Leaderboard

Great comments from all. Interesting to read all the views. For the budding loft converters a few observations. As a designer your starting point is to establish what folk want out of their conversion, what will meet their primary needs and then, aspiration. Next is to get down to brass tacks. You have planning constriants; ridge height, eaves alterations, what you can project from the roof.. dormers or Velux or in some conservation areas.. mme. From a BC compliance point you look early on at how you get a stair up and fire protection. A critical dimension is to see if you can get the clearances for the stair in terms of head height. Lastly you have a look at what kind of headroom you can achieve in the rest of the proposed converted loft. If your Clients are all six foot six plus then you need to say.. hey you are quite "blessed" but you ain't going to enjoy this even if you comply with the regs. On the other hand you can be "blessed" if you are of shorter stature. Everyone on BH is blessed! Next you delve a bit more into how you may insulate, do you need to replace the roof, get any drainage to work and so on. You look for booby traps that could burst the ball. Now have a look downstairs and where you can support load by means of load bearing walls. What are the Client constraints... do they want to live in the house or move out say. This then gives you a flavour of what to explore structurally. Once you have got this basic information you open your SE tool box and see what will work best, not just in terms of pure structural design but also what will best fit the local contractors. Good design is also about designing something that is elegant and buildable at a reasonable cost. That is the art of structural design. Next you iterate and go back to the Architectural side of things and this lets you design Architecturally in the knowledge that what you are doing has a sounds structural footing. Now you may then want to use Glulam beams..maybe an oak ridge beam for a feature if you have enough height, use sistered joists, steels, cold formed steel.. sometimes very little structural "extras" are required and this feeds into the Architectral design. which is the bit you see at the end of the day. In summary your starting point should be as above and as each attic and floors below are often different it is almost impossible to say "this is the way". If anyone wants some pointers then the best thing to do is to post some sketches thah show for example the span, height to the underside of the ridge, walls below. Rough it out on a bit of A4, take a photo and post. Don't worry if they look a bit rough.. you want to see mine! Lastly while some materials may best on paper to use.. say steel, glulam, cold formed steel the design decisions can be driven by the type of builder you have available. Say you know a great joiner that buys a lot of wood and gets a good price. You may want to play to their strengths and use Glulam that they can buy using their regular account, rather than steels that they may have to pay "punters" prices for. At the end of the day this can work out cheeper for you.

For electrics we waited untill the house was up then I marked up a set of plans. It's easier when you can walk around it pretending to turn light switches on and off etc.

We are at about 80-20 with dot ab and sand and cement 20 years ago it was the other way round I dabbed ours in thermal boarded I was tempted to sand and cement the lot Cheaper option The problem I have with sound coat being used for airtightness is it’s like you have given up on trying to seal the plasterboard Which isn’t difficult with a bit of care We are plastering and tiling four houses at the moment Tgat start from 1.3 million pounds Three are dabbed and one is sand and cement All four will be air tested and have to achieve 2 or Less

Luton man left shocked as his house is ‘stolen’ :- https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-59069662 Property fraud is where fraudsters try to “steal” a property, most commonly by stealing the homeowner’s identity and selling or mortgaging the property without their knowledge. They then disappear with the money leaving the true owner to deal with the consequences. The Property Alert service below helps people to detect fraudulent activity on their property by sending them email alerts when there is certain activity on the property being monitored, such as a mortgage being taken out against it. The recipient can then decide whether they think the activity is suspicious and act quickly if so. The alert email tells them who to contact should they be concerned. HM Land Registry Property Alert is a free property monitoring service for anyone who feels a registered property could be at risk from fraud:- You can sign up to get email alerts when certain activity occurs on your monitored properties, so you can take action if needed. The property you want to monitor must be situated in England or Wales and registered with HM Land Registry You must create a Property Alert account to use the service You will receive a HM Land Registry email (please check spam inbox) to enable you to verify your email details You must then sign in to your account to add a property Email alerts are sent when official searches and applications are received against a monitored property If you receive an alert about activity that seems suspicious you should take swift action. The alert email will signpost you to who to contact. You don't have to own a property to set up an alert The same property can be monitored by different people. Property, especially flats/apartments, can be registered with two titles. Blocks of flats are often owned by companies (Freehold), and the person owning the individual flat (Leasehold). When registering for this service please choose Leasehold title for individual flats/apartments. https://propertyalert.landregistry.gov.uk/ Advice on registering your property or properties against possible fraud was highlighted this week on the ITV Martin Lewis Money Show:- https://www.itv.com/hub/the-martin-lewis-money-show-live/2a1827a0127

