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Ebico Night Owl; I have known about Ebico Zero for a bit and for those who dont use alot of gas have a nil standing charge, great for those who still want to cook on gas but nothing else. Now they have introduced the "Night Owl" tariff for economy 7 users for 0pkWh - yes its free! Well nothing's for free - there is a standing charge, its fixed for 12 months pay by DD, you need a Smart Meter operating in credit mode, or an Economy 7 Credit Meter. And there is a fair use being 60% of your bill in off-peak hours. All that said you could get all your heating and hot water for free, especially if you were time shifting a heat pump and storing the heat generated for use on demand during on-peak times, but remember the size of the storage you will need is twice the size of something working with E10 Ok, so I can hear the cogs going round, so please go and check out if it might be something for you? https://ebico.org.uk/energy-plans/ebico-night-owl/ Now I am not sure about those of us who have E10 meters so I may have to do a bit of research. Octopus Tracker; For those of you who might be into Demand Side Management of their energy then the next offering is VERY interesting! Claimed as Britain's first tariff to truly follow the wholesale price of energy! Every day, they update the price of your energy based on an independently published wholesale market price, so just like shares the price can go up as well as down. However this means they could pay you to take energy! So with an email IFTTT app to link to your Sonoff WiFi switch link you might be able to automatically take advantage, and charge your electric car, store energy for your heating and hot water and use these on demand at other times. Please go to http://octopus.energy/tracker?r=mhIlS to check out if this might be able to help you save money on your energy bills You can also register your interest at the same point. Kind regards AndyT

Many thanks for the welcome all. I am currently camped out in the General Plumbing forum (an arbitrary decision!)....on page 4 now! Fascinating....I understand so much more now, Hep20...manifolds...hot return circuits....all sparking ideas/thoughts in the old grey matter!

I visited yesterday and was very impressed. It's only 20 minutes from me. A really good display and friendly and helpful staff. Free coffee and cakes, baked on the premises - I suspect locals may use it as a free coffee shop except that you have to sign in and out so it would become too obvious. They also do free pick up and drop off from local train stations for anyone further away. I brought away sample doors in 2 colours, making it easier to decide without being overwhelmed by different doors and to be able to see how they look in different light. A deposit is paid which is refunded on return whether or not you buy from them. One of their strengths can also make doing your own design more challenging as there are so many variations particularly in widths and interiors (they have 3 variations for access to corner cupboards). They do have an online design tool but it is hard to find - can't find how to access it from their main site and it is still in beta. It keeps prompting to save but I can't find how to register to be able to do this. I also saw some variations in the showroom that I can't find on their planning site. I have a couple more quotes to get from local places but this is currently favourite.

First time self build for me, wish I had found this site sooner! I apologise if any of this has been answered already in depth, I’ve had a read about but still a few questions remain. I have read the posts on UFH here and just wanted to clarify what I’m doing sounds sensible. And looking ahead for the next 2 months I need to finalise the heating system design with the plumber. House is part old, solid walls, single glazed sash windows, this totals circa 75 m2 split evenly between GF and FF. the extension is a further 65 m2, this is cavity walled with 75mm PIR insulation. The extension is all single storey. Floor or is the old house is 1. breathable membrane 2. 150mm geocell glass aggregate 3. 100mm limecrete screed with UFH pipes in screed attached to plastic mesh. Floor of new is 1. Compacted stone 2. Concrete oversight 3. DPM 4. 125mm PIR 5.. 100mm screed concrete with pipes in screed What I am unsure about is manifold position. I understand a central manifold is desirable but I’m really going to struggle to find a place to put it. I had planned for the manifold to be in the laundry, along with the TS, being fed from an outside boiler. However this is definitely off centre. I have attached a quick sketch of the place - distance from laundry to edge of zone 3 is 9m, going along the outside walls. I am concerned have a return from this will lead to a cold spot in the floor, and am unsure whether this is too longer run from the manifold. Zone 1 is old house, sitting room, zone 2 is kitchen / diner, zone 3 downstairs loo and bedroom/ensuite bathroom. Secondly, the design of the heating system itself. DHW requirements will be 2 showers back to back in morning, then a bath / shower sometimes at the same time sometimes staggered in the evening. Then what I presume is typical usage for washing up etc. What I’m unsure about from reading the posts here is 1. How does one judge whether an accumulator is necessary? Mains feed is fairly feeble but I haven’t measured it - is there a threshold requirement? 2. I was planning an external [ oil ] boiler, family always had Grants so would look for the same, thermal store to feed Rads on upstairs of old house, UFH through out ground of old and new, and then DHW. How does one spec a thermal store? By this I mean size, size of coil, immersion heater requirements? 3. I plan to install solar next year on the outbuildings, 10kw, and would like some guidance if possible on how to future proof the system to take advantage of this. Thanks all Bill

