint acts like an insulating blanket that slows the rate the steel heats up.. and that gives us the fire duration requirement we see in the building regs. The above it intended to give you a bit of a template if asking about intumescent paints.

Hiya. To provide a bit of context, much of my initial SE training and Masters research was on portal frames. I know enough to make a contribution on this type of design. Here is my offer. You can call me on the phone on (mobile number removed, PM for contact details) for a 15 -30 min chat. It's free for BH folks! This forms part of my pro bono work that is good for my soul, my primary qualification is in Civil Engineering, you work for the public. Text me first so I know it's you. I'm pretty deaf so sometimes miss calls. I use my own name and can be easily found on the internet.. I get some interesting calls and offers, these range from "massages" to lots of "financial" offers and other "stuff" that actually breaks up my day, hence me filtering calls. The section sizes you quote might be dependent on your eaves height, wind loading and the types of finishes. That the best I can do for now.

Yeah, that's not great. It should be fully insulated and the insulation should go all the way through the wall. Just resting like that isn't good either. I would personally probably have 2 clips - one just after the bend as it exits the wall and the second before it enters the down pipe. Also, wtf were they thinking with the black? Just looks crap. Not very good standard at all and enough to question the rest of the installation, frankly. Get them back to sort it out as it doesn't comply with the regs or with the manufacturer's instructions on condensate drainage for a start. They should know better.

Yes, we moved into our new house on Monday last week, pretty much 9 months to the day since we broke ground and 15 months after we purchased the plot. We know we’ve been very lucky with our build. The weather has generally been in our favour and we had no supply issues or delays. Above all, we’ve had some excellent people working for us without whom we could not have achieved the build. There are too many stars to mention here but if you look through the blog you will see them all get a shout out for their excellent work as it happened. Ahead of the move, Mrs P. did a superhuman job getting everything packed, and the move itself went relatively smoothly, with dry weather and no mishaps. Amazingly, Mrs P. also managed to unpack most of those boxes within a few days, though we do still have some residual boxes to deal with in due course. Moving in day: As we all know, moving house is always a stressful business and moving to a new house is no different. But it is a relief to finally get in - there is always the nagging fear that some disaster will strike at the last minute while the house remains unoccupied. But of course, all was fine. Is our build complete? Not quite. We have some minor electrical and joinery items outstanding, both inside and outside; we have the garden landscaping well under way but some distance from completion as you will see from the photos below. Beyond that, there is a list of jobs of the sort you’ll have following any house move: curtains, blinds, wardrobes, shelving, etc. - but these are ‘house move’ rather than ‘house build’ tasks imo. We do still have to obtain Building Control sign-off and there’s a VAT reclaim to do. On the BC front we had our ‘As Built’ air-tightness test performed by Richard Harris of Peninsular Energy Compliance this week (highly recommended). The result is 1.16m m3/m2 at 50hPa on the envelope basis. Virtually the same figure for Air Changes per Hour , as our envelope area is 583m2 and our volume is coincidentally 580m3. We are very happy with 1.2 ACH. Air-tightness test under way: We have been in the house for a week now and we are really happy with the way it feels and works for us. It’s warm, draft-free, well-lit, quiet, and comfortable; the layout and spaces are working just as we hoped. We are both sure we are going to really love living here. The plant room is (to me) surprisingly warm, running at 25-26 deg C due presumably to the amount of heat-generating equipment in there. I raised this as a separate Build Hub topic but the consensus seems to be that it's not an issue, so I shan't worry. As a side benefit, it does make a splendid clothes airing room. https://forum.buildhub.org.uk/topic/46744-hot-plant-room/ Energy use The combination of solar panels, batteries, ASHP and insulation levels seems to be working well - in our first week we used 0.7kWh from the grid and exported 63kWh. Not bad for February. I need to work out our best tariff option but that’s a job for the future. Enough talk, time for some more photos (some taken just before we moved in)... Kitchen/dining/lounge: Hall: Bathrooms - master ensuite: Shower room: Guest ensuite: Bedrooms Master bedroom: Guest bedroom: Bed 3 / hobby room (Ok, so we still have some unpacking to do.) Landscaping - plenty to do yet. The layout is literally as clear as mud to me... I'm sure it will all be fine in the end(!) And finally... Troy likes the new house - it still has yogurt pots that need licking out Dashboard: Contractor days on site this past two weeks: 15 Contractor days on site since build start: 587 person days That 587 days is well over the 500 days which requires HSE being notified of the build using form F10 (which we did). HSE have not spoken to us or troubled us at all and the F10 notification is simple and costs nothing, so I would recommend any self-builder do so - if you are unfortunate and have an incident it’s surely means less chance of getting into hot water if you registered properly. Budget: I confess that in the final weeks we have gone a bit beyond our self-imposed budget contingency and dipped slightly into savings, but that is really down to choices we have made about the quality of the fit, e.g joinery, kitchen, bathroom equipment etc., and also the extent of the landscaping we have chosen to do. We could probably have remained well within contingency had we needed to but luckily we had some leeway. Plan: We did it! Conclusion: Overall, we set out to use the entire proceeds of our previous house sale to buy a plot and build a better house, and we believe we have achieved that. Thanks once again to all the dedicated and skilled people who have worked on our house and made the build a success. Especial thanks to Mrs P. who indulged my yearning to do a build provided brilliant design input and kept the whole show on the road throughout - a truly wonderful person! That then dear friends is the final blog! Thank you for following us and for your kind words of encouragement and support through our project.

