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  1. ...and if the valve refuses to fully stop the water despite being closed then screw on a blanking cap. (I prefer to do that anyway with any unused valves for belt and braces)
    2 points
  2. Not entirely, but he is using it in the wrong context. You can petition the BCO on a signed off job to take the factor of 5 or factor of 10 ( if they've been lucky in love that morning ) where OPEN vents to atmosphere are required to vent the network sewerage system and each dwelling must participate in that duty. If the BCO looks at the topology and agrees that losing the vent ( aka stench pipe ) is not going to be to any detriment then you may get permission to do away with it. NOW; As jerk-face aka your plumber has simply said you don't need one, some questions arise. 1) Is this ground or 1st floor? 2) How many bathrooms T into that one stack? Building regs will stipulate that you cannot omit an AAV on a vertically downwards discharging stack if the fall attains a drop of 1299mm or more ( from the bottom of the WC pan outlet to the bottom of the horizontal sewerage pipe at the manhole that it discharges to ) which is referred to as the "invert". The logic is, that after you discharge your Sunday roast plus 7 pints of Guinness and flush the loo, the contents of the pipe travelling south will, if travelling south for more than 1300mm, create a vacuum behind it as it falls. That creates a deficit with some welly behind it in the above waste network. That force, albeit it only momentary, literally sucks the water out of the basin / bath / shower trap ( whichever is the one with the path of least resistance ) and then that leaves a clear path from the sewer gasses in the street and your nostrils ( can be hugely exacerbated by a windy day for good measure too ). So, the issue you have is allowing a bit of air into that cycle to alleviate the 'drop''. Can be done easily by T'ing in a small AAV ( 40mm ) behind the bath panel ( 9as long as the bath is connected to the same stack in the same room as the WC ) and also, if the issue persists, the basin trap can be changed to one with an integrated mini-AAV. DIY for this is certainly do-able
    2 points
  3. A lot of people ask me about the detail of how my house is built so I thought it worth a thread to explain things. First off, I didn't want an "ordinary" timber framed house with a cavity then a brick or block outer skin. That outer skin just costs a lot of money and adds nothing to the insulation of the house, it's just an expensive rain shield. I still wanted the traditional Scottish look of a white rendered finish but I want all elements of the wall make up to add to the insulation and air tightness of the property. The solution is a timber frame, clad with 100mm thick wood fibre external wall insulation boards (I used Pavatex, but other makes are available), and the render goes straight onto the wood fibre board. Here's a picture to make it clear: In that picture I only have a few of the fixing screws in place. A lot more were added and then driven fully home. The board is fixed to the frame with long screws with big plastic spreaders to stop the screws pulling through the board. There are a few twists to the frame however. First thing you will notice is that it is not an "ordinary" timber frame. For a start it's built with much thicker timbers than normal to allow more insulation in the walls. But secondly people keep telling me i have put the frame up "inside out" The OSB racking layer is on the inside of the frame. That's done for vapour permeability reasons with the least vapour permeable layer on the inside. With this build method you can either fill the frame with blown in insulation from the inside once the wood fibre cladding is fitted, or in my case I have chosen to use Frametherm 35 as it's less than half the cost of blown in insulation but gives the same U value. So I am fitting the insulation from the outside as I fit the wood fibre cladding. Insulating only that bit of frame I expect to get clad in that day as I don't want the insulation left exposed to get wet if it rains. The render is a lime based system from baumit.com. It has 3 layers, a base coat that is mixed from dry powder, then a primer that is painted on, then the top coat comes pre mixed in tubs. A fibreglass mesh gets pressed in to the base coat before it is dry. Overall benefits of this approach Vs an ordinary timber frame with blockwork outer skin: Simpler foundations (no need for provision to support the outer brick or block wall) More insulation for a given wall thickness More of the job can be DIY done, perfect for self builders. And an unexpected one, because there is no cavity, there is no need to pepper the wall with weep ventilators, so you get a clean render finish with no "warts" And here is what the finished and rendered front of the house looks like.
    1 point
  4. I used to think these were only for professionals or turbo-nonces who like to strut around their garden wearing a tool belt and pretending they’re Batman. Is there anything I need to know before I ignore all your advice and buy the cheapest one I can find online?
    1 point
  5. B a s t a r d s ! This is MY bathroom thread ! - you lot got my brexit thread closed you (expletive deleted)s
    1 point
  6. Only if it’s a clear over a very tight cut / gap. Otherwise I have always said grout then seal. And can we leave your mum out of this now? She’s trying to get some rest.
    1 point
  7. Many moons ago I was contemplating building in straw bale and looked into buying scaffolding including a corrugated iron roof so I could complete in the dry, I was informed I would get most of my money back when selling it as long as I oiled the couplers so don’t discount it.
