AliG

In this area, I don't believe they will allow you to connect more than a 5kW array back to the grid, it may be different where you are. So you might lose the modest return from FIT payments. PV panels have fallen enough in price that they pay for themselves anyway, but I think you might struggle to use the energy from such a large array.. You may deplaning battery storage of course, but I don't believe they quite stack up yet in terms of cost per kWH I thought it was for natural light, an upstairs hall is always nicer with a window. If you don't extend it out, building the corner of the roof would be more awkward on the new design. Extending it will give you a double height area all the way to the front door which might be nice. It looks like it does encroach into the corner of the office at the moment though so you could gain a little space there.

I would be totally guessing on the cost difference, but that design is much more attractive, so you might gain some of it back via a higher valuation. You can offset some of the cost by losing the stepped in area above the front door. This loses a steel required to hold up the outside wall and allows you probably an extra cupboard in the home office or at least more floor space. You will lose a lot of brickwork and render from the much lower gables, but you gain an extra gable. There will also be extra trusses although they will be smaller. £5-10k seems like a good guess, why not ask a roofing contractor for quotes.

Thanks, getting there, decided to redesign our en suite, for the second time today, luckily no major plumbing changes, but some stud work down and new studs up. Finally think we have it right. It has been painful.

Kitchen almost finished

I found a company called Knotwood who do aluminium fencing. TBH I did not know it existed. It seems to be popular in Australia, I couldn't find any prices here but in Australia a 6m long aluminium 65mm wide slat costs £36, so you could be looking at around £250 per metre of 2m high aluminium fence, so around 4-5x the cost of a wooden fence. I am planning to use green mesh security fencing and then plant a hedge to grow through it, this should provide a combination of security and seclusion at a reasonable price with low maintenance. A hedge will let some wind through to dry the garden, it depends how densely you plant it and what kind of hedge it is, if it is deciduous then it will let more light through in winter when it is wetter.

Generally for liquid screed the minimum coverage of UFH pipes is 40-50mm so you are looking at a minimum depth of around 60mm screed, some people will say 55, some say 65. For sand cement you are looking at around 75mm minimum depth. However this is an unusual floor build up, why is the screed reinforced? The beam and block floor should be load bearing. Are there load bearing interior walls sitting on the screed with the insulation below them rather than all the way down to the beam and block? Otherwise I do not see why it would be reinforced. I must admit I am not sure the thickness of the screed once it is reinforced, but I could imagine it being nearer 100mm. If so I would just make theEPS thinner. The lost insulation value would be negligible. PIR will be much more expensive. I can't imagine that they have reinforced the screed for no reason as obviously a thinner screed and no rebar would be a lot cheaper.

That's very nice looking, as mentioned bioethanol would be an expensive heating source, but its OK if just used occasionally for visitors. Also you don't need any chimneys etc. The Optimyst will be see through like in @Alexphd1's picture, I have had the electrician put a couple of mini downlighters in the alcove so you can light it even if the fire is not on. They are already running and it provides a nice glow. We also have a gas inset fire in the kitchen and a stove in our bedroom. the gas fires are expensive to begin with but once you include the cost of flues, fitting, gas pipes etc I almost wish I hadn't bothered. They are at the opposite end of the house from the boiler, I will probably be over £1000 to get the gas to the other end as it has to be routed all the way round the outside of the house. I have had the optimist plumbed in so I don't have to manually fill it.

I have a Optimyst fire waiting to be installed. i will post pictures when it is in. http://www.firesandstoves.co.uk/dimplex-cassette-1000-optimyst-electric-fire/ I spend a lot of time looking at Bioethanol and was a little concerned around the safety and refilling it. Depends if you actually want it to give off heat or just be something nice to look at.

Reading the guidance I don't see why you cannot reclaim the VAT on any kind of boiling water tap, surely it is a water heating device as below. gas and electrical appliances when wired-in or plumbed-in that are — designed to heat space or water (including cookers designed to have a dual purpose (to heat the room or the building’s water) — designed to provide ventilation, air cooling or purification, or dust extraction

Is the ceiling already built? If not why not run the stud wall right up to the insulation and seal it. This would considerably help sound travelling between the rooms.