Local Authorities have no idea what things should cost, so selling them a £300 wind turbine made for a boat, a fifty quid PV panel, a small battery system for say £500 and a person to put it all together, should probably be about £1000. Councils will probably pay 5 to 6 times that amount. Then, where there is a meeting to fit renewables to council buildings, someone in accounts, will drag out the £5000/kW number and say 'it is too expensive'.

Our last house had a fully insurance approved and maintained alarm. Out of interest, at one renewal time for insurance, I asked to quote with and without alarm and got the same cost. All these things were true if I declared the alarm. Kept the alarm, didn't declare it any more.

Just download ChatGPT and take all the effort out of it.

As above. As soon as outdoor temp exceeds desired indoor temp we shut all doors/windows and turn the MVHR down to its minimum setting. When the outdoor temp drops below indoor temp of an evening, we open all doors/windows and turn the MVHR up to max. Currently 33.7 degrees outside and 22.5 degrees inside. No active cooling but we do have external blinds which are game changers I reckon.

Just to report, our underfloor cooling is working nicely: 31 deg C outside, 23 deg C in the house - even with the lift and slide doors open. Beautiful day here in Dorset!

I have followed this exact advice. Job's a good 'un.

Anyone thinking this will happen in a few weeks appears likely to be disappointed. The latest NICEIC trade rag just came through and had this to say. It also doesn’t mention the problem of uni or bi directional switchgear. Anyone who has had an RCBO consumer unit fitted in the last decade is very very likely to have it full of uni directional devices. These are not permitted to be used where current potentially flows in both directions. Bi directional rcbos have only been readily available for a couple of years, if that. They are still not standard fit for most people. Usually only fitted to solar pv or EV charging. Europe has very different switchgear to us.

