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So far so good. we've just had verbal confirmation they approve of the amended plans. Test holes being dug next week, so I'm hoping this doesn't raise any issues.

Do you have a link? To be honest I’m not too concerned about the stiffness issues, I’m more concerned about my ability to use as much of the available PV generation. Given that mine is a none feed in tariff (DIY) installation, any generated energy is a “GIFT” to the grid and a financial loss to me. On reflection it’s a double wammy, I’m not being paid for anything I export and I’ve then got to buy it back to charge the Sunamp! To be honest, I would not of placed an order for a Sunamp if I’d been aware of the new versions inability to charge using avalable PV generation. I really dont want to have to be adding a DIY Willie heater system to something that should ‘work out of the box’.

Put a tee on the main run, pointing up. Run your pipe to the tee with a 90 bend pointing down and connect the two. Cap off the tee when you disconnect.

I've wrapped a bit of square edged paper around pipe before now to mark a dead-square line around the pipe. As long as the paper is wrapped tightly around the pipe and the edges are aligned at the overlap then the line marked by tracing along the edge with a marker will be perpendicular to the pipe axis. For putting a taper on the end of 110mm pipe I used a belt sander, with the pipe resting in a corner and being twisted around with one hand whilst the belt sander was held at an angle with the other hand. To finish the taper off I just used a Stanley knife as a scraper, held perpendicular to the bevel and scraped around to smooth off the bevel and get rid of the fluffy bits of plastic that remain.

A busy November saw all the trades coming good, albeit some were cutting it fine for the moving in day – 30th November – However, we have moved in with all the services up and running. Having said that, BT and Openreach have missed the deadlines and as a result we are without any internet, phone line or TV for at least a week! Also the master bedroom built in wardrobes are still be fitted. The landscapers have finished their work, providing us with a patio area and a driveway area which will see plenty of activity. Look closely and you should see the hedging that has been planted. 330 separate plants in all. This was a planning condition and the hedges are a mixture of Hawthorn, Beech, Holly and Maple. Locally referred to as native hedging. The turf will be laid next Spring. Our Air Tightness test was conducted by a guy from Perth - a good couple of hours away. We never set out to achieve such low levels because we didn’t want the capital outlay of such a system as well as the infrastructure it requires. Our score was 4.9 which in our eyes is very good. There are a number of minor jobs which I need to do such as touching up the paint work here and there; re-oiling some wood in places but all that can wait until we have given the whole place a deep clean. The main external jobs outstanding are the erection of the oak framed porch and the downpipes. Both of which should be completed within the next 10 days or so. Anyway, this was not a self build in the true sense of the words but it was project managed by myself and built using a main contractor and sub contractors after the TF had been erected. I hope you have not only enjoyed reading about our project but have found some useful bits of information within the blogs in order to assist yourselves with your projects, whatever that may be. Overall my experience has been a good one. It hasn’t been without its difficulties, such as additional unforeseen expenditure and additional expenditure as a result of our mistakes, or due to us changing our minds! Such examples include ordering the wrong door frame - we failed to realise we hadn't ordered a threshold suitable for level access - a mistake that cost us £1k. Changing our minds over the 3 toilets we had ordered. They simply looked lost in their respective environments so 3 new ones were ordered at an additional cost of £850. A failure to get a full grip of the scaffolding cost an additional £1k and a failure to budget correctly for the foundations and dwarf wall for the carport cost an additional £4k. Final facts and figures - Build schedule – 6 months from the day the TF arrived. Cost per sq metre - £1850 – includes everything, and I mean everything - from the scaffolding through to the landscaping and it includes the car port and porch [ still to be erected] but not the land or fees. Only two skips were used throughout the build – everything else was removed by us to the local dump or burnt on site – best investment was a £25 oil drum which we used as an incinerator. Thanks for reading - Paul.

Download available from here https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/SC293690/filing-history

He could have had the swimming pool suspended instead http://homeworlddesign.com/embassy-gardens-sky-pool-suspended-glass-swimming-pool/

Why not. The footpath officer expected me to wait for some grass to grow :-)

I've spent an hour or so digging out scientific papers on research into the use of sodium acetate trihydrate as a phase change heat storage compound, and it's been quite interesting. There is work going back decades that seems to highlight two recurring issues. 1) The cycle life of sodium acetate trihydrate when used as a phase change heat storage compound is limited to a few dozen cycles before it starts to degrade. This seems to have been overcome by the specific mixture used in the Sunamp products, as they have now exceeded 40,000 cycles with only a tiny amount of degradation. Some other research indicates that thickening agents may improve cycle life. 2. When charging sodium acetate trihydrate there is a requirement to exceed the melting point (58 °C) by about 20 K, in order to ensure that all of the solid has melted. Failure to do this results in spontaneous nucleation around "clumps" of solid within the primarily liquid mixture. This implies that the charge temperature needs to be around 78 °C, just to be sure that all the PCM has melted. Related to the second issue is the problem of getting heat evenly into the material when it is in the solid phase. The viscous nature of the liquid phase, combined with its relatively poor thermal conductivity (similar to that of water, as far as I've been able to find out) and the tendency of the PCM to form a mixture which is not homogenous (lumps of solid PCM may well float around in the liquid) seems to be the Achilles heel of trying to heat the PCM evenly when using a relatively small area heat source. Heating water from a small area heat source, like an immersion heater of kettle element, is aided a great deal by strong convection currents that readily establish in water as it is heated from the base of a container. It seems that convection in sodium acetate trihydrate may well be nowhere near as vigorous or effective as it is in water, and this may well lie at the heart of the issue over trying to get a Sunamp heat cell evenly charged when it has only partially discharged, I think. One thing seems clear. There have been a lot of researchers working on using sodium acetate trihydrate as a phase change heat storage material for several decades, yet it seems that Sunamp, in conjunction with Edinburgh University, are probably the first to develop and engineer a practical product that uses a mixture of sodium acetate trihydrate, perhaps with a thickening agent to aid long term stability, and possibly an additive to improve the thermal conductivity (graphite powder seems to be something several researchers have investigated to do this).