I have mixed feelings on balconies myself. We have ended up with one because I wanted a covered area at the ground floor level and the architect didn't want to do it with my suggested glass roof to allow the sun in. He said it would look grotty over time so designed a balcony. It all depends on how much you think you will actually use it, I can't say we have used them much when we have had them but it all depends on the view etc. Certainly if you lost the balcony there would be quite a substantial saving. You would lose 2 steels in the floor and one holding up the roof, and also the costs of cladding and waterproofing the balcony and the large glass balustrade as well as some brickwork. I wouldn't be surprised if the savings ran to £7-8000. You would gain a bigger bedroom, and as suggested you could simply is inside with the windows open. There would probably be room to have a sitting area within the bedroom. On the other hand it adds a bit of interest to the outside of the house and maybe you'd like to sit out on a balcony so there is personal preference involved.

@Hecateh you may have posted your plans originally and I didn't see them. Just looking at them, the master en suite looks uncomfortably small. I would make it wider and the dressing room a little smaller. I would also put a nice big shower right across the end of the room. When you say the bathroom will be an ensuite, how will that works as it is across the hall?

Ah right. You can move them down the roof or create boxes as suggested. However, to get them in below the ceiling they would basically be at the gutter. Looking at the elevations, 2 of the Velux windows are directly above normal windows. Did the architect intend them to light up the loft space? Unless they are lighting spaces that don't have windows I would be inclined just to leave them out. Hard to say without the floorplan. They are an expensive way of lighting the loft. I would certainly not have the 2 that are above windows, they would look odd from the inside and seem unnecessary.

Are the Velux windows not supposed to just fit between the trusses, they look to be the correct size for that. If not the trusses can be cut and reformed around the Velux, that is not unusual.

You can certainly see from the section that no steel is envisioned. It shows a lintel. I have steels in my roof exactly that truncated A shape. Cold bridging shouldn't be an issue as only at the right hand side would it be bridging to the interior, everywhere else it is the exterior of the balcony behind it. More difficult will be hiding the steel with a brick finish. It would go inline with the inside wall with a plate holding up the outside wall. When you look up at the underside of the wall though you are going to see a 300mm wide metal plate. Really SE should advise and if they have already been paid they have clearly made a mistake not to include it.

A bit like with cars we are on the verge of a battery powered revolution. With a 50-100% improvement in battery capacity wired products such as vacuums, lawnmowers etc will become redundant. Generally speaking these products are already more convenient to use but sometimes lack a little power or longevity or are just a bit too expensive. if Dyson made a battery vacuum with around 40 minutes run time and maybe a little more power on the standard setting that would enable it to be a main vacuum. Alrrady it is now quite rare to see a wired power tool

I thought I'd come on and recommend a Dyson just to get people going but was beaten to it. I think we have had 4 Dysons in the last 20 years and my parents have had a couple. I am never sure where the flimsy build quality comments come from, we have never had one physically break. What we have had is the suction decreases after a while. To stop this you have to really take them apart and clean them as dust accumulates on the inside. You also have to make sure you clean the filters. What I have found kills them is cleaning up large quantities of very fine dust such as flour or plaster. Using one in a dusty building environment is not recommended at all. I have seen the suction disappear and the filters clog after minutes of cleaning up this kind of powder. I think the issue is that other cleaners would allow this kind of powder straight through or it would clog up the bag which then gets replaced. In a Dyson it tries to filter it out and the filter gets clogged. Eventually the filters stop cleaning out and need replaced, they are not cheap. For this reason I am very interested in the latest no filter Dysons, but as ours works fine I can't justify replacing it. We have a V6 cordless, I got a good deal on a refurb on EBAY. Once you get one of these you simply find you stop using a corded vacuum. Unless you have a lot of cleaning to do it is so much faster just to whip it out and clean the specific area that needs done. Our cleaner uses it in preference to the corded Dyson. I believe that the new V8 is especially good on hard floors. Obviously it is great for cleaning the car also, however, I find the charge does not always last for a full clean of the car. I'd quite like to try some of the other battery cleaners, shame you can't test drive them like cars. I have tried various other cheaper cleaners on the grounds that they might represent better value. I have had a Samsung cylinder - useless, and a Hoover upright - constantly blocked. I have a Vax upright in London which was cheap and so far does a good job. We had a VAX carpet cleaner that broke twice in the space of being used 5 or 6 times. A handle broke off and the plastic spindle that turns the brushes broke rendering it useless. Luckily they have a 6 year warranty and customer service was very good, they just sent me a new one. It's still in the box, no carpets in the new place.

