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Wee update : tent is still up and weatherproof, have had 3 electric patio heaters on low continuously and a dehumidifier up there. It's not totally sealed at the corners/edges but I've closed up the worst of the drafts. The temperature is consistently a good few degrees above outside air, the dehumidifier has cleared up the condensation/dew that was initially forming on the inside and then dripping back onto the boards. Now getting solid 5-6% readings from my electronic moisture meter. Did a couple of small sections of the GRP in lunch breaks last week, sanding and acetoning at the joins between each day's work and it's going down fine. Also much more efficient being able to leave all the tools and materials up there overnight rather than having to bring everything down and back up. It dropped to 2° in there overnight while it was -5 outside, but otherwise has always been 5° or higher. Good demo of the power of solar gain too : yesterday lunchtime it was 2° outside but so sunny that with the heaters off the boards and air were at 22°! Bit of luck I'll finish the laminate this weekend, then going to sand and acetone the whole thing, put a thin coat of resin and then topcoat as I've read that can get a better bond if there's been a delay in getting the topcoat down. So far seems like the bonkers plan is working!

There are plenty of self builders in Scotland, and a lot of them (like us) are Englishmen. Probably the best advice you can give him is to join the forum and talk to us directly, otherwise you are going to be very busy relaying information. The first thing to get right is the plot, making sure the plot is actually suitable, which is where a good solicitor is helpful. Then we can talk him through building regs and building warrants that are different here to England.

Sort of. It does seem to be some sort of electronics problem and the manufacturer is sending a load of spares out on Monday so that I can get my electrician to swap them around and see if this works. It has taken much longer than I would like but this is largely due to issues with the original installer, both for me and the unit manufacturer, which needed working around.

That is pretty much the detail we have on the roof (except wood fibre board used instead of your OSB) For the eaves vent, I used the OV10 provile vent strip which is more suited to this application https://fascias.com/over-fascia-vent-ov10-1m-x-10mm And the bottom edge of the tiles sit on the top of the vent strip.

Thanks, As you say these talk about payment being due from the estate where the deceased was liable for CIL which is understandable and fair. In this case the deceased was given exemption and died just a few months before completion. I'll post the result of this case on the thread once it has been decided.

The Siga Sicrall sticks well enough to pull individual beads out of the EPS.

The nice man came this morning. I said I was an early bird so he rang about 7 before he set off from Maidstone then again to let me know he was 10 minutes out. I'd sent a picture of the driveway taken from the road and told them it was 3.6m between pillars. I did ask for a "City" tanker, as in small but the guy came in a 6 wheeler. Couldn't get up the drive so he had to park and block the road. One couple were fine and took the alternative route. Chap in a Range Rover started bibbing and I went and apologised. When I said it'd be about 10 minutes more he said "I haven't got 10 minutes!" Anyway, the guy reckons its a septic tank not a cesspool. It only though appears to have one chamber. I shoved drain rods in and hit "silt", but nothing hard at about 9' from the lid. The diameter is about 8'. Works out about 150 cubic feet or 4250L. He took all the floaty solids stuff plus a load of liquid. Then he did the manhole nearest the cesspool and sucked the clay pipe through from the house. He was amazed it had never been emptied in nearly 20 years. All free running now. Reckons the heavy rain had probably got in of late that meant the solids layer lifted higher impeding the inlet hence everything backed up. Suggested I have him back in 6 months when he'll bring the smaller truck and he'll jet wash the slime off the sides as well as removing a load then annually thereafter. Mortar looks alright to me. Built in the early 50s we think. Couple of crap photos: Little video, doesnt show much, trying to lean in/not gag or drop the phone. I need to buy / get made a bit of steel to replace the manhole cover just before the cesspool. 655x505mm galvanised, 8mm chequer plate should do it. The "cups" on the back of the lifting handles have rotted out. The render too around the actual pit cover needs making good. Also need to find where on the run the cube shaped vent fits. Thinking that might go down into a tee on the run. If the vent isn't there thinking debris might be falling down the vent pipe. I'm happy for £120 Edit: Should add I spoke to a neighbour thereafter. He reckons in the old days they were built and had to be inspected. As soon as the council bloke was gone they would knock the bottom out of deliberately rendered over "holes".

I boarded my ceiling in Australia with 6m boards, if I could buy them in this backwards country I would use them again.

You are always going to get a flatter finish by using the largest board size possible. Fermacell is crazy heavy and uses expensive screws that will be a nightmare to fix. 15mm large sheets of standard plasterboard or 2 sheets of 12.5 is how to get good sound insulation and use standard dry wall screws that will be a fraction of the price. Fixing boards to a ceiling without a board lifter will be the hardest workout you ever do. a 1200 x 1200 fermacell board weighs 21 kg. You cant lift that overhead and fix it on your own.