    1 point
  8. Neighbour had put up composite fencing to replace the wooden ones copy what my hubby put up in our garden. Parking her shenanigans aside, to answer the OP question, the composite panels and posts are more expensive than the standard wooden ones as we looked into them and found the quality goes up the more you pay (obviously). The neighbour put down a cheaper variant because it 'looked pretty' but much to her dismay, and weeks of laughter for us, the recent UK winds and rain (including thunder) battered them and they split. Parts of the her fencing went over and into our garden, so we had an almighty operation clearing it all up (had to hire a vacuum) to make sure all the pieces were removed, as we have kittens running about the garden. A few of her panels and couple of posts looked like they needed replacement, rather an repair. Five months on, mainly because of COVID, she has not had it repaired. I suppose it would look nice but you have to weigh up cost/quality and the event of breakages. If you are environmentally friendly, then that would also play a part too in your selection. The final point, is the cost vs aesthetics. Hope this helps.
    1 point
  9. https://www.cityplumbing.co.uk/C-Tec-CT1-Grey-Sealant+Construction-Adhesive-290ml/p/991057?uiel=Desktop Grey ct1. Also stocked in a lot of TP or plenty of places online
    1 point
  10. I've just used some BT1, straight in the gap between tile and end of bath. Bead of the same at the wall:
    1 point
  11. I was spoilt when I did a complete renovation of a Victorian cottage forty years ago. The local builder and his son were truly excellent. They allowed me to help where I could, showed me how to do jobs and listened to exactly what I wanted and delivered it. When I started this build I naively expected the same. Unfortunately my builder had retired and I took a recommendation from a friend for a carpenter to fit the soffitts. The work was awful and I let him go after the first day, he couldn't understand why. I have found some good workers since but it's very difficult so I ended up doing a lot of the work myself with Wendy to help.
    1 point
  12. Qualifications fall out of cornflake boxes nowadays, and then these beauties simply dry off the milk and instantly decide that’s the trade they’ll self-nominate themselves “good to go with’, then promptly head to B&Q or Argos for some plastic tools, and present themselves to the public to do that job. The fact they’ve zero experience or time served apprenticeship behind them seems to do little to deter them, especially when they’ve shared a pint in a pub with these trades folk, and have seen them counting their spoils, and think “oooo, I’ll have some of that”. Some guys have not even lasted a day with me. Plain to see they have zero pride, zero give a f.uck and zero basic knowledge. Plus it pisses the others off to see them asking for the same daily rate when they’re nowhere near as competent. Customers can be idiots too, chipping away at prices ( and then crying that the job is not champagne quality on lemonade money ) and those are the ones I despise. Establishing your expectations is paramount, if you’re as particular as the OP appears to be ( rightly so ) but assumption or lack of clear understanding of what is required ( before a single nail gets knocked in ) will leave lots of wiggle room for arguing after the ship has sunk.
    1 point
  13. There are plenty of excellent trades out there But most are on sites where the regular work and money is
    1 point
  14. Professional certainly used to mean they were trained to do the job, had experience and were more than capable - well what's what it means to me anyway And what ever we call it, in my opinion, it still comes down to pride in what ever work you do that's lacking.
    1 point
  15. I see your point, but all that "professional" really means is that someone is getting paid to do it. Doesn't necessarily mean they're any good at it or that they will be better than you doing it yourself, you're just paying for the convenience of someone else taking care of it. I can make a nicer omelette than the cafe round the corner or a nicer burger than McDonalds but I wouldn't necessarily do it if I worked there myself.
    1 point
  16. Technically it is called "with matters reserved" (ie reserved to be talked about at the later stage), and the applicant can reserve what they want. It is quite common eg to leave everything reserved except for the number of dwellings and the entrance, layout as these are the details which if they weren't there would devalue the plot. In a self-build context that might be eg "200sqm 4 bedroom house" and entrance plan. As that is the stuff the vendor needs to maximise their benefit. In my case we did a full suite of everything - including proposing planning gain contributions exactly in line with Council policy, as the driver was getting it through before they wrote it out of their emerging local plan and poleaxed it for 15 years. Ferdinand
    1 point
  17. My first step was to establish whether a self-build was even a viable option (it looks like it is - for now). My next step is to work out a savings strategy with my OH, she agrees paying cash for land is the better option so let's see what plan we can hash out.
