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Which direction does the hallway go ..? As that isn’t a room it’s a circulation space and you have one door to exit. Fit a fire door on the kitchen and it also then becomes an enclosed space for fire regs. Not 100% convinced the BCO is correct here

I reckon you're right. I remember back in 2008 an economist who was also chief economist for the firm I was working for was on TV saying that contrary to the politicians and mainstream economists mutterings we were going to enter into a very long spell of low interests rates, possibly negative. He said mid to late 2010s at the very least and to expect longer. I think this one is going to be worse and finally I've heard on the media there are others realising this may be the case too. On a brighter note, there's nothing like a good crisis to focus the minds of folk and it's usually a crisis that forces change, it's just a question of what kind of change emerges from the ashes.

There are signs in markets that suggest after the 2022/2023 winter that prices will collapse..... But will they? And if they do would it only be part of wave cycle theory which says the price will fluctuate much more than usual but on a steeper upward path for years Personally I think the wave theory will prevail as humans are predisposed to greed and fear.

So I'm fitting the wall plate for a slate roof. I have zero roofing experience. It needs to be flush with the outside face. Obviously the 200yr old building has a bent wall. The joiner wants it straight for his rafters. What's the best way to do this. Worried about fitting the aluminium gutter...

Because a lot of kit has recommended installation requirements. Eg my hot water cylinder had a note in the manual that says it will only meet the advertised performance if all external pipe work is insulated, if the room it is installed in its within the thermal envelope and if the cylinder itself is insulated with a jacket. I thought this last point really took the piss, given I’ve not been able to find a jacket big enough to insulate a 300L cylinder and even if I did, I don’ti have space to fit it, as the cylinder is installed right up close to an internal stud wall.

Sure, but get two very well insulated cool boxes. Fill both with equal amounts of ice. Leave one closed for 8 hrs. Open the other one for 1 minute every hour. I bet the amount of thawing vs ice will be quite different across the two boxes. A pocket of cool air is a good insulator. Displace that with warmer air every time you open a fridge/freezer, and you will quickly see heat gains.

Damp proofing companies always “tut and suck” then sell you whatever treatment you will buy regardless of wether you need it or not. A lot of “surveyors” are failed builders who know just enough to be dangerous and will always err on the side of caution in case you try to sue them. get a decent local builder to take a look (offering to pay for their time) to give you an honest opinion of the affected area and what the cause could be.

A pavilion has an outside terrace with an overhanging roof, usually on the south side to shield the sun from the windows. Rather than going full Mies Van Der Rohe and have a frameless glass wall dividing the terrace from the open plan space in the house, we'll be going for full length bifolds, which is the modern equivalent. Otherwise, steal away. That's kind of the question I'm trying to answer. Is high spec all metre square porcelain tiles and unobtainium worktops with slate feature walls and frameless windows, or is it anything above what you'd buy in B&Q? I'm not interested in shadow gaps and skirtingboardless junctions really.

whos design? why no fascia and why the birdsmouth on the inside of the wallplate?

The broad "per sq.m" figures are rather general I find. Dividing it between first and second fix might give further insight and would make more sense to me. "Finish" for me implies a relationship with spend on second-fix especially. From your description I would say yours as high-spec but for M&E only. Anything else is difficult to tell. I also wonder if there is an aesthetic component to "low" vs "high" spec finish too asp received by a potential buyer. Does a high-spec finish have a certain look I wonder? ("Single story pavilion style house". Nice phrase. Better than the term I had been using for mine … "modern bungalow". I will steal it.)

any space on a stair which includes handrails, and therefore this, must not allow the passage of a 100mm sphere

Once SWMBO moves him into it, it is precisely the fabric of his house !

Medium spec is pretty much what you would get from Persimmons Barrett’s etc Higher spec would be UFH German or Italian kitchen and bathrooms perhaps Slate roof Aluminum w frames Your probably somewhere in between

You can get bends and plenums which give you direction changes. Your boost only needs to be 25% above normal flow. Your normal flow is between 0.3-05 ACH. So work out you ventilated area of the house and divide by 2 to 3 to get your overall flow rate. The extract and supply should be equal and be at the rate you calculate. Put a manual boost switch in kitchen and outside bathrooms.

Not sure, but they say at over 3m3/m2 leakage rate the benifit of MVHR is small. You have to consider the energy use to drive the MVHR unit compared to recovery of heat. If air is coming into the house in an uncontrolled manner, but at an acceptable rate for ventilation, you are just adding additional ventilation, which you have to pay electric for.

