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BC aren't to know about this job/ no need them aware of it. Here's my base..

We use 2 × SunAmp PVs for our HW system in a household of 3 people. According to our water bills, our consumption is about 83 ltr per person per day. Our pattern of use is pretty even across the year: more showers in the summer; an occasional shared bath in the winter. The year round average temperature of our rising main is 11.3 °C (Oh, the wonders of logging everything in a DB and knowing how to do SQL subqueries). The H/W manifold is mixed to 53°C (perhaps a little too hot for kiddies but we are an adult household). I estimate that ~40% of our water is run as hot. (The washing machine and dishwasher, bogs, etc. are cold fill.) Cranking these number into a heat calculator, this gives a total heating requirement of just under 5 kWh / day + another 1 kWh / day heat loss as the SunAmps are tight side-by-side and amazingly insulated. (I don't separately meter the SunAmps, but a quick sanity check of my actual half-hourly electricity meter readings would indicate this figure is about 20% too high, but let us stick with this figure for estimating purposes. All heating is done at cheap rate tariff ( fixed at 9.66 p / kWh inc VAT) so this costs us ~ £211 p.a. Using an ASHP to supply the SunAmps at 40 °C, say, would drop this to 2.5 + 1 kWh saving us less than £100 p.a. or about £1K over 10 years. So in our case if we decide to install an ASHP, there aren't enough savings to make it worth installing an extra pump, a buffer tank and a two temperature ASHP to use it to (part) heat the DHW. We will stick to Keep It Simple Stupid. A couple of caveats here: I think our pattern of water use would be very different with children in the household. We have a fixed price deal until end 2022. We are going to see a big hike in our next tariff, but I feel that this will settle down in the longer term, so I am ignoring this for now.

The story so far. My background of building has helped; our modest budget dictates the house will be modest and simple. Highland planning guidance wants single or 1.5 storey houses, ideally traditional looking, or architecturally beneficial. Architects as a whole are probably the most important people to take Ideas and turn them into a deliverable home. Unfortunately an architect for us is unaffordable. We have a budget, and we have to squeeze and leverage every penny from it. So doing away with every fee / service we can has to become a mindset. So we sketch out our plans, make paper models for floor space, list what we want, we need then categorize these into must haves. Our must have boiled down to: 2 bedrooms, Office space, utility / boot room, WC in / near the Boot room for when were outside, Kitchen, Lounge, Bathroom I spent hours reading blogs, and topics, researching timber frame companies and the like. Once we had the outline we now needed the land. We visited lots of crofts* for sale, some as little as 10K some with building some with houses with land from 1 acre and 50 acre. Made enquires for electricity on 1 plot to be given an estimate of 30K for connection. Eventually we put a cheeky offer in for the croft and after a bit of back and forth bought our croft. I printed off lots of drawings from successful applications on the planning website, and used these as basis for the information we needed, to make the whole project possible we needed to add a couple of camping pods into the mix, and to this we needed lots of drawings and lots of information. I never asked for quotes as I knew we couldn’t afford somebody else to draw them. I have used cad before, a long time ago when I was in engineering, and to a lesser extent for building works (floor plans etc), but I had never produced scaled drawings. I found the software Arcon Evo, and this seemed like a solution. I downloaded the trial and started messing around with it. It’s buggy, but after a few hours I was thinking I might be able to pull this off, so I spent £300 for the full blown version, and set out drawing. The software is clever, you can make your own walls, similar to build up in a U value calculator, you draw in plan and it creates the 3d model. Once you’re happy you can create plan elements, these are automatic and form the part of the drawings. You then add the plan elements to a plan. This is your final drawing. For example, You create North, South, East and West plan elements, and you can add dimensions, text etc. You drag these elements into a plan called elevations. If you change the floor plan all the plan elements and plans change dynamically. But it is buggy in places so you have to check all is good. As this was not just a house but pods we needed drawings showing the site elevations, landscape plans etc. We now needed a land survey. The plot is 8hr 30mins approx. from our house so we put some feelers out for getting a land mapping done. £1500-£3000 to produce detailed digital levels and dimensions.... We set off around 2pm on a windy day in July, with my trusty dumpy level, 100m tape and sighting staff, also some red flag metal spikes. We arrived in Inverness around 9pm and stayed in a lovely B&B in Inverness for a mere £130 had breakfast at 7.30 we were on the croft for 10.30. The plan was simple, walk around the area the house was going to be, look out to sea and make sure we position it for the best views (there are 2 houses and a stone barn between us and the sea). Then from here get the levels to make sure the drainage works. And start measuring. The sea harr didn’t help, I couldn’t see Mandy more than 35M away never mind read the staff. We set our datum on the corner of the field on the road, we measured in 10M increments to the position of the house plot around 80M in then created a grid of 10M sq 40M x 50M, using our little metal red flagged sticks to mark the way. I had to reposition the dumpy level a few times due to visibility and used previously measured markers to re-define the datum. An hour or two later cold and wet we had the measurements we needed. After a brew in a café, we set off home getting in around 10.30pm just shy of 1000miles. Total cost around £300. I created a full set of drawing, to include Floor plan, elevations, sections, site plan, pod plans, plot elevations, landscaping plan, 3d plan for the pods. - I sent in a Pre planning application, this is a little thing in Scotland where they like you to ask in advance for planning before you ask for planning. Pre planning took 8 weeks, and was a report saying in general it seems ok, they would need more info on X and Y and drawings for A & B. with this I changed and amended the drawings and put forward my full planning application. I did get the feel that me not being an Architect, did rub them the wrong way, but after a few discussions and changes here and there planning was granted around 8 weeks later. so home drawn plans can and do get planning approval.... I have been asking questions on this forum and reading posts / blogs so added my Introduction with the plans.. The feedback was generally positive, but the big black cloud was the post from @ProDave with regards to the problems he has had with the render on Wood fibre approach. This is the blog I found to work and copied the methodology. How did I miss the posts regarding his troubles? @Russell griffiths, and others also got me thinking about the exposure, so a few restless nights with the calculator and looking for options, we plan to change the external finishes; the planner has been responsive and sees no issues with my request to change the external to Fibre cement boards (Hardie Plank). And also change the roof from Metal roofing sheets to Forticrete SL8 thin leading edge concrete tiles. These changes will give a cavity between the rain shield and wood fibre that I will wrap with Breather membrane. That brings us to present day. Now waiting for the formal quote for electrical connection. And an issue with the water main being made from Asbestos concrete running across our proposed entrance, so we need some trial holes before they make a decision on what needs to be done….. Shopping List: JCB Backhoe loader Static caravan portable storage small touring caravan - cheap as chips - this will be lived in by me for a few weeks at a time until we can get access, water, power and drainage for the static sorted. *A trap we nearly fell into is if you buy a croft you need to follow the rules and work the land, you are bound by these, there are upsides of available grants for help, and this is the bit you need to be careful about. If you buy part of a croft i.e. 2 acre, you’re still bound by the rules, but you won’t be able to apply for grants as the original croft will by default have this entitlement. You need to own the whole croft, and as far as I know this is a minimum of 4.5 Hectare, (11.2 Acre) to be able to apply for grant assistance.

