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Decision notice issued at 19:00 and granted, finally.

As an update, i got my building regs signed off this morning, grant of planning permission is due today. Who of thought i would have building regs signed off before planning granted. Ground workers on site in a couple of weeks, though need to get my self build exception in and agreed before then.

Changed to Octopus about 5 or 6 weeks ago. It took a month from asking for them to come and fit a SMETS2 meter (they did it this afternoon). Apparently it takes up to 2 weeks for everything to connect and sort itself out, and after that you can go on whatever whacky tariff you want. The installer was excellent. He did an extremely neat job - the result is a lot tidier than the original network installation. He also mentioned they're an amazing company to work for.

I believe as long as it says secure on it, it's OK. I have this one: https://www.camax.co.uk/product/secure-sprint-211 And I'm using Octopus and they say as long as a SMETS1 meter has "Secure" on it, it is OK. It's submitting readings every 30 mins to them. https://octopus.energy/agile/new/

It's kind of taken me 4 moths to get here, we broke ground start of January took a while to get the road and the rest of the ground built up with the stone (700 Tonnes circa!). But we have finally done the UFH, tied the mesh and then poured the concrete. UFH: Fitting the UFH was pretty straightforward to be honest. I had 1.1km of pipe to lay, and just planned it out as per the Wunda drg, I adapted a little as I went along to avoid awkward bits but it went fine. The UFH stapler was a godsend, made it Uber easy and was just great putting it into the insulation. The decoiler also a godsend, god knows how you would do it without one of those. Both well worth the purchase. I laid pipes out in concentric layout, it gives the most even heat distribution as a return is next to a feed pipe. It was fine doing it, i started with outer at 400mm centres and then turned back to leave me with 200mm spacing. Once back at the UFH manifold point I cut the pipe to confirm it wasn't burst and got a big whoosh of air (Wunda pipes come pressurised). The only mistake i made (or remember making was the lengths. I thought i had 11 100m loops, but turns out I had 10 loops at less than 100m, then 1 loop at 101m - which they supplied a 120m length for. Of course didn't realise that till the end and it was the last pipe to be laid...purely coincidentally. I took a slightly shorter route, but either that pipe was longer than 100m (I had at least 10m spare) or the length they worked out was wrong (unlikely) fortunately it worked out fine! I also used the clip track to secure them, which works well and sticks good to the insulation, doesn't do well at loops close to it but staples there sort it. I never fitted the manifold, I just used a clip track mounted high on a wee frame I built where the manifold will go. I didn't pressure test either....or pressurise for the pour, I wasn't concerned about holes as I was the only one there and I put 1000+ castles down to support the mesh to the heavy ground workers wouldn't' squash it on top. My pipes were laid on the insulation at the bottom of the concrete well away from the mesh and any chance of people drilling through them. I'm confident not pressuring will be fine during the concrete pour - those pipes are very resilient. Mesh: By Jesus - straightforward again, but f$ck me....the bloody wire tying loops. My back was dead..and i don't have any back issues, I was like Quasimodo bent over for days tying mesh together. I had a single layer on the main slab, with two layers in ring beam and three at sliders. I used maybe 1000 ties. The mesh castles worked well to support it and the hystools too to give the spacing. I defo didn't think about heights where your lap the mesh sheets as you end up 20-40 mm higher due to where triple sheets lap each other. So I have lots of spare hystools at 100mm. I had approx. 360m2 of mesh to put in, cutting it was done with stihl saw (quik cut) - made life easy. I also purchased a dewalt cordless grinder originally to do this but you would go through wheels like a maniac. So that was used for small cuts and came in handy trimming bits. The stihl saw (which i own anyway) made it easy. I did buy a set of 36" bolt cutters as someone said to use that - shit idea, mega hard and I'd have been there all day using them. They done two cuts, went back in the box and were returned to Toolstation. Rebates: I planned two flush thresholds for my sliders - I shuttered these using the 50mm packing that came with the Insulated foundation, worked ok - But i had to weight them down during the pour. Also - I worked the concrete below the long one, but forgot the short one and it left a space which I will fix this week prior to kit going up. I also done a shuttered section at my downstairs bathroom so I can fit a floor mounted shower tray. That worked fine - just need to dig it out. Concrete: We had C25/C28 Specified but just put in C35 as it was what the guys normally use. We had a lovely day for it, 14 degrees and sunny, went pretty well. We had a bit of a delay with the last part load - which was at garage, but turned out fine. We also done the pads too and just overfilled them with extra that was left, my pad heights externally to the footprint are for posts to support my canopy and ended up different heights but I just gave the kit supplier all the heights and then are cutting to suit. They are all well below the ground anyway. I wanted to power float, but I didn't manage to get it arranged and my guys didn't seem keen. I was going to do it myself, but ran the risk of doing it for the first time on my own slab and didn't want to majorly mess up what they had done as it would have been in the evening by myself. 36cube in total went in. The only issue I was left with was that the boys forgot the poker. They did the vibro screed and all areas were filled, but missing the poker meant that we missed the concrete under a slider rebate. The long one (4.6m) was fine as it floated up a little so I hurriedly spent some time moving it up and down working the concrete below it, then I added stones on top to level it off. I shoudl have done this with the short (3m) one but didn't think as it didn't float up. It's no major drama, getting some concrete this week and will fill it. It'll be a cold joint but it's at a slider with no wall attached. I added ducts for the island below the mesh to we can get power there. The day after the pour I cut a control joint and then I tried to cover it with plastic (DPM actually) but I was ill prepared and didn't have enough, so just stuck with watering it with a hose each day when I could. I did get a couple of small shrinkage cracks in the main slab where it dried too quickly (they had appeared the next morning) due to it being so sunny the day of the pour. But they are small and nothing to worry about. all in all happy. There is lots of other stuff I'm sure I forget but it always seems to elude me when I write a blog post. I also find it hard to find the time writing them - but that's self building for you! Pictures tell better stories! Lots included. I'm learning to not sweat the wee details, it's ok if things go a little pear shaped. It'll work out in the end. For now Foundations are finished and it feels good to be done here, we will backfill later and finish drains but that's in a few months. I just have DPM to fold up and attach this weekend (How do you fold up internal corners?!) prior to kit being delivered and erection starting next week. I've had two weekends off since the pour and it has been weird not being there every night and weekend. Things I learned: 1) Check all pipes lengths and lay them out first of all! 2) Buy the stapler 3) Buy the decoiler 4) Plan all your cuts out for mesh 5) Don't bother with bolt cutters 20210421_093630.mp4

