epsilonGreedy

This subject is more complex than I thought. Trying to catch up with the variety of solutions mentioned so far in this thread and I found this 8 minute breeze through the price/range of options useful though the presenter has an electronics focus rather than house wiring. I doubt one tool will strip delicate control wires from an ASHP unit all the way to a 32amp cooker circuit monster wire.

I am looking for a tool which might not exist. Some time ago a pro electrician visited and I think he used a magic manual hand tool that cleanly stripped of the cable's insulator in one squeeze of the hand. Have I recalled events correctly?

I have been considering buying a testing plug i.e. a self contained device that plugs into a regular socket and when then runs a sequence of automatic tests. Some online customer reviews suggest they report false errors and the price range for these is surprisingly wide. Are they worth it for basic diy sanity checking before calling in a pro? Any trustworthy brand?

Indeed. Each time I visit Screwfix and pay their regular list price I consider it a personal planning failure. Screwfix is a self builder's local convenience store that provides impulse retail therapy at a price.

Interesting, I was about to ask if MK was still the go-to brand and found this thread before posting. There are pages of bitter customer review posts on Screwfix complaining about MK sockets with low quality terminal screws and a bad feel to the clamp action. Think I will major on your recommendation of Scolmore for my build as a white plastic finish is good enough for me. I do like the shaping of MK buttons and the chamfer on their face plates.

My most recent and also most used cordless tool is a Makita 14v/18v torch which accepts an 18v 3amp LXT battery which seems to last for ever on light duties. The torch = DML802.

Same here but a number of UK trade college YouTube guidance videos claim the sequence should be: Spinning drum. Half portion of water to wet the drum. Then all the cement. Wait for cement to mix into a consistent slurry. Add all the sand. Then the rest of the water. Maybe my second hand mixer had too much mortar caked on the inside of the drum and when I tried the cement first technique the dry cement attached to the old dry mortar.

A British YouTube publisher known as Charlie DIYte is reassuringly sensible and understated in his presentation style. He is a full time pro handyman and has majored on Ryobi, if the brand is good enough for him it should be up to your expectations. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7x7wk8yeN2ZEJCo6BgP2ag I started with nothing and have locked into Makita for battery powered stuff mainly because I wanted their sexy pulse impact driver. Otherwise Bosch for big 240v drills and Screwfix's Erbauer for the other 240v stuff. Don't get too fixated on cordless for everything, sometimes a 240v powertool is more effective at 1/3 the price. Trade pro's attach more value to cordless because of their daily working practice, as a slower paced DIYmax self builder you can down tools at 6pm, leave the mains extension lead by the job and it will still be there in the morning.

It might look, walk and quack like a shed but I can assure you it is the "Site Workers Laundry Facility", that will be my line of argument when planning enforcement pay a visit. The most demanding task will be looking for a black sock dropped between washing machine and tumble dryer.

Thank you for running the calculation, I had not realized lighting levels could be determined through a room specific formula. The consensus here is that 10 watts led is not too much which was my concern and probably insufficient. Last night I assessed the lighting needs by dangling my 180LM Makitta torch from the shed ridge and the lighting level was not half bad. Anyhow I now have a good idea of the reasonable range when I go shopping for a light.

I started ordering bits for the garden shed electrics job and this was the lowest power @800 lumens led strip light I could find at Screwfix. The shed has standing headroom under a pitched roof, will it be too bright? https://www.screwfix.com/p/luceco-weatherproof-led-batten-10w-800lm-2ft/2138t

The limiting factor is my brick laying rate which is 1 barrow full in the working life of a mix. The mixer is an electric Belle 150 I think. Too late, I hit send on the Amazon order before reading the second half of your sentence. That's Swmbo's birthday present sorted ?

I am swinging strongly to this solution having thought about it for 20 minutes. Shoveling off a sheet of ply sheet is a key tip. Thanks.

Ok so rather than using x sand and n cement pre-filled buckets you are suggesting one measuring box for each component sized to the ratio? Is there a lower risk method of loading a mixer? Buckets involve getting much closer to the drum.