I dropped out of running my business in Australia 10 years ago and purchased a run down property in the middle of nowhere…. I work away for two solid months of the year and make the rest of my income from renting out accommodation to visitors. I need to get another building finished and available to rent before I am of the breadline but the quality of life is excellent, I wake up and the day is mine, everything i do is about maintaining or improving the property I live on, if I work hard my goals get closer, if i work less then it’s more relaxing. It’s a good life and I hope I never have to go back to working 9-5.

I think it's 7M in England and Wales, and 5M in Scotland. Mine is only 5M from the house and BC had no issues.

Astragal bars going on, so that’s the windows and bi folds more or less complete less the bars.

Just had a look back on my phone since the sd card started to work again - this is where we were this day last year and a couple from this morning. We move in w/c 14/2. Could have been a bit quicker but covid and babies have been an issue....

Hello! First post here, although I've been poring over the forum for a while. We bought a small stone barn and outbuilding with full PP in place to convert/extend in 2020, just as Covid was taking hold; unsurprisingly it took a while to get things going, finding a good builder proved more difficult than expected with some pretty gobsmacking variations in quotes! While we're not building to passivhaus standards, we are wanting the finished article to be as energy efficient as possible - just seems sensible to do as much as we can in this area, while we have the opportunity. So we're hoping to spec 3G windows and sliders, MVHR, and as we're in a non-gas village, ASHP. Just starting to mull over the merits of solar panels too. A couple of months into the build, so far so good, no nasty shocks yet (although we were held up for several months by what turned out to be an unnecessary, overcomplicated piling system that would have made a catastrophic hole in our budget.) Now the appropriate (and affordable!) foundations are laid and we're getting out of the ground, I'm sure I'll be looking for lots of advice as we get to the sharp end of making all the right decisions. LV

I was thinking exactly the same but thought I might be showing myself up saying so I’m glad you spoke up first! ?

