Temp

WBP = Water Boil Proof Plywood. Sometimes also called Marine Ply. Quality of this stuff can vary a lot so if your timber merchant offers several different grades pay for the best. I had some which was sold as WBP but delaminated quickly when damp. Concrete blocks should be fine. Our tray is a massively heavy Travertine tray that needed four people to get upstairs. Builder said it was the heaviest tray he ever installed. No sign of any movement after 12 years. However we have had water getting between tiles and tray. I noticed a damp patch downstairs a few years ago and for a horrible moment thought it was the trap leaking. Turned out it was just water that had escaped the tray through the door hinge gap. Sealing between tray and floor tiles was redone and it was sorted.

PS We filled in the hole with a pressure treated wood frame (4x2) and thick WBP on top with a hole where the trap had to go. PPS You can set the tray into the floor a bit if falls allow but I would leave the top about 5mm higher than the finished floor level will be after tiling. That way the plastic door seal won't scrape on the tiles when the door is opened. Might allow a bit more just in case the tiles aren't 100% level ?

We have same. Use a "top access" trap. McAlpine and others make them. The water seal in these is formed by concentric tubes instead of a U bend. The inner tube can be removed from above to clean the trap. Never need to access from below. Follow the instructions but the basic idea is... Plumb the bottom of the trap into place and support it at right height. Check the position by lowering the tray on top temporarily. Test for leaks. When happy mortar bed the tray. Then seal around the tray hole and screw the top part through the tray into the bottom of the trap. Check tray is level again. Later you fit the inner tube of the trap and the mushroom cap, bot of which can be removed for cleaning.

I suspect the bill isn't just for demolition. The photos show it was one half of a semi. It looks like the work affected the other half of the semi (on the right) and the unattached semi next door (left). This photo shows a bunch of steel now going between the two. I reckon the owners of the unattached semi on the left would only allow that if their house was being affected as well. So I make it at least four properties affected. Their flat, the one above and the two semi either side.

The Sun: Couple’s £1m bill as home COLLAPSES after botched basement conversion. And that's not the rebuild cost.... https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10471808/couples-dream-home-botched-conversion-mortgage/ There was another flat above theirs.

Guess I should check you know about the CIL exemption for self builders? To qualify you must not do any work on site before getting the paperwork done.

Sounds good. Relative of mine just has a pump to send sewerage up hill to the main in the road. Seems to be reasonably trouble free. Not sure if you need more than that these days.

There are several robots on YouTube doing plastering.

Welcome to the forum. If you have just agreed a price you still have time to do any outstanding due diligence checks. Get a 60m tape and do your own site survey, measure it, bang in some posts if the boundaries aren't obvious. Photograph them. Check against title plan. Does it have planning permission already? Services near? Access rights/Ransom strip? Visibility splays? Covenants? Will soakaways work? Good luck!

We have wet ufh in our bathroom. I recommend putting it on a separate programmable stat so you can set it to come on early without heating bedrooms. Love it. Heatmiser do a stat with remote sensor. Sensor in bathroom, stat on wall outside. Wire between. I made my own sensor from a NTC resistor in a tiny box from Maplin.

Look standard to me. Google ceiling rose wiring or see.. http://www.ceilingrosewiring.co.uk/ceiling-rose-wiring-older-cable-colours/

See advice in here.. https://brickhunter.com/blog/how-to-lay-bricks-in-winter "Temperatures lower than 4°C can compromise the structural integrity of your brick wall. According to the NHBC (National House Building Council), masonry construction should not proceed if the temperature falls below 2°C, unless suitable heating is available."

Why bubbles get stuck in pipes... https://phys.org/news/2019-12-student-year-old-physics-enigma.html

The term warm roof is ambiguous. Some people use it to mean a warm loft others that the insulation is above the rafters so the rafters are warm. Personally I would encourage people to use the following terms.. Cold loft - insulation is at joist level Warm loft - insulation is at rafter level Cold roof - rafters are on the cold side of the insulation (eg the insulation is between or under the rafters or at joist level. Warm roof - rafters are on the warm side of the insulation (eg the insulation is mainly above, but possibly some between, the rafters). The above also effects how/if the loft is ventilated. Are there any drawings available to show what was intended? Building Control might have a set?

