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Feel for you. Much will depend on just what stage of the work you are at. Seems like the beam B1 is in place but no extension roof? I had a quick look at the extract of the calculations. I can't see page 7 but the loading used to design the beam looks about the right magnitude holding up a bungalow roof and the load from the flat extension roof. The mention of a second storey is probably just the SE maybe just calling the bungalow roof the second storey? The beam is checked for at least three criteria. Strength checks.. moment capacity Mc 429.9 kNm, buckling strength Mb 145.9 kNm both of which are greater than the design moment applied to the beam = 121.5 kNm Deflection is also checked against a limit of beam span / 360 = 19.6mm, calculated deflection is 10.883mm I get 10.9mm .. close enough. However B1 has plates welded to the top and bottom flange which stiffens the beam quite a lot. Thus you would expect that the beam deflection would be less still and if it is less still why are they (the plates) there? One reason may be that the SE has decoupled the calculations and assumed that as the loads are not over the.. call it centre of gravity of the beam and we are only seeing part of the calculations. This eccentricity causes the beam to twist more and the SE may have designed the plates to resist this extra twisting and left the remainder of the beam to carry the other forces. The main thing here is that I am not casting doubt on the SE's calculations but would ask out of curiosity if this is the reason for the plates. Also the plates are shown as the same width as the beam flange, nominally 173.2mm. To get the plate flush means cutting a long standard flat bar down lengthways.. more expensive and also if the plate is flush your standard fillet welds are not appropriate. You need to use partial penetration welds or similar which are more expensive. Normally I would use a standard 200mm wide plate which give loads of room for the standard fillet weld, especially as we know that not all beams / plates are truly straight. Again I would ask.. why was it done this way and are there other underlying reasons for this design approach that are not immediatly apparent. Now this is really a mute point as the steel is paid for and B1 is in place.. other than it will let your SE know that you are now better informed. It is what it is. It's a great pity that neither the Architect or SE alerted you to this low height much earlier. But what options might be available to raise the soffit of the beam. Well it could maybe go up quite a lot until the bottom is almost level or just above the ceiling of the extension. Here we would do a bit of joinery work to brace the existing roof trusses as we would be disrupting the joint between the existing roof ceiling joist and the rafter. Turning to demolishing and rebuilding the supporting walls. Ideally we want to avoid this as these walls are probably offering sideways (lateral) support to other walls so when rebuilding you have the problem of re tying your new masonry into the old. In other words you risk making matters worse. Under the padstones the inside edge of the wall forming the sides of the opening can flap about and that will be bothering your SE. If you can live with it can you narrow the opening under B1 by say 100mm each side. What you could look at is either introducing some good solid timber posts fixed to the wall or maybe a couple of light steel channel sections, timber is cheeper. Now we have stopped the supporting wall from flapping about and they will carry a lot more load... which means they may not have to be demolished after all. If the builder can give the SE the hand mixed recipe they used for the padstones and the concrete looks well compacted it will probably be the same strength as the existing brick and thus they could just stay in place and put another cut down lintel over the top once you lift the beam. That could be one solution worth exploring. I would aim to keep on good terms with the SE , builder etc.. but start asking a few informed questions. It may be that your SE comes up with some good / other solutions.. free of charge in the interests of good will. Hope this helps and things pan out ok for you.

just a heads up your steel drawing download has personally identifiable information.

I feel for you, I really do. It's a horrible feeling when you've identified a problem but haven't yet found the solution. But try not to panic and just methodically work it through and Id be confident the end result won't be anywhere near as catastrophic as you fear it might. Your SE sounds like he's responding and looking for solutions. Try to focus on what is going to give you the best way forward on the project, as tempting as it can be I often find trying find blame for past mistakes doesn't actually help get them sorted. I see two initial steps... 1) Establish with SE if loadings on this beam are correct (i.e. if first floor mistake has been made) 2a) Assuming they are, talk with your builders about the best way to raise the beam as far as practical based on your SE's proposed options. 2b) If they're not, look realistically at how much re-specifying the beam is going to cost and decide if the extra headroom is worth it over 2a.

Get a long (greater than the wall width) bit to make a pilot hole with a slight fall to the outside. This will ensure both holes line up. Drill a piece of 50mm timber with 2x holes 125mm apart. Make the middle one perpendicular to the timber and the outer one slightly angled outwards. Peg the pilot hole to one hole of the timber and use the other hole like a compass for your stitch drilling. It will ensure a neat circle that will be slightest bit conical towards the inside making it easier to chip out. Then get hammer and chisel and get tapping. This can be tedious. Now repeat from the inside. I had 3 holes through 215mm block, 250mm cavity and 100mm block to do. They took an hour each with a cheap SDS.

Done.

