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Around 11 months ago, we started from a stripped site, the treatment plant was in and running the cabins / static so drainage just required connecting up. we had to wait for the warrant to be amended (change to the certificate of deign) this held us back ma month or so until the BCO just said "get on with it, we can sort that later"- top guy!! If we had waited for the amended certificate of design we would still be building, it took him 5 months to get it to us. I've documented most of the build in blogs on here, partly to have a refence to remember the process, partly as pay back to Buildhub for the inspiration and pointers in the planning / design stage. I'm so glad I spent hours looking at and reading others blogs that we made the switch to ICF. I'm convinced there is no way I would have achieved the efficiency I have for the money spent. Budget was always tight, so some decisions have been made due to Hobson's choice, leading to triple glazed UPVC windows and composite doors. The front door, south facing GRP Composite with low threshold and a slim glass panel leaks with 40mph winds, this leaks through the gazing cassette, and the low threshold. as I know we wont use this door much, we went for a slam lock, another mistake, it blows a gale through. To be fair the company are re making, I'm just not sure if there re-making the panel or the full door, I did ask, if they were remaking the full door to change to standard handle and lock, so it can be adjusted to minimise the drafts. we will see what happens, a full door replacement will mean taking off the reveals in side so a complete PITA, but worth it for no drafts. We had the airtightness test carried out, and they used the front door for the blower door to mitigate any issues with that door. I had put caps in the MVHR. so he just cracked on, the back door is not perfect again due to the low threshold. He didn't seal the blower door to the frame, not sure what the procedure is but seemed a little frustrating. We achieved 0.88 Air permeability, which I'm very happy with, budget wise we didn't spend hundreds on airtightness tape, just designed good solutions, and the doors leak a bit . Our As built EPC came back at A103 , with a possibility of A128.. the report say A105 if we install Thermal Solar EST saving of £40 pa , and A128 with a wind turbine EST saving of £1100 pa, so pretty much the best we could hit. To finish we need to sort out some paths outside, ramp, and the rain water pond, but other than the second bedroom need decorating the house is done. Next week we will hopefully get building control around to see what he 'needs' to get a completion cert. I'm hoping for some flexibility on the ramp and pond, . We need the VAT refund to pay for this stuff. We are working our way through the invoices, but we built for less the 90K and we still need the VAT refund. I've enjoyed it all, and we both agree we have a home. Good luck to all of you with your current builds.

We have used a 2kW bio ethanol fire for the last three winters now. It lives in the lounge, on the coffee table. Of an evening if there’s a nip in the air we light it for 30-40 mins with the lounge door partially closed. It quickly warms the room (not the whole house) and the room stays cosy for the rest of the evening. The more open plan your house is the less effective it will be. We’ve probably used it a dozen or more times so far this winter, more than previous winters due to the distinct lack of sunshine. It’s in no way a replacement for the beautiful Clearview stove we had in our old house but it does what is required of it, it has a real flame, it doesn’t create any ash or need cleaning and I’m not spending loads of my spare time harvesting, chopping storing and fetching timber. It’s also hundreds or thousands of pounds cheaper than an installed passive standard log burner (that most likely wouldnt get a great deal of use). We wouldn’t change a thing. We get ours from Amazon.

Just a very short blog to show the windy roost ( not fully finished, is a self build ever?) plant room. I'm quite chuffed I got it all to fit, and I think it's quite neat. It's full DIY and house's the UVC and combined buffer, UFH manifold, MVHR unit, inverter, consumer unit, network hub. All in 4M³. Plus storage to come. Yes, the printer doesn't fit, but it's coming to its end of life so that's all it's getting for now. Jobs to do: Ceiling Insulate MVHR ducting / box in Shelves on the left hand side Clothes Airer ( a Scottish requirement to have one)

Not missing anything there that is exactly what they did for us .

Another one here who used the Melton via a broker and found them easy to deal with, if you get them on board now as @Conorsaid they will stump up 80% of the plot purchase on completion leaving you with more than enough to get you deep into your build before you need another release of funds .

