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I’ve done both on a daily basis for the past thirty five years Skiming is a far better job Skimed walls should need no filling

A week ago today the tf arrived and this is where we are now, expecting to be w&w end of next week, Windows arrive tomorrow, excited to see them, welders will be back tomorrow to get the second AFrame in

Rather surprisingly our planning permission was granted at the end of last week. It turned out to be easier than we'd thought and a good few weeks before the planning authority were required to make a decision. We have a few conditions, some tree related as we're surrounded by them and one or two of the usual suspects related to foul drainage etc. As there's no progress on site, we've been doing a bit of woodland restoration (the main reason for building a house here). As I know you all like photos, the pictures below show the removal of some checked/failed sitka on an area of bog close to the plot. The plan is that it will eventually help restore the hydrology and then the habitat. I suppose you say we're just dealing with the 'garden' until we're ready to build.

Amen, brother Nod. The last time I had a spread do a single set over PVA I had them come back and sand it back. Looked shit. Two sets over PVA or get back in your van. I use a spread with arms like a lobster. You can hear the sound off the blade when the final 'rub' is being done. Nothing better. Sheet 'o glass.

I also disagree, taped and filled PB is office style on a good day. You try sanding back on a PB wall and you hit paper. You knock a PB wall and you hit paper. You BREATHE next to a PB wall and..... With skim you get a layer which is infinitely harder wearing, can be filled and sanding without instantly lifting fibres, and can absorb all the undulations that boarding, taping and filling simply cannot ever do. Ive been around both long enough to give an informative perspective. Plaster if you want a home, tape if it's an office. When the sun hits a taped wall you can even spot where the studs are.

And there lays the problem . BCO should have asked for your detailed proposal from the designer BEFORE you laid a single brick. I kinda knew this was a horse > cart situation but TBH I didn't want to say. Take heed of @PeterW'S comments as he's above and beyond in his replies here. You can take a horse to water, but sometimes it needs kicking, thrice, in the bollocks before any water gets consumed. Yes, the 4m wobbly sail at the top will need lateral ties to the superstructure, I wouldn't be able to sleep if it was my house and it was not suitably tied. Sometimes I get unsympathetic. Usually coupled with a ? day, but often always fortified by folk asking questions that they should already have been provided answers to, inclusive of the cost of their build package and process thereof. This forum fills some serious gaps in what 'should' be a fluid process between client and building supplier / contractor. Not just in this instance, so @Ed_MK please excuse me for generalising here, but thank F@@@ places like this exist. Fwiw, I'm learning too. "Every day is a school day".

You should confer with SWMBO, she's used to disappointment!

Definitely overthinking this Jeremy. What makes you think the surveyor will be any more thorough than the EPC bloke?

No, it's right down low, about a foot of the floor level, pretty much the same height as all the other sockets in the house. The old airing cupboard, off the hall, has both a radial for the immersion switched fuse and also a single outlet on the power ring final, for some odd reason, both next to each other, and about half way up the wall. I've never quite worked out why the original builder decided to stick a single outlet in there, but then I've never understood why at least half the outlets in the house were singles, either. I went around shortly after we bought the place converting most of the singles to double gang. I think you're right, I probably am worrying too much. I'm just a bit desperate to make sure nothing holds up the sale of this old house, as we're both sick and tired of it. Cover it up with cleaning stuff seems to be the answer - that sits in a plastic box on the shelf above, but can easily be moved down to floor level when the surveyor comes.

Were not looking for bloody harmonics ? Cut more tiles, then stick the buggers down ?

