jayc89

Architect has suggested ground floor in brick and first floor rendered. Rendering is easy, how would you typically fix brick slips to ICF and can that bridge the DPC/section of waterproof conc infill?

Perhaps it's a regional thing? I mentioned before, but York city centre is still bustling throughout the day, I leave the office at 5/6 and every pub I walk by is packed. We have a couple of nice restaurants nearby, if you want to get in on a weekend you can typically expect a 2 week wait, that's still the case and in fact I think one's getting worse! A burger van, yes a burger van, has started to frequent a local car park every couple of weeks, possibly monthly. Prices start at £12 (yes, for a burger) and apparently they sell out within 90 minutes. (They are good burgers to be fair, but, £12 for a burger!?)

Inflation stays at 8.7%. Baring cars, all things people typically wouldn't be buying in a recession. The crux of it is, not enough people are yet feeling the pinch.

When we moved in March 2021, I thought I only took out a 2 year fixed, turned out I actually took out a 5 year fixed. So I'm alright, Jack. We rent out our old house, it had a year left on it's existing deal before we moved it to a BTL last year, repayments went up £50 which we passed on to the tenant, their response - "Oh, I thought you'd have increased it more than that"! I work from a shared office space in York once a week or so, it's slap bang in the middle of the city and after lunch the streets are packed with shoppers, people out eating/drinking, more so since the weather's been nice and this is in the middle of the week. IIRC, I saw something suggesting that way back when, most people were on tracker/variable mortgage rates, so when rates increased, a lot of people felt the pinch quickly, however these days, much more are on fixed rates so there's a lag between interest rates going up and those fixed rate deals ending, when consumers start to feel it.

Hospitality is booming which is causing some skewed figures. Many people are struggling, but there are still people out there with money to spend.

That's kinda my concern. The gable end loft space is accessible via the hipped roof loft space, so "something" would need constructing there to separate the two. We'd be running PB up to the rafters in the gable end anyway, as it would be a vaulted ceiling, so presumably that could be stud work, PIR, taped to the warm roof detail finished with PB like standard? That would probably also give us good access to a service void beneath the ridge beam for ducting, lighting etc.

Original house has a cold, hipped roof, in one corner, it juts out where an extension was built, to create a gable end. You can just about make out what I mean here; We want to convert the gable end section into a hot roof, part of it will be used for storage (possible MVHR unit etc) and the other will be vaulted. I'm sure our Architect has it all in hand, but for my own curiosity I tried to figure out how you would typically join 2 roofs like this, but couldn't find any obvious details. Is this going to turn into another can of worms?

We did consider a Jack/Jill basin unit but was worried it would look too cramped, similar the concern with putting the bath on the longer wall was with the room being quite narrow it might be a squeeze to walk past, you certainly couldn't get anything else on the opposite wall, and we still have laundry baskets etc to fit somewhere.

In the latest design, presumably the bottom wall, as soon as you walk into the bedroom, which isn't great. Juggling the best for all three rooms is a bit of a faff.

The door into the bedroom? Yes, any further up the wall and it will be hovering above the stair case

It does currently look something like this; The wardrobe is currently a bit of a wasted space because there are openings on 3 of the walls.

A pocket door into the ensuite feels a little overkill for that design, I think I could probably get away with a standard one;

Couple of different options. Leaving the opening between the bedroom and the wardrobe would be easiest, not least because it's a 350mm thick solid brick wall. However I think the other option makes better use of the space we have and flows better...

That's a hell of a build up? What's the final u-value? Is the superfoil fitted directly against the PIR? I thought it needed a gap either side to work properly.

The room is pretty long, 4.5m so we could have both opposite the door, I was a bit concerned that 1) having everything on the same wall might be a little snug and 2) if the W/C was opposite the door, opposed to the basin, is that a good idea? We're planning a pocket door there, so noise will likely travel more than typical.

Currently going through the process of figuring out our a suitable ensuite/wardrobe layout. Black cavas, stud walls are not yet in place and the ensuite window is yet to be fitted, so we can pretty much do whatever we like. We don't have a massive amount of space, approx 4.5m x 4.5m to fit both the wardrobe and ensuite in. My preference would be to have a larger en-suite but SWIMBO wants more storage, a dressing table etc etc. We're thinking of something along the lines of this; Full length infinity shower on the right, velux window over head, free standing bath directly opposite beneath the window. Window has already been ordered and is not toughened glass so would need to sit approx 800mm up, which I think is OK? Windows are all south facing. Are we on the right tracks? Anything you'd change/recommend we consider before making a final decision?

It’s a bastard for cracking too, so it needs to be allowed to dry slowly. When I plastered a room using NHL I damped it down a couple of times a day for the first week too.

I direct mix of hydrated lime and sand won’t set, no. It’s often used as a practice mortar for that reason. But it can be made into a putty which will

I can literally turn the corner to where it‘s lime mortar and the bricks are fine. I’m about to have the cement raked out and repointed in lime so I guess we’ll see.

I have a gable end wall that was pointed with cement at some point. The majority of bricks below 1m have spalled. The rest of the house is pointed in lime and those bricks are fine. Pretty conclusive to me. Lime render needs a harling coat, bit like a slurry, which acts as the key. Shouldn’t be using anything like PVA.

doesn’t that depend on the carbonation process?

It depends on the manufacturer. There's no real standards when it comes to NHL, so one NHL 2 might be entirely different to another NHL 2. If it was me, given you say the bricks are pretty soft, I'd be using a lime putty based render, rather than NHL. There's a couple of Facebook groups that are really useful when it comes to older properties; "Traditional and Listed Building Advice" and "Your Old House UK - Repair and Conservation" I've learned a lots from both.

What are you rendering onto? Cavity or a solid brick wall? NHL, hydrated lime, has typically been used as it's very much like cement in how you work with it, however more recently studies have suggested that it can actually cure stronger than cement, so hot lime mixes/lime putty are now recommended for solid walls. On cavity walls, breathability really doesn't matter. Hydrated lime is typically used as a plasticiser, but in theory it can be used to make lime putty too, but it takes a long time.

I thought that was the case, but recently (last year or so) changed, so even replacements now need vents (if there is no other ventilation, of course)

It's for the master suite so will be used daily. Having said that, the current en-suite door is left open the majority of the day unless someone's in there. What changed your mind? Looking at the YouTube videos, the Eclisse ones at least, look pretty easy to assemble.