All, A few days ago, my oil boiler stopped firing. It was literally 12 months to the day that it was last serviced. The engineer came out and did a regular service i.e. cleaned the baffles, changed the nozzle etc and would not fire. He then changed the optical sensor, and the boiler fired up. At this point I had to go out, but left the boiler running. Yesterday, I noticed that the burner was short cycling, which is something that it has never done before. Generally, the burner runs for about 10 seconds, but it sometimes fires for only 2 seconds and shuts off. I mentioned to the engineer this morning that something has changed since the service and that it never short cycled before, but in true 'engineer' fashion he rattled off a list of things that he thought needed replacing on the boiler, if not the actual boiler itself...all the while ignoring what I was telling him: "But it never short cycled before you serviced it..." Does anyone have any thoughts on what might have happened? I should add that the heating (UFH) was off for nearly two days, so the slab did require a lot heating to get it back up to a reasonable temperature. Thanks in advance, D

How are all you passive house self builders finding the current weather? Do you feel vindicated and is the 5kw boiler keeping you toastie?

LOL, I initially read the thread title as 'Smug Passivhaus dwellers', and then re-read it and realised my error

This is where I like outside boilers. You can remove the burner, point it away from the boiler and fire it up with the flame visible and really see what is going on. Do NOT try that with an indoor boiler

I have a 350l and that looks slightly smaller. Mine is 22 inches X 72 inches.

Feel free to post your detailed construction drawings in the relevant subforum and you may get some useful feedback, even just along the lines of particular areas you should be watching the timberframe company.

Thanks for the advice. We are definitely having MVHR. It is a timber frame house. rather than brick and block. We have a contractor doing all of the build, so air tightness will be their responsibility. But we have made it clear to them that it is important.

6-8mm according to this. http://www.ebuild.co.uk/topic/15502-gap-under-doors/

I think that a bathroom is probably a special case. There is high humidity to deal with as well as a greater temperature swing over short periods of time. Then you have greater air changes an hour. Then you are not using the room for several hours at all. So I suspect that monitoring the air is more important than the slab temperature. Normally you want to balance the energy input with the energy output, this is not really possible with a bathroom.

So, I’ve started plumbing in the various pre-install bosses for bath and shower valves. The Hansgrohe iBox is a well made piece of kit. But, surely there is a flaw with these systems? There is no way to pressure/leak test the connections without assembling the valves which if you follow the install instructions you do once everything is covered up (boarded and tiled). We’ve all had a compression joint that just needs that slight tighten to stop a tiny drip? So am I missing something or have folks just connected up the valves to test and then demounted them again ?

Jeremy's experience in slab control shows that air temperature is just as effective and less complicated, as you say it is the temperature you are after. The only reason I can see for putting it in the slab is as a limit probe, if you can run the floor that hot! Personally 'A' gives you the most balanced result.

Thanks chaps. If people are happy to read, I’ll be delighted to post up all the info. Any suggestions would be most welcome.

For a moment I read that as saying they did coffee and cake delivery to local train stations!

We have fitted seven of these in new build houses selling at £650, 000 to £1,000,000. They seem fine and do not look out of place. We also used their solid worktops which are supplied by another firm and are also good quality. The main downside is that you need to get the design done yourself and you have to familiarise yourself with the website ordering, which I found a bit clunky. I also had a couple of deliveries after 8 in the evening and one on a Saturday morning which was inconvenient as we operate normal site hours.