Did you ask for alternatives? Otherwise, it’s like calling a car dealership, asking for a car, and being sent one you didn’t want. If you want a BMW you need to ask for one. Otherwise you might get a Dacia. Trying to be more constructive, it’s worth noting that RSJs typically aren’t that expensive. Once you get a new design from a new SE, you might find that the RSj supplier is willing to deliver the new beam and take the old beam away at the same time, and that it won’t cost more than a few hundred pounds for the supplier’s trouble. Find out who the supplier is, call them directly and see if they are amenable to helping you (once you have the spec for the new beam of course).

Finally made a start in earnest. The original plan was to stick build on site, but the cabin builds opened my eyes to the winds up here, and established concern for getting the house airtight. I priced ICF, and although the costs are higher in the begining I think, I can self build for similar money, but get a far superior product. This is a budget build, most of the nice to haves have been dropped. The only redline is we want to ensure this is future proof, so all on the ground floor. Around 12 months ago the area where the house is going was stripped down to bedrock. The initial plan was a DIY insulated raft, but the move to ICF opened up a more traditional strip footing using the ICF. Back in February we hired a 360 with a pecker to break out some of the rock to lower the NE corner, as the bed rock slopes to the SW. Bed rock exposed looking East NE corner We broke out and removed around 400mm of rock along the W and N elevations, the break out got shallower towards the SW corner. The main aim here was to reduce the height of the house on the SW corner, we will be bringing the ground level up to minimise the impact. We also need to strip some rock of the slab area to allow for the 300mm insulation. This week, thanks to an understanding BC officer, ( still waiting for the revised certificate of design to change the building warrant, but he's happy for me to proceed with the old warrant for the time being👍❤️). We made a start preparing. The plan is to shutter the strip foundation. First step was to level the strip with layers of compacted 40mm to dust stone, and also level the bedrock for the slab. Ready for stone looking W Starting on the North trench we barrow in the stone and compact. Adding more stone in layers and compacting, the backhoe loader was doing some of the grunt, but the leveling was all by hand, 100mm layers at time. looking NE Took the decision to build the sub slab to what will be the same level as the strip footing, this allows for the Radon barrier to be put under the strip up the side and then on top of this sub slab, then all services will be above the radon barrier and below the insulation in another layer of compacted hardcore. The main reason for, what will be a fiddly taks of having the radon barrier under the strip, is that the strip footing has 288 starter rebars and sealing these penetrations would be worse. Once the strip is poured we will finish of the back filling and install the radon barrier. More stone looking East So 5 days in me and Mandy have moved levelled and compacted 70T on 40mm to dust. And around 5 ton of quarry dust, this is used up here as an alternative to grit sand for blinding and pipe bedding. The shuttering is 150*50 timber that will be leveled then the radon barrier folded to form a tray, later to be joined to the slab. I'm going to use 6mm threaded rods to link the two shutters together, preventing any spread when the concrete is poured. Hopefully next week the ICF arrives, in I've got a 10 hour round trip to collect rebar. For a tank of fuel and a days driving I can save around £500 collecting from Central rebar in Aloa. For info, £930+ / ton direct Inverness suppliers (100miles away) we're after between 1250 & 1500/ton plus delivery charges ranging from £200 / £350 plus vat.

A perimeter upstand of say 25mm PIR will reduce the conductive heat loss from the slab -> walls -> ground. I'd you're not bothered about this you can just pour to the walls.

2-port buffer all day long, and then you can lose a pump.

No, prob a ban would cut down the workload.

@Sophiae If you make any blunder posts, just 'report' it and a member of staff will pick it up ASAP

Yes that will do it, the guy is basically telling you it uses some oil, quite normal for an old lister or new Hatz engine, and as mentioned above, it will run for ever.

I bought a similar one, with an old lister engine, it just ran and ran. 20l will keep it running all day.😃

A 5l can will keep you going a brave while.

Another option is to make the hole a bit bigger than needed (e.g. if a 12mm bolt, then a 14mm hole), partially fill with anchor resin, then insert bolts and get them perfectly aligned before the resin goes off. I'd say that's the easiest and fastest way. It'll only cost you a tenner for a tube of resin. I'd also consider cutting away a block of the EPS that's slightly bgger than the patch area. I'm assuming you'll be doing this as I doubt the balcony is fixed agains the face of the EPS?

Exactly. I want to mitigate the potential for error by drilling from inside - out. The block has 40mm of 'wall' and then 110mm of concrete, the rest (on the way out of the house as it were) is insulation and so won't be likely to affect the direction of the drill. I've made an exact template of the glass juliet balcony, so all I have to do is to line up the centre lines of the door (currently a suicide door) and the glass balcony: and drill ..... Thanks @pocster, thats the principle I feel like using: mark out using the template fix a decent jig to the wall (the drill-guide as @Conor above suggests) adjust the drill guide for level and direction (torpedo level; thanks @TonyT and @MikeSharp01) take my prayer-mat out, face east drill swear repeat

How are you going to fetch the diesel? I bought a plastic 20L Jerry can for collecting fuel when I had a digger, those were the days I could buy red from a local supplier.