Deuren

Not really - the research follows the funding. Try to get funding for a promising study proving it is all bollocks - good luck. Funding for highly speculative research showing we are all doomed is in ample supply. As with anything in life you have to follow the money.... As I recall, man made CO2 represents 3% of the CO2 emitted by the planet and eco systems generally. The UK purportedly is responsible for 1% of this so 0.03% of emissions. We are on track to bankrupt the nation on the pursuit of this folly and kill pensioners in their cold homes for this? Really? Bet you are glad I am back now ?

Which one though, many are intumescent sealers but not all adhesives. I'd say this perhaps: https://www.toolstation.com/ac95-intumescent-fire-acoustic-sealant-adhesive/p59088?

Welcome and well done with the foundations. What is the backstory with that? Did you negotiate with your structural engineer or get a second opinion?

Most definitely Did I post this up. Not read it yet. Columnist Pollution is the forgotten global crisis and we need to tackle it now Leon Werdinger/Alamy Stock Photo IN THE lead-up to Christmas, my household began to feel like a badly managed waste-processing facility. We planned to spend time with vulnerable relatives, so were keeping a close eye on our covid-19 status. Each lateral flow test generated seven items of non-recyclable waste, which piled up in the bathroom until I bit the plastic bullet and binned the lot. They are now, presumably, in landfill. The pandemic may have temporarily cut global consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, but from a pollution perspective, it has spawned an almighty mess. It became clear early on that large quantities of discarded masks and other medical detritus were finding their way into the wild. Recent research has revealed the shocking scale of the covid-19 waste heap. It estimates that by August 2021, the pandemic had generated 8.4 million tonnes of plastic waste, which has been dumped into the environment rather than disposed of properly. Such mismanaged waste is the main source of ocean plastic. Before the pandemic, we collectively fly-tipped about 32 million tonnes of it a year. The extra 8.4 million tonnes “intensifies pressure on an already out-of-control global plastic waste problem”, write the researchers (PNAS, doi.org/gnct34). This is no exaggeration. Last year, the United Nations declared that waste and pollution is a planetary crisis on a par with climate change and biodiversity loss, and that we must tackle all three together. However, until recently, this crisis was a distant third in the global pecking order. That, in part, was down to a lack of data. Quantifying waste and pollution is hard. But if there was any doubt about the scale of the problem, new research dispels it. It contends that waste and pollution have crossed a Rubicon called a “planetary boundary”, and are now a threat to the habitability of Earth. We are literally choking on our own detritus. The concept of a planetary boundary dates back to 2009, when a group of researchers led by Johan Rockström at Stockholm University in Sweden tried to define what they called a “safe operating space for humanity”. They picked nine global parameters that have stayed remarkably stable for the past 10,000 years, including climate, biodiversity, land degradation and pollution. These collectively create a life-support system for us, but are being pushed out of whack by our dominance of the planet. For each of them, they attempted to set a boundary that we breach at our peril. In 2015, the team declared that four of the nine boundaries – biosphere integrity, climate change, land use, and the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles – had been breached. And two of them were still undefined, including “novel entities” – mostly chemicals released into the environment by human activities. In other words, waste and pollution. The new paper attempts to fill this knowledge gap. It defines the boundary as the global capacity to run safety tests on these novel entities and monitor them in the environment. The authors say global production of chemicals has increased 50-fold since 1950, and there are 350,000 synthetic chemicals on the market today. Most haven’t been properly assessed for environmental toxicity (see page 44). The team estimates we have overshot the boundary by about 200 per cent, roughly as much as for biosphere integrity and worse than climate change (Environmental Science & Technology, doi.org/gn6rsw). The timing of the research is both fortuitous and strategic. Next month, the fifth UN Environment Assembly – the world’s highest-level decision-making body on environmental issues – will meet in Nairobi, Kenya. On the table is a resolution to set up a global science body for chemicals, waste and pollution, modelled on the ones for climate and biodiversity. This is the culmination of a campaign that began last year and has been gathering support. It is no coincidence that many of the researchers on the planetary boundaries paper are involved. Even without the covid-19 waste, it is clear that the campaign needs to succeed. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has done more than any other group to cajole world leaders into taking the climate crisis seriously. The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, created in 2012, has elevated awareness of the biodiversity crisis to a new level. Waste and pollution deserve no less. We aren’t going to step back inside the boundary any time soon. Global chemical production is forecast to triple again by 2050. But when our covid-19 waste has become an archaeological record of the first great pandemic of the 21st century, maybe we will have learned to stop fouling our own nest. If we are still around at all. Graham’s week What I’m reading The self-styled poet laureate of punk John Cooper Clarke’s memoir I Wanna Be Yours. What I’m watching Archive 81 on Netflix. Isn’t everyone? What I’m working on My wardrobe. Honest. This column appears monthly. Up next week: Annalee Newitz Graham Lawton

I think that is the approach we're going to take. I'm also pretty sure that as part of the overall 'design' that TF companies do to translate architect produced drawings into their own specific system structural calculations and a design has to be done by their engineers. Definately! Finding this a lot, especially as it's out first self build. I appreciate the advice given on here though, it's extremely helpful.

