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Well, just over 4 years since breaking ground I have moved in at last. Covid 19 was the kick in the rear I needed to get on with it. Still a long way to go but liveable. Upstairs nearly finished. No kitchen but utility fine. After all the trauma of the last 4 years has it been worth it? Oh yes, it is heavenly.?

It’s coming up to a couple of months since I last posted. With the upstairs now a contractor-free zone, we soon had many Ikea flat pack kits to construct for the kids bedrooms. Our joiner fitted the utility worktop and units in February and we have since been applying oil to both this and the kitchen worktops. The last bit we needed done to be able to get the house habitable was for the plumber to do second fix. This work had been scheduled for the end of March. The majority of the bathroom and en-suite was delivered a couple of weeks or so before the lockdown started but all of this has now been put on hold. The joiner was able to do a day installing the bathroom furniture. That is now the extent of the inside of work and it’s now a case of waiting till the restrictions are lifted. Given that we cannot order any materials or have contractors working, I decided to move my attention to outside tasks and do what I can with a shovel, barrow and metal bar. The first job was to clear away all of these scrap materials up the access road to the shed. I don’t have a van or dumper so did this with a wheel barrow over a few Saturdays. This took longer than I expected, just moving a pallet and half of dense concrete blocks burned a lot of calories! Some of the good sized left over broken slates will be useful for other projects but the rest and some smaller broken blocks were used as hard core to build up the path at the gable end. I plan to order a lorry load of chips which will be spread around the perimeter house. The next job involved pulling out loads of rushes using an iron bar and log to lift them out of the ground. I plan to add some additional drainage around the garden so have also started work on a French drain. Building control have given the okay to a timber ramp. I have bit more height to make up than your typically self build because of the suspended timber floor and to meet the regulations regarding the flight length this will need to be extended around the front inspection chamber. I plan to clad this ramp in Siberian larch with non slip decking. The next exciting job is going through the ground here to pick up hundreds of stones in preparation for grass seed. It’s not been the most interesting entry and I am hopeful the next one will be a ‘we are now in’ entry. In the meantime, to ensure progress, I’m going to pull together a list of jobs that I can do and others that I can plan for when the lock down ends. Stay safe and healthy.

Definitely, at least all the hot pipes need lagging. Apart from anything else it will reduce the standing heat losses from the HW tank.

Radial is lots of small flexible pipes distributed off a common manifold. Branch is typically a large run through the building with small branches to the rooms. Radial takes up more space (at the manifold in particular) but gets rid of the potential 'cross-talk' of noise from one room to another. Radial is more DIY friendly in my opinion.

So we had our 9kWp system commissioned on Friday, after it being on the roof of our holiday let for 3 months (but no mains supply!) Turned on Friday lunchtime and so far we’ve generated 120kWh. Not bad for one weekend! It’s been a mix of sun and clouds too. Heated up the DHW tank to 50c three times over now so the ASHP has been doing very little. We have this on 3 phase. Ive spoken to the installer and we’ve decided the Apollo Gem diverters aren’t ideal. As they are only single phase, it was pushing “excess” energy into the DHW tank, even when we were importing on another phase. So switching for a MyEnergi Eddi which will measure the net export across 3 phases. Now to play the game where we try and work out what appliances we can use below the current generation! Our OWL monitor has gone a bit crazy. Presumably as it can’t tell the difference between import/export so I have no way of telling what we’re exporting aside from watching the meter flash. But seems the Eddie has a decent app so can use that.

Fantastic location, and great progress.! Like your style; sharp and clean ?

The mill is a STEINEL but as to what model? Little STEINEL plate on the front but the actual ID plate as aforementioned is long gone. SV4 maybe? Runs OK it seems on a phase converter. Starts slow (without hitting the BOOST button) and changes between slow and fast speeds seemingly OK. Video:

Virtually at a standstill in the house until end of lockdown, but plenty to do outside. Extreme gardening, digging its a crowbar & lump hammer to remove builders rubble. Keep me going for a few weeks. ?