I’m totally agnostic but I think there is something in the bible about ‘thoughts becoming flesh’ and the dangers thereof. I’ve seen this concept given a positive spin by motivational gurus and I think there’s something to the idea that by thinking about something enough we can cause things to start to happen. You are just much more likely to make the appropriate choices that will lead you along the required path if your head is already in that space. The next step which creates a very scary momentum all of its own is actually voicing these thoughts and ideas to other people - very quickly these then go from ‘I am thinking of’ or ‘I might’ to ‘I am going to’. Suddenly there are no excuses or reasons to delay. It’s happening. This is the jump I have taken since my previous blog posts (which have in themselves also been an act of ‘starting the conversation’). People I have been speaking to re the house build: Gus Potter - structural engineer/designer/former builder Gus and I had a two hour phone conversation that was incredibly useful and informative. It’s hard when all the ideas live in your own head and it’s easy for the fear and doubt to kick in, but hearing Gus agree with many of the choices I plan on making was a phenomenal endorsement and morale boost. He also raised a lot of points which I hadn’t considered which have been extremely useful in mapping out this project in my head and hopefully avoiding pitfalls along the way. As a result of the call I felt a lot clearer as to the next steps I need to take. Estate agents all over the borders I’ve seen a plot that I would like to make serious moves on, but it seemed wise first to physically call in to all the agents I could find in the Borders to ask them if they are aware of any plots in the planning pipeline or such that will come to the market soonish. Planning is a lengthy process after all and so it was possible there might be plots out there that agents know about but which can’t be seen yet by Joe Public. There weren’t, but at least I know that now. The other thing to do would be to scour the planning notices, but I haven’t done that yet. The owner of the plot I got frustrated at not hearing back from the selling agents regarding the plot I was interested in so I contacted the owner directly via an email address I found on the planning portal notices. Initially I got crickets there too and both myself and the agents started to worry that he might be incapacitated somehow but it turned out he was just abroad and not very good at checking emails. On his return he replied to both myself and the agents and was kind enough to agree to meet me for coffee and a chat. I really enjoyed meeting him - he is a bit of a kindred spirit I think and it seemed as though the discussion went well. I recently sold a property to a guy who was an absolute dick in negotiations and the contrast with Mr Plot Owner couldn’t have been greater. He was emotionally mature, open, honest and straightforward and our conversation was friendly, civil and respectful. I wanted to explain to him in person why I think it is that his plot hasn’t sold in several years on the market and why the offer I would be making him was considerably lower than the asking price. By doing so I hope that he won’t automatically reject it and feel angry/pissed off/upset/disrespected by it. He is a really nice guy and I got the feeling that he would like to sell it to someone who loves the plot as much as he does and also has strong local connections. Whilst I tick those boxes I think it’s fair to say that he was disappointed in my offer. I’m sure he would like to get more for the plot, but unfortunately I can’t offer him any more. It seemed worth a punt to ask the question - I’d be gutted if I saw the plot reduced to what I would have paid at some point in the future when I had already committed to a compromise plot I don’t like as much. He was generous enough to not reject it right away but instead to say that he would think about it and talk it over with his partner before getting back to me sometime next week. I can ask no more than that. Other things I’ve been doing to prep Watching YouTube videos of Robin Clevett and others who stick-build. Selling my possessions on eBay to raise funds. Optimising the return on my savings. Working on the renovation of my flat which will need to be sold to fund the build. Working on a rough house plan layout to prepare for the PPP application. Learning about products and materials. Financial planning based on my convo with Gus - vaguely Gantt structure. Quietly crapping myself.

If you're looking to hook up panels to the inverters second MPPT dont use micro inverters as they push out AC whereas your inverter is needing a DC input. Optimisers is what you want if you're connecting to the MPPT input. I don't know how much Tigo optimisers are but I beleive you can use solaredge optimisers with any inverter if you turn off the safe shutdown function with a Solaredge optimiser Key. You can pick up SE optimisers off eBay very cheaply if youre prepared to wait. Last time I looked the Key is about £80

I meant to type 3000 - 10000ft ceiling height. Our blimp was limited to 3000ft. And less than 1300 feet after it was condemned. Being shot full of holes did not help either... (Watching the duct tape pop of the holes as we flew over the Alps was a sight I'll never forget)

Are you aware that you can look at resources like the British Gypsum 'white book' to see a variety of stud wall constructions and their expected sound performance, thickness etc... https://www.british-gypsum.com/specification/white-book-specification-selector/white-book-overview For our extension/refurb we have used Habito on some timber stud walls with 100mm acoustic rockwool infill - and don't forget to soundproof apertures like electrical sockets with acoustic putty pads. You might want to vary choice of construction somewhat depending on the requirements for the rooms in question and other factors. For example we have a wall with a pocket door where we wanted the wall to have decent sound resistance at the pocket and so have it double boarded with Habito then skimmed. Walls for a TV/music room potentially different requirement from other rooms etc. Consider dealing with noise sources at source - e.g. insulated soil pipe or acoustic wraps. For timber stud make sure to get good straight timber. Very best acoustic performance is normally from constructions where the two sides of the wall structure are isolated from each other - staggered stud construction, resilient bar etc. We wanted to also maximise room size on an existing footprint which took us away from staggered stud. We had a small area needing thermal insulation at minimal thickness and used an aerogel MgO board from Proctor - aerogel with a few mm MgO. It does tend to crack if you drill into it.