@IndySo below are the prices per sqm and sqf as per our quote and what we are working to. I've worked out the total size of the house floors (walls included) which is the gross external, then the gross internal (everything except the external walls, so these includes studwork and eaves voids on 2nd floor) then our final actual usable internal floor space (which excludes studwork and eaves storage on 2nd floor): Sqm Gross External Gross Internal Usable internal Area Total size (sqm) 319 279 262 Total size (sqf) 3433.716 3003.156 2820.168 Total build cost (per sqm) £1,337.93 £1,529.75 £1,629.01 Total build cost (per sqf) £124.30 £142.12 £151.34

Here's my golden rule of sockets (which I managed to forget myself). Any wall that is bounded by a door or full size window etc should have a pair of 13A sockets and a Cat6 connection. Where you expect a higher concentration of equipment (such as TVs & consoles, or PCs and printers) double or triple up. Sods law states that just where you want to put something, the nearest socket is on the opposite wall - I have this problem with our office printer it can only go against the one wall that has no cat6 and the supplied wifi module is unreliable. Think also about using mobile appliances like vacuum cleaners etc and make sure you have enough hall sockets so you're not stretching the cable to it's max all the time. Sockets in hall cupboards are also useful for charging battery appliances like cleaners, or drills, garden tools etc. We recently upgraded to use the BT wifi discs and they work well (other access points are available) however they work best when connected to a wired cat6 and not trying to reach the router via WiFi themselves - these ones also need adjacent 13A power supply but there are PoE alternatives. I thought we had more than enough 13A sockets during the build but am still reliant on multi gang extension leads here and there to get what we need. Big fan also of switched 5a lamp sockets, especially with a switch by the door.

One of my mentors was Professor Ian MacLeod of not least Strathclyde University. He taught me about the importance of having a robust energy mix that could withstand environmental and geopolitical shocks. He has been lobbying the Scottish Gov for years about this.. fell on deaf ears. It's often overlooked but folk don't realise that natural gas is used to make the precursors for things like plastic.. heart valves and so on. Ineos at Grangemouth in Scotland is prime example. Wind turbines make electricity but no byproducts for say your electric cars.. that need also needs a lot of plastic and faux leather. Coal fired power stations make fly ash that we use in low carbon concretes and as a retarder! So we now buy fly ash from China.. who are building apparently a new coal fired power station every week..

How are the block joints made airtight?

Why buy Russian, even if you are allow. Put your money in the UK with Scottish Larch.

Interesting, has any reason been given for the sand/cement one? I hope you can share the results of the air tests!

Yes, and it's as clear as mud. Still, this is one of those times when being over 60 actually pays off 😉 Wealth as in assets or cash?

Knauf around 10-15%cheaper

I have 3 smart TVs (ours and kids) on wired connections, kids xBox, both our laptop dock stations, 3 BT WiFi discs, BT Router (backhaul of ethernet up to the IP switch), two NAS drives, BT/EE broadband backup box, Ikea smart hub - so quite a few bits & pieces. Printer and Revo would have been on that list if within distance of a Cat6 socket. I figure the WiFi b/w is best used for truly mobile devices - that said with the BT disc system WiFi is much better than it was before.

Agree - make sure you know what way doors are opening also. Made that mistake in the utility room...

Sand cement wet plaster here followed by skim. 0.31 Ach 50. Many hours of prep with airtight paint and tape beforhand however.

