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Over the last couple of months we have made steady progress. But, I've been very remiss in taking photos. Last time I posted we were busy building up the walls in phase 1. It's now ready for the lintels, which we waiting a month to be delivered. This one requires some blockwork changes as the overhang is over a block joint. This is the inside looking North looking down over the valley. This is the outside looking in, again some block changes needed. We used thermally broken IG lintels, which were on a 4 week lead time so to fill some of the time we have been prepping for phase 2. We realised we didn't have enough space for concrete lorries and storing the spoil so we moved the soil spoil heap further into the field. This doesn't look much, but it took 3 days and countless repeats of load dumper, move and tip, and repeat !!!! We've also moved into one of the horses winter fields, but we will return to a field when we've finished. Apart from putting block on block and repeat we've bought a few items at auction. We got some windows that are exactly the same model as we are ordering, maybe not the exact size, but we can make them fit. Of course the cill will be replaced. We also got a lovely sink for the utility room. For the first time in months we are dry on site, not sure how long it will last. At the moment I'm trying to order the posi-rafters for phase 1, but I need some input on a beam from the SE who is being very un-responsive. We've realised that we have a beam on our SE drawings which say 'B3' and no details. He initially responded saying it could be either an RSJ or a flitch beam, but that was 2 weeks ago. I was told last week that the rafters are also on 4 weeks lead time. Once we have those then we will be putting some of the barn roofing on as a temporary measure as we'll get the whole build roofed at the same time. I'm horrified at how little we seem to have done, but as I'm no longer working at home I think the work force (hubby) may be slacking 🙂 More soon, when I have some proper progress to show. Jill

Yes.. some of that mesh looks really conjested. I would send some photos to your SE before pouring and make sure they are happy with the layout. You'll need to be right on the ball with the concrete compaction. Scottish BC may ask for photos of the rebar.. if they don't match up with the SE's design you may have a problem! Be safe and get approval for this now from the SE and then you can sleep soundly!

Just Bloody Do It.

Back in action. Finished the second coat outside, and got started on the inside today. Three bags of lime left, but I'm out of sand. I can either get as much as I need in 25kg bags for ~£50, or get another whole bulk bag for ~£60. I'm very slightly short of all sorts of things right now, which is a bit of a pain. I did clean the lime off the bubble window ^^.

On our site we put some scalps down by the existing gate, otherwise it would turn into a quagmire when parking there. Checked with CIL people first as although we have OPP for the plot we can't start anything until full PP in place. They were happy with this. The OPP included moving entrance to site. Also checked with planning department and they were happy for us to do this.

+1001 BC are not interested in that. We formed the entrance, got services connected and the static caravan on site before we even started on the building warrant.

If it has planning that is locked in because the development is clearly "started" then just go ahead and create the entrance using the details on the plans that are already approved. THEN think about a new planning application, knowing you can still fall back on the existing "started" application if that is refused.

From the second photo, it would seem you are replacing an existing gate. JFDI 😁

Hello everyone! I am writing from Italy. I decided to register because I found a lot of valuable information in this forum, nothing that I could find elsewhere. by the way congrats for the forum and thanks for having accepted my registration. I am not a professional builder, my job is more in cyber security of vehicles and I studied maths before that. With my family we live in a house where we recently did extensive renovations. This is a high efficiency house with electric heating, solar panels and insulation of the walls. in many cases I like and need to figure out what’s is the cause of the issues sometime happening in the house. Here in Italy it is difficult to find personnel with a level of expertise high enough to manage complex systems.. thanks again and happy holidays

Hi All Been registered here a long time, but first time posting so I thought Id do an introduction. We are refurbing a house we have been living in for 20 years. We've completely moved out, back to brick 1850s house, and im going down the eco route. Internal wood fibre insulation onto a lime plaster base, then im actually thinking about the breathaboard system inside that if i can get any), all UFH downstairs with foamglass base and dry tile UFH build up. Wood fibre in our roof (new one has been fitted), and passivhaus rated doors where we are replacing them. Im aiming for Enerphit (without doing any calcs) for insulation and airtightness and will just see how far we get. Project managing ourselves, with a builder to do the really big stuff, who is really great but he doesnt understand insulating to Enerphit standards, which im finding difficult. Taken us 3 years so far, with another 2 or 3 to go possibly Thats us Mark

I’ve not been able to hold off our very patient buyers any longer So we are moving in on Thursday Last time we had all the internals finished and it was the middle of winter Seam to have been more delays with materials this time At least we’ve come in under budget Though twelve months ago that wasn’t looking likely

It’s internal in a heated space. Why do you want to insulate it?

