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Stay with the owner who was present and on board the yacht when re floated. Just a bunch of fellow sailors helping out, and hope we would similarly be helped if we were in a spot of bother. Boat re floated

Prompted by a private message today We have just finished the house With just I say just the drive and patios to do As with our previous build I’ll put the cost m2 Excluding the purchase of the plots But including fees surveys Architects etc etc While I’ve a trade background and plenty of contacts There’s lots of aspects of building a house that where as new to me as they would be to most of you I’m 63 and my wife is 60 and both work full time Monday to Thursday From our previous build to this we’ve tried to do as much of the work ourselves as we possibly could The figures are to encourage Not to discourage and show that you can build a house far superior and much better insulated for less money than your average Persimmon home we are at 420 m2 and have spent Just short of 350k We expect to pay 12k for gates and allowed 20 k for materials for the drive and patios Which the 39k vat refund should cover The seller wouldn’t split the two plots Or the field So we may have another build in us 😁

This is still sounding so much like my situation from a few years back. I also changed the pump as a first move. I also then cut the H section out and found it clear. I removed the mid position valve and found that clear. I then decided it was very likely the heat exchanger in the boiler as it was unlikely to be anything else stopping good circulation around the primary circuit. Also open vented systems suffer with sludge build up, and I had no magnaclean. It’s interesting that my boiler is also the same as yours. You could just replace everything to fix as plumber 3 wants, but seems wrong to me. If I was you then I’d check the ‘H’ section of pipework and if it’s clear I’d be getting the same refurbed heat exchanger that has cured my problem. Assuming you can find a plumber willing to spend a couple of hours fitting it for you that is. I twisted a mates arm (quite hard it must be said!) £150 for him and £80 for the heat exchanger- which according to him looked new.

I believe DamonHD is the founder of OpenTRV https://www.theregister.com/2014/08/25/doing_my_own_ting_making_money_from_a_startup/

For the reasons I explain above (which you don't appear to have countered) I don't currently think that the conclusions you have drawn in the paper you have pointed us to are valid. I stress that I may have misunderstand, however I do not see how you can claim (as I think you do) that operating TRVs in uninhabited rooms a way that causes the temperature of inhabited rooms to 'sag' shows that the setback of the uninhabited rooms 'saves money', when you have already shown that the same setup but where you dont allow the temperature of the inhabited rooms to 'sag' (almost?) always costs money. I think the latter results prove that the saving in the former is really attributable to the reduced temperature of the inhabited rooms, not to the setback in the uninhabited ones! Furthermore I think that making the statement that is made in the paper is potentially dangerously misleading to the casual reader. I apologise once more if I have misunderstood. However on your broader objective I think we agree wholeheartedly. I believe TRVs do have an important role to play but that their control mechanism needs to be completely redesigned to respond to the correct problems and to ensure that 'bad setback', TRV induced cycling and other potential pitfalls of micro-zoning cannot occur. I furthermore think that, in doing so, the analysis needs a lot of care and attention and, dare I say it, critical peer review (because this is a complex subject and its all too easy to go astray). It seems to me that TRVs (with the correct, probably interlinked, control mechanism) have the potential to solve the balancing problem, which installers simply dont have the time to do properly (or at all) the spatial setback problem, but in a way which does NOT cause bad setback (which I am pretty certain just involves 'turning down' the uninhabited rooms to around the temperature they would reach if turned off, but not actually turning them off the sizing problem (both radiators and system) if fitted before the install and suitably instrumented quite possibly several other problems I haven't listed To do this will require a rethink of TRVs as we know them. Adia, who you presumably know, are already doing something in this space. The good news is that the hardware already exists at least for an electronic implementation, more or less any 'smart trv' presumably has the right hardware. Once the ideas are proven it would however be interesting to challenge the hydronic companies to come up with hydronic (probably cheaper) solutions!

Somebody would need to speak to the Planning Officer and whether it will require updated drawings or the withdrawal and re-submission of another application. Bear in mind the latter will attract additional application fees.