Am I missing something… I’ve fixed my bulk LPG supply at 35.7p/l inc vat. This is about 5p/kWh. An LPG generator would have to work at an efficiency below 18% efficiency to make it not worth it. what efficiency are lpg gennys? This might be. Better option then PV! think this one would cost 28.5p/kWh running at half load. Obv more cost effective at full load. Anyone want to check my maths? https://www.hampshiregenerators.co.uk/product/generators/lpg-generators/greengear-ge3000uk-3kw-portable-lpg-powered-generator/

We had an AEG combi microwave at our last house and we've ordered another one for our current house. https://www.aeg.co.uk/kitchen/cooking/compact-built-in-range/built-in-microwaves/kmk761000m/

Plus 1 it's probably not as expensive as you think to start again with a new roof Altering trusses is expensive and will give you limited options

With regards to soundproofing and cost two layers of 12.5mm plasterboard is better than one layer of acoustic plasterboard

Thanks all. I’m glad you’ve all instantly see the problems I’ve taken weeks to think about! Would I be able to double up the timber for the joists to keep them thinner therefore loosing less roof height? Then potentially replace with a sips style warm roof to get rid of all internal structure? then it’s a case of the cost of that to know if it’s viable. @PeterW can the bedroom not have an en-suite? @SuperPav the building (imho) already looks slightly incongruous to our neighbours and when it was built (1983) was objected to on height by the neighbours all of whom still live here! The original 1801 cottage is approx 3m lower ridge height - not sure any additional height would be welcomed! Extension might be the best option, but going to exhaust the roof first! @ToughButterCup hadn’t considered snooping into other planning applications…. Will give that a go now, thanks! @Marvin think we have to have planning anyway? We’re in AONB but not conservation or listed. Thought that AONB was designated land requiring planning for loft conversions. If I’m wrong that’s great news!

I wouldn't bend over backwards with thermal conductivity values. The actual quality of install is more important. To get PIR exactly correct is very tricky. It's only performs to its stated K value under lab conditions. Also it's very expensive compared to mineral wool and EPS. I would get the the existing mineral wool vacuumed out of the walls. Then blow in EPS beads. Put an airtight membrane inside your framing, seal it to all windows and the floor and ceiling. Blow EPS beads behind. Insulate the service cavity with mineral wool. Then plasterboard. Over all U value of about 0.25 at a guess. It would lightly perform much closer to this rather that PIR between studs.

I would suggest going for large tiles with dirt coloured grout.... If you stick with the sage green, I would go with the same colour grout and spray with grout protector. There are many edge choices. Go to any tile shop and they will show you all sorts of colours, shapes and materials.

The easiest thing to do is forget metro tiles, they look naff unless very well planned out. Always look silly in a corner, again down to planning. Choose a better tile and your options will increase tenfold.

Not sure I follow exactly where the edge is but there are border tiles available. Just check they are the same make and colour as sometimes two companies use similar names.. https://www.tiles-direct.com/wall-tiles-c26/retro-metro-tiles-c1065/retro-metro-sage-border-5cm-x-15cm-wall-tile-p1832/s1832?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_term=retro-metro-sage-border-5cm-x-15cm-wall-tile&utm_campaign=product%2Blisting%2Bads&cid=GBP&glCurrency=GBP&glCountry=GB&gclid=CjwKCAiAvaGRBhBlEiwAiY-yMBOKdrFL3PpHyFjiP0Hd8aGQSs5P4zS05QvSmYlKCg9fmKc01lZ3TxoCK2IQAvD_BwE https://www.dantotsu.co.uk/wall-tiles-c26/retro-metro-c1065/retro-metro-sage-border-5cm-x-15cm-wall-tile-p1832 Years ago companies sometimes made a version of a standard tile but with one rounded edge for this situation-but think they are rare now?

It does. Roughly speaking its 300k for everything up to second fix, then 125k for second fix, which is broken out: ASHP (after 5k grant) £6,200.00 MVHR £7,000.00 Second Fix Joinery £16,500.00 Porch £3,000.00 Kitchen £35,000.00 Second Fix Electrics & plumbing £11,000.00 Landscaping and gardens £20,000.00 Flooring £9,000.00 Tiling £5,000.00 Decoration £5,000.00 Sanitaryware £7,000.00 The main ambitious bit is probably second fix electrics which is probably on the low side. Kitchen is designer high spec, completely outsourced to a subcontractor kitchen specialist. Bathroom second fix is through plumber, and we will be purchasing sanitaryware (so no Bathroom designer or subcontractor for that). Bathrooms are mid range (Grohe or Hans Grohe for taps, Roccia sanitaryware). Flooring is subcontracted out (LVT downstairs @ £60 sqm, Carpets elsewhere at £33.50 sqm).

