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With one week to spare we have moved in?. Not finished as no doors or skirting finished etc.

If this turns out well then I'm going to do all of my downstairs, naked and streamed live.

Always let your brother in law do the ceilings first. Then let him do the walls. You do the mixing for him and bring him cold beer when he's finished. 2 very important jobs.

I've asked before but SWMBO won't let me make home videos...

It has been 3 weeks now since the last post and the TF arrived as planned. Sadly the tele handler didn’t!! It was two hours late and thankfully, didn’t impact on the delivery of the TF, although the driver was less than pleased being held up for so long. During the second week of erection, we saw the arrival of the large crane which really did pay for itself as it made light work of the roof timbers. A long day for all, but worthwhile. The final week saw the sarking and dormers being fixed and created respectively. A few little jobs remain but in essence the TF is up. The details – two joiners spent a total of 14 work days across 3 weeks – half a day being lost due to one of them nailing his finger rather than a rafter with his nail gun. Ouch!! The erection was arranged via the TF supplier, as was the large crane hire for the day. A total cost of £7600. This includes the sarking, soffits and barge boards. The crane hire alone was £500. Whilst all this was going on, the following was also being taken care of – A water connection from the mains across the other side of a single track road into a stop cock just inside the plot boundary. Our contractor carried out the road crossing whilst Scottish Water inspected the trench and established the connection. Cost of Scottish Water services - £976. Road crossing by independent contractor - £932. We took the opportunity to fit in the BT ducting at the same time as the BT pole is also across the road. The electric meter was fitted and power connected. This is being housed in the corner of the car port. Our electrician then came out and fixed up a temporary supply for the various trades to use. I have to say the Utility companies were fairly straightforward to deal with despite their somewhat strange working practices - SPenergy supply and fit the cable but not the meter. That is fitted by someone else. SPEnergy then have to come out and make the connection!! The stand alone car port /shed / log store was also completed. Just the door and window to the enclosed shed remain outstanding. This structure measures 7m x 6m deep – It has an oak frame and larch cladding. [Photos to follow] Finally, a word on the scaffolders. They have been called back to site on a number of occasions to move the structure or indeed amend the position and in fairness to them; they undertook these tasks without complaint. Yes, I will be pleased once they are off site but to be fair, when they have been asked to do a job and have done it. Coming up............the windows and doors will be fitted as will the ground floor insulation, ahead of the UFH pipes and screed going down.

@newhome none of the issues will lead to changes to the design, just delays the building warrant being issued.

I read it he was using a Trend jig at first. But no, home brew, top man! (Hastily edited )

Ok we’re back! Not on film yet but the wedding venue has been cleared and the bar has been reinstated into the workshop so I spent this evening trying to carry on with the stair jigs...... oh it was all going so well... on a trend worktop jig you use a half inch cutter and a 30mm guide bush. This gives about a 8mm gap between the cutter and the jig. So after laying out my the actual hole I want on a piece of ply I went and expanded it all by 8mm before I routed it into a jig, (potentially the mistake) then i routed a location slot so it gauges the next tread from the previous one. (This bit works great) as its a perfectly square slot it means I can tap the little bit of oak through for the opposite string. I tested the open tread jig first and it worked a treat. I even practiced on some ply for the first string and offered it up to my quarter landing and everything fitted ( phew ) so carried on to make the closed tread jig by transferring the original one with a flush cutting router bit to another bit of ply. So then I tested the new jig and I was very happy as it also seemed to work very nicely. until I saw this Notice the bit routed out has rounded internal corners!!! so now I either make up a set of complicated inserts so that the 30mm guide doesn’t go around the top internal in the picture or remake both of them without expanding them by 8mm....... then it comes to weather or not I should use a stair trenching bit which are flared. https://www.trenddirectuk.com/c242x1-2tc?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8e6ryIHZ2wIV6L3tCh1D0gv0EAQYASABEgLfgPD_BwE It sounds like I should use it but I can’t find any with a guide bearing so I assume they are just useing the shank as a guide. Or or use a straight cutter which I can get with a guide bearing. Hmmm,,, Iv got some research to be doing.