We installed a combi originally, one of the highest flow rates you can get, with preheat cylinder to make flow better. Now have UVC - water flow rates not massively different time to tap big difference. Given a choice between the two - UVC every day. Just set the pressure in your expansion vessel to match the water pressure. A 4 pipe just installs the diverter valve inside the boiler casing instead of outside. So not really needed, just simplifies pipes a little. Size the boiler to the heat demand, no need to go big boiler. Heat loss calculation is required - plumber, scratching head and saying a number isn't good enough. Then do not accept S or Y plan, you need priory demand hot water (PDHW) then you can have high temperature for DHW heating and low flow temps for the radiators either Opentherm or weather compensation.

I did have that written initially but wanted to acknowledge nod’s advice 👍

I would disagree, this was your architects mistake and if it were me I would ask how THEY. are going to resolve it.

How about rigid EWI which you can fix to the concrete and then render over?

And keeping the UVC gives you options when the boiler needs replacing. You can go for a 4-pipe boiler (different temps on HW and heating circuits, don't know what they're really called but we're getting great results with our new one), a heat pump, whatever. With only a bathroom and an en-suite, if your boiler can put enough heat into the tank to reheat quickly you can downsize it a bit if you want to save weight in the loft? Though that they doesn't play into heat pump etc in the future...

I'd avoid a combi for a lot of reasons They are over spec'd for space heating but frequently not powerful enough for multiple showers or a show and a bath Because they have a huge demand for gas the gas line frequently needs upgrading to a larger size If your water pressure is low on a combi you get what you get same with UVC Without a tank options for solar HW or even HW via PV and immersion are out 2 bar mains is going to be about 15 litres per min - need @SteamyTea

Let's build a summerhouse/cabin. Try to make it reasonably airtight and insulated but don't plan to register it as a house. Wife changes mind and fancies registering it as a house. (insurable) It's basically finished (just trim at this point). It's not been tested beyond looking for cold bits. Building regs are 0.6 ACH at 50 Pa to get your EPC. Eeeeeee. Cue much furious last ditch window cleaning and adjustment. At least it was cold enough for the rain to be solid. It's one thing being told that bicycles can be ridden online. It's quite another when you know one is about to arrive and you're expected to just ride it. I don't think I've been this uncertain and uncomfortable for years! "Mmmmm" says the man reassuringly. "Well I guess we can try." Thanks... 0.5 ACH on the first go. Smoke pencils did not exit the toolbox. Hell yes. Praise be the OSB and fancy sticky tape. It does seem to work. So relieved that I've gone and bought some panel pins to finish the window trims as a reward. Might even change the busted window cleaner me spring...

Imho Fusebox is really good stuff.

Thanks for the advice. I set about deleting the blending valve and pumps today and the issue became obvious........ I'd ordered 2 identical kits and built them up on a bench. There should be a non return valve between the blending valve and the hot manifold, on the bottom (cold) manifold this non-return valve should not be there, with just an open union to fill the space where the non return valve is located on the top manifold. I had used both non return valves on one manifold and both open unions on the other. The manifold with no non return valve (top floor) worked fine. Not surprisingly, the one with an entra non-return valve, which was pointing the wrong way, didn't work 🥴

It was cold, but I knew the house was well insulated (no heating yet) when I walked into this morning to start work and my glasses steamed up

I'm not there now but there's no internal pump. The best I can do is a screenshot of the page in the manual. Also I appreciate that I might be incorrectly setting the pump mode and so I will go in the morning and try again and gather evidence! I could put the old pump back... Also, I have just spoken to the plumbing company rep. who visited this morning (I'm sure he's a plumber too BTW) and asked why the HW tank has to come out and why we can't "replace all the H pipework". His answer is that with the full job, the problem would be solved and without it, in his experience, "it's never satisfactory". He said that they wouldn't be interested in the pipework alone. I would like to rid myself of the problem (and so would my wife), as I have been trying to keep things going since a couple of weeks before Christmas and then this week into the New Year is a nightmare for getting anyone interested. I can go to one more company on Monday (who access to several plumbers) and perhaps get a final assessment. I don't want to redo the H pipework myself but I could. The only things I need are a 28mm cutter and the pipe & fittings. My parents would also pay the money for the 'full solution' but something says that's just wrong. I guess it's down to confidence that it's the H pipework only. After all, the radiators all get hot so why not?