Here is the picture,, item 9856000 is the flushing body that you remove for valve fitting

The ibox is designed to be tested, it has a test insert in in that sends the hot to one outlet and the cold to the other, you can pressures test with either a blanking cap on the outlets or an outlet: Flush piping system To complete the installation flush out both hot and cold water supply. The arrows on the flush body are showing, which inlet is connected with which outlet, for example cold water suply with outlet 1 and hot water supply with outlet 2. If only one outlet is in use, after frst flushing the flush body must turned about 90º. When you fit the valve you take the flushing body out and install the valve, that is the whole point of them.

Each to their own but.......I’ve never understood the concept of a holiday that involves ‘cold’ and ‘exercise’. Nuts!

Just tried the 'Jeremy' method and I am 33.8°C and 34.2°C. Am I getting better. Now for an old joke. What is the difference between an oral and an anal thermometer. The taste!!

You know a lot more than me about kitchens but I have to say from my personal experience (my Diy-Kichen is over 8 years old) I think they are real value for money. I have just compared some of the prices to Nobilia (could be an old price list) and there is a vast difference. I like the Diy web site most of the others have got to much glitz and glamour going on, I want to see the units and prices. Whilst I want a kichen to be asthetic, it's functionality is more important to me.

DIY Kitchens mainly use PWS doors and make their carcasses. I havent seen their carcasses so I cant comment but I expect its fairly standard stuff - 18mm egger board with PVC edging. While I dont rate this spec as particularly high, for the prices they are charging, its not bad value, as a lot of high street retailers will sell the same stuff and charge a lot more. There is a perception out there that Blum drawer boxes are the gold standard. They are perfectly fine, but there are better products out there. English manufacturers use them mainly because of low cost and a very good distribution networks and ready availability. Unfortunately Blum's competitor products are not that readily available in the UK so which very popular on ready built European kitchens, very thin on the ground in the UK. Its largely down to the quirky nature of British kitchen manufacturing vis-a-vis the European manufacturers. Blum however have an excellent range of mechanisms for wall units. Coming back to DIY kitchens, the weakness there in my mind is the doors. PWS have had loads of issues in the past and the end result to the consumer is a complete mixed bag, mostly down to how good the retailer was at resolving the problem. I suppose the best way to look at DIY is this - If you are confident of the measuring up, confident enough to plan and get the kitchen install, DIY offers a very credible offering. Much better quality than what the sheds would sell you. Atleast comparable to what most high street independents selling British made kitchens would offer for very good prices. I still maintain that an entry level product from say Nobilia is a more refined offering, but DIY is very likely to have the price advantage.

Hi Marie, Welcome. Lots of great advice on here from really knowledgeable people. A lot of fun too. We did go off at a bit of a tangent. Do you have a project on the go at the moment?

They've just got a really good review from Which? for customer service, quality of products and quality of finish. No mark available for durability as not enough Which? members reviewed this area and it's worth noting that the sample size for DIY was 32 whereas the others were all above 100, apart from John Lewis who had 95 reviews and Wren who had 90.

As far as I'm aware, they get pretty good reviews all round, and I like the custom colour option on the fronts. Annoyingly though, they won't supply the units without doors - I wanted to buy a couple of units to see the quality and fit out a storage cupboard, but they wouldn't do it. Sorry to take the thread off track - does anyone have recommendations for where I can buy unit carcasses without doors?

We fitted one from diy kitchens on our last self build about 10 years ago. Good value, ready assembled and it stood up to wear and tear pretty well. The soft close door mechanisms only lasted about 5 minutes though - they may have improved them since then. It wasn’t helped by people slamming them I suspect..... A mix of oak and painted shaker. The painted bits had a grain in them that started to show the dirt after a few years. Drawers and hinges stood up pretty well. Delivered what was ordered and all well packed with no damage. Overall, I’d have a look at them for my next kitchen.

Good use you say coffin for a retired heating engineer for when the time comes... They do them like that in Ghana if I recall...themed coffins like? Be a good wake I'd bet ?