Ours is just off white (we re k rend and they basically do a white white (polar white) and an offwhite which is what we have) - I would suggest going to see a house in the colour you choose as it’s such an important decision.

Do we get to see a video of the moment you took leave of your senses skimming attempt? A @Construction Channelesque production please.

Skim it , skim it , skim it ! ????

I cannot work out what @Nickfromwales is trying to tell you . More emphasis please ?

Osmo Polyx would work and can be tinted.

Near passive with low heat input requirements can cope with 200mm centres - houses such as @JSHarris and @TerryE for example. Lower insulation values and higher losses mean more heat required and as the input is w/m2 then basically you have to up the wattage - this is either done by making there be more pipe per square metre or changing the delta between the flow temp and room temperature. The downside of this is once you have set the pipe centres the flow temperature is the only thing you can control so to get more heat out you have to increase the temperature. 35mm screed is very thin, especially on a joist based floor and is likely to crack so I would want to go thicker and lose the 25mm of Kingspan above the floor.

Well he is building an underground dungeon so black might be appropriate .

Bedec Barn Paint to match the frame!

You can still put a scratch coat on beneath it.

Looks cracking. Must have been great to have stood taking shots 8 & 9 and "feel" your home being built around you! The parallels with my own build are uncanny. That trench for the water pipe looks just like the one I had dug...

on the couple of quotes that we got showing erection as a separate sum, it was between 8-11k for our 270sqm 1.5-storey.

Just to be sure: it can't possibly include the price of the frame itself? Can it???

A storage container has arrived. According to the box once upon time it belonged to Hyundai.

Was you excited to watch the frame go up? We really enjoyed seeing it all come together after all the planning, dealing with all the bureaucracy ? and all things associated with getting planning permission. Hope you are enjoying it.

Remember with Thin Joint, its the special blocks which are slightly larger, and made in a different factory which has more precise equipment, that can have a lead time also. I used thin joint for our extension, and it was a joy to build.

We have 1400 members ... if they all give 20p he will have enough for a plasterer and enough left over for an hour with a therapist to get over the obsession with moving shower heads....

I think it is just Thermalite type blocks and you may need special ties as if they are standard size they don't course with standard size bricks. The first course needs to be spot on - laid in mortar. The rest looks easy (at least it does on YouTube). I guess the coursing thing may be an issue with openings as well but the blocks are easy to cut.

Ok I have heard back now and technically it is possible to fit blinds inside the window frame reveal of my internorm sliders. This works into the fixed pane behind the sliders less than 25mm gap......it can be done with pleated blinds, floating so they can cover any or all of the window at any point they dont have to stack at the top or bottom. The blind harware is very slim and is bonded to the glass (removable if required in the future).The bonding is done by a specialist company and comes with a 10 year guarantee. The company who can do it are part of hunter douglas group (who also own luxaflex apparently). It is thomas sanderson who tag themselves as conservatory blinds but they do a whole lot more than that. Not cheap as you might imagine but it is a workable solution. The only drawback is they have a max width of 1.4m so they couldnt do my biggest slider.

Let the plasterer dictate that. Just for clarification...... "Get a fackin plasterer or I'll send the boys round". Seriously . Don't make me come down there.

Just pay a plasterer PLEASE ! I cannot stand it when a good room gets mutilated by a bad skim job. You've saved by doing everything else yourself, just pay a spread. They'll get 3 sets on in one good day so will be finished in one sitting. No.....just no.

Wow, I gave up reading halfway through, looks like an extremely piss poor effort by the architect. I feel your pain, spending good money on a 'professional' and you get this to deal with. Seems like self building is a perpetual minefield of fighting to get value for the money we are spending on achieving 'the dream'.

They’re your private viewing ones, I get that you want to keep those to yourselves . This will just be you making out with @Construction Channel‘s trowel