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The government aren't doing away with them, they are just tightening controls, eventually, as with gas boilers, diesels etc. these things will all be phased out in most areas - provisions for remote areas may allow for a relaxation of controls. Even if they ceased to sell such appliances they would almost certainly allow the reduction in wood burning appliances simply to reduce over time through appliances reaching the end of there life and not being replaced etc. It would also be very difficult to police. I think that they should simply control the sale of wood fuel. If you cannot run your wood stove on locally gathered wood that you arrange and process yourself then having a stove is not really worthwhile in my opinion. Limiting what people can buy from B&Q or the petrol station would essentially control WBS use. Also an outright ban on the sale of any unseasoned timber would help vastly. Asda had bags of green pine for sale, I had a look at it out of interest and wondered how many stove novices would buy it and chuck it on their stove that night. It said in small print on the bag that this wood was unseasoned and it would require to be seasoned. If only well seasoned hardwoods and smokeless fuel was available that would solve a lot of issues. I think there are many many stoves that were bought as a piece of furniture for the living room and get used on a Sunday night or Christmas day - yet the ONS decided to use the number of stoves that have been sold and multiply that by "average" burning hours which were frankly ridiculous and came up with these preposterous emissions figures. I know a lot of people with WBS's which just don't use them - they wouldn't even know which end of an axe to hold and have no clue how to, or indeed incentive to, sort themselves out with firewood - I think they buy some wood for special occasions and that is it. Fine, leave them to it, that is a nice thing. What about BBQ's/Firepits in the summer? It is probably fair to say a lot of BBQ's and fire-pits smoke away during the summer - more people BBQ and use fire-pits than run WBS's and the burn time is probably comparable for the majority of WBS owners as many do not have access to unlimited amounts of firewood therefor it is just an evening event and probably only weekends at that. Ban all the plastic tat they sell for parties, or stupid little solar rechargeable garden lights that last a season and end up in the bin, what an environmental disaster these things are, think of all these little cells now rotting away in landfills. People jump onto the things that are easy to jump at, like WBS and diesels, but look at the utter rubbish people buy for an event and bin the next day. I saw a car air-freshener the other day that resembled a small Pringles type tin with a grille on the top that the fragrance emanated from - I looked at this tray full of them and thought what a total waste of resources, time and money. Ban crap like that. I bet people exist who buy this tat yet lambaste those of us with a diesel or a WBS as being environmental disasters. I might write a book!

We enforce a canadian /european style no-shoe rule in the house for everyone (visitors etc) as for the first year we had an unmade driveway so wanted to minimise grit etc. Much more hygenic and everyone gets to enjoy the soft & warm resin floor underfoot.

Why are scaffolders so difficult to deal with, my ex-scaffolder took to texting me at 5:30 in a morning and demanding updates on progress. In the end I’ve shown him the door, mind you, I’ve had value for money out of him. In the future I’ll be using my own to finish off the few bits. So here’s the photo of the house without the scaffold. In the next couple of weeks we we start putting in the rest of the windows, the scaffold was in the way previously, making it difficult to handle the largest 5 doors weighing 250kg each.

@jack has a polished concrete floor. Looks very nice indeed.

There isn't much difference between different hard floor coverings, the major issue that determines efficiency (how much it costs to run) is the amount of insulation underneath the floor. All UFH systems lose more heat to the ground than other heating systems, typically around 10% for a reasonably well insulated floor, but if the insulation under the floor isn't that good then the losses can be quite high. We have a mix of bamboo flooring (very like engineered timber) and travertine, and there's no noticeable difference between the two areas. Carpets and rugs do tend to slow down the heat transfer a bit, though. In terms of care, we find the travertine easy enough to look after. I sealed it with the special sealant after it was laid, and before it was grouted, then again after it was grouted, and since then have just swept it and washed it with a normal (non-acidic) floor cleaner.

