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I think your architect has picked up on design features from those other houses but has taken the idea just a bit too far. I think if it was simplified a bit it would get through and be cheaper to build as well. On another issue: Our house has some tall triangular windows in wood and maintenance is a pain. A scaffold tower helps but the steps make it hard to move from one window to the next. I would go for metal clad or upvc.

"Not mentioning them" would need to include not mentioning them in the planning application or on site plans for same. You have to send copies with the reclaim.

Seems reasonable if the incoming main can always supply 112L/min. I'm not familiar with the regs. Are you allowed to pump the mains direct these days?

Just to be clear.. its the splitting of the title that solves the VAT issue not getting PP for seperate occupation.

I would try the council naming dept as they have to approve names to get them onto the post office database. See if they will let you do that now. We didn't live on site but frequently had vat receipts sent to the delivery address instead of our rental, so we put up a post box on the fencing. The postman probably found it easier to find "Land south of the church" than our final official address. Even now PayPal and Amazon have "(house on right of church)" in the address field to try and avoid problems.

@ashthekid The responsibility or shared pipes changed from the neighbour (home owner) to the water co in 2011. There is a guide here with a lot more example illustrations.. https://www.water.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Private-Sewer-Transfer-Water-UK-Template.pdf

..but still inside the dotted property boundary. I won't matter if the pipes are in front or back gardens or under the house itself, just if they are inside or outside the property boundary.

One possibility might be to apply for planning permission to use/convert the outbuilding to a separate dwelling. Split the title so you have two plots (with shared driveway if necessary). Then you wouldn't have a VAT problem with the new house because you would be demolishing everything on that plot. Once the new house is complete and you have the vat reclaim done then you could merge the titles back into one plot. I don't think planning permission would be needed for that but check. I see two possible issues... Getting planning permission for separate occupation might be difficult. However the same trick should work even if you only get temporary planning permission for separate occupation during construction. That might be a lot easier to get. The land registry don't like splitting land if the same person will continue to own both parts. Its something to do with not being able to enforce covenants on yourself. Anyway it might delay the splitting process. It might smooth/speed things if you own one and your spouse/partner/children own the other. However self building can be stressful and you should think about the consequences of a split or even a death. Ditto taxes. Edit: If you go this route I think I would recommend getting two separate planning permission. One for separate occupation of the outbuilding and another for the new house. I think it could cause vat issues if it was all on one planning grant. This might not be possible it the seperate occupation one is temporary.

Yes I believe that's correct. I'm sure this has come up before but couldn't find it when I looked. See... https://www.gov.uk/vat-builders/new-homes

Another suggestion here. Perhaps try on some left over stone first? https://www.diynot.com/diy/threads/removing-rust-marks-from-indian-sandstone-and-general-cleaning.459264/

Google suggests its not the acid but iron in the stone itself.. https://www.stoneworld.co.uk/faqs/how-to-remove-rust-staining-from-kandla-grey-paving/

+1 @ashthekid Looks like you are the house with blue door. Neighbour is the house with red door. Water co is responsible for the red pipes, you the purple bit to your boundary only. https://draindetectives.co.uk/blog/who-is-responsible-for-drains/

When the water stops suddenly you get a shockwave going back up the pipe. This can make noises several ways, sometimes at sharp bends or one way valves. There are water hammer arrestors available but Ive never needed one.. https://www.screwfix.com/c/heating-plumbing/hammer-arresters/cat10420003 I believe they are just a pipe with air in acting as a spring (and perhaps a piston/seal to stop the air dissolving in the water?)

Yes that's more or less what I built (mine also had a layer of WBP to prevent racking) but didn't you say its already built? So not possible to fit breathable membrane before the cladding.

So the supply comes on site (call that 0m) and is pumped up 30m to a tank. However some plots are at 20m and 26m up so they are only 10m and 4m below the tank. So the worse plot should get 4m head (0.4 bar) which is consistent with what you say about them getting "1/3 bar pressure". Have I got that right? I think I'd do a proper review starting with the demand.... What peak flow will the site need in the future? Any further expansion planned? If you just use a pump to boost the pressure can the main deliver that peak flow rate at the time of day when it occurs? If not then some sort of storage is needed to average down the peak flow.