Care to post an example? Can you get it in sensible size quantities. I ask because we have a spirit burning stove on our boat and we currently burn meths which stinks. I would like to find an alternative fuel for it that has no smell, and is available in larger bottles than the usual silly little 500ml meths bottles. And preferably cheaper than that (hence wanting to buy in larger quantity)

Build is 157m2 internal with a detached double garage. Budgeting around 2k / m2, but hoping my Brother in Law who has just completed his 280m2 build for just over £1200/m2 can help me. I am quite fortunate that plumbing / electrics / roofing / carpentry trades are available in the family.

Looked into this a few years ago - getting ethanol was a problem for me - also heat output, despite being small was a problem if I recall!! Looked into LED alternatives but nothing like a real fire!!

thats what it is now really I have to construct a "fire pond " below and to the left of it

I've had one solar thermal panel connected to my heat pump return line, and heat meter, produced 17kWh over the winter so far. Will be taking it down in the spring, waste of space.

This guy who’s been sending me emails has been covering this surveyor who has “30 years” of experience. They don’t even accept that they the surveyor measured it wrong.

Your UFH (pump and manifold) is effectively on a close coupled tee. The heat source just circulates around a loop, which is the cross piece and the piping above it on either side, the UFH pump pulls from the circulation loop and deposits back to the loop from the UFH returns, without affecting the duty of the heat source circulation pump. It provides a means of hydraulic separation as you have no mixer valve in the system.

I like that they insist on you pointlessly installing insulated ducting under your insulated slab but they gleefully dump untreated sewage into our rivers and seas.

I haven't used these people, but I am currently in discussions with them. They seem to know their stuff. https://www.buildstore.co.uk/mortgages-finance

as @Conor says, self build mortgage is the way to go, we used Melton Mowbray via a specialist self build mortgage broker (https://www.mayflowermortgage.co.uk/).

If you have FPP, a self build mortgage provider will lend based on the theoretical final value, and release funds based on current value of the plot. So say 80% of £350k is £280k. Draw that down, build to the next substantial phase, get another valuation, draw down again. Ultimately all depends on you meeting the lender's requirements. I recommend Ecology, it's who we used, and this is how we managed the funding of our build. How big a house are you planning? £300k for everything from design to finish isn't much these days unfortunately. Depending on where you are, budget a min of £2k/m2.

It's a sort of automatic bypass. I assume this is on a heat pump which are usually very picky about a minimum flow rate so it has unhindered flow from the heat pump, and when the manifold pump wants some heat, the pump will suck it out of the flow pipe.

You should be able to ask your LPA CIL people to verify that site clearance won't cause you any CIL problems. *Ensure you have your plans exactly as you want them* - you might find it difficult or impossible to change them in future without jeopardising your self-build CIL exemption.

Hi @AppleDown I have had a quick look at your spreadsheet. I am Apple device so it opens in numbers this should not effect the following information though. In the Window and Door data input, columns P and Q measured width and sash you have mixed up the measurements probably m and mm so you have an extremely small window. In the calculations table you should see some figures in the daytime equivalent area once you have change to mm Changing this on my spreadsheet by some random numbers seems to fix the problem. Good luck

Yes you can swap the fixings once the hollobolt (big Rivnut) has been set.

There was, fortunately, and the solenoid from it seems to have fixed the problem. Boiler has been cycling on and off on its thermostat ever since. Beats me how a coil of wire on a former can be quite so unreliable, it's not exactly new technology. Might cut the old one open when I have a spare moment. Two of the four installer people who came for a further site visit this morning are expecting additions to their families, so now it has been put back until April. Funny this was not known about when the dates were put in the diary in December.

