Roger440

Took it all out. Trying to "blend" the plaster afterwards seems to generally be considered a bad idea. The lime is significantly thicker, and it will crack along the join. Also then allows you to use one of the lime based insulating products. Ours isnt listed which obviously makes things easier. Pics below as it stands today. As you can see, its had a chemical injection applied at some point. ABOVE the floor level. Which stopped precisely nothing.

I considered doing this in my house, rather than pull up all the concrete. In the end, i ripped it all up. When we first moved in the damp was terrible. Room always at 90% plus humidity. Started outside reducing the soil levels, then stopped the rain coming in chimney. That helpd a fair bit. Since then, plaster all removed. This had the single biggest effect. Within 3 months, the walls were dry. I could drill into them and dust would appear. Previously it was a slurry. But even then, you couls still see a darker patch at various points just above the floor. 4 months since the floor was removed, everything is totally dry. Walking across the bare earth floor creates dust. Humidity generally 65-75% .Lime crete goes down mid Jan As this is the first time getting involved in a non DPC property, i was sceptical about the theories put forward. Given where we are now, frankly, im amazed at the speed it dried itself out. Scarecly believable considering the state when we got it. The socket back boxes which are 600mm up from the floor had corrided away completely, they had been that damp for so long. As above, causes were, concrete floor with plastic underneath, modern gypsum plaster and excess outside soil levels. The thing is, every house is different, soil conditions, water levels all different, so you cant ever be 100% sure until its done. But id say, bite the bullet, take it up. Bear in mind, that any remaing concrete will still act as a barrier pushing the moisture sideways, so the limecrete section will need to disperse all the moisture from the floor are, but through a reduced footprint. Plus of course you can then install underfloor heating.

Before you wack up internal insulation, given that its a solid wall, almost certainly it has no DPC. If you cover it up with a bunch of moden materials, the moisture will have no where to go. Tread carefully. Worth a read of period property forum.

Any suggestions who? Im in north bucks.

If you can smell it, its not working right. One morning i detected a smell, just like a old septic tank, and found that it had indeed stopped working. Not sure for how long it had been like that. Getting it going again, the smell was gone in a day.

Intersting. Mine was blocked on the pipe intake. Indeed, several times before i got it right, though i suspect there was a build up of sludge around the entry as a result of lack of flow. Sadly, when i did get it emptied i wasnt there. One of my bubblers has never worked, (3 in mine)and i missed the opportunity to find out why. BCO was also of the view that the integral sampling chamber didnt qualify as such. He still signed it off though. Edited to add, does your return pipe not have an opening along the run where it got blocked?

In my experience tradesmen want to do what THEY want to do or believe should be done. Not what you want. Step away from anything mainstream and it gets hard. Im STILL, after 4 months, trying to get someone to tile the floor using specific waterproof products. (it floods). Nobody is interested. They just want to use the products they like (which are not suitable). At this rate, i'll be doing it myself!

Id suggest this is the vortex's achillies heel. It is hyper sensitive. Yours was probably set to low on the return. As mine was. Eventually it gets blocked. The easy way to unblock is to disconnect the airline that goes to it and connect to a hose pipe. If you turn it up more, which ensures it cant get blocked, you end up moving too much water and the quality of the effluent drops. You can judge this just by looking to see how far into the murk you can see. I believe ive found the sweet spot now. Bear in mind, if you make ANY adjustments to the other funtions, it will affect the air supplied to the settled sludge return. Ive no experience of other plants, but im not sure its really as good as they claim. Costs us £150 to empty here in the sunny southest.

Did mine 25 years ago. One area sunk, but rest is still good. The great thing about block paving is, if it does sink a bit, pull up the blocks, but of sand and re lat them Job done. I actually put the base down, then didnt lay the drive for 2 years, Nature is the best compactor of type 1 and sand.

Epoxy Mastic. www.rust.co.uk

Agreed. There are simply no sensible priced plots in this part of the country. GH looks "sensible" in that regard. Especially as many of the "unknown" costs in a normal build are taken care of.

Too many people is my issue. And bicester is way over delevoped now.

It is grim. There are others too.

You have been to milton keynes then? These already exist. Though in fairness, they date from the 80's rather than being new.

Slabs not structural. Its just filling the gap between the walls.

Interesting. Just struck me as a waste of money. If you did it right first time, less digging out, and no screed required. But im just using logic?

Whilst sorting things out post flood, An area of screed was in rather poor condition, probably to weak. Handy as the insurance company chaps were convinced it was screed, over insulation over concrete. So they were saying floor out to replace insulation. Happily, its screed over concrete, and presumably under that, insulation. (built 2007) But that got me thinking. Why would you put 90mm of screed over a concrete slab?

Building regs is just a joke. It can only be useful if its enforced , and enforced by people who cannt be "influenced". As for self certifying trades people, its even worse. I have a whole suite of certificates. Not one job is compliant with the applicable regs. Some pretty much not at all. Many were council BCO's. I dont know what the answer is. There are not enough knowledgable/skilled people in the industry anyway. If you take away a whole load to be inspectors, it will make things worse.

Alll of this. The daft bit is, its not a new system. Its the same system everybody throughout europe, and here, would have had to deal with if they were sending or recieving goods from outside the EU.

There are no tarrifs ONLY if its manufactured in the EU. Anything actually made outside the EU, but shipped from an EU country will still attract duty. So its not really a free trade deal, more half of one.

Thats taking the P. I dont pay anything like that for full container loads. It suggests they are not including VAT, but i wonder if it is really?

For what its worth, he surveyed my house prior to purchase. Identified lots of issues. Everything he saw, which couldnt be further established without destructive work turned out to be pretty much bob on. Ive found nothing of note that he didnt pick up. Expensive. Very. Useful and worth it. Definitely.

If you can be sure the dpc is fixed/working, then all should be well, but id still tread carefully. My house is similar, old bit half the size of the new bit, though i didnt build it. I just accept that the downstairs part of the original house just wont be that good. Ie, no insulation on the walls, but will have in the floor (foamed glass) My old 30's semi cost twice as much to heat as this, and this is twice the size. Thats despite having the flue from the wood burner (now removed) open, But it has to be or the humidity starts to climb. Basically its viable top close off the ventilation without creating other issues. I suppose i could use MHVR. But as its comfortable, and not that expensive to heat, i'll live with it.

There has been a flurry of posts on here about older houses. Stop, and get educated on it first. Insulated plaster board, celotex etc. No, no no. Not in an 1800;s house. Seriously, peruse, at length, these 4 sites before you do work you later find needs ripping out. One word. Breathability. https://www.heritage-house.org/ https://www.mikewye.co.uk/ https://www.lime.org.uk/ https://www.periodproperty.co.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=1

Yes, everything temp said yesterday. Its a nightmare. Simply no containers available. Currently you need to pay 8-10 times the ore october rates IF you can get one. If your products are bulky releative to cost, prices are going to be going up big time. Ask me how i know...................................... Worldwide trade is coming to a standstill. Not going to be pretty.