Nickfromwales

Who cares about payback? MVHR is for quality of air. Consider the HR element to be a bonus as then you're not pulling freezing cold air in all winter and paying "powered fans" to spin to recirculate stagnant heat from the vaulted areas. Genuinely quite shocked to hear this approach thb, but 'different strokes' I guess.... I'm buggered if I would ever spend all my life savings and then be pulling cold air in and puking heated air out to the clouds for the rest of my life!!

A 150mm to 200mm ribbon, continuous around every opening. The pic above shows about 300mm as the clients went loop the loop with liquid Barney.... The danger when a self-builder becomes beyond obsessed with one particular thing, and then can't stop themselves ordering a few pallets of something......then some more.....and some more...... Not imo, the parge with tile adhesive is a much better surface for the liquid AVCL than rough blockwork, and gives a far more uniform surface for tape to be applied to. I got a <0.2 ACH with the last one, a masonry refurb of a 1960's POS. Blasted that past EnerPHit, and out the other side 😎. You'll need to use foam over the closer, and dab over the masonry / Soudal / tape. Which is fine, as then the fixings of the plates will be behind the tape / foam, and be sealed nicely. This is how every job gets done that I've seen. Tape last. And yes, the window company "could" have used bloody cranked plates....... they just thought it would be good to make like difficult.

Yup. Just fit A2A (air con) for heating but also for cooling. You’ll need more cool than heat. 300mm of PIR is 150% passive!! Take a chill pill and we’ll guide you back on track

The brush on stuff is good, just when you use it it tends to either need to be lathered on to allow the fibres to bridge stuff (which means it takes days to dry) or you brush most of that back off. It’s a bit of a fiddle to get used to applying it, plus you then use a lot more than perhaps you needed. One benefit, as it says it’ll plug 5mm pores, is you could miss the parge work out, but it needs more coats lathered on and lots of drying time vs parge and thin coats of the liquid AVCL. If times against you, I’d parge.

Use flexible tile adhesive instead of sand / cement, you’ll thank me later Use the standard set not rapid, and mix it to quite a stiff consistency. You don’t need a 5mm thick layer so don’t go wasting time / money getting these perfect and uniform. Just get it on, do a couple of reveals, go back to the first and trowel it to get it half decent, and then go over with a wet sponge an hour later to get a ripple free finish. Couple of hours later you can paint the liquid AVCL over the parge. Moisture will soak into the mortar so don’t worry about it not having fully dried out. I do about 150-200mm of parge, then about 100mm of liquid AVCL, minimum 2 coats, leave to fully dry (this is very important) then tape to that. How much of the cavity closer will be exposed between the frames and the tape / parge?

Yea, same with systems we use in swimming pool halls, so the buildings constantly depressurised. This promotes chlorine being evacuated vs the space being pressurised and it then trying to find a way out through the build fabric (or into the house). Learn some odd facts along the way when dealing with loads of different / bespoke projects, and I’ve picked up lots of important things you’d (and I’d) otherwise never have thought twice about.

Gonna be a while….

Yup. Simple always prevails. Heating bills weren’t a worry then I guess though, just don’t let the fire go out

If using AeroBarrier then I’m confident to say it wouldn’t be needed, but if you’re using the likes of MBC TF then you’ve got nothing to worry about as they will tape these for you in their price. Have you checked that in the contract? Not seen one yet where they didn’t tape them Double-check, and then tell Norrsken to stand down and just foam and mastic seal for weathertight, and be on their way.

Does any rain get into that gutter?! It’s not exactly out as far as most people’s… That looks like even slightly heavy rain will just shoot past that gutter. Very odd way to have done this and if it was my house I’d have not said I was happy with it. The roof should be able to take wind-driven rain all day long, and repel it robustly for the duration of its life. This is a non-starter, so alarm bells are ringing. I’d have expected to see more tile overhanging that vent, so does the manufacturer have an online installation guide you can link to? Doesn’t look right to me at all! Other roofing gurus will comment soon, but for me it looks very odd.

It’s @Big Jimbo’s choice of where he pisses, thank you 🙄 Give it another year, then maybe not so

I doubt I’d change its composition tbh, but I’d say to use the Mapei builders screed as (iirc) it has fibres in it. Defo needs fibres, sorry, been a loooong week.

Oh, I should have added that it’s a great product and I’ll be using it more often. That information may be of use too lol!