    1 point
  18. all depends how serious you are -- quite sure you could trim lifestyle a bit and make it happen sooner --bear in mind anything you borrow will in the end cost you 2 or3 times as much with 245k of an income -you must live very well if it will take you 5 years to save up for a plot -- and if most of that is going on present mortgage ---maybe downsizing ?might release money quicker to get to your end goal If your serious about self build and want to do it most economical way ,then you need to start economising now,ask most people on here and they will be running older cars etc -cos blowing 10-15k a year on a fancy car devaluation is not top of their list . I run an old car 10 years old cost bugger all -if i replaced it with a new model of same car it would be 9k a year loss against 1k running costs -holidays --where you going to go in next few years with all the covid about If you are serious you can save plot money alot quicker than 5 years I,m guessing all these things are choices you can make or not - Ohh and im just turned 69 and just started --so you got plenty of time --just wish I had started 15 years earlier
    1 point
  19. When you have a complicated case like this with £££ riding on it you really need to write to HMRC and ask them. It will come down to what they say ultimately, not what people think on here. I don’t think you can leave the building and incorporate it into the new house and have it count as a new build as it fails the “demolish everything to foundations” test. It might then turn it into a conversion instead but it would fail on that point as the building you are demolishing has been a dwelling and presumably lived in.
    1 point
  20. I think it depends very much on the planning authority. Generally, they'll want to see a design that fits with the local area. Infilling with a log cabin design in a row of 2-story brick houses, for example, is unlikely to be acceptable I'd suggest. You may also be at risk of under-developing the plot, as the plot will be priced for a bigger property - not a problem if you've got the cash and want to live there long term, but might disadvantage you financially if you want to sell, or need a mortgage to build. If you find something you like, try and have an informal chat with the planners to test the water. There will be no guarantees, but it should rule out the complete non-starters.
    1 point
  21. Its all well and good saying 750mm which we do but have you ever seen the depths that the water boys actually put it in at. Multiple times i've seen them within 400mm of the surface they're lazy when it comes to obstacles and connections
    1 point
  22. Thanks all! Very helpful. A busy day yesterday. The pipe is now (along with a fibre-option-cable duct) in and I have lots of photos that I can share with Anglian Water. In the end, we didn't remake the concrete road surface around the duct that I mentioned, with a road plate over for protection. This will enable us to easily revisit it again if Anglian Water requires it. Interestingly, a few days ago Anglian Water said that they don't come out to inspect the installation of a TBS. (temporary builders supply). I will send them the photos and see what they say.
    1 point
  23. Stainless steel conducts less than steel wire and can be thinner but it is a metal and is highly conductive - I stopped using metal ties in the 90’s preferring nylon bit ocd but every little helps
    1 point
  24. You can also apply for planning in principle Costs about £500 no bead for formal drawings or dimensions A square in the middle of your plot roughly where the house is going Access marked out This will establish viability of building on your plot
    1 point
  25. Can you not look then for plots with outline pp ? Might be an area specific thing but the plot we still have had only outline on it and because we have had a few enquires about it which have not materialised I decided the best plan might be to get detailed planning for it, my view was that if it was set in stone re position of house etc it would save all the to- ing and fro-ing which has been going on with different people wanting different things however when I approached an architect and the agent marketing it they were both of the opinion I was wasting my time as whoever eventually bought it was sure to want something different!
    1 point
  26. If you have the salary that you say then there is no gain whatever from doing any of the work, stick at what you do best and just sign the cheques, be a very good manager, and not a poor bricklayer.
    1 point
  27. If only you had 2 way audio, could have sold them some walk on glazing.
    1 point
  28. We have stick built primarily for cost saving, will share the actual cost later but hopefully £50K+ saving, fortunately have some time and energy though I do feel a bit bushed in a good way at 53 and the challenge and satisfaction from it all. Also having the support of my Dad, he's 74 has been invaluable and an opportunity to spend time together. Maybe that sounds a bit odd. I am still enjoying it.....
    1 point
  29. Well its just my Dad and myself. He draws and measures, I cut and fix. Thanks for the compliment. No professionals on site yet.