I plan to setup a proper independent external socket for the site e.g. power the mixer. The shed will be demolished within a year once the garage is built because the planning permission specifically forbids the erection of a garden shed. The shed is butted up to the static caravan with just a small air gap between so not a separate outbuilding in terms of topology or cable routing.

Well there is pedestrian and Pedestrian, I hope the better 10 bricks a day ? The bucket & spade seafront of Skegness is not so far away and it is raining hard here.

Getting the static caravan and shed plumbed and serviced has been a useful learning curve. The newly installed garden shed (site workers laundry facility) now has a plumed in washing machine and tumble dryer. Power is provided using an extension lead and this needs to be replaced with fixed sockets plus a ceiling light all spurred off the static caravan's RCD proteced consumer unit. What bits should I order if the starting point is a 3 core 2.5 mm2 cable that emerges through the shed floor in the corner? So far my shopping list is: Double socket face plate. Wall socket box (one designed to clamp on plasterboard after I have created a pseudo wall cavity with osb). Ceiling light (probably small led panel = no heat under wood roof). Light switch (given possibility of wet hands I am thinking pull cord or proper exterior grade rubber light switch). A local 1amp fusebox for the light circuit. A junction box to branch out to the power and light circuits. 20 amp twin and earth cable for the power circuit. Lower amp cable for the light circuit. Clips and maybe conduit. Maybe waggo boxes to make the connecting up simpler.

Thanks looks like an good option, I will experiment. One thing I realized last year when doing the footings is that the traditional builders technique of tipping a loaded shovel into the mixer is quite safe as it keeps the operator away at arms length. Tipping a full size bucket with a metal handle within the aperture of the drum has the risk of the bucket handle snagging one of the mixing paddles.

I was just using the analogy to convey a notion of how small a bucket I was looking for i.e. something larger than a paint kettle but smaller than a full sized garden/builders bucket. On a moving sailing boat if you were to throw a regular size bucket overboard and hang onto a line, it would skip over the waves for a few seconds then bite on solid water as it fills. At this point the operator standing on deck would either be dragged overboard as the filled bucket adopts a drogue (sea anchor) position or would have to let go.

Does the plot have any physical access constraints? A weak, steep or narrow approach road. Overhanging trees or power lines. A loaded concrete wagon is about 30 tons. Roof trusses and picture windows are awkward and delivery of a 38' long static caravan can cause high anxiety when delivered down a narrow country lane.

When visiting another self builder the other day (who had laid 18,000 facing bricks) we both confessed how easy it is to loose count when loading a cement mixer with set ratios of sand/cement. He resorted to pre filling a set of buckets with sand or cement before loading the mixer and I now intend to do the same to achieve visual mortar consistency above ground. My Question: Can anyone recommend a source for small buckets where six would equate to a half mixer load? Many moons ago I sailed on a french yacht that had a strong mini rubber bucket, this was small enough to be thrown overboard with a rope attached when the vessel was under way and adopt a drogue position without pulling the person overboard. Six such a buckets would be ideal at my mortar mixing station.

My thinking too, though I reckon some masonry ties are required. Lightweight blocks can be shaped. Or given that the structural element of the durisol wall is intact how about boxing it off with a sheet of something? Before proceeding I would run an experiment to test how adhesive a mortar/durisol bond is given the three different materials exposed. Long term is there a concern about different thermal expansion causing hairline a crack in the render?

I guess so but previously I had scaled down my under screed insulation thickness to 150mm on the basis that anything below 10% was acceptable, now I realize the majority of the time the ufh will be coasting along well below the max output in the zone where the 10% to 20% factor applies.

One thing I noticed while adjusting the whole house heat loss to 50% or 30% of worst case is that the heat loss to ground rockets up to > 20%.

I thought my original heat loss of 5.8% for 150mm of insulation was low, having adjusted the insulation number from the PIR default to EPS I now get 9% at a floor temp of 25 c. Would I be correct in thinking EPS is the default choice under a screed in a traditional build?