epsilonGreedy

Much appreciated, I had not encountered that site. Pleased to read that brick and block self builders can join the passive pursuit.

Not quite The starting point is no mains gas, a garden that will not accommodate a regular LPG tank and a dislike of oil heating having lived with it for 4 winters. Cooking via LPG. From a social perspective the happiest occasions in the last few years have been centered around an open fire with for example the grand daughter staying overnight and playing with her dolls house. My current tentative heating design will be based on a 250 l thermal store connected to economy 7, a wood burning stove/boiler and an lpg gas boiler for urgent top up. On a typical working day a brief 6 am central heating blast should bump the house temperature up to a tolerable 18 degrees. At 4 pm the residual thermal store heat should be enough to warm the house then at say 7pm we can elect to fire up the woodburner stove or rely on LPG heating top up if it is a mild day. My concern is heat regulation on those freezing deep winter weekends. If OH gets carried away with stoking the stove then after a long burn the stove's boiler water circuit might struggle to shed heat. I hope that with sufficient water volume the system will not be too thermally spikey. My current guess for total water volume is 200 + 70 (rads) + 25 (pipes), that should soak up a lot of heat and then there are those sash windows.

I have a cunning plan for heat dumping, they are called opening sash windows. Trouble is that will confuse the MVHR system and now I am worrying that my house will go critical, will unstable isotopes emitted up the chimney from my wood burner get caught in the EMF field of my racing MVHR system and trigger nuclear fusion?

This is encouraging to hear and I hope air tightness is where a rookie like me can make a difference by prowling around after 5pm with an array of sealant guns. I cannot find public domain info covering airtight techniques for conventional brick & block designs. Indeed. I am already discovering that apparent late stage build events need to be designed in detail before foundations are poured e.g. adopting a wall hung toilet design can move an upper floor soil pipe exit by two feet which then means an inconsequential casement window in the room below needs to shuffled a few bricks left or right but oh no that puts the window aperture too close to a 90 degree turn in block work.

I have only frequented this forum for 3 weeks and it is becoming apparent that solid fuel heating is the closest this forum gets to a political schism.

Ok fair enough, I am still on the nursery slopes of my self build learning curve. I was planning to design in a through the floor air feed for my wood burner before my build commences. If, to guess a number, I can get my brick & block, concrete beam floor house down to a score of 5 for air tightness i.e. twice as good as current building regulations, would a sealed stove with an external air feed be a wasted endeavour?

I thought Log Burner + MVHR = External Air Feed Only? Wouldn't any room aspirated stove cause so much air leakage it would upset the MVHR air exchange balance.

I had not considered the issue of drain disconnection. The Cranford Soilscape map describes the soil for my plot as "Slowly permeable seasonally wet slightly acid but base-rich loamy and clayey soils". http://www.landis.org.uk/soilscapes/index.cfm The prompt for my question was a thought about the best time of year to pour foundations. If a clay soil is prone to some seasonal expansion/contraction I wonder if the best time to create foundations is half way through this cycle i.e stress the foundations with 10mm of heave and 10mm of subsidence as opposed to pouring foundations in late August with subsequent 20mm of heave.

When designing foundations which dynamic force worries a structural engineer more: An upwards force, or. The ground beneath the foundations dropping away. In the context of this question I am not referring to diagnosed heave or subsidence that is already damaging a building, my interest is which presents more concern when designing trench foundations to cope with anticipated heave or subsidence.

I am beginning to doubt my original concern which launched me down this investigation of cutting. For background, I noticed that on a nearby build with a special bond the bricks were not splitting 50/50.

You guys have saved me some dosh here as I have curtailed my desire for a hi-tech surveyors laser. My revised plan is to buy that Cotech end-of-line basic function laser measure for under £40 and then a water level gauge for £25. I have two survey tapes in my tool kit already. This basic kit and some schoolboy trigonometry should be enough to: Set out a trial foundation plan on site to verify the suggested building fits the plot. Measure gradients to then calculate excavation effort. Lay out a drainage plan to measure falls. Will the cheapest water level gauge with 20 meters of connecting tube be ok? Would a 10 meter tube settle faster?