I can use the car charger if I back about a foot into the garage. I put a piece of wood in the door tracks so it can't come down on the car. Neither door is working properly. We will need to investigate next year.

The sink is Porcelanosa, all the tiles and bathrooms came from them. There are a couple of places where I could probably have got a better price or different item, but it made like a lot easier to order everything from one place and they have been very good. All the other sinks are reconstituted stone, I am excited to see them up. The builders are a bit scared as they are ridiculously heavy and wall mounted onto metal frames. The single ones are 69kg and there is also a double one. I have decided to fit it tiled in as I am worried it will sag over time.

Unusually the floor is a glue system. The builders were quite surprised to see that on an engineered board. It is this flooring https://www.luxuryflooringandfurnishings.co.uk/150mm-american-black-engineered-lacquered-walnut-wood-flooring-15-4mm-thick.html I had a company I had used before in Edinburgh quote me on Walnut and their samples were either quite flat and disappointing or very expensive. I would have had more grey in the bathrooms, but the wife is not a fan. She likes then to "glow". On the other hand we have gone for grey walls and furniture in the lounge and dining room. On a positive note I managed to use the Tesla charger at the house for the first time today. I am sure @Nickfromwales you get a lot of unreasonable requests. I try to be very accommodating. I try not to rush people as time is pretty much free. Unfortunately this time our old house is sold so it is now very expensive to not be in.

This is pretty much what I said to the builder. It isn't going to happen so go back to doing things in the right order not rushing them. Actually I have been impressed by the trades continuing to do things right, protecting floors and so on even though they were hurrying. TBH it's amazing how much got done in the last two weeks, if only they had sped up a few weeks ago. The main issue was not having the heating on earlier to dry out the plaster. Everyone has calmed down today. I have asked the movers to bring our stuff to the house tomorrow, and will just store it in the two rooms where the floor is down so that it's not in the way. That way we will have our stuff over Christmas and New Year. We had packed away the vast majority of our clothes, even some Christmas presents expecting to get them back a few weeks later. I have booked a place to stay until early February. They literally were just finishing off the type 1 on the drive at 5pm today so that the movers can get in and I can take the new car up to the garage to charge. I am pretty easy going as long as people are making an effort and being nice! I was really pleased with the floors as I ordered 470 square metres of it on the basis of a single sample less than a foot long from a company on the internet. It was £39 a square metre including underlay, I saw some stuff twice the price that wasn't any nicer.

Haha, so nearly. Yeah we're not in, they just couldn't get enough done. The electrics in particular weren't finished and the smoke alarms. Also I don't think they were going to manage to get any doors in. Another week and it might have worked. Temporary stair finally went in onTuesday. Can finally use the front door. Master bedroom plastered and ready to decorate. Sofa delivery, just had to leave them wrapped up for the moment. This en suite we hoped to be using by today. Kitchen will be finished tomorrow I think. Two ensuites made it in white and grey. Really pleased with the floors and the skirting boards.

Had meeting with architect and builder this morning. Airbnb booked until February.

That's basically what we are asking for. I have reduced and reduced to the builder what is acceptable. We have 4 people coming from America to stay arriving on Christmas Eve. I have asked for 4 bedrooms with floors and working bathrooms upstairs. And a kitchen. And heating and hot water. No paint, no finished stairs, no sitting rooms, no driveway, no render, no soffits, no satellite dish....

My wife went round this morning and was adamant that it had no chance of being ready. In fairness she has consistently pointed out that I have been wrong in hoping it would be ready earlier. But I see no point in taking a negative view and just wait and see then deal with it. The builder has been on the phone this evening and he is adamant that it will be. I am on the train home to see in the morning. I can deal with the ups and downs and just roll with it, my wife just cannot take the stress and uncertainty and is really at the end of her tether.