The hallway leads straight from the kitchen to the front door. I seem to be getting a few conflicting opinions to what the BCO told me. 🙈

Yes I have had this. Extra costs were less than 5%. It was for during construction fire risk. Some floor decks were fire resistant and some wall had Fermacell sheathing. The TF supplier did all the calcs. The project was a terrace with brick and block ground floor and timber frame above, max 4 storeys. The fire engineering compartmentalises the space to reduce the radiant heat to adjacent buildings. The end units had a double layer of Fermacell on the outside walls. There are lots of ways to engineer this. We just had normal JJI joists but the FR Caber flooring.

Why not have a glass internal door instead of the window? It would let a lot of light in and be safer.

LOL! Oh, I don't know, I found his book Bullshit Jobs highly entertaining. I think he really did encapsulate a lot of office working life in particular in that book. One story which was both very sad while utterly hilarious was the one where a colleague had been sat dead in his office chair at work and nobody noticed. I also rather enjoy his final book The Dawn of Everything. RIP a colourful deep thinker who definitely knew how to shake up the conversation!

Lol. We’re both getting an education here, I assure you

Definitely not, silly is not asking. Usually the outlets do the 90’ themselves, however I made my own (another avid DIYer, and tight!).

The council tax rebate only applies to bands A-D as It's presumed owners of houses in higher bands are well-off. Not people who's circumstances have changed but who's properties haven't. Only those people on means tested benefits get Pension Credit and Tax Credits. Non-income related ESA awarded for being medically retired isn't means tested. Unless some other scheme is announced I'm having to tough it out on dwindling savings. Or be forced to sell-up.

Different starting conditions, different climate (wetter!), different public and installer mentality. Perhaps I should have said 'Its clear that the underlying technology is mature, but its deployment in and adaption to a domestic situation in the UK is still relatively immature.

Weep holes just allow any trapped water behind the wall to escape, as you are using blocks a small (plastic conduit or even 15mm plumbing hep20/etc. is ok) spaced about 2m apart. Put foundations in, first layer of blocks, weep pipes,build rest of wall, pebbles or gravel at bottom behind wall for drainage and to stop weep pipes from blocking up) dpm up inside face of wall and then backfill compacting layers as you go

first house we bought, putting an extention up, dug up concrete at the back of the house and found one of these still in fairly good nick, hardly any rust but the handle is not the best

The system pressure are worked out for the extract and supply. The route for extract with the highest pressure drop determines the extract pressure drop, the same is true for the supply. You need the datasheet for your materials, ducts, manifold, nozzles etc. and your target flow rate. From this you should get the info you need. Basically the high the flow rate and the longer the run the higher the pressure drop.

WHAT!

If you take into consideration the entire infrastructure together with all the structural reforms required to make the Net Zero shift, I'd reckon the total bill is way beyond private investors. They will and are cherry picking the bits most lucrative. The reality is that private investors don't like early stage risky high capital bets. But instead of me jabbering on, it's probably better to quote from a pieve by Aviva Investors for COP26: This outlines that in order to make the technology being relied upon to even get close to Net Zero, a lot of very expensive technology needs to be developed, tested and then scaled in order to make it attractive to the investors to take it forwards. This pattern is fairly well backed up by history. I'm not trying to be a naysayer, but there's a good number of proposals coming out about how it's going to be achieved, including by governments, that are frankly pretty naive.

I am a convert to 'no dig'. I would spread masses of manure asap and let the worms do the work. This will be esp important if droughts become the norm. Also catch all rainwater, even diverting it over the garden if that works for you. Plant nothing that is expensive. The nursery has had a difficult time growing it, and it will surely die. Gardening is a hobby. Why pay someone else to have the fun?

There may be a few issues Reducing flow temp to hot water cylinder will increase CoP, store water at a lower temp. Slowly over a couple of days reduce the temperature until the last use of the day starts to go cold, then add a couple of degrees. Cold rooms in the house increase the heat loss in warm rooms as they are experiencing heat loss external and internal. So the heat pump has to run harder to make up the difference. Also you end up making the heating circuit smaller so the heat pump cannot flow at a high enough rate, so suffers frequent shutdowns or short cycles. Both are no good for the CoP. Go on to heat geek and read up on how to balance your heating system. You really want the system to have an open system to flow against, but set the flow rates to get the temperature you want. The thermostat then are set higher than you need and operate as limit stops only, not as temperature controllers. You then need to get your heating flow temperature as low as you can, do the same as the DHW reduce over a period of days, then when it's not heating as you want it bring back a degree or so Can you set up weather compensation? Again have a read on heat geek site.