Both will send samples out in the post Both will drop upto 40% off the showroom price If your visiting Preston Brendan at Home matters will beat both the above of you can find what you need 25% Off ticket price

Most definitely No in fact it’s a nessesity.

it’s a common way of rewiring lighting depending on the construction of the home. was more popular before people started doing loop in at the switches. I like it because you just position the joint box at the loft hatch area so you can sit down with feet out the loft stripping the cables and making the joint box accessible and every switch has only one cable at it so nice and easy.

Rocia Al Murad

Why don’t you put in a proper living wall system you tight sod.

Silestone? We will see what lengths they do the upstand come Tuesday - I have a massive run of it. If it is jointed then these are pretty invisible if it is done well.

We will be using a structural engineer for the final calculated foundation system, of course. The ground surveyor advised on the typical foundation system based on the build method, expected typical load of the TF building and ground conditions itself. I also think that many of the TF companies also provide a foundation design based on their specific construction methods anyway.

You could also do it in cement board and then cover it with microcement in your choice of colour and texture. Gives a joint-less finish and probably cheaper than buying a piece of slab. Have a look at Topcret, (other suppliers are available).

Just to clarify, it is not the builder’s fault. Builder asked architect what height we wanted everything, architect told him specifically to set the carcass legs so top of units is 856, so that when 30mm worktop gets installed top of worktop is 886. We’ve ended up with 887, so builder was out by 1mm lol. Most builders don’t take well to such accurate specs, but mine luckily takes it in his stride. I’m really over it. It was a mistake, time to move on. As many here have said, we won’t notice after living in the place for a bit. Agree ergonomics is important, but only really for chopping, and for that I can cure the mistake with an extra fat chopping board. The island is really big, significantly bigger than our L, so we will do most kitchen work there anyway.

It happens in life outside the build - should have said this, should have done that etc. To get philosophical for a moment, you can't change the past so little point worrying about it (spilt milk etc). But you can learn from it. In this case, I'd suck it up but make it VERY clear to the architect that any future spec / measurement related decision needs explicit sign-off from you in writing (email / text if sufficient) to avoid any similar recurrence.

My two pennies, or for whatever worth, is that it is fundamentally a question of ergonomics. For me, I love cooking and spending a lot of time preparing food on a surface that is too low usually results in back, shoulder and neck discomfort, pain and stiffness. Experience I gained from a number of years working in professional kitchens and then domestic kitchens. I would not accept this for the benefit of my own body. I also have to say it's pretty poor and unprofessional of an architect to accept a major mistake, offer to repair that mistake, but then threaten the working relationship if you, as a client, who is paying a lot of coin for the service to suffer if you want it put right. Frankly, it's disgraceful behaviour and tantamount to blackmail.

What time do you want me around, will be near bath tonight, so not far to pop in.

Thanks Peter. Waiting on a survey from them now.

As others have said, state you cannot keep paying the builder and tell him his services will not be required after date xxxx. Inform him to remove all materials not belonging to you. Once he is off-site, his insurance on your property is void, so what you do is of no concern to him or the now lapsed insurance. Don't ask questions, of BC where you may not want or like the answer. Assume you need fires for a multi level house. Just live on the ground floor so escape isn't an issue.

We have fire doors throughout but they're all always left open. It doesn't cause me to lose any sleep overnight.

I still can't get my head round what people are will to pay for a heat pump. Pricing is stupid expensive.

You won’t notice the 20mm or whatever, you will forever notice the slight chip or line in the stone where he’s made good when it is removed. My current worktop is 890, tomorrow it will be 905.. will I notice ..? Unlikely.