WHY do you want MCS certification? The only tangible need for that in the past has been a requirement to claim the FIT. But with no FIT any more, why would you want to pay the "MCS Premium" for a bit of paper that is worth virtually nothing to you?

I really do not understand why people are bothering with hydrogen as a main stream domestic/light industry/commercial fuel all the studies point to it being inefficient and costly.

I think you need to get a copy of that report. Write a letter to manufacturer's registered office (which you can look up on Companies House for free)giving them the background and in writing and politely, but firmly, threatening legal proceedings unless they provide you with a copy. The basic points you need to make in your letter are: logic dictates that either the manufacturer is responsible or the installer is responsible; if they, as the manufacturer, are not responsible then there is nothing for them to hide and there is no good reason for not sharing the report with you; in circumstances where they are refusing to give you the report, the logical inference is that the report must implicate them and therefore you can only infer that actually they are liable; accordingly, if they don't provide you a copy within 21 days of the date of the letter, you will make an application under civil procedure rule 31.16 for pre-action disclosure of a copy of the report. This should rattle their feathers a bit and may get you the report. The report won't necessarily be the gospel truth as its author is probably biased, but it is likely to be relevant to your determination of who is at fault. Your only alternative at this stage is to hire a expert in sliding doors and sliding door installation to assess them and write your own report which you can then use to cajole the responsible party into fixing the issue. If you go down that route, be sure the expert complies with Civil Procedure Rule 35 and the Civil Justice Council's guidance on experts to be used in Court proceedings. I'm not suggesting you actually go to Court, but doing these things and threatening the sliding door company with a discrete Court application that just gets them to give you the report may help in making it look like you are willing to take that step, and that might be enough to prod them into action, get you the report and then use that to take matters forwards.

ah i see! thanks for the breakdown and explanation. I really appreciate it. I am just waiting on a couple more quotes now!! wish me luckkkkk in finding the right trader!

Another interesting point the SE told me about was to notice where the cracks have formed, they (mostly) formed along a path where the original builders used small cuts to fill gaps, he said that if the original builders had planned it a bit better then they would not have had to use small cuts and could have made it wholly from full bricks which would have provided a better structure, so there is a lesson to be learned here - well I'm learning a lot anyway!

Anything that reduces water flow will help, but perhaps not much in extreme or long duration storms. Harvesters are easy enough with newbuild but messy with retrofit/rebuild. They reduce all flow to drain because you have the same rain but reduced bought in water. As Ferdinand says, rainwater butts are easy. They are also a recognised solution in new developments where there not be another solution, or simply as standard. If already full, then they don't help much. But you could do what I do, to take the load of my old drains and soakaway in the garden. In summer the several butts are used for the garden, but in winter I turn on the tap slightly and let it dribble to empty over a couple of days, thus doing what a complex storm system does, and slowing the flow to downstream problem areas. Anything can be presented formally as a solution, and if well presented with logic, has a chance. You might need a lot of butts though.