Went through the same thing with my own build and here's what I gathered after countless hours of research and AI aid as well. Ajax - is the Apple like new entrant into the market, and has the most stylish keypads, sensors etc. But they don't sell direct and are the priciest - got some quotes and it was easily 2-3x other competitors so I dropped this idea. Texecom - this is the industry standard for a graded system (I think you need Grade 2 for home security). Kit is pretty well known and standardised through the app and keypads are a little dated - works but nothing to look at is the consensus. Apparently there is no charge to use their app if you have the WiFi/Ethernet module. Orisec - relatively new entrant in the market and seems to have been setup by ex Texecom people. App is slightly newer and seems to get more updates. £45 charge to use the app on a yearly basis. Pricing is virtually the same as Texecom - based on the installer so you take your pick based on what you like. Pyronix - seems to be lowest rated of the lot (at least if you look online). This is the one we have in our current house (a wireless one). It works but the app is quite shit and frequently logs me out so I miss the notifications(!) when an alarm is triggered. Also currently £45 for annual access to the app. The other choice you have to make is a wired or wireless system. Wired does add a chunk of cost upfront (wiring and labour cost to do the wiring), but you don't have to change batteries every year which means high Capex low Opex. The advantage with most of the systems is that you can start with a baseline wired system for your key doors/windows and then expand gradually by adding wireless sensors in the future (like if you're adding front gates, rear outbuilding etc). FWIW - I've chosen to go with a wired Orisec system with option to add wireless sensors in the future. It was a toss up between the Orisec and Texecom and I'd be happy with either - went with the installer recommendation.

British Gas are just shite on toast, and their forte is ripping off pensioners. Be lucky if she got a Worcester, more likely they've gone bottom shelf and fitted a glow-worm. The above is exactly what I would have drawn if someone asked me to sketch a typical BG condensate arrangement. Just shocking. I went to one pensioner that had become another victim, and as they hadn’t brought a ladder, above 2m around the side of the house, the copper gas pipe just wasn’t clipped, literally flapping in the wind. They put a combi in and left the old boy with a manual mixer shower, so he was getting scalding hot water from it; you can’t leave anyone infirm with a non-thermostatic shower fed from and instantaneous hot water heater. List of this goes on and on, from what I’ve seen over the years from BG. Great adverts, even better sales-people, then the most dogshit plumbing you’ve ever seen.

UPDATE: ITS ALIVE😅😁 I purchased a different USB drive, because when I read some of the reviews on the first one they made me think it was possibly the USB drive, as I looked under a microscope at all the capacitors etc. and tested them and none looked blown etc. anyway. Great result - the newer USB drive works like a dream, all files are there, I have a replacement motherboard coming so hoping that I can just plug in the SSD and it will boots as a PC.🤞 but for now the files are safe, and I have ensured that Google Drive is backing them up....

ChatGPT was only there to clarify the hundred questions I had for the builder. We deliberately chose the no carpets and LVT throughout. As much as I like hardwood/oak floors, the constant upkeep with 2 young kids and a busy lifestyle meant that resanding/oiling etc every few years would be too much. Have gone with something that should be bomb proof (fingers crossed!) for a few years and when we get tired of it, we can always change it to something else.

That looks like dogshit. Flashing should be up behind the wood cladding, so that needed cutting back, lifting away, and the lead offered up behind it. Woodwork and ridge tile etc is abysmal. Shocking how anyone can say they can do a job like this for someone, when they clearly have zero clue what to do or how to do. 2/10 at best, more like a 1/10 though.

Uncomplicated, small buildings should be dropped in one continuous sitting. Start on a Monday not a Thursday, and avoid the weekend so nothing is left unsafe. Have a plan and 1 person in charge, not a family day of chipping bricks, to reduce the risk of anyone unaccounted being somewhere they shouldn’t be, when things fall unexpectedly. Obvs absolutely ZERO children or pets on site, and fence off access whilst the works go on.