It's a massive waste of money and materials though, regardless who ends up paying for it. I don't see how it could be considered a poor installation. There is no standard for a worktop height (how could there be given we're all different height with length limbs?) and so unless it was specified beforehand then it's to spec as long as it is within bounds of reasonable expectation. Edit: I stand corrected! Apparently ISO 3055:1985 states that food preparation should take place between 850mm and 1000mm. I think that only reinforces the point that this installation is well within spec though. Or by 'poor installation' did you mean having the island worktop a different height? In which case, yeah, that's nuts and taking that route formalises the assumption that one of them is somehow 'wrong' and a compromise had to be found to make the situation tolerable. Maybe we need motorised unit/worktop height adjusters, just in case someone buys us a pair of slippers for Christmas that have a slightly different sole thickness than the ones we wore whilst doing our builds?

Looks to be missing a digit, so proof of work not accepted - recon you may have abused a nonce - did you increment your nonce correctly. Means that @pocster is probably looking at a different picture - so no wonder he does lot like it.

I suspect it might be an optical illusion caused by a combination of varying depths of frost between the warmer screw head locations and diffraction of light from the meniscus of thawed water. Can you cover a screw head overnight and remove the covering in the morning? It’ll still have been subject to the same temperature swings but I expect it’d look ‘normal’. All speculation of course. Alternatively, if the dips really are forming might the screws be contracting in the freezing temperatures?

I don't know that version but I have the Conder ASP6. When I was looking for prices i found buying it from Travis Perkins worked out the cheapest as it was free delivery and offloaded by the hiab on their own delivery wagon.

is this the upright Condor, or the Solido Smart? We've the latter and it's very good.

Wire every light and switch back to a central position and create a joint box that allows you flexibility. wire normal switches with 3core and earth instead of 2 core and earth so that it contains a neutral if required for electronic switching/smart devices.

We have a big kitchen/dining/living space with vaulted ceilings and have specified a hidden led strip along the wall/ceiling join that will throw light upwards. We'll also make this dimmable in sections, so the kitchen space, the dining space and the living space. There'll also be 3 dimmable pendants over the kitchen island. We'll add some floor lamps in the living space. You have to get the housings for the leds in place before plastering of course. Simon

Yes, I agree that I just need to take things into my own hands. Ultimately, the house, even without fire doors, will have a sprinkler system on the ground floor and an alarm system throughout and brand new appliances. It will be far safer from a fire regs perspective than what was there before, so it really comes down to just bureaucracy.

F*ck 'em and be damned. When you are up against it to dance to someone else's tune. You do what you need to do to survive. I've been in plenty of tight spots ( not with my build ) and admittedly cut corners , take risk because the alternative is worse. So you might get a slap on the hand from BCO so the (expletive deleted) what. You have more important things to worry about.

Yes. Move in. If the builder grumps, tell him the alternative is you might go bankrupt and HE might not get paid. This is the best solution for everybody including him.

Your builder must have a god complex. thank him for the work done, pay him and tell him to jog on. any issue with BC Is with you and them. What they don’t know won’t hurt them….

I think they want to see the drain runs, ie lines showing the pipes to and from the manholes and gullies.

Just hang those Aco drains on the wall and plant cress in the slots.

That's a first! ?

We are incredibly similar!

You are (strange) but totally right to be honest - make them tell you to f*ck off! I wasn't sulking but, if I was, sulk over. Happened to me at Audi Sports Net and will probably happen again - who gives a toss! I just don't want to ever be in a situation where I self censor - there is just no point in posting in that environment. Anyways, notice given on my shithole rental today (nice views mind) - move 'planned' (ie I have done f*ck all about booking anything) for w/c 14/2. We are not even going to be wet in the plot until week after next. Should be fine though. Called off the air test for the 11th and the b/c final inspection for the 14th. Sold Plot 1 - largest price achieved in the area ever - shows that people will pay for spec and quality - this was a major call when speccing the thing. I just think that quality sells itself and while the sales agent needs telling the market sets it's own level. Plot 2 will sell this w/e for even more. They are great plots tbh - I would have had an excitable accident in my pants a couple of years ago to have had the opportunity to live in one of those. Carpets in today - no joins. Had to move a 5m x 12m carpet through the plot and around a swerve. The thing weighed over 1/4 tonne. Boomed it up with the forks to get it in over the terrace thing and then 3 of us sweated and swore for an hour moving it in place. Got 1500 sq of carpet done - galleried landing and 4 massive bedrooms with joins under carpet bars only at the door thresholds. I didn't think that could be done tbh. Anyway - for those sensitive souls on here (don't ever go near a site if you are!) I appologise in advance for any upset I will cause ? Blame that Pocster chap - he has probably offended you alreay anyway! I have offered a walkthrough without thinking how I can do it - I can load it up to You Tube but would rather not - any alternatives?

Don't go. Keep posting and keep swearing. But remember ... you ain't nothing until you get 1 of these!