When the sun is below the horizon and 450 divided by 2 = 250 it is time to quit for the day. My assistant setting-out surveyor and I had a minor domestic incident in the gathering gloom at a foundation profile where our joint mathematical error became apparent. The gloom was both visible and mental. We had no choice but to soldier on marking out the foundations because although it was 9:30pm, tomorrow was dig-day and the JCB would be onsite at 7:30am. I had seriously underestimated the time needed to set out the foundation plan for a main house and garage comprised of 5 interlocking rectangles and 4 internal supporting walls. As the clock counted down to dig-day some fag packet maths revealed I needed 35 profiles, 70 stakes for the profiles, the rock hard ground required that all profile stakes needed a pointed entry = 140 cuts with a saw and oh don’t forget the 140 screws. The elastic sail measuring tape in my toolbox had thrown out my initial schedule and meant the first setting out attempt was scrubbed because I could not get stable diagonals. A new 30 meter long £35 steel tape from Screwfix was the answer when paired with my proper surveyors grp tape. Three days after that trip to screwfix and after 3 days of punishing heat, we drove home defeated with an incomplete set of walls marked out. At 1am my mind was churning, should I cancel the dig and be branded in the locality as the hapless self builder who messed around the pro’s. Could we live with a trapezoid kitchen 25mm out of true, yes, but what about the stairs condemned by my arithmetic error to run up the supporting wall 25mm out. The alarm woke me at 3:15am, I was back onsite for sun rise and even the vocal sheep in the adjoining field seemed to be mocking me. Before Swmbo turned up at 5:30am dressed for the office I banged in the remaining profiles and we then marked out the missing walls in a new colour (those line marking paint cans gunge up quickly). The JCB arrived 40 minutes late which allowed me to walk the foundation plan with a superficial air of confidence that masked my inner fatigue. Mr Digger was not phased by the erroneous foundation line, he just rubbed out the bad line with his foot and said he would align the bucket edge to the good one. The sun was up, the sheep had shut up and it was a relief to hand over to the pro’s. The day just go better. Building Control arrived at 11am and decreed 1m trenches would suffice because ground conditions we so good, the clay looking stuff was actually silt. We could have got away with 225mm of concrete but I had ordered enough for 600mm foundations. Mr BC was in such a good mood he gave the assembled crew a quick lesson on how to distinguish nice silt from evil clay. Many visitors passed by and declared I had the best looking trenches seen in Lincolnshire for years.

With the fabricated trusses already fitted on site. The next job was to create the middle section of the roof, this part was cut on site and it was quite satisfying helping to fit the rafters into place. We had some good weather for this job and I was pleased once these were all in place. The next task after this was creating the bridles for the Velux windows, fitting the smaller lean to rafters and then the gable ladders. After this, we were ready for sarking boards. The next job was the roof paper and fitting the velux windows. The next job will be the ground floors windows, these are due to arrive on Friday.

The lads that work for me I pay them £3.25 per sq mtr labour only Which equates to about £200 a day

The problem we have with taping is any crest or bump on the wall will show With skim you can feather off inperfections A point I’ve made before was prefill all joints casings and beads Two tight coats Three passes with a STEEL float No wet angles its a myth that you need to fill after mist coating. You certainly shouldn’t see lines of easy-fill

@vivienz Thanks and yes the house is in a woodland although the plot doesn't look quite like that (the previous owner took a bit of a scorched earth approach to it). There's a photo in an earlier post I think. @NickfromwalesFunnily enough it will be a timber frame although unfortunately the quality of the timber is probably not up to it (yet, although we're working on that, but it's a long term project when you're working with trees!).

don't you need adhesive under those tiles?

Just thought I'd post up a simple idea I had and works really well to keep the gun nozzle clean. Simply drill a hole slightly smaller than the gun neck in a small clear bottle (I used a Lucozade one) and half fill with acetone. When you've finished with your gun, simple push the neck though the hole into the bottle of acetone

skim for certain.

It wouldn’t save time or mess Lots of dust Many of the new house builders lead by wimpy moved over to a taped finish Some still do

Oh no you need to plaster, even when you Ames tape you see it forever!

Nooooo you haven’t have you my godly image of you being ultra accurate have all been wiped away in an instant gutted.

I figured then if the kids can leave their socks in the dining room floor I could lay out a bit of pb, some tiles and a length of sharp metal. The fact SWMBO's out has nothing to do with it...