IMO That’s a whole new roof, those “w” trusses can’t really be altered without massive work, the flat roofed dormer will give you much more room but i agree with you will not look as good as the individual ones, then again, can it be seen much and by whom? i think you’re main problem I’ll be height, with only 2.25m you will loose lots with roof structure and bigger floor joists so may not leave enough head height.

One of the costs of climate change is migration. But that is alright, the UK can set up a 'sorting hat' somewhere, maybe New Zealand. They could use a few sheep to do it, got to be faster than what we are currently doing.

I just don’t like hollow walls so would not have dot and dab, I had cement render followed by wet plaster finish, this was specced but me after the initial quote from the main contractor and it did not alter the price!!! I can hang anything anywhere with no worries.

We took to doing it as standard in some new school buildings. Always offered to the client as an option, which some welcomed and some declined. It wasn't really for vandalism, just big teenagers jostling and the urge of kids to excavate into any small hole that has begun to form. For my own home? I wouldn't bother.

'Garden' is a loose term. 'Curtilage' might be a better term to use. We have an acre plot but the actual curtilage is what was highlighted by the red line on the planning application - which is often, especially in cases like ours made smaller than the actual owned land to reduce the cost of any planning application. We'd say our garden though is all the red line plus the land to both the front and back of the plot, which I don't think would wash with the PD section on outbuildings. A neighbour recently had planning refused for a PD development of a garage which was in the obvious place to put it but it fell partly outside the curtilage in the green belt - he reapplied and called it an agricultural shed and the plan was approved. So also take care with the description of what you are intending to do. Simon

You'll never notice the difference, its just because its denser than standard plasterboard.

But the turntable compensates for the fact the microwave energy is not even inside the oven, so without it you have to keep stopping and stirring what you are heating to avoid cold spots or local boiling.

I set a 20 min timer and go down to plant room and kill the hot water. Half the time they seem to be sitting on the bog on their phone with the shower running in the background...

Just had an Email from Octopus energy to say my standing charge is doubling soon but prices guaranteed to be £50 below the cap. They also re iterate they are a non profit organisation and have doubled their hardship fund for those struggling to pay. At least they have not gone bust like so many others. Self generating using PV with the price of panels coming down in price is my next project to ponder.

We put network points in all the rooms but so far only used one... Everything else is on the mesh WiFi network. Are these drawings for a tender for a single contractor to do everything? Then there should be clear notes and specs for everything you're wanting the contractor to do. We went separate trades once builder was done with the shell. Not a single trade from then on (except the spark) looked at our expensive, detailed drawings and specs. It was all point and spray up on site.

Your insulation value should be geared around the insulation, not the plasterboard, get the insulation levels right and it hardly matters what board you use.

The problem is that while all the 3 methods you mention can work, 2 and 3 require a lot of attention to detail to avoid a lot of air movement behind the plasterboard. If you're going to do it or oversee that it gets done properly, i.e. really picky, then that's fine. Otherwise, wet plaster is the "easiest" way while just employing a plasterer.

Cellulose, the first commercially useful plastic was plant based. Many polyurethanes are as well. Last week's comic was all about chemistry. Endlessly recyclable plastics could fix our waste crisis Katharine Sanderson Untold amounts of plastic waste is polluting our land and seas. Now, we’re using chemical tricks to design infinitely and easily recyclable materials ../../../../wp-content/newsci_images/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWFnZXMubmV3c2NpZW50aXN0LmNvbS93cC1jb250ZW50L3VwbG9hZHMvMjAyMi8wMy8wMjEwMjQwMS9TRUlfOTA5NTg2NjguanBn.jpeg Graham Carter One thing chemists do superbly is make bonds between atoms. We are now wading through the consequences of that success: plastic waste that ends up burned, landfilled or floating in the oceans. Plastics are polymers, long chains of molecules linked by strong chemical bonds. This is why they can be hard to degrade or recycle. Snipping apart those chemical bonds, to return to the small molecular building blocks, is often a tricky chemical problem. There has been varying success in dealing with the main plastics we use. The low-hanging fruit is polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which is used to make plastic bottles. It can simply be shredded and remoulded into fresh bottles. No chemists need apply. It is a different story with most other important plastics. Take polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which is ubiquitous in double-glazed windows and plenty besides. “PVC’s an absolute nightmare,” says chemist Anthony Ryan at the University of Sheffield, UK. There is no known way to recycle it, and even if you did, you would end up with vinyl chloride, a toxic compound that can increase the risk of cancer. One job for chemists, then, is to devise new reactions that can break plastics into molecules that can be reused. Susannah Scott at the University of California, Santa Barbara, has recently had success doing this with polyolefins, a class of plastic that includes polyethylene. She developed a technique that uses a catalyst to break down these plastics into smaller molecules without having to use bucketloads of heat. These smaller molecules could be used in detergents, paints or pharmaceuticals. We also need to design new plastics and plan from the start what will happen to them after they come to the end of their life. Chemists are starting to invent plastics that can be recycled infinitely or that break down into materials that nourish the soil. One example is the plastic devised by Ting Xu at the University of California, Berkeley. Xu added tiny enzyme-containing capsules to the plastic. The material can be processed, heated and stretched into useful objects. But when its life is over, all you need do is soak the stuff in lukewarm water for a week or so. This releases the enzymes, which digest the plastic into small molecules. We will need plenty of new materials like this if we truly want to eliminate the scourge of plastic waste.