If it comes with a reel of PLA I would experiment with that first. If the battery adaptor gets hot then PLA might creep or even soften. I think it will be ok but if it is an issue try ABS or PETG. The nozzle temperature needed for PETG (235-265C) is slightly higher than ABS (235C). Find out what the max nozzle temperature is for your printer. If not hot enough to print PETG it's possible you can upgrade the nozzle heater (aka hotend) cheaply. The heater is usually just a small aluminium block with a heater resistor and thermocouple in it. The Chinese churn these out by the bucket load. One for mine cost from £6 to about £30. Some people say you need to put the printer in a heated cabinet to print ABS reliably and since a lot of my printer is actually made from PLA the whole printer could melt :-)

Morning everyone. I've had loads of requests for a copy of the lighting design, done by a supplier via the electrical wholesaler, to be honest 'm not very impressed as it appear to have been done using software and a best fit approach, based on their range of lights. look forward to your feedback. Lighting_Design.pdf

Even reading it for the third time that still made me smile.

I used this stuff to stick the airtightness tape to my block work and the pir on the ceiling. https://passivehousesystems.co.uk/product/gerband-fortax-6400-airtight-sealant/ A good bead along the edge then push the tape onto it. It's flexible so will move as the different materials move. A word of warning though don't get it on your hair as it doesn't come off without a razor or scissors.

a thick coat of pva or emulsion on eps and let it dry -so tape of choce will then stick to that ?

I'll check for you today on some EPS, but the Siga stuff we're using seems to stick like sh*t on a blanket, to everything...

Death of the CIL liable person is in the legislation but where liability is due, not after an exemption is granted. The way the legislation is written you would lose the right to the exemption I believe unless the council adopts a more compassionate approach but that's never guaranteed. You could possibly request "Discretionary relief for exceptional circumstances" here:

The chrome sleeve pipe solution was not just for the look but to protect the plastic pipe above the floor for accidental damages. A short copper or chrome pipe above the floor means a connection to the plastic pipe underfloor which is not prefered in some cases and chromes are not good for push fit connections with plastics. Then I found these brass-copper pipes which can slide over the plastic pipes end for the radiator connection. Its not the cheapest solution but this way, -no connection below the floor and just one piece plastic pipe for point to point manifold plumbing -solid straight pipe protection against accidental damages to the connection end of the plastic pipe with radiator. -nice chrome look as well. (actually, I think we can buy 18mm chrome pipes by meter and some 18mm flanges which would be cheaper)

The Brickies will bed the wall plates But they will need to be jointed first Build upto to chamber Joiner Will position the joists Then board out or temporary board Then the Brickies will build them in as they go up Better to have the joists on site in advance as you have no way of knowing how quick the Brickies will get on Couple of weeks of dry weather and your job will fly and they won’t want to hang around Heads and cils some build in some after I chose to build in and project Brickies and other trades are usually pretty careful Scaffolders don’t But they need to go in before it comes down Team talk before it comes down may help Or a preyer

No, these are not chrome effect plastics which clips on to the pipe. They are actualy 18mm chrome-brass pipes which has a inner diameter big enough to slide over to 15mm.pipe. It is safer if you are using point to point plastic pipe connections but with the decorative chrome pipe protection over the floor. You just slide to the end of pipe before fitting the valve as you can see from the following video:

So you’d got fully Sunamp? How would you deal with UFH and cooling? I assume you’d retain the ASHP and feed it directly into the UFH. Thanks for all the contributions to this and other Sunamp threads. It’s crunch time for me, I’m starting first fix in the New Year, so need to finalise my space heating and hot water design. I’m come to the conclusion that one large ( suitably sized) Sunamp, charged using solar PV and off peak grid electricity is the way to go for DHW. Still not sure about Space heating! In my case I’ve fitted hundreds of metres of pipe in the slab. Do I really need the cost of an ASHP and unventilated hot water store? Maybe the Willis heater is the way to go and in summer when it’s too hot, just open the windows and purge the hot air! What keeps you awake at night?

Well, it is up and the top on. The scaff structure feels very sturdy (I ordered a bunch of spare lengths and we added diagonal braces as we went till it all felt rigid). Only took two lengths of scaff across the top (with braces to centre span) before the sides felt rock solid. So decided to leave most of the rest off and support the tarp with rope along the lines of @Cpd suggestion. That's holding well, will add more to make it more of a web but ran out of time today. As per @Visti the cover is just sitting over it, tied off to the building rather than the scaff. Went with a big 8m x 10m sheet of clear mono cover tarp which appears to be much the same as the scaffold sheeting @Ed Davies recommended. Foolishly ordered the long sides to have the fewest pieces, had an entertaining time trying to juggle a couple of 21' horizontals and freestanding legs before they were clamped together. With hindsight should have done that as 8' lengths with couplers and built it a bay at a time... The wedge-joined-to-a-rectangle shape made it impossible to get the tarp totally taut as a single plane. So instead decided to tension it into natural sags that run downwards to the outside edges at front and back (like a poor man's butterfly roof) - had a bit of light rain today and it's run into the fold and out as expected. Still plenty of headroom under the droops to work. So far very little wind and the forecast for the next fortnight is fairly calm and light rain so hopefully it will hold up ok. Now just need to get the old tarps off the roof itself, will use them to enclose the sides against driving rain / splash from the tarp "gutters". As it's going to be pretty draughty up there my plan now is to borrow a couple of electric patio heaters to warm/dry the boards rather than trying to heat the surrounding air.