Yes, they're very badly designed and made. I've never been sure whether that style is actually mandated for the water main entry to your premises. If you think you might need to use it in a hurry sometime in the future, and you're reasonably sure what it stops, then sure. If not for your for you mains entry, I would replace with a ball valve though, they're much better. e.g. https://www.screwfix.com/p/pegler-ball-valve-blue-15mm/11085 For the mains, I usually put a ball valve immediately downstream of the stopcock and use that in preference to the old-style stopcock. Or an MDPE Plasson fitting if it comes in as MDPE pipe.

Can't view flame but I can hear the burner stop firing a few seconds before it locks out so my suspicions are on the solenoid. Startup and shut-down timings are OK so I don't suspect photocell or control box. Don't think it is meant to try re-lighting on flame failure outside of the startup sequence. No problems with voltage dips and there is no hydraulic bypass. Will see if there is an old pump in the garage.

Agreed, although at 8mm thickness there won't be much deformation unless you go mad with the torque wrench Simon, they wouldn't need to be welded in place, so not too difficult to do if you can get inside the box section (just a bit fiddly perhaps)

Add floor level sensors that bring a light on at its dimmest setting or a floor level light.

Yes welcome to THE builders forum, lots of real life expertise here, bring on the questions and good luck 👍.

Good morning and welcome, sounds like a great project

Final update Been faffing about in the background, to get the house heating and summer house heating to work together, one is high inertia (thick screed UFH) and one very low inertia (low volume fan coil). Final solution is, have dumped WC altogether and now flow set to a fixed demand temp of 35. That suits the fan coil in the garden room and a slow batch charge of the floor. Observation the heat demand of 35, the discharge temp from the heat pump never actually gets to 35 for the 10 to 12 hrs it runs, at the moment. Most days it gets to about 33 by the end of the heating cycle. Zero cycling occurs, except for defrosts. There are two thermostats, one in house and one in the garden room. The house thermostat can call for heat and changes set point of an electronic UFH mixing valve, the garden room thermostat can call for heat. The electronic mixer valve in the house, is selectable to two different adjustable set points, currently set to either 35 Degs or 27 Degs. The 35 Deg set point ensures mixer is fully open and zero mixing occurs. The system volume isn't large enough to support the heat pump driving a single fan coil on its own, so the house floor is always available to act as buffer via the 27 set point on the mixer valve. Batch charging is simply controlled by a single room thermostat, with a hysterisis set to 0.1 - at 00:30 it is set to 20.5 (starts heating if at or below 20.4), at 07:30 it is set to 20 (switches heating off when above 20.1) and at 12:00 it is set 19.5, makes sure heating doesn't restart. DHW heating is timed to allow heating any time between 1pm and midnight.

No it's fine. The reason they did it in the first place is because carpet is stretched and held in place with grippers. If they cut the carpet you'd have to lay need grippers and restretch the carpet. Obviously this is the 'right' way to do it, but really, a layer of carpet beneath a non-structural stud wall isn't going to cause any problems and it saved hundreds of pounds of work. Equally, leaving it there is fine. The new carpet fitters will install new grippers alongs the walls and install the new carpets normally.

and I thought my idea to build a 4' high wall with local sandstone that we dug up for our basement was a big task! 😱

Wow that’s a mammoth wall (like the rest on your site). At least you have plenty of stone 🤷‍♂️

My experience of the county court is that it is, like planning, a bit of a flaky enterprise and depends a lot on the individual judge. So, don't read a single data point as gospel. The judges are, apparently district judges (i.e. junior) (rather than lay magistrates) and therefore qualified as either solicitors or barristers. But a single person makes the judgement and they might not have any practical skills or relevant experience or know how to read a drawing. But...these are low monetary value cases, often with unrepresented members of the public or maybe one side represented by a solicitor, often done and dusted in 1/2h to an hour or two. They're most unlikely to go to appeal, so not much oversight. I think there's a lot of scope for the judge's personal opinion rather than a strict reading of contract or consumer law. Also, don't underestimate the impact of the 'final notice' or 'letter before action' and the initial court papers with shortish timescales for reply. Those concentrate the recipients attention and they therefore force the recipient to decide (a) do we want to contest and (b) do we want to invest the time, energy and money required to contest. I think that 50-75% of recipients will fold or negotiate a mutually agreeable solution at that point. Tick the box for mediation to demonstrate how wonderfully reasonable you are and how much you are trying not to waste the judge's time. And that's then another hassle for the recipient and another few hoops for them to jump through. Meanwhile you want to get your job done. Give the supplier one last opportunity to address the problem for free or cheap, then order from another supplier and start the court process with the original. Unusually for UK red tape, the process is about as painless as it can be. You can file your case in 10 minutes if you've done it before, 25 if you haven't. It'll take a while to conclude, 6 to 9 months, if it goes the whole distance - but it often doesn't need to.

