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@Roz are you taking the roof off and digging up the floor..? if you give your build a big woolly hat and a warm pair of boots then you will mitigate the loss through the walls. Then make it airtight and you are well on the way to reducing heat loss. So if you can increase floor uValue and roof uValue then the 0.3 wall value become less of an issue

In my last post we were waiting on two items arriving from our suppliers: Velux flashing kits and a metal roof to be fitted at the back. The velux flashings arrived first and we were able to make good progress and finish this side. Our joiner then came back on site to fit the metal roof. Unfortunately as mentioned in my Terrible Thursday post the flashing arrived at the incorrect angle, the plan was then to use the lead, but thankfully we decided not to and we managed to get a replacement flashing sourced quickly, which allowed the rest of the slating to be done. Last bit. And then finally ridge tiles. To be honest the roof was a bit harder than I thought. Various different materials, which can all take a while to arrive on site. If one supplier delivers late or supplies an incorrect part it can hold up the entire roof fitting. As with the entire build, except the blocks and concrete the materials are all organised by us, so perhaps it would have been less stressful to leave it to a single contractor. We had a great roofer who did the work in all conditions and a joiner who came on site quickly when we needed him.

@newhome A picture of beauty that they actually work ..!!! @lizzie tbh if the installer is showing signs of not returning soon, I would advise Robbens and suggest their system isn’t fit for purpose either as they can’t dodge this one. And that pipework is lovely - I’d hate for me and @Nickfromwales to have to come over and turn it into a scrap pile .....

Hi - yes things are getting messy but in a positive manner! I have been very busy these last few weeks, working a full 8 hours or so and a full weekend. The house has now been plastered except for the sitting room. The reason being the chimney still hasn't been completed. Should be done this week I am told! Once it has been done, the plaster boards can be finished off and the room plastered. Allowing for the rooms which have been plastered to dry thoroughly, I have followed on with my paint roller and whitewashed to walls and ceilings. I am using Johnstone's Trade Contract white emulsion which in turn has been diluted. The first coat I applied was more diluted than the second coat. Having asked a question on the main forum, I am comfortable with painting the walls in a weeks time or so with our favoured colours. I have been giving it my all simply to keep ahead of the joiner, who has started the second fix joinery. The upstairs has been finished but the downstairs will wait until the floor tiles have gone down. Outside I have also been painting the exterior wood. We are using the Dulux range - Weather shield - Firstly, I applied two coats of preservative primer. Then, on went two coats of dark grey undercoat, before finishing off with a top coat of Bowler Hat. Having followed their procedures, I am hopeful this will be good for at least 10 years. The stone work is nigh on complete. It is basically the gable ends that need finishing of together with the chimney. Unfortunately I am struggling to upload some photos - these are the ones I did manage to do. Perhaps I will have better luck when the next post is due. Thanks for reading.

In the words of Will Smith I decided to get jiggy with it. Anything to put of more tiling. WTF did I pick the most visible, awkward corner when I've never tiled a wall in my life? Main bits o/of scrap MDF plus some softwood edging, not sure how long that'll last! 40 & 65mm diamond grit hole saws from eBay. Was going to varnish it but me and my impulsive side... Tile dropped into the holder, jig plate dropped in. I can add holes to this piece for the hose outlet, basin feeds etc or just cut another MDF "tile": One of the smaller ones: For the 65mm dia one found it easier to fill the hole with water rather than pi$$ about trying to squirt it in: Jig plate removed: A quick rinse: The backside: I can do these to order, might take a while : I'll get away with this I reckon. @ProDave, I need to drill more holes in this tile don't I, between the big and small ones? Has anyone seen my cheapo Parkside set of diamond grit edged hole saws? Need a smaller size for the hose outlet!

I’m sure yours won’t be as sick as mine. Call Robbens and ask them for advice re their system as their suggested installer won’t get in touch.

We find our players at deserted house in the middle of the Elan Valley (of Offa's Dyke fame) Dramatis Personae: NFW Harsh task master, stickler for detail, permanently runny nose, and 3/4" spanner duct taped to his left wrist, roll of plumber's tape inserted in his his ear lobe, wearing an olive on each finger. Some say they were put there when he was 15 by his Apprentice Master : NFW seems to be carrying on in the same tradition..... Apprentice Rumored to be a descendant of Offa himself, is building himself a reputation for truculence. Refusing to take anything NFW says at face value, he is digging in for the long haul. NFW has tried often - without success - to brand him as 'his' by getting him drunk and forcing-fitting copper olives over his toes. There are now so many on each toe, the apprentice can hardly walk. The apprentice seems not to have noticed. The practice of force-fitting olives over toes is widespread in the Valleys. NFW: Oi! Boyo, see that snow box by there mun ? Its blocked. Well it needs a bucket o' steam to mek it work, like. Flush it out like. Yew need to go Screweys to fetch a bucketo steem luk..... Apprentice: Noooo. Gerrit yerself mun. NFW: Well we'll put the kettle on then mun; mek our own steam. It's OK, I'm on my way to to the cloakroom.