Your wish etc:

Dunno, thinking about Felicity Kendall now...

Through footings is different ..! There are standard details for this sort of stuff and you can get specialist movement joints. I’d much prefer a seamless joint and a tiny risk of movement over the other option any day..!

a finer toothed saw as you would use for plastic roof sheeting is best solution https://www.cabp.co.uk/Accessories/Tools/Spear--Jackson-PVC-Predator-Saw-14-PPI_TPVPRE.htm to get a nice cut if no table saw available--table saw works cos of speed of blade std hard point wood saw is a bit coarse by choice ideally the way you decide on TPI of a saw is you want at lest 2 to 3 teeth in the thickness of the material you are cutting then it will cut smooth and not snag 16tpi will be even better for plumbing plastics

And the cons of metal: Sharp edges Cable routes need grommets through studs Not structural - need timber around doors etc. More tricky to fix to More tricky to cut Can rattle Difficult to separate from plasterboard when demolished

There not any cheaper Most joiners don’t like them Some house builders use them pros Perfectly straight Easier for services Better sound proofing Fire proof I’ve used them on a weekly basis for the last thirty years Just find them to be so versatile The few studs I have in our build Mainly bathrooms I’ve done in metal Absolutly square and plumb anc no shrinkage

Yes this was very much an all trades build - I supplied the materials were I could and just paid the labour costs. An example of that is the Joinery. I supplied all the oak materials etc., whilst the Joiner worked on an hourly rate of £25 per hour. Again the floor tiles and associated sundries were supplied by me and installed at a rate of £35 per sq m. The builder supplied and fitted, so to speak, all materials for the ground works & drainage systems. His costs also covered the stone mason, although I supplied the stone at £70 per sq metre. The same is said of the roofer - He supplied and fitted everything required for the house, car port, porch [ when fitted] and the Rainwater goods. The timber frame, additional insulation and erection costs came in at £316 per sq metre. I supplied all the landscaping materials and just paid for the Landscapers labour - A breakdown of £5500 for labour and £6100 for materials. I hope this helps and should anyone require more specific details, please send a PM.

At the risk of going way off-topic, we don't any more. The Ordnance Survey grid is now defined in terms of the European Terrestrial Reference System which is, in turn, defined in terms of the International Terrestrial Reference System (via a transform which takes account of the drift of the European continent north eastwards at about 2cm/year). The ITRF is basically the coordinate system which forms the axes of the WGS84 ellipsoid.

If an ablate sphere is one that bulges in the middle like the Earth, what describes a rectilinear volume that does the same?

If you go to France you'll find that metal stud walls are very much the normal method of constructing internal walls. The French equivalents to the big DIY sheds are full of the metal stud stuff and it seems pretty much everyone uses it. Here we seem to have a tradition of using timber studs and have stuck with it, I've no idea why, other than the old "I've always done it this way" problem that I'm sure many of us have encountered. Metal studs are often quicker to put up and will be stiffer for a given section (the Young's Modulus of steel is around 10 to 20 times higher than that for timber), but it's not necessarily a given that steel will provide better soundproofing, as being stiff, and have much less internal sound absorption, means that on it's own a steel framed partition wall probably won't be any better acoustically than a timber one. If built as a double partition, with an air gap, which can be done with steel as it's so much stiffer (less thickness needed for a given stiffness) then the acoustic performance can be very good, but this isn't how normal domestic type steel framed stud walls are usually built. No reason why they shouldn't, though, other than a bit of added thickness. They still need internal insulation plus a decent thickness of plasterboard, though.

The damp proof membrane you put on top of the sub floor will stop any air coming up. It will get overlapped with the dpc on the walls so will be no where for air to come up unless you puncture it.

Que? It's south of me, as near to England as you can get pretty much

So far this winter I am averaging less than £1 per day for space heating. I am not losing sleep at how I will pay the bill. If we were serious about climate change and reducing fuel use, a house like ours would be normal, not just something a few of us strive to build. And this is the Highlands, -9 last night, daytime high today -6, but you would not know it unless you step outside (I guess the frost on the outside of the windows might give a hint)

Are you missing a trick here? A plot that big in the city would surely support more than 1 house? Or are you planning a phase 2 later on to the right of the house you propose? (what is the significance of the "1" in the house outline?)

Try this Sample_Costbook.txt Rename from txt to xslx

Tis most lovely this build...and it's on Skye???