Looking for the perfect induction hob. (aren't we all?). But in my particular case I have a couple of questions: 1/ My current (chef king) induction hob, when set to "low" reverts to a @Onoff @Onoff @Onoff pattern which is kinda annoying (sorry couldn't resist ), since especially when boiling pasta (in a pan with lid) it basically boils too much (pasta water/bubbles explode over the edge) and then it goes off the boil.. repeat.. A Bora rep tells me this is standard for induction. True? Anyone have a hob (bora or not) that is better at super low temp? 2/ Controls are important. I love my current hob's turning dial since I can turn down the hob in half a second without hitting the panic @Onoff button (okok I'll stop ). My current ceramic hob on the other hand is TERRIBLE, its touch controls need a super annoying amount of persistence before they acknowledge what you want. 3/ In-hob extractor quality vs standard. Again, Bora is a prime candidate. I'm suspecting it is something I want (as opposed to a hanging extractor, or a in-ceiling one, which also costs $$$) but Im not completely convinced it is good enough. Has anyone been able to contrast with in-ceiling, in particular how much grease settles on your surfaces? 4/ In-hob extractor cleaning. I'm not that messy a chef I think, but it's rare that my hob is sparkling clean after cooking.. which means the extractor probably ate some of what came down. How much cleaning do you have to do, and is the extractor (compared to a completely flat surface!) a massive extra hassle? 5/ Power. I love my hob's 3500W mode for starting a boil, but I rarely need anything beyond 'half power' for most cooking (although stir frying / wok style frying should theoretically be done at as much heat as your hob can muster. My recipe for Chinese style fried rice almost requires it...) Would love to have thoughts/experiences. Thinking of Bora Pure currently..

I think I questioned that when they went on ...

Got roofer I trust to put mvhr roof vents in

A number ..! It has to be laid to be polished, so is slightly higher to allow for material removal. There are also a number of other things you need to understand as the aggregate finish can be “patchy” depending on how the mix is laid. You also cannot use fibre reinforcing so you have to use a standard reinforcement if needed. I would have loved to use it but it does need to be planned in advance, polished and then protected when the rest of the build proceeds.

we are looking at this just now and trying to decide whether to have engineered wood or tile or vinyl. Wood always looks nice but all these options add extra layer of finish and therefore cost. Has anyone polished their concrete screed to achieve a finished surface or I am being stupid? What are the downsides of polished concrete?

Here's a guide as to typical thermal conductivities of materials that might be used for flooring (the higher the number the more thermally conductive it is): Carpet - ~0.1 W/m·K Oak - 0.16 to 0.17 W/m·K Bamboo - 0.2 to 0.35 W/m·K Travertine - 1.26 to 1.33 W/m·K Porcelain floor tiles - 1.5 W/m·K Concrete (typical floor density) - 1.0 to 1.8 W/m·K Slate - 2.01 W/m·K I doubt that thin layers of any of the hard materials will make any detectable difference to performance, but it's worth bearing in mind that, as mentioned above, the higher the thermal conductivity the colder the floor may feel in bare feet when the heating isn't on. Even with the heating on in our house we find that the travertine feels cooler underfoot than the bamboo, as the heating rarely heats the floor much above 22°C to 23°C, so it's still well below body temperature.

You won’t get a better conductor than porcelain Also extremely hard waring

Not a good idea to do this, IMHO. A hob extractor moves many times the amount of air that an MVHR system moves, so the system will become massively imbalanced if it gets many tens of litres per second of additional flow pumped into the extract side. Also, no matter how good the filters are on the hob extract there will always be residual fat vapour etc in the extracted air, which will end up coating the MVHR ducting and clogging the filter (MVHR filters aren't designed to deal with "dirty" air like this). Best bet is a recirculating hob extract, with a good filtration system. That ensures that the MVHR remains balanced and that the MVHR ducts etc are less likely to get affected by cooking residues. You can opt to just have a normal extract vent, but this may pose an airtightness problem when it's not in use, and the MVHR will end up unbalanced when the extract is in use. FWIW, I fitted provision in our kitchen for a recirculating overhead hood, but we've found that we just don't need one. The MVHR does a good job of clearing away steam and cooking smells, and as we never fry anything we don't have a potential problem with airborne fat etc. One thing I did add, which seems to work well, is a fresh air supply duct from the MVHR in the ceiling just outside the kitchen door. This seems to work well to stop cooking smells escaping from the kitchen, as there's always fresh air available by the door, that flows across the kitchen towards the MVHR extract in the corner.

