LA3222

@dpmiller, do you have some photos you could stick up of how you solved all the details of your dormer? I am trying to get my head around how the flashing should be done and like you, my dormers will be rendered. I believe there should be lead soakers u dear the tiles at the side which are nailed to the dormer cheek under the counterbattens? Then once the tiles are down they should have lead flashing over them which goes up the dormer cheek over the counterbattens? The render board goes on top of the battens and then render away? I'm not at all sure if I'm thinking along the right lines here, if you could give me a steer it would be appreciated Ta Jamie.

@Visti sorry to see that bud. Not what you want to arrive on site and find when you have paid 'professional's' to do a job. Keep your chin up and fight through.

That's very interesting about the bats....clever buggers. Not sure my wife would be happy about bats - the bat cave at Safari Parks is the one thing she hates (so the one thing I drag her through?)! I need to look into some temporary lights whilst we build - it's pitch black and there are badgers knocking about the garden too!!

My build is 5 miles from Caldwell. When's it dark, it is very dark. Takes some getting used to - the boss told me she needs a light outside as can't see a damn thing sometimes. It's mega on clear nights though.

Ha Ha, I was being tongue in cheek when I said should I be worried. However, that being said I can see how self build can destroy families. It is easy to get so wrapped up in the build that it chips away at a marriage a bit at a time. I have two young kids (8&9) and it does weigh on my mind that I need to continually make time for them whilst also progressing the build so they have a house to live in. We live apart during the week so they get the worst of it, however it is what they want so everything is a ok at the minute. Two/three years like this though could easily take it's toll. I guess a lot depends on where you start from. Is it a joint desire to self build or is one partner the driving force and the other along for the ride. I think it needs a complete buy in from both in order to fight through the rough spots. A lot of the grand designs programmes, it seems to me that the dream is not shared, usually it's the blokes dream and the wife just goes along with it. To be fair though, I am not aware of any on here ending up divorced after self building - maybe it's just the grand designs effect where they skew the outlook by deliberately choosing stressful/prone to fail builds for dramatic effect. And yes, Kevin McCloud does come across as smug/condescending at times - not a good trait, particularly in light of his own recent professional short comings.

With £250,000 on design fees I suspect the architect was well paid.

I just got the impression that he didnt care. It was almost like the house was his crowning design masterpiece, something for his name to live on in, as the designor of this wonderful house with curves...ya...ya..ya....and I just don't think cost was in his mind - 'that's the clients problem' is how it seemed to me. Don't get me wrong - it did look amazing and the way the value of the plot etc seemed to go up, I suspect it will be worth at least what it cost to build, unfortunately for the client he didn't have that budget. A shame, when it showed them down at the water they seemed to have a great little private area, they had their stuff there and it was theirs. Now it's all going to have to be sold for someone else to enjoy.

Just seen this episode....anyone else left thinking that his architect was a bawbag who was only interested in his vision and how wonderful the curves were. Oh yes, to build a curve isn't easy as every block has to be cut at an angle?‍♂️ nice one nobhead, clearly not bothered about cost. Yes the client was living in the clouds but I found the architects attitude rubbed me the wrong way. When his kids got to their teens he should have wrapped, never going to be the family home he wanted when they're about to fly the nest. Divorced and broke, what a shambles. I wonder what the divorce rate is amongst self builders? My wife's living in a caravan for two years whilst I live in a Travelodge room - should I be worried??

Every quote I have so far seems to come in at (300m2): Site Insurance £2500 24mths Warranty + BC £3000 Tried stripping BC out to use LABC but that's even more overall. A lot of bloody money for some paper that I have to have in order to remortgage down the line. Does this seem about right or are my trousers being pulled?

On second thoughts, would it be worth angling the drip bead to encourage the drips to occur away from the face of your cladding?

In my non professional opinion I would imagine that it will tidy things up - I can't see anything wrong with your plan.

Should timber frame be further broken down?

You're in East Lindsey ain't you Jonathon? I may have to have a butcher's on the website? On another note, you been getting much done with the weather as it is? I was stuck indoors this weekend! I'll have to come have a look at what you been doing.

Not quite sure how what I wrote wasn't simply worded and understandable?

And therin lies the crux of my original point. I feel like we have gone full circle here. In a word Patrick - yes. You can not lodge the as built EPC your self, hence my comment about potential future issues. You can do the work easy enough on Stroma - anyone can, but you need an EPC assessor to 'lodge' it. So at some point you will have to engage with an EPC assessor, the issue Terry had (which I was highlighting) is potentially finding an assessor willing to do the as-built if they haven't done the design assessment. Circle complete.