I remember the day when I instructed my labourer to fill in all the holes in the joist hangers with twist nails. I told him that if he ran out there was another bag of nails in the shed. He got the wrong bag and despite nailing a hundred or so twist nails continued with galvanised roofing nails. He will remember the day he had to pull them all out again.

Installation Update So as my previous post had mentioned, I ended up going down the MCS approved route. After starting the installation yesterday then getting hit by heavy rain today, the install team are picking back up next week to finish everything off. I've not actually seen the progress with my own eyes yet as I'm living off site, however I've attached a photo sent to me by my Missus who passed in her car after the first day. So what did I end up with? 8x Black 420w PV panels (mounted 'in-roof') 3.6kW Hybrid invertor 8.2kWh battery Including the paperwork, registering and fitting it cost me just shy of £10k. **Insert Gasp Here** Yeah, I made that noise too. Although we've not finished the installation yet, let me just explain a few reasons why I went down this route and what I'd do if I did it again in the future. In the end I was hit by 2 storms during our build whilst already 2 months behind schedule. To make matters worse the roof installation got pushed along so much that it was split in half by the festive period with absolutely dire weather on top of the storms. My original plan was for my roofer to install the trays and for myself (with my electricians help) to install the panels. My electrician would then crack on with the other parts of the install that are inside the house. The problem is the timelines were all completely knocked out of sync. I didn't have the time to do my part due to work commitments and my electrician isn't due for another week on site. The roof, while exposed and not even felted yet, was then battered in the storms (A bit of wood nearly speared itself through my neighbours car!). So, I was forced to get a company involved which removed the burden from my other tradesmen who were already quite literally under the weather. Would I do it differently? Absolutely. Yes. I've still got a sour taste in my mouth because I'd have been able to save around £3k from my calculations if I was to do it all myself. I'd have then used that money to install a immersion tank to pre-warm water going through my boiler and reduce my gas bills (something I've planned space in for as a future upgrade). It was a tough pill to swallow going down this route but we're nearly there now I suppose! Hopefully these posts help others in the future much like everyone's replies have helped me. If I remember, I'll be back with an update once the system is all up and running to give any final verdicts!

I can't think how the website has any bearing on how good they are as builders. Some of the best builders I know are semi-literate.

We had a small plot and didn't have room for a drainage field, so we were going to have a deepbore soakaway. The deepbore soakaway turned into a 47m deep well, so we needed another solution. The neatest solution for our needs that we could find, and was acceptable to the BCO, was a Klargester reedbed system. We used the supplied reeds for a year or so but they were very vigorous. We were told we could use irises instead of reeds as they had suitable rhizome root systems and grew less than half the height of the reeds. We never considered willows as they would not have been suitable for the reedbeds we had.

Yes but they tick the looney greenie boxes

All those restrictors are self-defeating anyway. Tiny volume of water doesn't flush the loo properly so gets flushed two or more times. Pathetic shower doesn't rinse off suds so longer is spent with the water running. 🙄

Ha, my BCO looked at my huge bath and said “you know that does not meet building regs but if I make you change it you will only put it back again afterwards!” And moved on…..

Skip loader taking afternoon nap. Volvo still upright. Haven't got my knee down on a digger for 30 plus year's