Not everyone has a railway in their garden. So tell more (in a new thread)

I've one of these and it's excellent. Very little play or wobble. Used it to drill precise holes in a stair stinger for metal pole ballusters. There are cheaper versions available. https://www.axminstertools.com/ujk-technology-drill-guide-with-10mm-chuck-106072

Coming out of hibernation after a couple of years 🙂 At the very early stages of thinking about adding PV in some form. As a starting point, any suggestions for suppliers and target price for panels? I'm currently living on a boat, with a 1kw system and LFP battery. I designed and built the whole system and I've get happy with it, but I don't know anything about grid tie etc so I'll have a lot to learn when I move back in to my house...

Any boards that are being taped should alway have a gypsum primer on them

A mist coat is watered down emulsion. Take emulsion add 20% water mix well, paint/roll as you normally would. Next coat full strength emulsion.

Yep. Commonly known as a genie lift, although other brands are also available.

I can support the looking after yourself comment above. I’ve been doing 12 hour plus days on-site 6 days a week since March. I’ve also been training since December for the Cateran Yomp in two weeks (54 mile walk in 24 hours) I am knackered. However good effort in getting going. Well done.

Excellent start. Well done. That sentence stuck out for me. That idea - future proof - was one of our design key ideas. Little did I know at the time that I in a couple of years time, I was going to have two new hips: both done in 6 months. The dual-use bedroom / office built next to the accessible wetroom has made a huge difference. It has (Ithink) speeded up my recovery a good deal. For example, stepping over the bath rim (as would be required in our last house) would have been painful or impossible. And certainly riskier. I think of us as being fairly hard-core selfbuilders. Nowhere near as much so as you are though. For example Keep fit and take enough rest, eh? Almost impossible, I know, but I didn't, and suffered at least a year's delay.

MR board is fine skinned It’s more the joints that need sealing

If it is any consolation, I was disappointed my air test came in at 1.4, though the tester was having kittens saying it was the best one he had yet tested. The building still performs very well, heating usage is exactly in line with what the heat loss calculation says it should be. There are no noticeable draughts and it fits my basic test that on a windy day you can open 1 window or 1 door with no perceivable draught entering or leaving that one open door or window. (previous house with all the plethora of individual extract fans, window trickle vents, cat flat, letter box etc, if you did that there would be a draught blow through and likely an internal door blow open or shut) So although it would have been a "fail" that does not mean it is a bad building and was a waste of time trying or it is going to waste a lot of energy. The flaw in your argument is if you knock down and rebuild you would just employ a specialist to do it all properly. I only know of one timber frame company that will erect a complete frame and guarantee a particular air tightness figure. And that is for the bare shell. You then have to guarantee that all your following trades, plumbers, electricians, even joiners, do not drill holes in your air tightness layer and destroy your good air test. It is a sad reflection on the UK building trade that most tradesmen in the industry don't have a clue about air tightness and think you are being silly when you talk about things like that. You really are best seeing to the detail yourself, you have done a large part of the house already, just carry on. With a rebuild I bet you would either still be doing the detail yourself, or complaining that it has been done wrong and having that same argument.

Water down normal emulsion about 20 to 25% for first coat, same with all plasterboard.

You can set this with ToU . Better still if you add the mod bus interface ( 500 quid ish ) you can control it through HA . I only do it manually so I can adjust per day based on weather , SWMBO , EV charge etc etc . Its all part of the experiment!!

Se and pw both have ‘self consumption’ modes I.e they will charge / discharge to suit demand .pw is in this mode ( don’t think you can disable it ) . Se can be manually set in this mode . If it is they can in certain circumstances’fight’ and steal from each other - this was my issue at the start of this thread . To avoid this we manually charge / discharge se . pw max output sustained is 5kw . More than that it takes from pv then if still not enough grid . If I set se to discharge then a sustained output of 8.6kwh is achieved by their combined outputs

Your builders can hire lifting equipment, from most hire shops that make lifting heavy steel safe and manageable

I was under the impression that he did, but just discovered BCO said everything has to be redone from ground up. He only approved foundation.

http://www.buildingcontrol-ni.com/assets/pdf/TechnicalBookletD2012.pdf

Best make sure the architect didn’t give the SE the wrong info, just in case you go in with guns blazing..

You drill from the outside in…

Ok, don't panic, it's a Saturday night, you can't get any answers from him right now, but s**t happens sometimes. I hope someone can come along and give you better advice, but I agree you need a second opinion. I wish @Gus Potter was around as he's an SE and would give helpful suggestions.

