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That will offset China's New 70GW plants built in 2023.... AT least we in the UK can feel smug that were clean while half the population can choose to freeze or starve to death.

Another beautiful week in Cornwall only 7mm of rain on the Sunday The week starts with laying the soil pipes then it was sand, hardcore, burying the soil pipes, laying the radon barrier, mesh and more concrete for the slab leaving a lovely surface to start the ICF walls next week. And the field was cut and baled, not as much as a normal September cut due to us moving our spoil down to the far field and tramping the grass down and making a very very muddy gateway between our two fields. Nether the less it was 10 bales for our friendly farmer Rob. Total man days of labour week 3 is 9 man days Cost to date Brought forward from blog Building Regs, Part O and SAP £14625 Refund from Architect £300 Fee to LABC for inspections £600 Foundations Weeks 1 to 3 £30,000 Total to date £44925

Hi all I'm plumsnson. I'm planning to mostly DIY renovate my home with the ambition to retrofit in a high degree of airtightness and energy efficiency. I have some experience retrofitting IWI, UFH and full renovation to a small flat, and helping a friend retrofit insulate slab for UFH & doing his bathroom etc. I enjoy learning about building science and since this house needs substantial renovation regardless, and is small, I want to attempt a high standard for air & insulation - I need to look more in to EnerPHit but if the house performs well it'd be nice to test & accredit if this is affordable. I envisage this will involve retrofit insulation (likely EWI with a vapour open outer) with thermal bridges addressed, unbroken airtightness layer inside, MHRV from loft space, thermal store in loft space, heat pump, UFH, south facing roof solar, and air tight wood stove (shoot me). So should be easy. I know there is a wealth of experience and knowledge on this forum and we can advance collective knowledge through open sharing, so thanks for having me. BG: I've moved my family in to an odd little 1920s built house, end of a terrace of 4. 2 stories, hip roof. They have a steel frame, posts in corners and one in middle that halves the span of the first floor. I've not yet uncovered how the wall top-plates are constructed. Floor is one half suspended timber with only 200mm void below to hardcore, other half concrete. Ground floor walls are block inner (awful crumbly garbage), 50mm empty cavity, brickwork outer. First floor is single skin block with battens and tile outer! Brick chimney breast, 1 fireplace downstairs, 2 upstairs.

Despite the yellow weather warning we luckily had the coastal wind pushing it away, most of it fell on Tuesday but only 6mm The trench foundations are excavated and inspected. Then the concrete poured, and the first blocks laid followed by dolly blocks and internal supporting wall starter blocks Total man days of labour for week 2 is 13

Just electrics and air test to do . When bco signs it off - what do you actually get ? A magic form called what ??

We've had to keep this a big secret. About 2 years ago, we were approached by Channel 4, asking us if we wanted to feature on Grand Designs. Like many of us on here, having watched the show a lot, and seeing how they typically go, we immediately said 'no' 😂 . After a fair bit of discussion, we came round to the idea, as we thought it would be a nice professionally produced story of our self-build, and so here we are. You can catch our full story and how it all went, on Wednesday 2nd October, Channel 4, 9pm. And for a sneak peak, you can see what we've been building on our Instagram: @thefoxesmaltings

Flooring started to go on today. I had to pre-insulate the floor round the edges where the wall sits on top as this will not be accessible later on. I used hemp insulation here as it was the closest to wood fiber I could get at short notice in the sizes I need

Do you know about profiles for your blockwork ends/ corners. if your 1st floor is in it’s easy to make some 4x2 upright at the exact location of the wall ends, simple screw into some scrap timber and plumb up and fix to the floor joists. you can then mark your blockwork gauge or height on this timber and slide your string line up a course as you go.

And once cheap grid-scale batteries are available, they'll install those (no nimbys to slow them down), and their renewables will really come into their own.

I go 2100mm off FFL. A little thing I sometimes do is pick the frames up the thickness of the tile, wood floor etc so you can slip it under rather than cut around frames, architrave etc. I also lay wood and tile floors before skirting and again leave a 10mm gap between skirting and concrete for carpets to slip under. Are you using wall starters to tie in to exterior walls or have ties been left out to tie into? If the later your best following block courses best can. I’d also run some 100mm dpc under first course. Off FFL should be 9 block and a brick to box lintel. Upto FFL you could do your course of 100mm marmox and 2 course of brick bedded up slightly to get to FFL.

>>> My only concern is storage Nice design. Looks like you have ample room for a big shed once you've filled up the loft space in the garage. 😀 Put up a picture of the view to make us jealous?

You get peace of mind that it is all finished to their satisfaction and they are not going to hound you or demand you change something that is non compliant etc. And it means there will be no big issues should you choose to sell. And for a lot of people it is the magic bit of paper needed to submit your VAT reclaim.

Personally, for the hassle factor I would always go Plasson. You will find that as soon as you get away from bog standard fittings (and 32mm is just starting to get non-standard) that the prices vary wildly - so you need to shop around and ask for discounts and be prepared to order on-line and wait. This isn't B&Q stuff anymore.

is it full bore? some valves are smaller than the pipes they fit to and can cause headloss. Also, some are designed for outdoor use, and others indoor only. Also things like integrated non-return (check) valves.

Very pleased with ours, although I imagine there isnt mutch to choose between most of the different manufacturers to be honest. For what its worth my parents have a mitsubushi which is also good but in my opinion is slightly louder than ours (ironically they couldn't have a panasonic as the spec sheet says its too loud!) and the controller even less user friendly.