    1 point
  30. Start making frames, would like to get a roof covering (Isoroof) on by late autumn if possible.
    1 point
  31. Having gone through the process of considering then discounting travertine as our floor covering of choice, we eventually settled on a porcelin tile to cover those areas (kitchen, utility and vestibule) that were not having oak flooring laid. Unfortunately for us, the person who we believed was going to be doing our tiling (and does virtually all of the builders tiling), at the last moment refused to undertake the work in our house. Quite why I've not been able to establish, nor has my builder. To say I was put out is an understatement. My builder was none too happy either. Fortunately, he was able to pull a rabbit out of the hat a couple of weeks later, in the form of Tony from Australia, a tiler on an extended visit to Orkney. As neither of us had seen his work, we agreed that he would tile an initial small area and decide whether he would do the whole job on that. We needn't have worried, a really nice and hard working guy, he set about measuring and marking out, discussing patterns and the best way to achieve the look we wanted. As the tiles started to go down, we could see the care he was taking, and we are more than happy with the result. Due to insufficient clearance under both the front and back door we ended up creating mat wells for the door to open over, edging the wells with aluminium trim. Moving into the bathrooms, where we had decided to use the same porcelin tiles, we tiled all the walls to half height, and finished with a simple straight edge aluminium trim. In the picture you can see the bulkheads we created to conceal the cistern and give a finished height of 1000mm, and the frame / surround for our bath. Access to the cistern / basin trap is by a removable tile (held in place with silicone). If for any reason we do need to get to the cistern and the tile breaks, I have 6 boxes left, so a healthy supply of spares. In the utility room, the units and oak worktop were fitted. A 50mm offcut strip from the utility worktop was used to create a handrail on the staircase, as required by building control. One of the key uses of our utility is as our clothes drying area. Readers may recall from earlier entries that we have a section of vaulted ceiling in the utility which now accommodates two clothes pulleys. Each pulley can take a full load of washing which means all washing can be hung up above normal ceiling height,out of the way. I fitted the utility MVHR extract in this space to ensure moist air is drawn away, and can happily report this particular feature to be very effective, drying all washing overnight. Through in the kitchen, plinths were fitted, doors put back, appliances installed and the worktop (quartz) lifted into place. On the island, we decided to go with a quartz splashback, and to finish with oak on top. We're very pleased with the finished look. On the other side of the kitchen, we are still undecided how to finish the splashback, so in the interim have a length of quartz. We may opt for tiles, glass or leave it as it is. We also have to decide how to finish the underside of the overhead units. This was something I flagged at the design stage but I was overruled in the quest for a 'clean look'. We have the option of fitting a piece of pelmet or a piece of shelving matching to the doors / carcuses. I suspect the later would give a better overall finish. Next entry: 2nd / final fix electrics
    1 point
  32. Block & beam 1st floor installed the past couple of days...
    1 point
  33. blockwork and fintwork & beamblock flooring
    1 point
  34. NEW ENTRY 4 weeks after we hoped to have it, our warrant was finally approved. Another weeks delay waiting for the digger driver, but finally work has started in earnest on site. Strip foundations were dug and concrete poured the following day. A minor set-back during the pour, a hydraulic line split on the mixer forcing it to shut down. An hour later after the mechanic had brought out and fitted a new line, the job was finished. You’ll note the lack of a digger on the concrete pour. 4 men - 2 on barrows,1 spreading in the trench, 1 tamping and levelling the concrete off. It’s the fastest I’ve seen strip foundations poured. Having finished the pour, the concrete was floated to a smooth finish. Not normally required with block foundations but as we are building with ICF, it’s important in ensuring that the base blocks are level. The ICF (Amvic) system blocks that we are using are formed from two sections of 65mm EPS separated by 150mm plastic webs to form a hollow core for the concrete. The plastic webs are embedded in the EPS for rigidity. Here is a close up of the block: Note the teeth on the top and bottom edges of the EPS, these ensure the blocks securely interlock with each other. The markings on the side of the blocks are to aid cutting and are set at 20mm intervals. So, after measuring and setting out, the first course of ICF blocks were laid. These were half blocks, a full block having been cut in two with a table saw so that there was a flat edge to sit on the concrete strips. A second full course followed, taking us up to just above finished floor level. The pour to fill the hollow core of the blocks took 1 hour. C35 concrete had waterproofer and steel fibres for strengthening added to the mixer. You can see the steel fibres here: A hoistable skip was filled by the concrete mixer and lifted by crane. Again, a team of four worked their way round the foundation, releasing concrete from the skip into a ‘funnel’ which ran on metal rails fitted over the top of the ICF blocks. The rails allowed them to quickly slide the funnel along the ICF block wall, filling up the core as they went. 2 men worked the skip and funnel, while a third, following immediately behind, used a vibrating poker in the core to agitate the mix and encourage settlement. Every segment of the block (as separated by the plastic webs) had the poker treatment. My builder followed round, running a line the length of each wall, bracing it where required to ensure the finished wall was straight and true. The finishing touch was floating the surface of the concrete in the core to a smooth finish, to aid the painting on of a radon barrier. Next entry - Upfill, insulation UFH and slab
    1 point
  35. P.s. Nice way of getting past the language filter
    0 points
  36. Your momma sure does care about your schooling, Forrest Will you CT1 every other grout line? No. So don’t CT1 those ones. Simples.
    0 points
  37. Don’t worry.. we are just being sarcastic.
    0 points
  38. Do NOT attempt to use CT1 as a finish product. Use silicone. Grout the 3mm gaps and sponge them back so they’re just a little concave. Then silicone. CT1 should only ever be on show when it’s the clear one and around a shower glass, or at the wall / floor junction over a grout. Silicone everywhere else. Mapei do a great range of colours, and NoNonsense from screwies is ok too. Grout in the corners first, now I’m off back upstairs. Keep the noise down.
    0 points
  39. Where they are this would see them get blackballed from the Rotary Club. The very thought!
    0 points
  40. Sometimes people forget the really obvious. KISS
    0 points
  41. 0 points
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