It was a bit of a confusing response but I think we’ve read enough of @pocster’s posts to ‘know’ what he means. It’s just like learning a new language full of Pocsterisms.

I can’t answer this properly, but could the SE have cut and pasted info, or even spec’d the big beam thinking there would be a 1st floor? That’s definitely work checking out…

The main problem is that novice DIY'ers just don't ask the questions they need to, when they need to. I've just been detailing a window and door installation for a client and the window fitter wanted to frame-fix everything. Let's just say that he is now using the correct manufacturer-specified fixings, and they're not being fixed within 20mm of the face of the ICF core!! Client pays me to oversee / act as a sounding board for whatever he doesn't know, and we can (usually) iron out these creases whilst the job is still on paper. A quick sketch from your builder would have shown the sections and you could have then said "STOP", and then done a re-work. Steel beams deflect, and the sliders themselves will expand, so that is another important detail, but this does sound OTT, listening from afar.

Already made the decision to go with the faster flow rate before peer pressure kicked in!

An update and a milestone. Each week I log all my meter readings, import usage, PV generation, ASHP consumption etc. Today, entering the figures into my spreadsheet revealed that I have self used £1499.79 worth of electricity since installing the PV. That has taken 4 years and 16 weeks to achieve that. It's all free now baring equipment breakdowns, That is shorter than the initial estimate of 6 years, due to the higher cost of electricity now. If electricity had been as high as it is now right from the start, payback would have been just 2 1/2 years. Starting to think of an addition to the system now.........

Enjoying flux 35p ( ish ) for 52kwh = £ 18.20 When you factor in the ‘earnings ‘ , the fact it’s powering your house , charging an EV ( only 4000 miles per yr ) . ROI ( as some of you are obsessed with that ) gets considerably better .

Living life on the edge. But its not as bad as looks really, more a 45 degree slope.

Hi. Just surround the pipe with acoustic rockwool and box in with plasterboard. Use foam to seal at the floor and ceiling, patching in with plasterboard if the gaps are "major". Foam all round a soil pipe really amplifies the sound, as I did one that went down through a B&B lobby once and it was noisier than with just a boxing around it. Got swapped out for rockwool.

I have never been sold on this type of design. I think there has to be compromises along the way. I suspect they were originally designed for sub 40 m2 flats in Tokyo, rather than larger detached houses in Scotland. Below is the heat profile of my very basic cylinder. The heating element is at the base, the heating window is limited to 1AM to 7AM. Generally I have finished using lost of hot by 9AM, then it is minor stuff and a shower in the evening (I work the later shifts). You can see that the cylinder 'settles out' by 10AM and then gradually cools during the rest of the day (there is usage in this time) So short of 'churning up' the water, there is little headroom to draw of a constant low temperature for space heating, without reducing the DHW temperature. Note that the bottom of the cylinder is about 18°C by 10AM. But while it is being heated it get to about 42°C (probably higher as all the probes are just taped to the exterior pipework/copper cylinder, except the cold supply with is in the loft tank water itself, why it rises a bit during the day, ~1.4°C, since the mid Feb, so will rise more as the year gets on). So if you look at the mean temperature line, most of the day it is only 30°C, which gives you about 100 litres of water holding about 2 kWh of energy. Now the temperature of the whole cylinder can be raised until the top is sitting at around 65°C, but the bottom will still be at around 18°C or so, that would be a mean of 42°C, so the bottom half is only 12°C higher, not enough to make much difference (shade under 4 kWh). These calculation do assume perfect stratification, which does not happen. It is also late, so my sums may be wobble, and I have broken my glasses, so even @Onoff is starting to look good.

Laminated glass will be etched BS EN 14449, toughened BS EN 12150

That work for me also ????

As incredible as it sounds when I was a teenager I would go with my dad on jobs ( yes I learnt nothing ) . Once I recall at airbus we had to core a 3 metre hole ( tunnel more like ) at a specific angle through reinforced concrete . Rig bolted to wall . Drill back then was mofo heavy and needed 2 of us to get it up there . Took our time ( water pumped to the tip ) . Would have taken a few hours . But we took all day so my old man could charge 3k ! - that must of been 35 yrs ago . But no one else could achieve that and certainly not at that price . It was super specialised gear at the time . I got paid 30 quid 🙄🤣

Was that the kit that drilled those holes into the vault for the Hatton Garden job?

Sorry to hear you are going through this. Good advice and professionals at the design stage really are crutcial to a good building project. I think the people you have hired are all crap though, architect, builder, SE and 'project manager' You will have to live with these decisions for a long time so make sure it's right. Consider using a different SE, there are options and solutions for everything. Your SE might be some bozo just punching numbers into a program and coming up with these huge beams.