I have already discovered how much O-Level trigonometry I have forgotten. I still think I should buy a basic laser distance measuring device so that during build I can keep a covert eye on the accuracy of work by various subcontractors e.g. check how straight/square internal walls are or stud wall frame positions. Looking online I see that a handheld laser measure starts under £50, hobby laser spirit levels are < £100 and a basic surveying kit for measuring incline is about £200 but I am unsure what the features mean at this point.

Sorry I missed some essential info. Trenchfill foundations, concrete beam/insulation/screed ground floor, brick & block two story wall construction. Probably 0.5m variation in the site across the foundation plan area and hopefully less than a 1:30 gradient in the longest drainage run of say 30 meters.

The brick manufacturer has warned that one of the styles in the mix is particularly heavy hence a single delivery will not have the typical number of bricks.

I sometimes wonder if the specification of English Bond was a Friday afternoon whim expressed through the conservation officer's quill. Walking around the location Flemish and English Garden are used. Maybe I can get away with English Bond Lite i.e. two courses of stretchers to 1 header. I have seen such a variation in a period window and door brochure. It took me a long time to catch up with your thinking, I like the horizontal or is it vertical thinking. I assume the routed cuts would still be made prior to laying? My concern is that the pointing of the header course would be labour intensive and/or would leave the brick finish splattered with pointing residue.

Yes the house details are highly prescribed by the local conservation officer, I even have a mandated colour code for the front door. Should Disney ever film their own version of Pride & Predudice this house will be perfect.

I am currently part way through the conveyancing for my plot purchase. The owner of the plot says he has no problem with me visiting the site to confirm plot dimensions and the planned house position. My first setting out will only be a trial run and so I do not wish to spray any marking lines just yet. What tools will I need to to set-out the foundation plan? I am also concerned about gradients for a suggested foul and surface water drainage plan but I am confused about the capabilities of sub £100 lasers.

I am in the same position as @pulhamdown except I am at the start of my self build journey. My current idea is to have a wise-owl project manager operating in the background on my behalf. I envisage this project manager would be available for a few 20 minute telephone conversations per week or could visit the site during the evening to pass judgement on work in progress if I am concerned. For example I would attempt to produce a service and drainage plan myself, then pay him for 30 minutes onsite to pace out the plan to verify my thoughts.

My plot has detailed planning permission but the architect's elevation diagram filed online with the local authority does not provide enough detail for me to interpret ceiling height. There are 3 heights noted on the elevation namely 2400 from dpc to joists, 250 for joist height and 2050 up to gutter height. I hope that upper story 2050 does not equate to bedroom ceiling height, what could I expect? 22mm will be lost due to floor boards on top of joists and more for ceiling plasterboard. On the positive side there might be 50mm of timber rail sitting on top of the upper block course. I also get the impression that trusses sit on the inner block skin with the top of the outer brick skin being lower to compensate of the rafter angle. There are a few variables here but at the end of the day I would not feel comfortable with upper floor ceiling height less than 2250. Before I start budgeting for custom roof trusses with a raised joist can anyone guess what the default ceiling height would be?

I fell on my feet and have two of those identified. Next will be a local quarry, thanks for the tip.

This thread fills me with trepidation with its 10 fold range in the estimates provided. Hopefully the diverse numbers can be attributed to people picturing my plot based on their own personal experiences. At least the weather will be on my side with digging likely to commence in late April.

As you say, something I can do hands on without a long learning curve. The brick manufacturer quoted £0.20 per cut today but that will be £1000 for the 10,000 half bricks I need.

This sounds promising. I have an offer to visit the production facility of a nearby sash window manufacturing facility and will report back. The salesman is warning me about cheap Polish stuff on eBay

£600 phew. When negotiating the last minor percentage gap in the purchase negotiations I declined the offer in favour of a keener plot price. Based on your estimate I did the right thing, time will tell.

The seller of my plot has offered to bump start my self build by throwing in a 20m site access drive. The multi plot site already has a decent shared site access road comprised of hardcore and topped with a finer grade (think apples and plums) brown stone base aggregate. My plot borders this access road and the proposal is to spur this existing site road into my plot for 20 meters in an area that will become the plot's permanent private drive and hard standing parking area outside the garage. A gravel topped private drive is prescribed in the planning permission. My plot is level close cut ex horse pasture that gets a bit squelchy after 2" of rain in a winter week. What is the value of this offer?