Best effective in summer bypass mode, but if you've got PV you'll have DHW sorted anyway. Plus this is a bloody expensive bit of kit!! North of £8k iirc. In a PH I cant help thinking the money would be better spent on a stand alone MVHR system and separate DHW storage device. Get an MVHR with a small HP inside for summer cooling if thats a part of your remit. Jesus, I'm only on my second cup of coffee and I'm already confused lol.

Hi everyone, just joined the forum and wanted to say hi. We've just bought a bungalow in North Devon and are hoping to add a storey to make it a great family home that we've needed for so long. This will be our first project of this kind and I'll no doubt be looking to the forums for advice on many occasions.

Also a miracle that I know how to work them now!

Ha ha, you and @Onoff make a good pair ? You should aim to get it all done before the weather changes completely though if the room is cold and damp.

Is a Cavity Master type kit any good? A few different makes around. Sure mine is 127mm not 100mm...

We’re all reasonably well fed. Get a sparky to go up there

And being competent means naff all if they won’t come back and fix stuff!

I meant that the maximum U factor for PH walls, roof and ground floor is 0.15 w/m2K and that mine are 0.095 W/m2K which allows me to use the space heating system that we have.

Yep, that's who I used. No complaints.

That's what we found when we went to appeal. It was still rejected but the reasons given allowed us to resubmit an application taking all the inspectors comments into account. I think that was what helped us a lot when we went to committee and won.

Same company here

Apart from the cost, my issue with architects is this idea of splitting of responsibility. We wanted our builder to be responsible for absolutely everything. An anecdote supporting this idea is that some close friends of ours used an architect who specified a kind of tile which had to be stuck high up onto the outside walls of the house with some kind of adhesive. Soon after the building was finished these tiles started to fall off (which was extremely dangerous because they could have hit someone). It also made the house look awful with some of the tiles missing and some presumably still perilously clinging on. When the builders were asked to fix it they said that they had done exactly what the architects had specified and refused to help. When the architect was contacted he said that the builders must have used the wrong adhesive. My friends had to play 'piggy in the middle' and the legal battle went on for several years (with the house not getting fixed in the meantime) and causing my friends considerable stress. Eventually the court decided against the architect who, with perfect timing, promptly died! My friends were then forced to sue his estate - adding to the protracted proceedings and legal costs. I'm obviously not saying that all architects are like this and clearly they have something to offer some people. But it does show that when two parties are involved in the delivery of a single project there is always scope for responsibilities to become unclear. I have an engineering background and didn't find the design of our house very difficult. Also we employed (via our builder) an architectural technician to do the technical drawings. We found this worked very well indeed and I'm not sure I can really think of anything that I feel an architect would have added. But I agree that in some cases it would be a good idea to use them.

How would a very nice boy like you know?

I bought the cheapest mat kits off eBay and they worked fine - you can bin the controllers they supply by default and get something nicer. They tend to come with primer, rollers, conduit, tape etc. Got the 6mm backer boards and fixings from UFH superstore. Mats are ordered by size and can be cut to go around obstacles, you only need heating where you would stand so not under sinks, baths, WCs etc. We went for the lowest wattage wire (100W I think) and it has been fine. Make sure you get a multimeter to check (& remember to record) the voltage of each mat when still wrapped up, after unwrapping and after laying - the alarm units are good also for peace of mind during fitting. Once the mats are down (and supply / stat cables pulled through to stat back box), you make up the floor level to just over the top of the wires with latex and then tile on top of this. Spark then wires them up as second fix, you need a separate fused connection for each mat.

Make the slab structural and get rid of that screed !!! Gives you 140mm kooltherm with 100mm concrete. Massively better performance and quicker as only one wet floor trade. Roof doesnt make sense either as if you use a 200mm joist then you can get 175mm of mineral wool In there then add 40mm of kooltherm and you are 30% better than the spec already. Can you post plans...?

If you design the mountings before the cladding goes on you can make sure you have sufficient “meat” to fix into in the right places.

It’s the eco tax just like with pv panels and EWI. Thats my biggest gripe with all these things. Tax payers subsidise it through grants and incentives so they just increase the price 1000%. I find it ridiculous that we have one of the highest percentage of pv panel uptake in the world when we have so little uv. Especially in the NW and Scotland. Its made a lot of people very rich though and gives idiot politicians something to boast about. This country is crazy.

What are you putting on the out side of the house, cladding??? https://passivehousesystems.co.uk/product/winflex-airtight-window-tape/ https://passivehousesystems.co.uk/product/gerband-fortax-6400-airtight-sealant/ That's the tape and adhesive I used for my inside walls. If you are sealing the inside with tape maybe just silicone the outside.

We're both saying the same thing, different use of terminology. I was referring to the exhaust from the whole unit, not the internal exhaust between the MVHR heat exchanger and the heat pump heat exchanger, which is what @PeterW was referring to. In the Genvex units there are two heat exchangers in series internally; the normal air-to-air MVHR one, then on the exhaust side of that there is the heat pump one. The overall exhaust from the unit is what I was referring to as the exhaust, the air that actually gets exhausted out of the house via the exhaust air external terminal.

Yes. Your neighbours are an obvious starting point. What's (was) their experience: what lessons did they learn? What were their footings like?

These are what I normally fit for bathrooms.

Looking really good. It's coming together at a cracking pace.

Could have been worse:

2019