Thanks Peter. Long time coming. Final push came when immersion heater packed up in the cottage. Tried to get a plumber without success & just thought why am I bothering. Just decamp to new house all heated by the sun.

Contact your insurance company, tell them what work you are having done and ask them to confirm if you are still insured. Often if you are not living at the property you may need a special policy but again, ask them to clarify.

Yes, lag all the hot pipes. You may also want to undo some of the clips so you can get thicker insulation around. Lag the cold pipes too if you are really bored.

I agree with ProDave. I wonder out of general interest, does your plant room have underfloor heating pipes embedded in the floor? Does it have an MVHR extract (I can see the MVHR unit itself)?

Good point made there @joe90 about no need to counter batten, all my buildings have been built with sarking so you NEED to counter batten but on a roof where it’s just, rafters, membrane, batten and tin then there is no need. Living in such a windy location as I do means you need a solid roof from the get go. The roof membrane does a few things, it’s your major line of defence if you get a leek, when I had water blowing back up the roof and under the ridge it would have been a disaster if it was not for the roof membrane...... also tin is notorious for condensation and it will run down the inside of the roof sheets and drip at points where the tin sits on battens, again without the membrane this water would be into your house.... the next big thing is it’s a breathable so yes it will help to allow any moist air from The inside out whereas the old tar felt or non breathable felt would just end up with condensation on the underside with nowhere to go and cause all sorts of problems. boarding out with foil faced insulation board if foamed and taped VERY well can act as part of your VCL but the overall buildings VCL need to be looked at as a whole and not just individual areas, but yes this is how I did mine.

What a wonderful job and location, you must be very proud, enjoy.

Did building control put up much fight to the idea of a timber ramp? That's what I want to do but had heard they don't like it.

Such a beautiful location, good to see someone can be making progress at these uncertain times!

Nice to see continuing progress. You'll have some stories to tell.

Worth considering the pipe bedding material. Where I live pea shingle (6mm) is £25/t but graded limestone 'pipe bedding' which is basically 6-10mm clean is only 18/t. Better check with your building inspector but mine was happy with either. I'm laying around 100m of it so it does make a difference.

As far as I can. This is a small area of decking and steps down from the back door, incorporating some storage. This has been ongoing since just after Christmas, doing a little every now and then on nice days. Underneath has been made into a storage rack for my scaffold planks, a lot easier to get them in and out than the previous storage under the static caravan. The 2 layers are made with Unistrut which is both easy and seems to give a smooth surface to slide the planks in on end. Below the deck frame, a sheet of OSB is suspended, covered in damp proof membrane. That is to ensure drips of rainwater that get through the gaps in the deck planks, don't drop onto the planks but run off to the edge. Also incorporated is storage for the wheelie bins so you can just step out of the kitchen door and put the rubbish in the bins. An arrangement we liked when in the static caravan. Of course like a lot of jobs, this is as far as I have got. I have run out of wood, and can't get any at the moment. Underneath the deck will be covered in with fencing boards to keep driven rain out (and keep the planks out of sight) with a door on the front to open when you want to get to the planks. And it needs handrails. I have one length of handrail and 2 spindles bought to see what they were like. Not enough to do anything useful with.

10 base 2 Ethernet was a "radial" as in lighting circuit. 50 ohm co-ax cable between T pieces on the network cards and a terminator resistor at each end. Nobody has used it for years - almost as long as IBM token rings. A "star" configuration is probably a better description of modern Ethernet (e.g. 100base and 1000base copper)

My grandparents had a loo that had the pan down at the normal place but the water holder was way up the wall..... it had a chain that you pulled and it was a serious flush! It’s strange what you remember from your childhood....... can’t rely on childhood memories but you would think that if it’s high up it’s going to come down with more force.

Kept the US company Mobile in oil sales.

That will be a male body, then. The evidence of female bodies disagrees.