Or one of my teenage kids. Suddenly baths are back in vogue - moot point as they have replaced the 45 min shower.

We need a tighter brief so we can help you more. What stage is the general design? Agreed, still in process, fixed? Has there been an M+E design? Has it been signed off? Has any of your M+E got a requirement for data: if so what's the specification for that? Will WiFi be 'enough' All Quintec light switches (other systems are available) or hard wired? KeepItSimple

Yes I much prefer OSB behind the plaster board as well, it’s an extravagance but I still do it…….

hi @Patrick didn't know you were taking photos! glad you got my good side 😎

but you can use it to offset your water usage in the house, especially now there's a new net-zero water usage jobby in planning, right? I know for us it helped us to get through planning with regards to water usage in the house and the number of toilets/showers/baths/dishwashers etc we've planned. we've got a RWH tank and didn't do it for any kind of financial return or saving, we wanted to reduce our reliance and demand on mains water. I hope to be in the new house for at least 30 years so if it eventually pays itself off then great! otherwise I won't be losing any sleep about the payback period. As with other things, decisions don't have to be made just on the financial payback period of the technology.

Surely the best way to reduce dependence on Russian (or other unfavourable regimes) oil and gas is to reduce the overall energy requirement, as well as invest in zero carbon alternatives? The majority of UK houses are still hopelessly energy inefficient. I realise that I'm lucky to be in a self built passive house and as such have relatively low energy requirements for heating etc but we must improve the fabric of the nation. I expect that one upside of the painful increase in utility prices will be more careful usage and thought on how to reduce domestic bills permanently.

Wouldn’t you want to fit as much PV as possible for example 5kW and let the inverter limit to the DNO max figure, pretty sure that’s what most people are doing these days rather than the original installations of 2010/2011 FIT where it was DNO max limit and that was that

Assume we get to 30p kWh. A 6kW array should generate say 6300kWh per year (calc based on data HERE) assuming you can use all of it, = £1800 saving per year. 6kW worth of solar panels = £3K (Midsummer wholesale Solar Edge today 08.03.2022) + Inverter (£835 - same source) + bits and self install £1k = £5K / £1800 = 2.7 years - not bad.

Morning Harry. Only just read this thread. So how long have you had the planning officer boarded up inside the place. Did you supply them with food and water ? Hope you got on ok fella.

Subsidies are designed to incentivise behaviour rather than to be inherently fair or logical. In your example the RHI has encouraged the installation of a heat pump which may not have been installed otherwise. The other option may have been to install an oil boiler and not improve the insulation at all. I believe it to be legitimate under the OFGEM rules and not fraudulent. The requirement to install basic insulation (eg cavity wall insulation) before hand and to cap the total KWHs go some way to prevent the most extreme 'playing the system'. A related but different example: it would be ridiculous if you were obliged to pay back (or stop receiving the RHI) if you were to improve insulation after the RHI claim (i.e. during the 7 years) as this would disincentives later insulation.

Want a Planning Officer on your side? Do ask asked.

Is that a thing? (says he lighting blue touch paper and standing well back.)