For completeness, I have always managed risk pragmatically, wherever a client has expressed any such concerns. For one current project I spec’d all the ‘wet plant’ to be housed within a newly created GF plant area, and in that footprint I specified a recessed area in the concrete of 30mm. In the middle of the recess, back to back with the utility wall, sink and washing machine, I installed a trapped gulley with a back inlet for 50mm waste to feed in. Note: the white self-adhesive stuff is Radon rated peel & stick barrier, as there was a very high Radon risk here. PITA to do but very necessary. Here is where the washing machine up-stand will eventually connect via 50mm waste. Then I shuttered it with EPS / tape / foam (mummified it) before the pour. The idea being that this can be easily moved / removed after the pour if needs be (for fine tuning height of gulley etc / wiggle room). The finished article, post pour. Note the sand shuttering around the UFH pipes, cheap and simple / effective; just hoover it out after the pour, final fix the manifold / pipes in their forever positions, and backfill with cementitious SLC LINK This was an MBC raft, so they pour the SCC concrete and then return the following morning to cut / scabble the recesses out very accurately, so in that area we now have a 30mm L-shaped recess as a bund for management of any leaks. The plan is to use moisture resistant cement board for all of the wet plant room walls and ceilings, caulking joints etc with intumescent acrylic sealant to attain A1 fire rating too. These bottom of the cement boards will go down past the DPC under the stud walls to meet the concrete in the recess (eg TOC -27mm) where I’ll use 3mm packers to hold the boards just above the rough concrete to create a void for the SLC; this is to ensure the SLC will completely envelop the boards to arrest any future movement / feck any waterproofing up. The boards will effectively be ‘submerged’ in the (~5mm layer of) SLC, and the SLC will naturally run back under them to fully close the purpose made gap. Belt and 500 braces for £2 worth of packers. This will also detail airtightness at the external wall, where the tapes are meant to meet the slab at TOC; plenty of CT1 behind the cement boards at DPC level +/- 15-20mm. Then I will self-level the whole recess, banking it up at the far ends of the room by just 1 or 2mm max, to create a smooth graded surface which arrives at the gulley pot from all corners; The walls will all get smothered with liquid tanking solution, and left to cure fully for a couple of days. No need for steep falls like a shower tray, as gravity and a 25/30mm bund means water can only go into the gulley. Aim is for a burst pipe or failed EV etc to be nothing this room cannot handle. It’ll all get painted with heavy duty 2-part garage floor paint, white on the walls and grey on the floor to make my OCD happy, and lots of it, to create a fully maintainable and presentable, watertight finish. The trap in the 100mm gulley will need to be maintained (kept ‘wet’) to prevent stench; in this instance this will be topped up routinely by the washing machine output. Note: the utility sink will NOT discharge into that 50mm up-stand and into the same gulley, but instead into the adjacent foul pipe rising to the FF, which will also collect the kitchen sink from the adjacent room. This means zero food solids or other stinky stuff will ever sit in the gulley in the plant room floor and create a stink; the only thing the plant room will ever give off a whiff of will be laundry / washing powder. The fact that folk use their WM’s every day, or every few days minimum, means the trap will be wet year-round. If the topology doesn’t lend itself, then you can run the water softener regen discharge into it instead; as a source of daily, clean water. I prefer to not rely on a self-sealing trap in the slab, as I will always want the full flow potential of an uninterrupted 110mm arrangement, vs water squeezing through these socks. Such units are available from decent manufacturers if a retrofit is your only option LINK. Avoid cheap / unbranded units as they’ll let you down eventually.

Hmm. Is this not an (expensive) solution looking for a problem?

Could you explain please? Do you want comparisons of materials, or decibel reduction numbers or something else. The simple answer is "very".

You beat me to it. I'm closer to 15W/m2 output at -9. Sounds like cosy feet and melted body to me at 40W/m2. The 75mm spacing make my 300mm strange, I still only flow 28 degs max.

They are brittle and have far less tolerance to snapping, vs regular wood screws. If he put plenty in then I think you'd be Ok, but if few and far between, then it could be a problem. Are these still exposed? If so, just pump a woodscrew in next to each one.