Anyone using or considering using sarking board, beware, as it’s a bit stronger than weetabix. All you need to do is look at it the wrong way and you’re off back to the stack for a fresh board, and adding another to the ‘cut’ pile. Used it on a recent project (22mm) and soon to be using it again, same thickness, maybe 35mm (tbd), and the carpenters will be getting programmed as to how these need to go on, when and how the batters go on, and impressed upon as to the desire for these to not be damaged during install or immediately after. Plan was, and is, to lay the sarking and breathable membrane, then the vertical counter battens, and then the roofing battens, then plywood, then metal roof suppliers chosen membrane, and then let the metal guys do their thing. You absolutely cannot walk on these unless it’s dead on a joist, one or two inches either side and you’re foot will begin to stove the board inwards, 4 inches away and your foot will go straight through it. This gets even worse if you’re laying these in the rain or slightly wet. Be extra careful of the tongues and grooves, as just picking the boards up the wrong way is enough to damage the groove end / side, I shit you not. 2 man job, minimum, but a labourer to hand for handling and sorting off cuts makes the job go a lot faster. If the labourer can use a saw and a tape, even better.

Utter nonsense. The system needs to be balanced, which is part of a proper commissioning process. MVHR units can’t balance, they have fans pushing air in / out, and are subject to the flow and distance to each terminal; ones closer to the unit will see huge flow rates, ones furthest away much less. Whether you care or not isn’t a good platform for giving advice. Do the job properly or not at all

You’re not pushing down hard enough on the drill / impact gun I expect. The lifting of the boards is called ‘jacking’ which sees the boards lift as if they were being ‘jacked’. This is usually where a fully threaded screw has been used vs a part-threaded screw. It does need a screw for every nail in every board, it’s called preparation. “Fail to prepare, prepare to fail”. I worked for a dickhead a good few years ago, and one thing he said always rang true….. ”Short cuts take 3 times longer”. Much as I hated it, he was right. Every time I tried in life to go the easy / quick route, I ended up pulling it all out and doing it all over again. I’m a stubborn bastard so I kept going against this, but it just came back to bite me and now I just do it right first time. Lecture over, put as many (or as few) screws in as you feel comfortable with

You don't tape to blockwork. You need to parge the blockwork, to get it flat and uniform, and then paint it with liquid airtight membrane (assume Passive Purple from Intelligent Membranes?) and then you tap to that. If you've PP the bare blockwork then that's less than great as the pours of the blockwork will allow air to pass behind the tape. A pic of what you have would help, but, tbh, you just get the windows installed and then airtight afterwards, which reduces unnecessary work and effort. This was one where I got the builders to fully parge the woodcrete ICF, as it's pretty dogshit unless you do the lot, and then PP over. Then they foamed, then they taped. Very difficult project where I was principal consultant, but the builders were really good guys and we got an initial 0.88 ACH, then a bit of 'go find the leaks', and then a final test at 0.66 ACH (as built, end of project test) which was really not expected.

Hoover the crack out, stiff brush to loosen up and debris, and wet it thoroughly with SBR 75%, water 25%, and pour the SLC on to the wet solution. Don't let it dry and then pour SLC. Don't drive over it for a good day or 2.

Can you post a pic of the pipework under the boiler and another stood back a bit, so we can see if maybe it goes into a trap or a pump unit etc?

The subfloor needs to be robust, so no loose screws / nails, and no excess movement. Nothing will survive a moving deck. If the deck is nailed down, then I’d punch a 5.0 x 60mm screw in where every nail is, right alongside it, and get the preparation done properly. Is the bounce because they’re original, smaller joists, or because the deck isn’t fixed down properly?

With a higher hot water demand I’d recommend staying on gas. Cheap reliable workhorses with a still very reasonable running cost. Oodles of hot water and a very small footprint for a decent sized system boiler. You can still divert solar or battery power into hot water all summer, so the boiler will do a lot of sleeping during that part of the year. Maximises longevity too. You’d have to have a big ASHP and cylinder and the SCOP would defo take a hit, plus you will hurt the ASHP longevity too imo, asking it to do DHW all winter, and heating. Ive done a good few heat pump installs, so I’m good with either machine, but the solution should always be about the remit, and the client.

Electric instants are dire at best. The 3ph ones are amazing, but single phase are pretty shit and completely driven by cold water temp; in winter, they get soooo much worse performing.👎 Add the cost of a huge cable to supply it, electrician costs to supply / fit, and the eye-watering amount of electricity it will gulp whilst you are using it. Fit a hot return, and enjoy the benefits.

#victoriandad lol.

Seems you’re off the hook mate