Oh dead oh dear. so..... Peter is a little accident prone...... He was on a Local authority tree felling course. This was before we were married, so very very young. In the way of the world as it was then, lunch was down the pub and he had a drink (never a big drinker, it always went to his head). That afternoon, the chainsaw slipped and went straight down onto the top of his knee - luckily it wasn’t particularly deep. He arrived at A&E and was promptly seen by my sister who was was on duty as a nurse - she sewed him up and phoned our parents to come and collect him. The Local authority banned drinking before work and at lunch for those operating machinery soon after. Several years later we were doing a large extension on our house. I was out collecting the windows and Peter was up a ladder, with an angle grinder, cutting into the brickwork for the new joist hangers. He blames it on being left handed but the grinder hit something hard in the wall and kicked back, swinging round on the handle. The grinder hit him in the chest on what would have been his bra line for his moobs (they didn’t exist then but certainly do now!) . I arrived home to find a very shaken looking brickie who had taken Peter to hospital in his pristine Jag. He was a little surprised at my “oh well, never mind” attitude. It is one I have learnt to develop over the years to stop panic setting in. Huge scar but just needed stitching again. Many years after that we had an allotment. It was a hot day, he was cutting the grass with his petrol mower. The mower needed re-filling but he’d forgotten he had a little fire going to burn some raspberry canes. Fumes, fire, a spark from the canes and WHOOSH. His arm is engulfed in flames. The only water available was from a well with an old fashioned hand pump. He used that to put his arm out. Put everything away and put the fire out, drove back home and asked me to take him to A&E. They wrapped the arm in cling film (who knew that was the best first aid treatment) and sent us to the the nearest specialist burns hospital (Kensington and Chelsea) on a Saturday afternoon! Luckily there was no home game that day as the hospital hires out some of the car park to Chelsea fans! We had a family BBQ planned for that evening, it still went ahead. So not only extremely accident prone, he has the luck of the devil as well, and of course no sense, no feeling!!!!!! He regularly asks for a nail gun for Christmas with an excited little glint in his eyes. It’s not happening. Our daughter is just as accident prone! I live in fear. Do I win?

Building an underground house ?

Forgot to seal a top access shower trap/waste. First use it was raining on my computer in the room below. Near death experience... I embedded some 10mm threaded rod in the concrete slab for my shed to make it easier to bolt down later. Some days later I fell backwards and one ended up a few inches to one side of my head. Nearly impaled. I spent the next 10 mins cutting up some 40mm pipe to put over them.

Last one was falling / slipping down a ladder and running the electric plane across the lead.

And the Buildhub Darwin Awards are up and running! Hope I don't join the ranks doing the cess pool tomorrow!

Well, folks, that's it. The last nail in the last joist. Its been hammered in HARD. Here's why. For reasons only known to the inexperienced self-builder, I put the floor joists up working from both ends of the room to the middle. 400 centers. That makes a gap between joists of about 328ml. The middle three joist are longer than the others - they had to be inserted closer than the others: 310ish. Tight. Well tight if you are my size. Arms and head above the top chord of the joist - beer gut wedged firmly between the POSIs, but swinging the hammer now like a demon (900 nails down and just a few more to go - all because of you @Pete). Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy. Well yeah, until it came to turning round to reach that sodding wedge to help nudge the top chord a mil or two higher. Christ this is tight. Turned a few degrees. Couldn't reach the wedge. Bugger - - Hand in my pocket - - maybe there's a spare wedge in there? Nope. By this time there is a semi painful wedgie though.? Dropped the hammer. "Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo" Stumped, and firmly wedged, I realise I am going to have to wriggle out of this. Up? No way Jose. Not strong enough to overcome the effects of the beer years. Starting to sweat a bit now. More from annoyance than anything. Down? No choice. Only way . Now, those of us whose work trousers 'need' braces because our trousers have half a ton of tools hanging off them (all lies girls, just lies) will realise that descending through a really tight space has an inevitable effect on your braces. That partially painful wedgie now got worse. A lot worse. You see the back clip of my braces caught fast on the bottom chord of the joist. The front of my work trousers started to pull hard. My eyes started to water I think. By this time, my hands were in the air, and my head altogether too close to the gap between the joists. And suddenly with one bound (as it were) I was free. PING - THUMP The clip of the braces parted company with the waist band - shot up inside my clothing and hit the bottom of my shoulder. No wedgie pain now, just shoulder pain instead. All of this was happening dear reader at the same time as my T shirt, gillet and windproof were slowly making their way past my beer gut on the way to my my head. Couldn't see a thing. But sure as Hell, I could feel my shoulder. A few seconds later, there I was topless on the scaffold boards. Cold? No. Furiously hot. Just a matter now of jumping down to the floor. Yep, I suspect you are ahead of me......... The jump was elegant. Feet and knees together (just like I wuz taught) Thump. I stopped. My trousers didn't. Normally that wouldn't matter. No need to fuss over a small thing like that. Standing in the doorway way my best friends wife with a grin from ear to ear. I wouldn't have minded but her dog went mad.