All of use it to some degree. I have a few big butts (water butts). But nearly all go for the "for the garden" sort rather than a second plumbing system to flush loos. The second sort is very complicated for the benefit, and you have to have more holes in your house. Shower heat recovery is an easier halo, if you want something.

However if you don’t use all the rainwater the excess has to go somewhere so a soakaway is still required.

I respect the difficult job of the overstretched planners. So I suggest make an impressive and easy to understand schedule of why a plastic chimney is a bad thing. Carbon, weakness in structure (drawings of extra work) , maintenance (what is the life to replacement or repainting the faded bricks?) , and of course pastiche. Throw in 'vernacular' where you can. ie make it easy for the planner to agree with you, and difficult to answer each of your points. You might, for balance, also state why it is a good idea.....because the planners may like the roofline. Any precedents? 20 years ago, housebuilders were adding fake Elizabethan beams, screwed onto block walls, and using new bricks stained to look like recycled. Again the planners were strangely unaware that these were pastiche until told. Have these fads passed? I found that most people , including planners, favoured the roofline effect, but had no idea that these were dummies. The use of the terms 'plastic, dummy and fake' helped the argument. Planning officers are especially skilled at understanding the rules and in diplomacy. They are not usually so good with drawings, architecture or the practical side of construction. Vernacular architecture is described as a built environment that is based upon local needs; defined by the availability of particular materials indigenous to its particular region; and reflects local traditions and cultural practices. Does a plastic chimney satisfy the above? No re materials. No, re local needs and No, re cultural practices (of having a fire) But, you presumably have an infinite amount of time to complete the house. Maybe the plastic chimney can be stuck on a bit later, when you have found one that meets your standards.

This construction is really a 'deemed to satisfy' construction, and what it satisfies is the requirement of ADE that the internal walls and floor meet min Rw 40 dB. You can meet Rw 40 dB with out the insulation and 18mm board, though with 15mm wall board ceiling. https://www.gyproc.ie/sites/default/files/C106029.pdf

The net result is the same in terms of power output, but the impact can be different. The better quality diverters generate a proper sine wave output that's in-phase with the grid. That's how the Eddi works (same as the Immersun, of which it's an improved version). Phase angle firing is a lot noisier and might cause interference with stuff like radios. People with crappy dimmers might have experienced this. Burst firing can cause perceptible flickering of lights, although I don't know what sort of lights are affected, and it probably depends on how much energy is being diverted. Presumably if it's a lot, it's probably very bright, so pulsing lights aren't likely to be noticed.

That looks really good. The horizontal beam at 1st floor level, the top of the steel needs to sit flush with the 1st floor so you can sit the glazing or door frame etc onto it. As the steel beam was smaller than the floor joists I built stud work underneath with insulation and a membrane to fix the top rail of the downstairs sliding doors to ( the downstairs doors are 2.4m high). Then I finished the outside with a 400mm fascia board that tucked behind the upstairs doors cill and used some soffit board between the fascia bottom and the downstairs doors. Hope that makes sense! I got all the Ali trims from factory that made the doors and glazing so they were all the same RAL.

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Might be worth a look at Hoskins bricks if you want something 'old' looking; we used Old Farmhouse Blend.

Just finished running a scarifier over my lawn. Think I managed to get all of the grass out of the moss ?

My installer mentioned how (expletive deleted)ing amazing I am - which is of course true .

There ya go folks.... us mere mortals make our way to Screwy's or a local Shed and buy stuff. Dave scours the Scottish countryside for bits and makes his own inverter. Still, look on the bright side, @MrsProdave is missing: some knitting needles, a large quantity of sewing pins, the face on the kitchen clock, the battery from her watch, the copper wire she uses for her jewelry making class, the phone charger that used to be on her side of the bed and her best Tupperware waterproof box. One day, our Dave is going to get caught, just like they always catch the miscreant on Line of Doody. Eventually.

No its not, those detailed in ADE are just examples of how you can meet the requirement of ADE for Rw 40 dB for internal partitions. You could have a partition floor made solely of cheese and as long as you had a lab test showing it met Rw 40 dB it would meet the requirements. Though meeting the fire regs for a cheese floor would be interesting, and a tasty fondue.

£7,999.50 in change to be exact