I found the manual online here but cant find "TH1A" mentioned in it. Nothing obvious in the Trouble shooting section. https://www.manualslib.com/products/Mitsubishi-Electric-Pac-If063b-E-8788433.html

The only issue I can see is with the VAT reclaim. I would make sure it is consistent with what you get approved rather than what you build. Otherwise see...

I think I would jack them up a few mm and insert one or two shims/plates cut from 1mm mild steel. Perhaps do the middle ones as well if they will move. One way to lift them a bit would be to cut a length of say 4x4 that is a few mm longer than the distance from underside of joist to the floor. Perhaps put down some plywood to protect the floor first. Then hammer it upright like a pit prop.

Welcome. Opinions on Potton houses vary. My planning officer actually asked me.. "You're not building another Potton house are you?" Presumably this is because there are two in our small village already and the fake beams on them might have been OK once but just look a bit corny now. It depends what you want as they have a few different styles and some are better than others in my opinion.

Typically you run SWA cable in the ground and use potting boxes to make waterproof T joints one per light. The wire from the T joint up to the light is typically rubber and sometimes prewired to the light. About the loops.. I mean run the SWA to near where a light is going and make a loop in the ground. Put the T joint in the loop. The loop is just to give you some slack/spare wire in case you need to dig up a joint in the future.

Welcome to the forum. The idea is to prevent water vapour created inside the building from getting through the plasterboard and insulation to the cold structural timbers where it may condense into water causing them to rot. So the vapour barrier should go between plasterboard and insulation.

+1 I used Hikvision wired POE cameras, each on its own cable back to a hub in the loft that supports POE to power them. I also have a server on the same hub so not all the camera traffic goes over the main house network. If you go a similar route note that with some hubs only half the ports support POE so worth checking before you buy. I had lot of issues getting motion detection working reliably, typically I got too many false triggers due to wind moving tree branches, spiders, moths etc. If I turned down the sensitivity it missed people walking about. So I've ended up recording pretty much everything on the server. In an ideal world I would have seperate IR illuminators so spiders aren't attracted to the camera and PIR sensors connected to the system to trigger recording... but perhaps that's overkill.

I think its quite rare for a 110mm vertical stack to freeze. More common for smaller diameter "horizontal" feed pipes to freeze (eg from kitchen sink to the stack).

I'm not a Hetas installer but I would build a 150mm or 225mm ID diameter chimney using pumice liner blocks. Then use a register plate/adapter to connect to the stove. They can be painted black to match the stove pipe. The manual here.. https://www.hunterstoves.co.uk/Content/Images/uploaded/Instructions New/Aspect Eco Dry Instructions.pdf says.. Something like this or one with a flat rectangular plate that can be screwed to the underside of the cast lintel.. https://directflues.co.uk/isokern-dm36/adaptor-increasing-stainless-125mm-to-150mm-isokern Do check exact dimensions before ordering. Took me three attempts to get the right adaptor for my stove. They mixed up ID and OD and things like that. I think some places make them to order. I note that the manual also says... There is a diagram in the relevant Approved Document that describes this. In short this means the stove may raise the temperature of the hearth over 100C or at least its not certified that it wont. The latter would allow a thinner hearth (eg 20mm slate/granite/glass).

Planning conditions typically say something like.. "Before occupation..." or "Before work starts on site..." So you only need to discharge the ones that say "Before work starts.." at this stage, however if you are able to discharge the others as well then do as many as you can at the same time because the fee is per application not per condition. In my case I sent them lots of documents and several brick samples as they lost some. Eventually after several email exchanges and revisions to drawings they wrote back saying they were happy so I applied to have to conditions discharged and sent the fee. These days they may want the fee up front with the request to discharge all on one package. Just a reminder: If the CIL is a thing in your area remember to get the exemption paperwork done and confirmed by the council before starting work. Some people have been caught out.. They asked the council if they were exempt and the council said "yes the project will be exempt"....but that's not the same thing as actually applying for the exemption on the proper forms and getting the reply back, you still have to do that.