Attached, file suffix is .TXT and will need to be renamed to .XLSX 4kWp array, 16 panels, each with a Solaredge microconverter. Solaredge 4kW inverter. Due south facing (within a few degrees) on 40 degree angle roof. Mounted flush with roof using GSE system. Aylesbury, Bucks Tall trees on east side provide shading soon after sunrise, but completely clear after that Weedon energy.xlsx.txt

Sadly not. One of the major issues we had with the Sunamp was that it wouldn't accept a charge until it was significantly discharged, and there is no easy way to find out the actual state of charge (temperature doesn't tell you anything very useful as it's a phase change storage system), The new controller has fixed the charge acceptance threshold problem, but there is still no easy way to determine the remaining state of charge. To be fair to Sunamp, trying to do this would be complex and error prone, anyway. I think the only way to attempt it would be to measure input charge (easy for an electrically charged unit, not so easy for one charged by hot water) and also measure discharge energy. To do the latter would mean measuring the temperature and flow rate of the outgoing hot water, together with a factor to allow for heat loss (a fixed factor dependent on time since last charge would probably work OK) and then subtract that from the last know fully charged state. The fickle nature of UK weather, plus the variability in the house demand (some days are a lot higher, when the washing machine, dishwasher etc are run) would make any attempt to predict PV generation relative to consumption challenging. Given that I think we will only end up paying about £60 a year for hot water, if it ends up costing us £10 more a year just because we're not squeezing the last bit out of our available PV generation I'm not going to lose any sleep over it.

That is problematic under the new endless tenancies in Scotland. I think. TBF it would not have been easy under the old law either. I am not sure how they draw the line between short term tenancies (ie long holidays) and residential tenancies. And I am not sure how anti-AirBnB laws will affect things. Scottish Govt are stirring the pot on that.

I feel more relaxed already ? by internet osmosis.

We also replaced a bungalow with two story cottage and planners kept saying it was “imposing” as both our neighbours (100 meters away) were bungalows, ha, I measured next door (room In roof) and it was 1200mm higher than they had planning for but it was years ago and I was not fussed, also I designed ours as a hip roof to reduce “mass” (and wind noise on the gable), they soon shut up and the appeal officer also pointed it out to them ?

Engineering toolbox gives thermal conductivities of likely [¹] woods ranging from 0.12 to 0.17 W/m·K. This page says 0.22 W/m·K along the grain and 0.14 W/m·K across the grain for pine. Skip reading this article gives mostly higher conductivities for engineered bamboos. Taking the worst-case (i.e., lowest) plausible value of 0.12 W/m·K and assuming a thickness of 12mm that would give a thermal conductance of 0.12/0.012 = 10 W/m²·K. That's about the same as the conductance from the surface of the floor to the air (by both conduction/convection and radiation) so the effect of a wooden floor would be to no more than double the temperature difference needed between the top of the substrate (screed, concrete, whatever) and the room. Since in a well-insulated house that's only a degree or two anyway and any other flooring will have some thermal resistance of its own the effect of the amount of extra insulation provided by the wood would be tiny. As @Bitpipe points out, if you're likely to walk around in bare feet much then the reduced conductivity of the wood allowing the floor to feel comfortable at a lower temperature might be a more significant effect. [¹] Balsa's probably an unlikely wood for floors.

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Made by Dulux for Wilko... as is Wickes paint..

Our ground floor is suspended timber (over basement) - build up is UFH in alu spreader plates - 18mm OSB - 12mm ply - 9 mm ply - 6-7mm Sika resin comfort floor. Nice and warm underfoot year round, whether the UFH is on or not. Remember tiles etc are good at conducting heat away from your feet so will feel cold unless warmed up via UFH (i.e. in summer). Wood, resin etc is a poorer conductor so will feel warmer underfoot.

This is the Highland Council document on the subject. It makes it clear this is a building for human habitation and only the drainage needs a building warrant, https://www.highland.gov.uk/downloads/file/1346/bst_018_caravans_and_mobile_homes

I'm not sure that's correct. I asked my council about something similar recently and they said that the exemptions are all-or-nothing. The BCO said this was part because e.g. installing a combustion appliance isn't just the appliance, it has direct impact on e.g. insulation, fire safety, ventilation etc. And part because the exemptions are really so that you can build an actual shed without getting them involved, but without creating a loophole that would allow you to build something non-compliant and then live in it / rent it out. He said essentially if it doesn't have loo or heating it suggests it won't be slept in (at least, not regularly). But if it does then chances are it's intended to be accommodation so needs checked like any other building/extension and they'd expect a full warrant submission showing compliance with all the regs. That may not be a definitive answer, Edinburgh council are known for being quite picky, but you might want to double-check.

