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I thought it was 6 months as well and as I was I out of work at the moment was very stressed. But bigger stress was that my Dad had just been in hospital for a triple heart bypass that had ended up with complications and ended up under anaesthetic for 8 days as they stablished him and a total of 14 days in hospital. I was about a month late and wrote a letter explaining the work stress and stress from my Dads operation as the reason for the late submission. Got cheque for full about with no questions asked. Restored my faith in HMRC in that there are some humans with compassion working there.

What and miss all this?

Jesus. If we're against you AND the better half, now could be a good time to shut BH. ?

Perhaps, one day, I will tell you what I can see but for now I just do not believe it but I think they call it thinking inside the box!

Time to head off, it's beer o'clock

Essentially there are two different requirements in the Building Regulations themselves, but these aren't 100% clear in the guidance in the Approved Documents. The first requirement is that the foul drain has to be vented to atmosphere, such that there can be no build up of pressure inside it - the idea is to allow any gases to escape via a vent. The second requirement is that there has to be a means to prevent a partial vacuum forming in a soil pipe when a toilet is flushed or a basin or bath emptied. Common usage was to combine both of these requirements into a single vent pipe that does both functions, and either run it through the roof or run it up the outside of the house if the soil pipe is external. However, there's no need to do this at all, you can split the two functions and solve each individually. You can fit a vent pipe, to allow the foul drain to be at atmospheric pressure, pretty much anywhere along the pipe run. You can even fit one beyond the entry point of the soil pipe inside a hedge or flower bed, at fairly low level if you wish, or run an external vent pipe outside the house and up above eaves level. To resolve the partial vacuum problem you can fit an AAV inside the house, well above the highest outlet, in a position where it can be accessed for maintenance. This will open if there is a partial vacuum in the soil pipe and allow air to be drawn in, then close to prevent smells from escaping. An AAV cannot stop any build up of pressure in the foul drain, so if you fit one then you need an external vent as well. The advantage of fitting an AAV and an external vent is that there is less heat loss. Internal vent pipes act a bit like chimneys and constantly draw cool air up through them, so unless well-insulated they will draw heat from the house and can act as a focus for condensation. If you have an existing vent to the foul drain, then you should be fine with an AAV for the new upstairs bathroom. It needs to be well above the highest drain and accessible for occasional maintenance/replacement, so you can't build it into a wall without some form of access cover, plus it needs a reasonable air supply.

There's legislation came in in 2009 which pretty much prevents Joe Public buying second hand batteries like this. The cynic in me says it prevents you doing anything "off grid" on the cheap. No different to how "they" reduced the FiT rates when they realised the amount of cash they could lose! It's all about provable, documented waste streams & waste transfer tickets now. Saying that the "mixed" loads I see still going off site suggest otherwise unless they get sorted elsewhere! Things like batteries and waste oil, anti freeze etc are going to attract more attention than a bit of old timber and Unistrut though! I'd try a battery recycler like this: http://www.g-pbatt.co.uk/industrial.html Maybe play on your SHC connections? I think even they have to prove where a customer's waste went now in that it was properly disposed of.

Most of that area under the window will be covered by the heated towel rail which might help take the eye off things!

Yes. Nowt wrong with them. When it's grouted up you'll wonder what the fuss was about. . The cuts under the window will soon mellow too, but that's about as thin as you'll want. You cant really do anything about that as it'll screw you for the bath if you do, and that's not what I'd do.

The old chicken and egg problem - what comes first the tiles or the walls.. have you thought of switching from landscape to portrait for the tiles they may create a better layout - I dimly recall there is maths for this but I can't find it. It's something to do with the aspect ratio of the tiles matching the aspect ratio for the walls - all of which look like they are higher than they are wide.

I think he should just make some 6.973mm tile spacers (Waterjetted from 316 stainless...) and that would work fine and get rid of the cuts ....

I think a few slaps across the face may be in order. ? The fact is that nobody makes tiles to fit your bathroom. Get over it and you'll soon see that cuts are normal. On the window wall simply bring the two tiles in the centre together, then cut the mosaics out of the tiles. That'll give the illusion of continuity with the grout lines and give you bigger rips on the right hand side. You've just got too much going on in one room to be this particular, so compromise at least a little or you'll never get it tiled. Oh, and putting extra vertical strips of mosaic in instead of smaller cuts of tile will look ? I promise you. ??

It's dreaming that keeps the spring in my step tbh. I get to build wonderful things all the time...........just for someone else. ? Enjoy life, keep touch here, and come what may. As for lists, I can't even go to asda without one. If I do one of my kids doesn't eat ?

Good call. I reckon that if it doesn't fit in your lives just yet, don't try and force it in, and don't underestimate what you've achieved with a renovation job. I'm also an RAF reservist, and with that, a full time job, teenage kids and an ongoing build, I'm thinking it would have been an ideal retirement project...

Renovations are a big undertaking, so we'll done on getting there! A couple of friends have done them on really old properties and me and OH are both agreed we much prefer a new build! We've taken 2. 5 years so far but will pretty much be 3years to fully complete - its tough but we've never sacrificed a nights sleep, always in bed for 10pm! :-) enjoy the fruits of this one and I'm sure you'll take stock and always keep one eye on plots. Before we got the water tank, we had pretty much bought an old barn - it fell through and it seemed we would never find anywhere. I've probably said it before but you never know what might come up. Btw - lists are essential! I've got a wee blue book full of them, even at 34 I forget a lot! Effort to build - don't forget you can design your house to be easy to build with only a little thought. Have a good New Year and don't leave us! Jamie

Getting the feeling the LPG joke tanked....

The closest I've found to a RPi, in terms of price and performance, but including a SATA port, is the Banana Pi, or the Banana Pi M2 if you want a SATA port and WiFi/BT, like the RPi3, To all intents and purposes the Banana Pi is about the closest any of the cheaper SBCs come to emulating the RPi, and will run Raspbian, if that's your preferred flavour of OS. Still no RTC, though, but adding one via I2C is as easy as it is on a RPi, or you can just use a time server if the unit happens to have an internet connection. TBH, just having a SATA port makes the world of difference, as it means getting away from having to boot from an SD card, or via a slow USB 2.0 interface, and allows better control of the filing system. At £32 inc VAT for the Banana Pi, or £35 inc VAT for the Banana Pi M2, there isn't much of a price difference with the RPi 3 either. The main snag is that the board is physically a different size, so won't fit in cases designed for the RPi.

"Shitoff" is not a term we appreciate on this forum. "Jetwashmyarseuntilthecraphasgone" will be what we use from now on. The management.