Are you sure you ordered the slate flashings? Just looked back at photos of mine, slates don't sit noticeably high . I didn't modify anything.

Love it Ian Id certainly do things differently to what the big companies do For not a lot more money It all seems about box ticking

Luckeyly,I mounted my panels on the ground,where I can easily clean and service them....15 bifacial's on east-south strings.Today 17kw and my hot water boiler is 75°C.Northern italy,though🥰

How open is the lockshield valve on that rad? I don't think drop legs from a flow and return circuit above will make any difference but heat will always prefer to rise Ages ago I got into a discussion with a chap who had a type of reverse return circuit for flow and return in the loft of his bungalow - all the pipes dropped down from ceiling to the rads The last radiator fed with the flow was the first on the return leg really high primary balance and all the lock shields were pretty much fully open

Yes thats the one. The openings are hexagonal on mine, presumably to increase surface area

I haven't fitted windows with horns since the early nineties.

I agree, which is why I'm doing my research, to see if there are any wheels that I can find to grease...

And probably extend drains that currently go into them. Presumably you know what flows where.

The problem seems to be the horns. Why have horns ?

Is the stack within the thickness of the party wall? I can't see a 'chimney breast'. Can we have external pics? How does the purlin socket line up with the edge of the stack, for example? Can we assume it is about on the bottom side of the stack? If so, in the absence of any other 'hypotheses' so far, can I throw in porous stone effectively 'by-passing' the flashings and soakers? Have *you* had the roof re-done or was it like that when you bought the house? Did you have exactly this same problem before you had the pointing, flashings and soakers done? A bit unlikely, but could water be getting (in some volume) *inside* the stack, soaking the wall and transferring through. I assume you had the flaunching done at the same time as the other works?

So you don't open a tap or flush a loo in the night? Nothing uses water? If you do use any water - you introduce anything UV kills off. Do you want that? My answer was no. So run 24/7/365 and replace every 365 days.

@-rick-, @joe90 Is this helpful? Same orientation as the layouts. Dimensions in millimetres. Room is 3300 x 2730.

As Conner said. you won’t be building over it, you will need to move the two inspection chambers outside the new extension. then the only pipework below the extension is your direct feeds to the new chambers. so the drain runs are yours only.

Soudal plasterboard foam adhesive can be compressed pretty tight to blockwork, but aren't you only going to save the depth of a dab, say about 10mm per wall like this? If your blockwork isn't perfectly flat maybe not even that much. (It does stick well though and goes a long way)

No, by you'll want to move that sewer regardless. Just reply to BCO saying it's your sewer and provide an updated drainage plan. Your designer should have accounted for this in the application anyway.

Looks good. I kept away from lead for our build as much as possible, but of all the lead replacements I used/tried, I quite enjoyed working with Leadax

Lightweights. -2 is nothing. That's about the forecast high here for the next few days. Shortly I am off to defrost and sweep the snow off the truck then off for a very cold day trying to recover a stricken yacht off the beach.