I would have thought there was a pretty good chance of getting PP for self catering in Orkney. It could then still be built as a "caravan" once you have PP. Look at @Crofter blog, That is exactly what he has done, built under the definition of a "caravan" with only a building warrant needed for the drainage connection

I do not think that tiles or engineered wood will make a huge difference. You need to worry more about insulators like carpet and maybe if you use a thicker than usual underlay under your tiles if they are click fit. Have you considered tiles made to look like wood, and Vinyl Tiles? They are both good choices ?. Start from the other end for the covering, and decide what characteristics * you want for your floor, weight for importance and prioritise. Then rate each finish on each thing, and multiply by the weighting’s, and look at the top two. May help. Ferdinand * eg hard or soft feel, required lifetime, installed cost per sqm, is it cat proof, will grandma go arse over tip, does it show mud etc.

Hello people, I am at the early stages of building a cabin in my garden and this forum looks to be a wealth of knowledge.

Nothing wrong with engineered wood over UFH. Our last house had Maple, and this one has Oak. And if anything, I find the heat transfer to the rooms downstairs with UFH pipes in pug mix and wooden floors is better than in the bathrooms that use spreader plates and tiles. UFH is never a "quick heat" system, it works best at a low level but on for a lot of the time. Just make SURE you have a LOT of insulation under the floor.

I'd just jack 'n pack one corner at a time if required.

When we replaced our bungalow with a double storey we created sight lines into both neighbours' gardens on either side. This was not mentioned by anyone, either architect or neighbours or planning. So maybe you were unlucky? Or I was lucky? In that case you may well be fine. Sit tight is good advise.

Sound advice - it is out of your control to all intents and purposes, you will have to await the outcome and the time will be better spent not worrying about it.

Is there anyway of fitting a course mesh to the bottom of the PV to break up the sheet of water coming off it? (so it creates an upstand) Only shallow so leaves wouldn't get backed up

The objection to the garage is one of the more comical objections that I have read, people need to get a life. The house is further away than the one you are knocking down and the windows facing the boundary are not habitable rooms. I cannot see any issue at all. Also I think the windows are at right angles to each other although it is hard to tell. Why do they underline that the house is larger. What is the relevance? This is the kind of nonsense we got. What is the relevance of being overlooked by the other neighbour, that is nothing to do with you. The planners will likely ignore the objection. Arguably their house is way too near the boundary and causing the issue. I believe the 20m type rules do not apply when the existing property is breaking the rules. So in Edinburgh there is a 9m distance for habitable rooms to a boundary and 18m total. But I believe if the other house is less than 9 m from the boundary then that is their problem not yours. Basically people want to build right up to the edge of their plot then think it effectively gives them ownership of part of yours.

not a fan of the black and yellow, however, these are superb. make the metal seem like cheese as opposed to the bits https://www.screwfix.com/p/dewalt-straight-shank-hss-co-metal-drill-bit-set-29-pcs/1979v

The most important bits of pipework to insulate are the flow and return from the boiler / ASHP / (insert other means of heating the hot water) to the hot water tank, and then ALL the pipes connected to the hot water tank for a few metres away from the tank. The aim being firstly to minimise heat loss from the tank, and secondly to avoid the hot water flow and return from "heating" the house when you don't require any heating. All our hot water pipes are insulated for the same reason to minimise heat loss into the house. We tackled the delivery time of hot water from tank to tap buy careful layout and short pipe runs.

There's no Legionaires risk with a cold mains water pipe at all, unless you're on a private water supply or the cold water is coming from an open tank (in which case it shouldn't be used as drinking water), and even then the risk is very tiny. Mains water contains enough residual disinfection to ensure it remains bacteria-free throughout the distribution network, as long as that network remains sealed (i.e. no open storage tanks). Even then, it takes several days for Legionella to multiply at lower temperatures (say, around 20°C to 25°C) and a cold pipe will almost always have regular flow through it. The risk is no worse than a normal household going on holiday for a couple of weeks in summer, when all the pipework will get warm for days on end.