Google Bisazza gradient mosaic tiles. One source.. http://www.tilesnaturally.co.uk/bisazza/ Or from Aliexpress.. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1866616732.html

+1 Are you already on your year out or does that start next year? Many uni provide help finding placements.

Forgot to seal a top access shower trap/waste. First use it was raining on my computer in the room below. Near death experience... I embedded some 10mm threaded rod in the concrete slab for my shed to make it easier to bolt down later. Some days later I fell backwards and one ended up a few inches to one side of my head. Nearly impaled. I spent the next 10 mins cutting up some 40mm pipe to put over them.

If it comes with a reel of PLA I would experiment with that first. If the battery adaptor gets hot then PLA might creep or even soften. I think it will be ok but if it is an issue try ABS or PETG. The nozzle temperature needed for PETG (235-265C) is slightly higher than ABS (235C). Find out what the max nozzle temperature is for your printer. If not hot enough to print PETG it's possible you can upgrade the nozzle heater (aka hotend) cheaply. The heater is usually just a small aluminium block with a heater resistor and thermocouple in it. The Chinese churn these out by the bucket load. One for mine cost from £6 to about £30. Some people say you need to put the printer in a heated cabinet to print ABS reliably and since a lot of my printer is actually made from PLA the whole printer could melt :-)

There are many different types of 3D printer.. https://3dinsider.com/3d-printer-types/ I think that was from an SLA resin printer which might be more brittle but has other advantages such as faster printing. Some of the plastic filaments used in FDM printers is stronger. Occasionally with FDM you can get delamination between layers just as wood splits more easily along the grain but I've not had too many issues with that, especially not with PETG plastic.

Many many decades ago I was at a military camp trying to win camp competition for best turned out room. Running out of ideas to improve things we removed every screw we could find. Not all were brass so we had to "acquire" some so they all matched. The brass heads were polished to a high shine and the slots aligned. As i recall we got extra rounds on the range :-)

+1 There is a lot of force when someone dumps themselves down on the edge of the loo seat after a night on the town. The top of the frame tends to move away from the wall and the bottom towards it. How well is his timber frame fixed to the floor/wall? Is that Wedi foam board? I like Wedi board but I wouldn't use it for this. The back of the pan i have isn't dead flat and i think this could cause forces to be concentrated at a few points. I'm concerned tiles might crack or be pushed into the wedi. I'm going to use Hardibacker behind the one I'm doing.

I recently did a mini survey of the dimensions of wall hung pans as I have one to do. The 180mm dimension between bolts was common to the 8 pans I looked at. However other dimensions varied. In some cases this could be rectified by raising or lowering the whole pan 10mm but not always. In 2 out 8 the vertical spacing between pipes and bolts was different to the geberit frame. Eg the 8mm bolts were higher or lower in relation to the two pipes.

Its called Localism. The CIL is meant to replace other planning charges such as S106 agreements. Its intended to fund infrastructure projects like schools and roads that are needed to support new housing developments. Councils draw up a list of projects needing funding over say five years, and estimate the floor area of houses that will be built over same period. They effectively divide one by the other to calculate the CIL. I once saw the spreadsheet my council drew up for their CIL scheme. Not all councils switched from S106 to the CIL straight away although the government introduced an incentive. They limited the number of S106 contributions that could be collected for the same thing. For example only 5 S106 contracts could be agreed to fund the same playground.

You should be exempt BUT make sure you follow the exemption process to the letter or you can loose it. The forms are here.. https://www.planningportal.co.uk/info/200136/policy_and_legislation/70/community_infrastructure_levy/5 I think you want form 8 not sure about others. The key point is do not start any work on site until the paperwork is done.

Plastic pipe is almost never straight so much prefer copper on show.