More learning adventures in tiling and a blade recommendation! Searching some tiling forums and ATS Diamond Tools got good comments. I ordered therefore a 180mm / 25.4 blade. Just over the £20 with postage. Comparing to the Atlas Norton one from TS and there's nearly twice as much depth on the cutting edge, around 9mm vs 5mm. The Atlas Norton is 2mm thick and cuts 2.5mm wide. The ATS is 1.5mm and cuts 2mm wide. I also sorted the fence: What can I say, smoother cut, less vibration & minimal chipping on the one side on the up stroke. Also virtually no breakout at the end: The spacers don't quite fit in the cut slot but I'll live with that as the cut is so much better.

Yes sorry @CC45 forgot to mention last time round - It is 8 parts sand and 1 part cement with a splash of water. Tested it today and what was laid yesterday is rock solid.

Cheers all. Ordered one from Franke themselves as it was the same as Indy prices £17+ was still a touch painful, though. But worth it for a high end sink.

I have gone to a different company for the windows and Rationel wouldn't budge.

No he didn’t want them in the footings at all

I have a spare cable floating in the stud en suite wall so I can put a socket or something (isolated bathroom type?) ready for hairdryer, beard trimmer etc AFTER the build is signed off. I believe health and safety is OTT and I like the Ozzie comment above. “well if they are that bloody stupid they deserve to die". ?

You're right. It only bothers me because I was a bit shocked to find it when we moved in, it not having been noted on the survey. What bothered me most was that there was no RCD in the house, so as a quick fix I just changed the socket for one with an integral RCD, just for peace of mind. As it happens, it's useful, I plug my electric trimmers in there for the monthly beard trim and my wife plugs her hair drier in there too. In the case of my trimmers, they are iffy, legally, as they are professional barbers ones with a lead that's long enough to reach Zone 2, but like other countries (and barbers shops here) I just use common sense. My wife's hair dryer has a much shorter lead, so I had to fit a mirror on the back of the cupboard door. There's no way that her hair drier could get within 1m of Zone 2 when plugged in, and the same would apply to pretty much any other domestic appliance, as they are usually supplied with pretty short leads.

I never mix batches. Just open the nearest box and whack it down, then go grab the next one and keep going. Just thinking, if these are ceramic then you could easily re-finish the edges with a diamond whetstone.

Decent stainless gas liner with correct closure and hanger etc will be £300 plus, and then the GSR has to install the liner as it becomes part of the installation so scaffold needs to remain. So add £250 plus scaff costs for fitting ... Built concrete liners with the correct sealant between are exempt as they are deemed structural so do not require an inspection by GSR. But my money would be to spend on a balanced flue gas fired log burner. Something like the Gazco Huntingdon 40 would fit perfectly and it can be routed up above the inner lintel so it “looks” like a proper stove and then out the back of the chimney breast and you will never notice it.

Stop complaining, you pay £1.192/m3 for foul water, I pay £3.4150/m3.

My personal opinion of course. I wouldn’t use a thermalite trench block if you gave them to me for free!! i have just had my trench blocks delivered standard weight concrete 7kn i personally have brought a special block designed for footings that is 300mm wide so you don’t have a 440 block wasted by being laid on the flat, dearer than a standard block, but I think they make a nicer job. Can you not lay one flat and one stood upright to make up your width.

In my opinion it is very tight depending on what else you intend to put in there. Cars are getting bigger, and in my local authority 6mx6m is the absolute minimum size they consider to be a "double garage", and that guideline is from nearly 10 years ago. I have attached the 2014 guidance doc for your perusal. The bit you want is section 4, particularly 4.10. There have been conversations on BH before, and we all as ever have slightly different opinions, but I would say think about your needs in terms of storage, garden tools / furniture, and machinery, workspace etc. Do you have "bike store" and "bin store" requirements that can be covered by making it slightly bigger? In your case there looks to be space to squeak a bit more in front to back depth and up to a couple of m in width, but start with requirements and potential requirements, and different ways of meeting them. It is also worth thinking carefully about storage in the roof, whether hooks, a mezzanine, or a future upstairs workshop or studio (could save you needing a garden building later). One of my hobbyhorses for those is a damn great covered hole in the floor so heavy or bulky stuff can be moved in with a block and tackle (but nobody else agrees on that point!). One thing that some recommend here is a steel security door between the garage and house. There are inexpensive suppliers of these. It is really a question of just thinking it all through carefully. Glass price seems OK. F residential-car-parking-standards-supplementary-planning-document-and-consultation-statement-cabinet-6th-nov-2014.pdf

Looks very tidy. UFH fitter has done a great job there.