For anyone who was following this thread some months ago. A few weeks ago my old cold water tank sprung a leak, not from a joint, the tank itself. No, I hadn't been playing around with it, it hadn't been touched in the 20 odd years I expect it sat there. I saw the drips coming through the ceiling as I read my son a story before bed, he would have gotten very wet, or worse, if I hadn't spotted it when I did. This confirms my dismay at the lack of leak proofing being fitted loft tanks, and strengthens my resolve not to repeat the error when I have the (now new) tank replaced.

You have to very careful mixing strategies as even with the bedroom trickle vents the bedroom may not be properly ventilated as you don't get a draw through from any fans elsewhere. Do you have a basic plan you can post up, there maybe some simple solutions. Also how airtight are you planning if not below 3 for the whole house MVHR may not be right solution for either part of the house

Yes and they have no reason to visit again.

Take your internal walls up to the underside of joist height. Even if they aren’t load bearing walls I’d still have them so the joists are sitting on them to take some bounce out of the floors. If your joists are not on yet, string a tight line from the outer exterior walls at each end at joist height and run your interior walls in to that height. when you eye through then from one end, all your walls should be same height through out the building. medium dense blocks are fine for internal walls. We use both medium and thermalite, just depends on the developers preference.

The criteria for being exempt is "substantially of non-combustible material". So not entirely of non-combustible, nor of a specific material giving a specific fire resistance over a specific time. Just non-combustible. Metal isn't combustible i.e it doesn't burn, it may melt but it doesn't combust. There is no requirement to build a detached building (over 15m2) out of block or brick if it's within 1m of the boundary - they obviously would comply as well but so would steel sheet. Or do as @DevilDamo says, keep it detached and under 15m2 and build it out of whatever you like.

put a long level on it and take photo. sandstone is cheap for a reason! As its riven it's never flat so water does collect on some slabs. Over very small distances you would need a large fall to clear it which looks crap and your table wont be level etc. its a balance.

dont really have anything to compare with but it was a doddle to install, the controller is not 'that' user friendly but they are all like it. touch wood no issues as yet.

the flashing is really a soaker so should be below the tiles and extend a min on 150 under them.

A long list of other jobs to complete from the missus!

Obviously no slope/fall to drain the surface, a level area will always puddle to some extent. Your only real option here (apart from taking up and starting again with a fall) is to drill one or more drainage holes in the area of the puddle.

Just need to close DRAX now.

Jealousy will get me nowhere mate.🚘

I've heard that single room MVHR is less than brilliant, particularly with regards to actual heat recovery. If true "fresh in / stale out" then trickle vents become redundant / unnecessary. Most BC officers don't have a Scooby-Doo tbh.

You have a start and stop hysterisis for the compressor. So for a target of 25, the return flow will drop by a predetermined amount below the target flow temp, once at that point compressor starts. It will run until the shut off hysterisis temp is reached. How long it runs depends on system volume, heat demand and how deep the heat pump modulates. My settings are based on my system and what it does and doesn't do. Mine at a target flow of 25, start up hysterisis is 5.1, so return temp is allowed to fall to 19.9, before compressor start. Cut off hysterisis is 2.3 so cuts off at 27.3. My total hysterisis is 7.4. All this changes with different heating systems and houses. Mine is 300mm spacing UFH in 100mm concrete screed. Heat pump is a Maxa i32V5. Today excluding DHW the compressor has started 5x times up to 10pm, shortest run time was 18 mins (9 degs OAT) and longest run 2.5 hrs (5 Deg OAT). WC is all about running just enough to top up the energy in the house, so I use the hysterisis and a WC curve to play with the floor heat output. Based on the floor average temperature, to get the correct heat output. The WC curve starts at 15 Deg OAT at 25, this gives a floor minimum temperature of 19.9 (don't want the heating on really at that temperature), at -9 the WC curve stops at 30.3, so floor temp is a minimum of 25.2 (not tested this temp yet). So far this is working fine down to +3 degs. Depending on actual run times at sub zero this will affect where WC stops and at what flow temp. But once set it's set for ever.

Very easy to find… https://www.planningportal.co.uk/permission/common-projects/outbuildings/is-building-regulations-approval-needed-for-an-outbuilding

Wishing you all the best for the transmission. Help ma boab as they say in parts of the UK. In all seriousness I think you have gone a good way towards being as open as you can, a thank you from me.

Yeah something like that - you're just ensuring that any water runs off. Usually no need to hold down, just do something subtle with a leadworkers mallet. Re the flue - you don't say which make it is, but they usually clip together with an airtight seal, very simple. Check the stove instructions - the outlet is usually sealed to the flue with rope and special 'rope glue' e.g. https://www.solidfuelappliancespares.co.uk/product-category/spares-accessories/stove-sundries-accessories/door-rope-seal-kits/ A CO monitor, smoke test etc and you're done. This kind of work is notifiable to BC if it's not done by a hetas person.

At work we make the door openings 930mm to leave the Chippy happy. That’s for a 838mm door. lintels are dropped on at 2100mm above finish floor. Again to give plenty of room on the height. Any gap between lintel and door lining is packed with insulation before been plastered over. 2100mm will also leave the decision of going 2040mm or 1981mm until another day. As mentioned, knock up some dummy frames.

Your missus will explain.

I fully-filled my undercrackers when the bill to service my car landed.