We are the experts, @Onoff and I. Do you like bean and potatoes mash? I can donate a succulent cutting I steal from the sub tropical garden, and an echium that grew from bird poo.

What's the glass wool insulation doing up there in between the rafters - apart from reducing the air circulation around them? The correct place for it is down on the floor with the vermiculite. Along with another 200mm or more!

+1 to the above. I think the work done has stabilised it. If as we suspect the present soffits were fitted about the time of that work, then if there had been further movement you would have seen the soffits separating from the walls. I don't think you had seen any movement there which means the stabilising work has worked.

Wow that’s comprehensive, well done. IMO it’s not going anywhere with that new purlin, new brick support and substantial timber. I think it did “spread” like I originally said but much too late to pull it back but as it’s going nowhere I don’t think it’s a problem.

Weve recently installed 2 x SE systems on top of the 2015 FIT system we already had. A breeze to install and very easy to add/alter if you want to expand/rearrange panels. We had an optimiser fail on the FIT system a few years ago which was easily spotted with SE module level monitoring. SE diagnosed the fault remotely and sent out a replacement within a few days... I didnt have to ask. Fitting the module is DIY if youve got access to an alloy scaffold tower(own/hire/borrow) OR a ladder and rope/harness. Remember that with an SE system youre only dealing with <40 volts on the roof. Loads of advantages with an SE system that have been detailed in previous posts👍

I think EWI-226 Aquabase is preferred for XPS and EWI-225 Premium is preferred for EPS. The Aquabase is more expensive. I also found the NSAI certificate, which I find a better read than the BBA equivalent. https://www.nsai.ie/images/uploads/certification-agrement/21_0428_EWI_Pro_External_Insulation_Systems.pdf *Edit timeout, or I would have added this to the earlier post.

Hi Canski, sat out 1st time last ev.. on this LHS, & it's an absolute knockout spot. And the RHS door gives me a bit of privacy in fact/ damn useful choice doors opening out this way after all.

This would work - easy to install and just needs a power source, preferably not an extension lead.. https://www.appliancesdirect.co.uk/p/iqool-smart12hp/electriq-iqoolsmart12hp-air-conditioner

I've done as planned and I'm very happy with the results. I can see a continuous layer of foam from top to bottom of the cord and it's spread quite wide so I'm very confident that it's airtight! great solution from the hive mind. thanks again.

Gorgeous house and great build cost as well! Hate to sit on the fence but it's a bit of both, I love keeping busy and learn new things so I want to get involved for that aspect but also as I think carpentry might be a business I'd enjoy (from a furniture aspect) so think doing loads of bits in the house would be a great learning environment. But there is also the cost part, the more I can save the more I have as a retirement cash buffer. Wife still works but from home and although retired from my main career I wouldn't rule out me finding a work from home job down the line. Kids have few years between them, son is 16 ie will be 18 when build complete so whether he lives with us depends if we get plot within commute of whatever uni he goes to. Daughter is 10 so we can count on her for foreseeable future. A final aspect (on the keeping busy front)... If on the off chance the whole experience is borderline enjoyable and we actually create a thing of value (commensurate with the stress), I also wouldn't rule out selling the final article and going again! (If my wife doesn't kill me first)

Anyone else been stung? Paid 90% with installation meant to start in a few weeks time and have just found out they went into liquidation yesterday. Been to the yard and there is barely a thing there. So despite one of my payments being entitled "Materials" and another "Manufacture" they have neither got my materials nor have they manufactured anything of my house. Anyone else been in a similar position? The more I speak to other trades and my architect the web of people they have let down is getting ever larger. The liquidator has informed me it'll be a week or more to get letters to all the creditors and then maybe a month or more before they know if there are any assets to liquidate. Feeling more than a little disappointed and have no recourse against them. More than that I now have foundations for a house I cannot afford to build.

yours was a post I read through on my research before pushing the button on Flight. I originally got a quote in Feb and accepted the quote in June and all was rosy until last week when emails went very quiet and then today finding this out. My price from Feb to requote in June went up 10% but the payment schedule reassured me that I was relatively safe as I made the material payment a while ago. going to get prices for block construction and see if we can make anything of the little money we have left. I’m not expecting a penny back from them so anything would be a bonus.

lobbing it over the 1100mm handrail? child with small head should not have been below

That’s a fabric house not the fabric of the house!

@joe90 Thanks. Love that you took the photo on the table saw too! Often the only empty surface in my garage.

I know . In an era gone by . Now a great supplier of cream teas and fudge ( both euphemisms )

Build it as one room, get it signed off, then do a little re-modelling.....

🖕

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