epsilonGreedy

I should consider this method as well but I am mindful of loosing internal floor area. My 1500 sq ft L-shaped house penalizes such insulation driven encroachment of the external walls... time for me to prove this numerically. I imagine your method is less prone uneven results

Something between legal and probably way short of the passive house standards that many here design to. My detailed planning permission mandates 15 wooden Georgian windows including 10 sash windows with boxed counter weights so Jane Austen will feel right at home with the designer drafts. If I do go the extra insulation mile anywhere I am leaning towards lining the inner block wall with foam backed plasterboard which will be fixed with sticky foam glue. I think @jsharris mentioned that dry lining is more effective when convection channels are eliminated by avoiding cement dot and dab techniques and instead applying sticky foam in a grid pattern with contiguous perimeters.

Ok based on what you are all saying, time for a new approach. The beads idea came into my head because: I was focused on the hassle of removing insulation the following Spring in order to complete wiring, plumbing or ducting jobs in the loft space. I recall working in my parent's loft in the 1970's and the irritation caused by the layered wool like insulation. The loft space of my previous year 2000 vintage Bryant Homes house resembled a back garden after 1ft of snowfall and I could not imagine deconstructing such a maze of criss cross insulation layers to access the ceiling. I now reckon I should roll out insulation between the rafters over the occupied 70% section of the house to provide 100mm or 200mm of insulation for the first winter. Based on the feedback here, I am led to believe that when needing access the following year it should not be a distasteful task to remove a single layer of a few rolled insulation sections.

L-shape. We will be spending the first winter living in one 2-story rectangle (900 sq ft) with another 2-story wing of the house (600 sq ft) incomplete with just stud wall frames and bare block walls. Yes a traditional brick and block 2-story house.

The background to this question is a motivation to move into my self build as soon as it is humanly possible. According to my current plan, occupancy could start in October prior to a working central heating system and with incomplete electrics or ducting in the attic. I think I should install a 50% layer of insulation in the attic to survive the first winter but which insulation material would cause least inconvenience when work resumes? My hunch is that polystyrene beads between the roof joists would be sensible and then prior to final Build Control sign off inspection I would then raise the loft insulation up to standard with rolls of some woven Rockwool type insulation laid over and across the joists. Would I be correct in thinking it would be preferable to sweep beads aside in the loft when work resumes v. dealing with woven rolls and the fibres my lungs could ingest?

I phoned the Building Control office for the local authority covering my potential plot yesterday and was told they do not exercise control or require an interim inspection prior to temporary habitation. In contrast down on the South Coast near Portsmouth a pre occupation inspection is performed = https://www.buildingcontrolpartnershiphants.gov.uk/starting_work/inspections_required/intro.aspx Any chance your could arrange a friendly Jacobite invasion to knock some sense into the chaotic situation south of the border? p.s. Who provided your site insurance for £450? Would I be right in thinking you have pared down coverage to core essentials?

It is a planning stipulation, I am beginning to appreciate this is not a cost that a team will absorb to get the job.

Even so I do not understand why those higher up the building materials foodchain tolerate these middlemen. What value added service do they provide to either the selfbuilder or manufacture of bricks who is prepared to quote for the delivery of 10,000 bricks to a selfbuild plot? I believe the free market is rational which implies I am missing something about the function of Brick Factors.

Challenge convention. This forum attracts those who are willing to challenge all and any existing precedent or practice in the British house building industry. Surely some of you find it incongruous that our lighting circuits are based on the needs of 1930's vintage lighting physics. We install multiple lighting circuits in our new builds each capable of delivering 1000 watts of AC power to 21st century light bulbs that only need 1 to 3 watts of DC power. I think @jsharris did find it incongruous but encountered regulatory barriers and equipment deficiencies during his research. Anyhow after starting this thread I do at least understand the time for whole house DC is not here yet.

In this example I would not want everything controlled by a single switch. Based on my current kitchen I would want 4 switches for manual mood arrangements e.g. range hob illumination, lights above work surfaces, under wall cupboard lighting and pendants over the island. Would this also apply to upmarket gear as supplied by Victron Energy? The offgrid preppers would not tolerate such background wastage but I guess you are referring to the 240vac/12vdc function when enabled with zero load. I suppose the answer would be to added in a lithium iron battery and selectively charge from mains when battery voltage drops but now things are getting complicated. If I was going PV from day one it would be an easier decision to use 12v LED from day one.

My uneducated opinion has been formed by a JSHarris blog entry plus the following US podcast. https://www.dotnetrocks.com/?show=1373 (Background info here https://www.dotnetrocks.com/?tags=Geek Out)

If a home is wired for current 240v ac lighting standards then I guess the circuit is good for 3 amps i.e. +700 watts per wall switch. At the other end of the scale a 60w (lumens equivalent) LED draws 6 watts including losses for some lashup of semi rectified cheapo circuitry embedded within the light. The more I learn about their design it is surprising these do not cook and blow within 5 minutes. At this point is it reasonable to conclude 50% loss in the embedded rectifier? If so, surely a light switch capable of handling 750 watts and the sparkiness of 240 volts and the dangers of AC, will cope with the 12 watt draw of 4 x 12 volt DC LED ceiling lights.