Rotate the image +90 degrees. i.e clockwise. The pole plate is the ~ 50 x 50 mm timber that locks the rafter to the ceiling joist. The simplicity of this connection is remarkable but this is not taught at university... and you won't find this in standard text books. What you will find is plenty Architects / builders and other historical types talking about this but few actually know how it works @ETC fancy a go? Just kidding you.. The primary forces are the gravity loads, wind uplift, timber shrinkage and creep. Now you live in France.. so you'll have some of these stunning winding stone stair cases that seem to be supported by sky hooks. We know they work and why qualitatively.. like the pole plate above... but if you get some twat from your approval authority that says.. lets see some calcs. It is very difficu to prove it by calculation. Even when you can you find that many old buldings and their structural membesr can't meet the moderns design loadings. When this happens we as SE's need to delve deep in our basic maths, we have a look at probalility and risk of over stress. and all the while folk are slagging us off and not willing to pay for us keeping their kids safe? I've got some high end soiftware that does finite element analysis.. it could maybe come close but it could take me about a week to set up the model.. then I need to verify that my model is rational, then explain to some (expletive deleted)wit in the council what it is all about. I would not do this for less than 7.5k... UK pounds. Now imagine if I sent this stuff to your local French Authority. They would / may do one of two things. The smart folk would say.. let's see how the Scots guy is modelling this and the conditions / assumptions he is making in his model. they would use it as a CPD excercise all at your expense.. the rest would say.. we don't like Jocks so "^ let them have intercourse" Still happy to give you a bit of advice though but as you can see from the above I'm a bit of a pragmatist.

I agree. It's a good appoach to let sleeping dogs lie. The existing roof will likely be restraining the existing wall heads. Often in the Uk we used what is called a pole plate roof. Here there is a timber runner that locks the rafter base to the ceiling joist. I'll dig out a photo, not tonight but later if of any interest. The more you mess with an existing roof the more risk that it will move. If you have a period property then you get no prizes for cracking the walls! Now this may not apply to you but many old walls rely on having a good amount of compressive load from above. Sometimes we can "unload" an old wall and we think that will be good for it.. but in fact it can be very bad! At first glance this is counter intuitive but the compressive load keeps the say soft lime mortar in compression. Masonry walls perfom well if they are subject to reasonable compression. In laymans terms this helps keep the joints tight., and by default water resistant. I could show you the maths but lets stick to concept ideas for now.

Completely agreed. I won't be looking for the cheapest - I'll be looking for an SE who besides doing a good job will not be annoyed by @Garald always asking why. (Oh, and will actually be interested in not doing things in the most standard, boring way. Plenty of people in the Paris area just scrap everything in the attic and build something very standard from scrap, I take. My feeling is that if the task actually forces the engineer to put serious thought into the issue, the end product will be much better.) > An Architect with 40 years experience behind them will save you piles of cash too! Well, it seems that due to legal requirements I'll need to go through an architecture studio no matter what. I suppose the algorithm is to ask around for an SE that works in an architecture studio, and choose the studio in which that SE works?

No Just the perimeter

I admire your tenacity and interest in sturctural enginering. But here is a bit of tough love. It will take you about 20 years to become competant to design this kind of stuff economically that you are wanting to do. Find and pay for an SE that likes doing the things you are trying to acheive and you will save loads of money. Your chances of producing a set of calcs that can even begin to back up what you are doing is close to zero. You will have to also learn about wind and snow loads not least. Then you need to trace all the loads down to the founds, prove the load path / building stability / fire protection and check everything below that! Yes you may be able to read books and work out the forces in the members. That is good fun and will introduce you to the tehcnicsl terms. Anything you do is time well spent. But you'll need to know how to work out the wind, snow and gravity loads. You'll then need to establish the deflections. Next you will have to quantify your connection design. This is going to be harder as you are marrying into an existing structure. To put this into context. I was a builder for 20 years, then went to uni at the age of 40 to become an SE. I'm now 60 years old and now reasonably competant in this kind of structural design. But every day I learn new stuff.. Give it a miss and spend your time researching insulation / sourcing materials. Sorry to say it. If you fancy being a Structural Engineer then it is a great job. My journey has taken me into the Architectural and Conservation side so now I call myself a Structural Engineer and Architectural Designer. But seriously it's taken me some 15 to 20 years to develop my basic skills and that is off the back of me being a local builder for 20 years before that! Now I'm no thicky on paper. I have a Masters degree with distinction and won the best all round student prize at university. Frankly you can become a Surgeon faster than an SE! but that goes back to how many folk you get to kill in one go! see below. Per say it is a very responsible job. It's the kind of job that keeps you awake at night! I often say.. Doctors generally get to kill one person at a time but an SE is able to kill lots in one go! If an Architect makes a bit of a bollocks of it then your building may leak water / be cold / condensation or look as good as you expect.. yes you may lose some money but you won't get killed! If there are any teenagers (parents) reading this or folk that are stuck in a dead end job.. My advise to you is choose a study course that teaches you how to teach yourself. @SteamyTea et al. Probably the thing for me was that the folk that taughtme enabled and gave me the tools to teach myself. I love cooking. I could have pursued something completely different. When I was a builder I did not know how to teach myself! @SteamyTea @MikeSharp01does this make sense to you?

