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.... to jolt me into reality. Now, I'm glad the wall blew down. Here's why. In case you missed it, here's the backstory. And the analysis of why it happened. But the Loss Adjuster didn't agree (despite being a very nice man) And you might know we parted company amicably enough with our builder. My remaining 8 fingers have been sizzling over the last few days. I worked right over the weekend and looked at what I saw. Hard. Little worrying hints about this that and the other, not quite obviously wrong with the build, but probably wrong with the build. Why was most of the rebar still neatly in its place in the stillage? Is that wall 'out' by more than a country mile? Why is there quite so much shuttering? Why am I noticing and mending quite so many saw cuts in the blocks (they should be perfect)? Why did the pattern of the blocks change mid-course? (Exactly the same error-smell you get when checking a bit of JavaScript or CSS) Peering down corners showed a worrying absence of rebar Why could I see all the way to the bottom of an empty column (no concrete in it yet) of blocks in some corners, but not others? A little bell rang in my mind. What would I have done had I had been similarly worried at work? Ask for a properly constituted Professional Review, that's what. Taking courage in both hands, I rang the Durisol rep, and he came out straight away. The message was not good, not good at all. So bad in fact that I had to struggle to hold back tears. Tears of rage and disappointment. Real, cold rage. So I did what I always do when that happens, did something approaching hard work, and in doing so got really sweaty. Then talked it through. The catalogue of errors are not for telling here. I'll do a full blog about that. Long and the short of it is...... We're taking the house down. I kid you not. Block by block, course by course. We've taken a good 6 feet of it down today, more to come down on Friday. The build restarts on Monday, and ought to be finished Thursday of next week. Know what? I am soooooooo relieved. There were several patches of good work, but lots of bad workmanship. Just bloody laziness and lack of care. Enough to make one suspect that much of it needs ripping out and doing again. And that feels strangely 'dirty', sort of disgusting, revolting even. A careful still and video evidence trail has been created with official written assessments of the work done to date to follow. New blocks ordered and on their way up here. If we had concreted on time, we would never have seen the errors, never seen the cockups, never seen the stuff-it-I-couldn't-careless about building to a line or a plumb line. The blown over wall did us a favour. We would have first realised something was wrong when the cracks started in the corners...... You know the kind of thing. And then where would we have been, bills paid and settling in to a few sunsets on the terrace? Thank God it blew over. So, a quiet pint is in order. Debbie, if you are reading this, we're off down the Patten Arms. Ian

Thanks folks. I'm just lucky. That's all. Lucky to have found @JSHarris, @Declan52, @Nickfromwales, @Onoff, @Stones, @PeterStarck and his Admin side kick @PeterW and many others .... @TerryE EARLY enough to read what they wrote. And be able to absorb what they wrote over a long enough time to build a slow, almost smouldering confidence. There's not a great lot that can't be sorted if you are prepared to be appropriately open about stuff, and careful to be diplomatic enough when things go pear shaped. Like when @Nickfromwales delivers yet another one-liner. God his kids must be long-suffering, patient saints.

looks alright to me, but a plumber will be along shortly to advise properly. The next electrician who wants to take that socket front off will swear at you.

heh...sadly i won't have a housekeeper so i'll keep looking for a more low maintenance solution Lizzie

It's an old mqx box bought from Amazon near 3 years ago. Banned now from there due to kodi being preloaded on it. This would be a more up to date version. Just Googled it and found this on eBay. Never bought a thing from eBay so not sure if this guy is good or bad. http://m.ebay.co.uk/itm/232383501032?_trksid=p2385738.m2548.l4275&_mwBanner=1

I rang Jon day today, to delay his visit @craig. He sounds an interesting guy..... Hmmmmm Ian

Hope everything goes well, better it happened now than find out further down the line when not a lot can be done about it.

Installed fine. The first pic is what it loads up to showing 4 places to load up camera feeds. The 2nd is the option menu.

Hat off to you Ian for taking the right decision. I can't imagine how tough that must have been to swallow. My approach was to do it myself, and then I have nobody else I can blame

I'm not fully calm yet. I had a tearful wobble (out of site), and as soon as that happens, I start to remember all the really truly dreadful things I have seen and experienced (worst Warren Point, Rotten Row - for those who are old enough to remember) and think of our lovely little grandson who has at less than 11 weeks had two lots of heart surgery and will have the next good few years in and out of Max Fax surgery. So many people would give their eye teeth to have the problems we do. I'm fuming, quietly. Oh, forgot.... Recourse to the builder? We haven't paid his latest invoice yet. And I have Debbie to thank for that. Bless her. Ian

Being the impulsive type that I am, I just went for it, no VCL! What have I learnt? The studwork needs to be dead level for Aquapanel. It's nowhere near as forgiving as mrpb. Self drill screws which I was going to use to screw through to the Geberit frame just rip it to pieces so I gave up on that idea (I think it's the wing tip on the screw). Went mad with the Sika (mad enough?). The right hand side of the Aquapanel is for some reason 3mm low.

Decent looking place, small showroom but nice examples of their work. And lots of work on show outside as guys had moved the workshop outside to enjoy the sun. I've given them some dimensions and will await a rough quote back, then arrange a site survey to discuss how to actually attach the bloody thing. I do really like this example from their showroom with the hardwood handrail, could tie in nicely with my cladding.

@Trw144 - have a look at Everedge if you want a durable lawn edging. We've used on several borders between lawn/beds/paths and it's really good stuff. Not cheap, but likely to outlast us. https://www.everedge.co.uk/

Go bespoke, as you'll find these aren't exactly off the shelf items, ( but I've been proven wrong, and usually by my pie-hating nemesis @PeterW ). Fyi, these are just simple cranked stainless tube, with a couple of tabs welded on .

Just in case you are unaware, some micro-hydro generators have a built in dump load that can take all the output and heats the flowing water.

It's been there getting on for two and a half years but is looking a bit tatty now. We have replaced one section with galvanized steel and will do the other section later in the year.

You go over the ply with 40 grit paper and a block. You then go over the whole area with a smoothing compound ( a fine self leveller ) and then it'll be like a snooker table.

Just found a photo that shows our larch cladding with the black uPVC over the EPS, for the ~150mm or so below the DPM level: