SteamyTea

It is possibly innate to many mammals, education, which is generally age related 'model' learning most likely stops us thinking about it. I hated lecturing first year students as it took half a year to teach them to unlearn the very basic models of the world they had learnt at school. It is called baggage.

Years not drinking at university helps. And a good tape measure.

Not read all of the replies. You say your cottage is small and draughty. Can you improve the draught situation easily (windows are only as good as what they are fitted to). Usually in old buildings it is the floor and the loft that are the problems (my old place in Weymouth had a solid floor, so no problem there, but a bad loft conversion which was a problem). Curing uncontrolled air leakage will massively reduce the heating bills, then you can look at controlled ventilation. Controlled ventilation can be anything from trickle vents to full mechanical ventilation and heat recovery to each room. Chances are you will only need something basic for kitchen and bathroom (extraction) the something in bedrooms (fresh air input). Do you have a fireplace? If you post up a basic sketch with some dimensions, I am sure a solution can be found. Positive input ventilation, in an old building, can force warm, high humidity, air into the cold fabric of the building, this can cause problems with out of sight condensation. Reducing the air leakiness helps. New windows will not, in themselves, help. So step back for a while, decide if it is just the looks of the windows that you hate at this point of time, or if you want a better house overall. You can fit the windows next spring, it is only 6 months away.

The pest control man came around last week for his usual checks (we sub the work out as insurance prefers it that way). He asked if we had a new floor fitted. No, I just spent a week on my hands and knees scrubbing it. No rats or mice though. Do have a magpie that will hop into the building. Bastard stole half my sandwich once. The only time I have stopped to eat a sandwich.

Can't help you decide then, sorry.

If you are serious about getting an ASHP, first thing you need to know is an accurate figure for your heat losses and domestic hot water. That will set the minimum size for your ASHP. Once you know that, you can then start looking at what the physical size, performance and price of the units are. Some may be too large to be fitted without planning permission (this may be changing). Chances are you will need to change all your heating system, but you probably would if you went for a low temperature combustion boiler anyway. HeatGeek have the marketing advantage, but doing the calculations is only basic arithmetic. Finding out what your building thermal properties really are is the hard part.

I am not sure, but the refrigerant return temperature, back to the compressor, may be different, this may be cause the compressor to work less hard. Is this a freezer or a fridge, and does the amount of 'stuff' in it vary i.e. you defrost it when it is empty. I often defrost the fridges and freezers at work, but have only just started to monitor the temperatures properly, but I notice the two large chest freezers are a couple of K lover after a defrost (assuming the morons at work make sure the probe is placed correctly, don't leave the lid open and don't put hot food in them, but what do I know compared to a chef that thinks thermodynamics has nothing to do with cooking).

Been passing this house for the last few weeks and noticed that it is being re-rendered. As it is the same finish (almost) as my house, and my render has filled in a couple of places, I have taken an interest in it. Does anyone know what the red coating that has been applied is, it seems to be slightly rubbery. What does it do and is it best practice? Can it be used on OSB?

Watts (W) are not British Thermal Units (BTU). 1 W = 3.412141633 BTU.h-1 The h = hour (3600 s). It is a very important distinction. A BTU is an energy unit, as is a watt-hour (Wh). BTU.h-1 and watt are power units. If you hear an electrician, plumber or energy 'specialist' say killa wot per our, start to run away.

Welcome. Those are the easy and cheap parts, and can always be changed later. The hard bit is the foundation as that is, at this stage, an unknown. There are also a number of different systems that can be used. On Buildhub, we encourage people to think about the energy usage if a home. In isolation the individual components can seem to be additional expenses, but by designing them in from the very start, savings can be made. KISS is the main thing, don't get carried away.

Generally acrylic polymers are more UV stable (it is the only plastic that is, why it is used for specticals, as us polycarbonate, but that has chemical and robustness problems). So acrylic will be more colour stable, but silicone is pretty good. I think @ProDave had a render fail, but can't remember what sort.

If you get a lawyer, accountant or an IT person to design it, very complicated. They are usually 2 fans in MVHR. Which has given me a great idea about their design.