I thought I recognised that picture from around 2018. It was cobbled together connections for the EASHP condensate and the water softener regeneration outflows. It was a standard swept T junction with threaded male end with a reducer with threaded male end. I just searched for female threaded spigots to fit the pipes I had. IIRC they were smaller than washing machine waste fittings.

Yes that was my advise.

Lay the pipe as shallow as possible. You can go to 1:110 so your 30m run would have about 275mm fall. If invert at the start is -250mm, this will give an invert at the soakaway of -525mm assuming ground is level at 0mm.

The cost tariff but confuses me are you saying at -10 you only run the heat pump for a couple of hours? If you are only running on a set tariff period I would check your programmes to check what's occurring. If your system has cooled to sub zero temperature it will take hours to recover. That's why it's pump cold water around. Things to check crankcase heaters, if the crankcase isn't warm no start. In sub zero temps don't switch it to standby or off. Cosy isn't really designed for heat pumps (heat pumps and battery yes) running for short bursts is no use .

For the last couple of years, every time I've finish a box of pozis, I've replaced them with the torx equivalent. They're just so much more pleasant to use.

Yes I have come across a family member in this situation, she does not require a PWA but has received a letter telling her she does and they will act for her.

And for mass take up of renewables like heat pumps and solar PV someone really really needs to give all the DNO's a kick up the whatsit and make it their problem to upgrade the grid rather than saying no you can't have. Take away the hostility that people like me would face if they wanted more PV for example.

The electric car thing. We are being told they are just as good as an ICE car and we should all have one. Just 2 problems with that. First they are NOT as "good" in some respects because range and charging times limit their use compared to almost instant refuelling of an ICE car, and they are even more hopeless if you want to tow something. The "sales pitch" needs to be more honest, they are just as good for many users that don't do long journeys or tow anything, but be HONEST that they are not a drop in replacement that will suit all uses. And if you answer that with "they will get better" then that just reinforces my point, they are not yet ready for all users so why buy a pre production development model? And secondly they are just too expensive, most people like me could not afford one even if I wanted one.

Bear in mind that as soon as you serve a Party Wall notice you will be liable for the fees of your surveyor plus those of the adjoining owner. In any case you will be liable for any damage. If you do the work without serving a notice the only recourse the adjoining owner has is to issue a High Court injunction. If they are not successful with the injunction they will be liable for your fees and expenses in defending it so quite a gamble if they are not sure of winning.

If using nails use ring shank.

If we all adopted “. I will when they do”. Attitude then nothing will ever get done.

That is quite a bold statement. China does have high emissions, but they are the wields largest manufacturing nation, so we really need to account for the embodied CO2e on their exports. As they did not start industrialising until the 1970s, their accumulative CO2e is still way lower than the UKs. This is important because the gasses stay in the atmosphere for decades, and in the case if carbon dioxide, centuries. China is also the largest installer of renewable technologies. So rather that blame everyone else, take some personal responsibility and change your habits.

Apologies for updating a couple of older topics but if you're like me and have been diligently combing through old threads for nuggets of wisdom, the following might be helpful. Short version, out of three scenarios (pipes at 19mm centres below surface of slab, at 50mm centres below surface of slab, and pinned to the insulation); the pipes at 19mm give the best performance, but obviously very close to the surface (~79.2 W/m²) the pipes at 50mm showed a small decrease in performance against those at 19mm (~75.1 W/m²) the pipes pinned to the insulation showed a much larger performance hit (~56.2 W/m²) So when considering in-slab UFH and choosing between tied to rebar or pinned to the insulation, tied to the rebar will win from a performance perspective every time. Longer version, in Imperial measurements (US-based author) https://www.pmengineer.com/ext/resources/PME/2019/July/014-017-pme-0719_siggy.pdf

I am another that had no written contract with my builder, just an estimate, and an open ended contract ("carry on until I say stop") This worked probably because I knew and trusted the builder. I was kept informed as they progressed how the bill was mounting up and I paid instalments due on time. When it became apparent my old house was not going to sell quick we moved onto "plan b" and took over the build ourselves. By this point we had a wind and watertight shell and I have been doing the rest myself. Taking much longer, but it enables me to keep a lid on spending and only spend at the rate we can afford. Because I had a good relationship with the builder, was honest with them from the start about finances, and kept them informed, then when the time came to part, that parting was amicable to the point I know when I am ready to get them to do some more work, they will do so.

Just to add that you're very far from being alone - going unexpectedly over-budget seems to be something that hits a lot of self-builders, even some of the most prepared. In our case we managed to afford to get the house built so it was secure, we weren't prepared to cut corners on what we wanted (this is planned to be our last ever home), so I ended up doing far more work myself than originally planned and we still ran out of money. I've spent the last two years only doing work when I've been able to save some money from my pension, so it's been very slow going, and that delay has cost us a lot of money in interest payments, council tax on two houses, etc. All I can say is that you will get over this, and with luck you will get the house you want. As a final point, I would like to add that I think that some of the TV shows about self-build have a lot to answer for, in that they often seem to play down the true cost, and make self-build look like a more affordable option than it often is. My personal view is that they rarely, if ever, give the true cost of most of the builds they show, and that may well mislead a lot of people.