I have been itching to pose this question on the forum. Given how eager folks here are to incorporate tomorrow's world in their new builds today, why is there little discussion of whole house 12 volt lighting circuits? Many of the woes of mains powered LED lighting vanish as soon as cheap rectification electronics is removed from each bulb and instead the same function implemented centrally in a quality piece of kit. I must be overlooking something because this seems like a win-win decision for a new build. p.s. To simplify the discussion let's ignore hi-end central mood lighting options.

I need to raise "blockwork" higher up my league of worries. Forgot to say "Gobsmaking views", must be worth £300/SQM alone if such an intangible can be priced.

A large first project guess 2500 sq ft, mine will be around 1500 sq ft if I proceed. Where did you incur delays, were these before the digging started?

While reading the House Builder's Bible I encountered a description of a mysterious economic process in the supply of bricks. Apparently some shady characters drive around logging new build plots and register an exclusive commission claim with upstream brick merchants and manufacturers. The book goes on to explain these intermediate brick factors pocket 20% of the value of any future order for a plot no matter who submits the order. What possible value-add do these brick factors contribute to free market capitalism? Think I might build in Sicily and fund the Mafia instead.

Yup we are planning such a kitchen, I call it the Sam-Cam look. A few years back a TV crew showed Samantha Cameron in her kitchen which had a distinctive style that was the antithesis of a modern fitted kitchen, it featured mix & match and irregular heights. If its good enough good the PM's wife...

Ok. Having looked at brick cutting videos on YouTube I noticed that the cutting process munches away a measurable percentage of brick bulk, at least it could be a consistent munch rather than the irregular percentage split from a manual whack to a brick. Part of the learning curve is discovering where to focus my worries.

I am new around here and I cannot speak on behalf of the "spirit of the forum", even so I hope @Fredd sticks around. To date I have been a consumer of that spirit, I am intoxicated by the forum's ethos and tolerance of a newbee with a list of elementary questions. From my perspective I sense many here have a passion for getting it right even if that takes years and the cost / m2 creeps up. I represent a different sort of prospective self builder who just wants to create something a little better than a commodity house and break even at the end of the day, as a consequence time is an essential measure of success for me I and hope to benefit from Fredd's no nonsense experience.

The inner and outer walls will be tied. Once of the concerns that prompted my question is the brickwork of a house in-build that I have been visiting. The brick laying team seems tidy and conscientious as far as can judge but the half bricks look irregular from the cavity side. They are producing their half bricks from full brick splits, to make matters worse the full bricks have three hollows tubes and as a result the bricks are splitting 55/45 or maybe 60/40.

Over the last week the House Builder's Bible has lived up to its title, now I am looking for the next revelation. The HBB has helped me understand the main building techniques available, it is excellent for material selection and budgets. However I now need to understand the workflow of house building such as should a hallway block wall be plastered before or after the stairs is fitted, can an inner block 2-story wall be taken up to roof level before posi-joists are fitted, do stud wall frames get fixed to roof joists before bedroom ceilings are screwed in place. I could plague this forum with a load of rookie questions but my preference would be to read a book which complements the House Builder's Bible. Any recommendations for such a book? I don't need a book that covers plot search or the big-vision inspirational side of architecture. My mind is now focused on the site management, build workflow and sequencing. My Amazon research has led to these books. Building Construction Handbook Paperback. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Building-Construction-Handbook-Roy-Chudley/dp/113890709X Haynes - Home Extension Manual https://www.amazon.co.uk/Home-Extension-Manual-Step-Step/dp/0857338161 The Self-Builder's Guide To The Construction Phase Not sure about this one, the contents section looks good but the typesetting is amateurish and has the feel of self publishing. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Self-Builders-Guide-Construction-Phase/dp/0993406424/

Does the high proportion of half bricks in a decorative bond, specified for conservation requirements, compromise strength? I am asking this question in the context of a standard two story brick house with a tied block inner skin. The type of bonds are English, Flemish, Garden Wall etc.

You might be right, I will wait to see if negotiations on the plot reach a conclusion. This site selling reclaimed slates is useful, for typical slate sizes the per slate to roof coverage ratio is x11 to x13. https://slateprices.co.uk/reclaimed slate prices.html The same site also suggests allowing for transport and onsite wastage of 5%.

When looking at slate prices online I see prices quoted in m2 and per tile. Is the m2 price equivalent to surface coverage of the tiled roof laid to industry overlap standards or is it the literal area of the unlaid slate?

My partner issued a prohibition notice on that proposal and it does seem to represent the low point of many self build stories. The costs will mount up with lowloader transport, temp service connections and buy/sell costs. I might live in a basic 2 man towable caravan onsite 3 nights a week up to a weather tight shell just to discourage material theft. My main residence is a long commute away.