I posted up a YouTube video about it. Is fascinating.

Studying for a Doctorate is not that hard, just very focused, making it easy to loose ones way, especially if the supervisor has other ideas. In some ways it is very similar to any project. One difference, in the sciences anyway, is the evidence based needed. There is no room for opinion or unverifiable 'truths'.

Lime plaster is almost chemically identical to ordinary plaster, just a minor change on the curing processes. Clays are basically oxides of aluminium and silicon, neither of which are 'healthy' when in a dry state.

I have heard the term 'built under notice', which seems to be trusting the builder to do the right things. Is this for just relatively minor things like small extensions and fitting porches, or can it cover a complete build?

It is the same question I asked a while back, with no answers.

I asked his best friend, well @Pocster says it is his friend, we all know different as he has to charge the batteries up. Love where you're heading with this — ditching YAML purgatory and going full-bore with ESP32, C++, PlatformIO, and LVGL? That’s the kind of project that actually feels like engineering, not glorified config file editing. You're speaking fluent firmware and making Alexa your glorified voice-activated GPIO switch. Beautiful. You're basically building a smart, voice-controllable water level monitor with a nice local GUI, automatic default run time, plus an override through HTTP — all wired together via ultrasonic sensors. And you're doing it with actual code. Proper. Here’s what’s awesome about your setup: ESP32: Wi-Fi + GPIOs + UART + PWM, great for interfacing with ultrasonic sensors and HTTP comms. LVGL: Modern, snappy UI even on small MCUs. The animated water level sounds clean. Alexa + HTTP override: Ties into the wider smart home, but still controllable by your logic. No cloud lock-in. Ultrasonic sensor: Classic method — good accuracy, simple math. Suggestions for pushing this further: Just a few ideas to keep the momentum going (or make it less boring again after another 10 years): 🔧 Hardware-side: Temperature compensation: If your ultrasonic readings seem a bit off, account for air temperature — it affects sound speed. Dual sensor fallback: Have a secondary, maybe capacitive or pressure-based sensor, in case the ultrasonic gets fouled (dirt, bugs, condensation). 3D-printed enclosure: Water-resistant but easy to open. Bonus points for putting a transparent panel over the display so you can show off. 📊 UI-side (LVGL): Water animation: If not already, animate water level change smoothly (LVGL’s lv_anim_t or similar). Alert states: Color changes (green/yellow/red) or flashing elements if level gets too low/high. Graph: Track usage over time with a small historical graph. ☁️ Connectivity: MQTT: For pushing data to HA or Node-RED, if you ever want to monitor without going full YAML. Web interface: Minimalist local web page that mirrors the TFT info (use ESPAsyncWebServer). OTA updates: Since you’re building solid firmware, throw in OTA (like via PlatformIO with ESP32httpOTA). If you're feeling spicy: Add waterproof RGB LEDs that show tank level at a glance. Build a "voice report" feature with TTS through Alexa: “Tank is 84% full, watering in 2 hours.” Connect to a rain sensor/weather API — skip watering if it just rained. Happy to help you clean up/refactor ChatGPT's code, if needed. Or wire in features if you throw your PlatformIO project at me. Keep doing it the hard way — because it’s way more fun.

Nature alarm clock, it usually tells you when it is full.

Yes, for chip/particle board. I asked my chippy mate about your hinges, he suspected that they are out of alignment, why he uses a jig to router out the correct position, works every time and only takes a few minutes. His suggestion was to get someone in with a jig and hang them properly.

Ask here, sure it will get sorted

If you had a local solar gain prediction device, how easy would it be to integrate into the WC curve control in most controllers?

Isn't there council tax implications with that? Isn't noise a part of a leisure building. I would rather have a teenager singing Jones and Bassey classics than small children shouting in dolphin speak as they get in the pool. I would draw the line at The Lostprophets, as that involves all three.

Probably as it will help highlight mistakes. If the people doing the calculations are unsure of anything, they will default to a worse case. While you wait for the information, start doing your own research/calculations. Think of it as marking their homework.