Are you sure you are on the correct scale. G3 or G4 sounds more like what you are talking about, not "F", I got mine (G3) from RS Components. Stock number 8279510 Filter media roll white 1mx 2m x 10mm G3. It cost about 3x what you paid and I would order again.

Thanks. The marmox technical support chap said to do something similar to this:

Update: I’ve been playing around today: prototype… think I might go with lead as much easier to manipulate and seal corners. I think something like the attached photo will work…(this is on a door but windows will be the same) Trim equal all around gives a neater finish then angled wedge on top with lead drip above that. I’ll leave a 5mm gap between lead and the cladding to allow airflow and and insect mesh. Ideally lead will run under membrane but may tape instead… something else to decide. I’d welcome any thoughts and tips anyone else has.

It sounds like the downpipe was leaking. Fix that and the damp will go away. If the wall was getting regularly splashed above the DPC level then the best DPC in the world will not stop the damp entering.

Update: Received the following just now- “Please accept our apologies in regards to not informing you when we issued the CIL Liability notice out at that time, as the originally email with the notices was sent out to your agent directly dated 04/10/2023 (attached). Due to the situation where development has commenced on site and you didn’t get notified, on this occasion we will allow discretion whereby you can submit the relevant forms, and we will grant the relief. Please do note that the full CIL charge plus the additional surcharges will not be imposed.” Thank goodness! These last 24 hours have been traumatic to say the least. But it appears that they do have some heart following my email to them detailing all the flaws in their process conducted. Thank you all for your input and advice. What an amazing platform we have here 😀

@frankmcs65, @Dillsue Thanks for the encouragement, I'll get on and order them. When the electric supply eventually gets restored!

I leave out the cement. I use a lot of Baumit products and would use probably RK38, or RK 70 if you have any left over from anything else (the latter being finer). Alternatively you could use plastering sand and lime putty - the advantage over bagged lime being that putty will keep for years as long as there is water over it - stops it absorbing CO2

You could extend along the blue arrow up to 50% of the original width. You could extend along the black arrow up to 4m or 8m with Prior Approval. But only if the small part sticking out is not original. You cannot extend along the red arrow without Planning. You may be better off speaking to and engaging a local Planning Consultant so they can review the Planning history, establish the restrictions and advise on the development options.

I'd say the principal elevation is the one facing highway B. I'd use the yellow dimension to assess the width of the house for the side extension. No side extension would be PD facing Highway A - it's a highway. Yes prior approval needed for an 8m rear extension and yes the 4m height is to the ridge of a pitched roof. The type of roof is not a problem - it's PD. Be aware the section of roof that runs back from the plan of the extension onto the existing building would be dealt with under Class B because it's an extension to the existing roof. A dormer would be allowable on the rear subject to the total volume of roof extension (some used by the extensions as mentioned) and the other requirements regarding height and position etc. Finally it's not 50% of the house area, it's 50% of the curtilage minus the house area. Your extensions and other buildings (garage etc) should not use up more than 50% of that figure.