Join the queue, Jude, join the long line. It's so long in fact I can't see you way down there at the back. Let's keep it simple. Turn the guilt into determined useful behaviour ; that was then, now is now. Forgive yourself. Move on. Take cost control into your hands. That means hard work on both your your parts; OH and you. Break the job down into chunks that are meaningful to you. Get a price for those. Make sure the price is agreed. Take notes, and share them with the trades person. Do not allow the trades to ' .... It'll be Ok, I'll get you a better price for that ... ' find out how much before mandating the work. You hate your rental . Move. Caravan? You won't be the first or last to do that. Communication; Very brave of you to be that honest and open. It's not an option to load one party with appropriate levels of responsibility. Being over-stressed at work is normal. Face it, own it, do something about it. Take control. Keep coming back to us all. Ian

Really sorry to hear this but it must be a relief to start discussing the issue with someone even if only on here for now. Hopefully the support you will get here will help you to put everything into perspective and understand how you can tackle the issue going forward. Then when you have everything straight in your head you can sit down with the hubby, explain the problem clearly and have some idea how you can move forward and take back some control. Some good advice above and I can't add much to it other than to say that I think the majority of self builders go through a budget wobble (or 2!) sometime during the build and have to take action to address so you are not alone by any means so don't go beating yourself up over it. The good thing is that you are tackling this before you get in any deeper. As others have said look for areas where you can economise and use this forum to seek advice on where to obtain the best prices for x and y. There are plenty of people on here with experience who will be able to advise how you can cut costs in specific areas without ending up with something not fit for purpose. Also don't rule out scanning the selling sites on Facebook, Gumtree or eBay for materials. You won't be able to claim the VAT back unless they are a VAT registered seller of course but if people have items left over from a project for example it can be much cheaper to source them that way anyway. The most important thing is to try to stay positive and to do what you need to take back control. You will feel much better having done so and it won't help anyone at all if you keep things to yourself and remain stressed to death. Keep talking, it helps x

I so know how you feel. I had the same although we did not use a main contractor but a project manager and trades. PM was in charge of budgets. Costs spiralled out of control and by the time we realised we were too far in to stop a lot of it........I say we I kept it to myself too, nearly caused me a breakdown by the time I eventually did come clean to OH situation was even worse. he was an absolute angel about it all, didn't change the horror of it but at least he didn't blame me. We got there in the end massively over budget and not all from over spending on items a huge amount was waste and mistakes and doing things over again....I didn't know most of what was going on.......like you we are useless at practical things and health does not permit either. He never wanted to build the house it was all me. Its a very hard lesson and I came out of it feeling broken by the experience. No one to blame but me. If you are at a stage you can pull back on some things then look closely, I was afraid of PM due to my ignorance, don't be afraid to confront your builder, I should have done it...and sacked him. Take back control you will feel better for it lots of helpful people to support you here. Good luck.

Ok take a breather and have a sit down with the builder and explain to him that as costs are starting to spiral you want to be more involved in this aspect. From now on you want prices for each part that is to be completed. As in for a basic finish, a med quality finish and a top quality finish. Then you pick the winner. You can't always go for the top quality no matter how much you want it if the budget is tight. Nothing is too be done without you signing of on it. This esp applies to all the lovely extras that the builder might be suggesting. Thing's like your plug sockets for example are easy changed further down the line. Same goes with light fittings, internal doors and handles, tiles, flooring etc. Loads of jobs can be done cheap and revisited in a few years Do out a spreadsheet of the list of jobs that need done and how much you have left out of the budget to do these tasks. I would also be asking how he was so much out on the costings for the garage. What has caused this near double in price difference?? It doesn't really matter if your husband doesn't want to hear it but you are going to have to explain it to him and both of you pull together to get the house finished. A simple look listen the build costs are starting to spiral but I reckon if we use the costings in this spreadsheet and make a few sacrifices on a few things I still believe we can do it. Don't be all doom and gloom.

“At its simplest level, there is nothing to stop one member of the forum offering to loan money, on whatever terms they happen to agree, to another member. “ this is what this forum is, a talking place to exchange ideas and get to know people. If those people want to help each other it’s up to them. I have gained soooooo much knowledge from all you guys over the last few years and thank you one and all.

Would you please straighten up the picture of the stag?

Welcome. (Looking forward to something powered by radon!)