Change of £2.3k for the 12. Change of £2k for the 9, and ~£1000 saved every 10years vs owning ( and having to service / inspect ) an UVC. Couple that with no requirement for pressure reduction / relief controls / valves etc and the benefits soon outweigh the uplift in capital cost. Much simpler ( cheaper ) installation too, just cold in and hot out. I have just completed one, and am in the middle of another, spacious 3 bedroom property, ( for plumbing etc ), and both feature a HRC ( hot return circuit ). For the first one there are 10mm pipes to all the basins ( qty 3 ), and they have all been left without HRC, however the HRC has been awarded to the kitchen sink as its at the opposite end of the building to the plant room. The way that one is set up is so that the kitchen sink is the last outlet of the DHW manifold, thus heating the primary DHW 22mm pipework / manifolds etc and killing the dead leg of water off between the water heater and the manifold. As that is all larger bore, it creates a problem without a HRC as it increases the amount of dead ( cold ) water that needs to be drawn off by a sink / basin before getting premium temp DHW out of that particular outlet. As the kitchen sink HRC operates with occupancy, the manifold is always preheated therefore massively reducing the wait for DHW to the basins ( hence now not needing HRC loops to them ). The wait for premium temp water at the kitchen sink is sub 2 seconds, and the wait to any other sink / basin is sub 5 seconds. This house is often unoccupied so works well ( efficiency ) for 'stop / start' living. A side effect of heating the manifold is that all other non HRC outlets benefit from a much improved Dhw 'arrival' time. On my current project, I have gone a bit more complex as the house will be used almost immediately for a 'retired lifestyle'. First, some basics; With any HRC arrangement you need to bring all of the HRC return runs back to the point of origin and terminate them in an additional manifold. The reason is, that to be able isolate an individual hot feed to a particular outlet you'll need to do so simultaneously at both the DHW manifold AND also at the HRC 'return' manifold, in order to stop back-flow from the other HRC linked outlets. Because of this, I would recommend a single centralised manifold system and only distributing from there @Rich, if you do the manifolds as you've suggested you'll acually be worse off not better off as you'll have taken larger bore 22mm pipework all the way through the building and will have increased the amount of dead leg water volume significantly throughout. Running a basin from the upper floor manifold would be painful in terms of wasted water and time lapsed trying to get hot water there to wash your hands after a pee. Don't do the upper manifold. . For you, I'd recommend the single manifold and HRC with the UVC in the garage ( as we both know that's where it's going to end up ). Losses from an HRC are really pennies in the grand scheme so don't be put off by eco-warriors telling you the running cost will be high, it won't. Simply manage it with a timeclock so it's sleeps whilst you do, and it shuts off when you leave for the day. Insulate the hot and HRC grouped runs accordingly. See my next for a neat solution. Now, to clarify on HRC awarded outlets, you do not want to include any baths, showers, or other infrequent / high volume drawn outlets. If you run a shower then the longest you'll have to wait for premium temp DHW will be around 10 seconds or less, same or less with a bath. Reason for discounting those is that they're infrequent use / high flow rate outlets, and waiting a short while to get them up to temp is of little or zero consequence given how long you use them and the ratio of dead / lost water compared to the total amount drawn. A HRC is a great thing to have too IMO, when implemented correctly, as not having to wait for hot water eg to wash your hands quickly after using the loo / wanting to quickly swill something in the sink is something you'll soon get fond of. FYI my combi is about 2.5 and 4m away from both my basins ( all ground floor rear ) and less than 2m from my kitchen sink but I still get annoyed waiting for the 4-5 seconds to wash my hands after using the loo. Ok. On the current one we've gone for a full on, both barrels smoking HRC setup for instant DHW output ( at each HRC awarded outlet ) and I came up with a good idea ( IMO anyway, tin hat at the ready ) for managing the HRC to minimise these 'end of days' losses ?. As most folk will be installing an burglar alarm ( most, so no need to shout at me if you don't have one ? ) I decided to contact the alarm installer and ask for him to supply a couple of relay boards so I could activate the HRC from the alarm panel status; So :- alarm off = occupied = full HRC operation alarm full on = unoccupied = HRC off drumroll please........... alarm part-armed = no ground floor activity at night = HRC set to part coverage. In the part-armed state the ground floor HRC circuits ( kitchen sink / utility sink / cloakroom WC basin ) are shut off by some ball valves, and only the 1st floor master and ensuite basins have circulation to them. That's going to be achieved by separating the HRC return manifolds into 2 'groups' so they can be; "all off", "on group 1", or "all on", respective to the state the alarm panel dictates. Couldn't be easier. This dwelling has a reasonably sized multi directional Pv array with Sunamp ( x3 ) heat battery storage, so in actual fact running the HRC will likely never actually see a running cost. Battery storage ( AC ) is set to feature too, so not even running the HRC pump should have an impact. Re insulation of the pipes, simply do as I'm currently doing and run both the 10mm HRC and a the 15mm DHW pipe together and insulate them both with one piece of thick walled 22mm insulation. They fit perfectly. Terminate each dual run at the outlet with the 15mm terminating into a 15mm x 10mm 'centre' tee, the 10mm terminating in a street elbow, and the 10mm then fits in to the side ( centre ) of the vertically rising tee and you get the 15mm top of the tee left for the final outlet connection. @Rich, are you having Pv ?