ragg987

Oh so still a few months / years / decades - get that application in pronto ! Looks like they cannot ask questions that violate the Equality Act - https://hoa.org.uk/2018/02/mortgage-when-pregnant/

Is that legal?

Not sure if this helps - when I spoke to our council about planning, the discussion about a basement came up. They told me that this does not have any real bearing on the application as it does not increase footprint or have any impact to bearing, over-sight, blocking light and similar aspects. Where they will be concerned is the safety aspect - creating 3 levels brings in requirements for escape paths and safe areas - enclosed stairways, for instance. Of course the other department that will show an interest is your Council Tax - an increase in floor space and amenity may well mean a change in rateable band(s) or value. That earlier kitchen extension - any way it could be positioned as PD?

It is a question of trust. I did a lot of my build this way, I may have been lucky but in my experience local builders and other trades are not out to rip you off, they take pride in their work plus need to hold their head up high in the community. At the other extreme you can fix price, but the builder is going to add their x% contingency to any such deal, plus you end up with a bunch of variations. I suspect x might be 15 to 20%?

The 2 builders I spoke to were charging a day rate (skill based) so not a case of what is more profitable. They wanted a margin on materials, which seems fair, but I believe this is an area where a determined person can make a significant saving e.g. by scouring internet or ringing around for best prices. Builders just get stuff from the local build merchant, generally more expensive even before you add the margin and time. Some might argue that buying materials will impact your cash flow as you have to pay vat then reclaim it, but your price plus vat is likely to be no higher then the builders price less vat, then the reclaim vat payment at the end becomes a nice bonus.

And if you intend on adding PV then running cost of ASHP has the potential to be lower.

I paid £9,200 for a 58m2 section. Excluding wooden substrate and RWG.

Same here. Do be careful if you "supply and fit" with small traders who are not VAT registered as any materials they supply will have VAT included, they cannot recover this and so will pass the VAT on to you. You cannot reclaim this VAT as the materials were purchased by a third party. I purchased my own materials in these cases - so became a labour-only service.

## beef mode on ## Technician or trades person, which covers 99% of the people who come into your house to fit or fix stuff. I am an engineer but could not fit most of this stuff. ## beef mode off ##

I can see why you would infer that from the article, but I do not think that is what it is claiming. It is saying that the heat emitter is sized to heat at 25C above room level, but only cool at 12C below room level, which accounts for 2 of the 8 times less efficient claim. The rest is about solar gain etc which is right but is the reason why you are cooling. So a daft conclusion made based on sensible factors. In a low energy house you would not have 45C heating with ufh, ours runs between 23 and 30C depending on external temp. An Ashp is less efficient cooling compared to heating, but you are talking about a drop of COP from 4 (heat) to 3 (cool), so still efficient.

I keep our cooling flow no cooler than about 12C out of the Ashp, but the output from our buffer to the floor will be higher, possibly about 14 or 15C, as there is an unavoidable mixing effect in the buffer. There is a slight mist on exposed copper. I have insulated the Ashp circulation pump and pipework as well as fitted a drip tray, as per specification. I find that cooling the floor to cool the room works, but we get a slightly damp feel to the room, possibly what the pocket of cool air on floor refers to. I did not see any condensation or damp patches on the floor

I think cooling via mvhr will require a lower flow temperature than cooling via slab. So I am not convinced doing both at once makes a lot of sense. To get meaningful coolth via mvhr is going to need a large delta temperature as air flows are relatively low.

ASHP seem to run more efficiently if not at max, however a scroll / inverter generally means it cannot run below 30% of max. So a 10kW HP (nominal output) would run at 3kW (nominal) lowest. In a low energy house this is quite a lot and HP will be cycling when demand in below 3kW, which you can reduce by using a buffer tank.

We used a manifold to split the main trunk (metal) to multiple flexi ducts. The manifold was quite close to the MVHR, the flexis were long. Insulation inside the warm space is essential for the 2 runs between the MVHR and the external cowls else you will get condensation. After three attempts with the supplied foil-backed fibre insulation and aluminium sealing tape I finally resorted to armacell sheets that are stuck to the metal duct - this is excellent stuff. I used the non-self adhesive stuff and purchased a tin of adhesive with it. For runs between MVHR and internal vents we did not insulate - not needed as air is not very hot or cold relative to room temperature.

Agree.

I would say you have full consent, though of course it will depend on what you requested in your original email.

You could test it too and make sure it is fit for@pocster when (if?) he gets to the lawn.

I believe you have dropped a zero here - 1kWp of PV has the potential of delivering about 1MWh per year in optimum conditions, England. Not clear what problem you are trying to solve here. Is it: I want maximise my use of generated solar? As you have mains gas / combi, as you say you will need a water store if you go that route, seems counter to the gas combi capability, plus your savings will be small compared to investment An option might be to get battery storage, you would need to do the calculations on return, but prices seem to be dropping Is it: I want to future-proof and think about ASHP? An ASHP will require a DHW store, so maybe install it now and use the immersion diverter as a stepping-stone to a future ASHP. But see above, it will not pay back on its own merits. And presumably your combi is good for another 10+ years so why bother now? I guess you could use the solar-heated water as input to the combi, maybe others can comment here Another option might be to have a cold-water coil in the tank that pre-heats the water to supply the combi

This is our second year with the mower. I left the mower out all winter in early spring simply used the app to re-program it to mow on a schedule. It just got on with it. It does occasionally get stuck, the app warns me. One new issue, this year, is we have a few tough weeds growing in the lawn and the (small) mower is not able to cope - it either bounces back off them or get stuck. I sprayed weed-killer last weekend - partially helping. One way you could help with edge trimming is to have a course of paving blocks at edge of lawn - you can then let the mower overlap cutting above the blocks - in effect have the boundary wire closer to the lawn edge. While this controls the height of lawn you will still need to tidy up as the grass will grow over the edge on to the paving. So no perfect solution, if you are requiring that perfect edge you might be better off employing someone to provide that rather than invest in a mower. Or recalibrate your vision

Hi @lizzie, just a reminder of the discussion here... Edges - not completely, you still need to strim. I get away with strimming 2-3 times per year. Our ground is lumpy and sloped. Works OK. Check the spec for degree of slope.

Fwiw this is what we did, and we were lucky enough to have sold the old house just at the end of watertight. Or plan b was to site right down at this point. And we got a sensible price to boot. Best of luck, these are tough decisions, self build is hard enough without having to worry about financing during the build.

We have a partial basement, but our ground floor is a split level and the semi-basement follows the split. Your QS may have a point - the build per sq ft will be higher for the smaller basement than if you increased it, however you will save money by reducing the footprint of the basement. If nothing else you are digging and hauling a lot less earth. Your foundation where you do not have a basement will be cheaper than if you did have a basement.

The biggest impact is from a fabric-first approach - ensure there is a high-level of insulation (walls, floor, roof) and air-tightness, then the rest is less critical. Though once you have a high-level of airtightness then you will need some active ventilation - e.g. MVHR. The two are not mutually exclusive - you can have an eco traditional home. It is attention to detail that will make the difference.

I would err on the side of caution and if the original drive has something CRITICAL, no way would I risk putting into another computer unless I had a backup. Suggest you either make a full system backup (and understand how to restore it) or clone the old drive to the "new" one and try to boot off the new one in the new laptop. I do like Macrium Free (Windows only) for backup and cloning, and CloneZilla (Linux or other OS if using live edition) but there are loads of other options out there.

Lovely story. Have you considered doing stand-up?