Unfortunately it was and proved to be quite a work out for someone like me who in a previous life drove a desk! Anyway really pleased with the frame, it's construction and erection. Fleming Homes. Would recommend them.

Our guttering finished today. Really pleased with it. Now waiting for some rain to test it out & hopefully wash off the baked on pigeon poo on the roof.

Another option, if it's a plasterboard wall is just move it to the hall then? This no electrics in bathrooms is just because we are wimps and not allowed to make our own safety decisions. In Australia it is normal to have a socket right next to the shower and that is usually where the washing machine stands, and a hairdryer plugs in. When I told my BIL we are not allowed to do that because someone would walk into the shower with the hairdryer plugged in and the water running. His reply in his Austrailian accent was "well if they are that bloody stupid they deserve to die"

Just take the socket front off. Connect the wires in some heavy duty terminal blocks, and put a blank front plate on. No socket in bathroom, no problem. don't make life more complicated than it needs to be. I refused a request to put a socket in a bathroom once. I had to go back a while later for something else and found the washing machine sat next to the bath, a small hole drilled through the wall through which the flex was threaded so it could be plugged in in an adjacent room.

I think you should give in to temptation and get the shelves loaded up.

The sliding doors are all on the south west elevation. Only one pane slides in each of the four doors. All our glazing has come to £18k do you think the garage is too small at 6x6m?

I am sure in your case it won't. But you now (or very soon will) need an EPC of E or better in order to let a property. That is going to give a lot of landlords a big upgrade bill, or they are going to stop renting them and sell them. Either way I predict a glut of old low EPC houses that have a much reduced demand with landlords not wanting to buy them, and that will have to push their value down somewhat? Personally I would now not buy anything worse than a C unless it really was priced lower to compensate for the higher running cost, or the upgrade costs.

Did you pinch these from Teresa May as she seems to have mislaid hers.

A quick note for anyone planning on coming to see the piles going in on 17th July. My contractor has been in touch to say that he is over running on his current job and will be starting late on mine. I have a site meeting with him on Tuesday so will update then.

Draw a line, eat the bastard nuts and chuck two more down your kegs. You'll need to steer the blade as you cut, as the radial saw still wanders.

oohhhh I've been pottering about doing silly stuff to the house waiting for a bank loan to be approved... IT HAS BEEN.... so, money should hit the bank in the next 10 days. I Cant wait to get started on REAL work on the house!!!

My site will be getting busy from next week onwards. Piles go in on Tuesday then lots of other stuff after that. The site is in north Dorset if you'd like to come for a reccy.

As those who have read my blog know, I have an 8.5kW Mitsubishi Ecodan and 300 litre preplumb cylinder with UFH, 155m2 slab, no buffer, no PV. I will in the next few weeks be posting on my blog in respect of how the DHW and heating have performed over the course of 12 months. DHW over the course of the year, COP of 2.3, a bit higher in summer, lower in winter. Heating COP of 3.5 No short cycling on the heat pump. Plenty of DHW capacity and fast recovery - despite continuous drawing off of DHW we have not experienced DHW running out or going cool. I did a cost comparison before deciding on the ASHP set up, including Sunamp and PV, but ASHP came out on top taking into account capital, running, service and replacement costs into account. I'll go into more detail in due course, but thought it worthwhile highlighting that an ASHP is a good solution and works well for us.

Last weekend we had the structural engineer out checking the ground. Having dug the pits the structural engineer has confirmed that the ground is suitable for building on