Not aware - well you answered him. You may have forgotten, I get that. All I intended with my original comment is to highlight that doing it yourself may present issues later, as already highlighted by Terry and that perhaps you should be a bit more circumspect in the advice you give: Strong advice which fails to consider potential issues later on. That simple Jeremy ? I have read all the SAP/EPC threads (admittedly a while ago now) and iirc you didn't find it straight forward to get a SAP assessor to take your work at face value and lodge it on your behalf. Please don't paint it as simple when it is clearly not. How many SAP assessors out there are going to be willing to accept a self builders workings and officially lodge it when their name is on the ticket? Not many I dare say. You sucked me in one more time - I'm done, I've got some trees to chop up and some grass to sow, laters ?

I have played with the stroma software myself and it is not difficult. @JSHarris I know most things are easy to do so if you can then why not have a go. Before embarking on a self build, the most had I done is hang a shelf - not because I wasn't competent to do anything else but because I had no need to. Through this forum I have learnt a lot and now I tend to tackle the majority of my foundations myself and fit the windows etc myself. I am simply making the point that you are telling people yes, stroma is easy etc. but failing to highlight any potential pitfalls such as Terry found. I would have thought you would have mentionned that tidbit - particulary when you consider that Terry asked you to recommend someone that would do it for him to solve the issue. I am not commenting on this anymore - trying to argue with you Jeremy is a pointless exercise. Once you are on a track you won't deviate and always have to have the last word, I will stick to reading - I have better ways to spend my time than poi ting out that another well established member on this forum has a counterview to your own that people should perhaps be aware of.

Whether intended or not, this comment bothers me. I am too am a self builder - emphasis being on the word self. If I can do something myself then I will, however I will only fight the battles worth fighting.

Regardless of the 'purpose' of the thread @Patrick It, like many many other threads on here has evolved from the original content and for future readers my comments very much apply. I have read 90% of this forum now and am currently working through Windows - I am reading threads from 2016. Without a shadow of a doubt people will read this thread 4,5 yrs down the line and take advice from it. Therefore a balanced view should be presented. Secondly, the quote you ascribe to me is one I ripped from the thread I mention in that comment - it wasn't said by me, rather it was a long standing contributor to this forum who used those words.

Yeah @jamieled, it should be tenting/non tenting type I believe. It is dependent upon if you have a cold or warm roof setup. There will be loads of info on this in the roofing section.

I know you had no problem doing this Jeremy, I have read numerous threads where you have talked about it. It's all well and good telling people how you did things and how it all worked for you but there is then the danger you are giving them a bum steer and putting them onto the path to future problems. I did a Google search and found the thread but don't know how to link it - it was @TerryE who had the problems getting the final bit done after doing the initial bit himself. Quote from the thread I refer to: " So the purpose of this topic is: To advise other self builders to avoid the approach that I took: saving a few £100s is really not worth the hassle: commission a professional firm to do both. " I think you should maybe have a bit more caution and caveat the advice you give Jeremy, as due to the fact you are clearly very competent, people may just take it as gospel and assume what worked for you (a few years ago now too) will also work for them.

I may be misremembering but iirc I am sure I read somewhere on this thread that a member who had done the design SAP their self was having dramas finding a professional to do/lodge the as built SAP as they weren't willing to do that without having done the first bit - I'm sure it was one of the long time members who had this issue??? I have it in my head that there is no point doing the design SAP yourself however easy due to the later problem this creates. In the grand scheme of things SAP reports aren't particularly expensive regardless of how we all feel about whether they are worth the paper they are written on.

Just re-read this. My quote of £80+vat for C35 pump mix seems like a good price now.

This was something I was concerned about, so I paid a landscape designor to come up with a hard landscaping design along with planting schedule and when I submitted a variation of condition application for the house design I made sure this was included. When the plans were approved a comment to the effect of 'landscaping is to be as per plan...' I should now be able to reclaim VAT on it all, hopefully without any push back from HMRC.

My foundation plan designed by TSD has the sole plate straddling the insulated slab and an insulation upstand. So in effect the inner skin is over the concrete and the outer skin is sat over EPS. As to all the above, I don't disagree with the content of what you say @JSHarris, I was simply trying to say that your comments at times seem to describe a SIP only issue which is not the case, so was just trying to clear that up.