Benpointer

Good point Rick. The steel ducts are actually on the 'warm' side so don't need insulating (though we have popped some acoustic insulation offcuts around them just because we have them. The 'cold' side ducts are Zehnder ComfoPipe 160mm pre-insulated ducts as shown here:

A principal role of the project manager is surely to deal with the unexpected - for example, when a key team member is ill and out of action. But what happens when the project manager is laid-up? Following an ‘incident’ (all my own fault), I have spent the past week unexpectedly in hospital. That was definitely not in the plan. Fortunately I am home again now but largely ‘confined to barracks’ for the next month or so. At the moment I cannot even visit the plot, although I hope to be able to make the occasional visit over the coming weeks. As you can imagine this is deeply frustrating. Worse still is the realisation that my lack of hands-on project management has made absolutely no difference to the pace of progress (well actually, it may have increased without my involvement, tbh). Curious. The main thrust over the past two weeks has been carpentry, ventilation ducting, boarding-out and plastering. And fortunately we have two excellent chippies and a great team of plasterers in. We really have been very lucky with our trades; here’s hoping it continues through the remainder of the project. Mrs P. has been magnificent during this period too, keeping the show on the road by constantly stocking drinks and snacks, regular runs to Screwfix, keeping the site tidy, as well as fixing all the internal acoustic insulation. Not to forget planting all our new trees! All while running back and forth to the hospital 20 miles away to keep the Project Manager sane and stocked with essentials (edible food mainly). So, great progress has been made despite (or because of) the absent PM, and we continue on plan. Ventilation ducting and caprentry I had some wild idea that Mrs P. and I might fit the MVHR ducting but the least said about that the better. Fortunately, as noted in the previous blog, our chippies Chris and Alan stepped in to run the ducts very neatly to all the rooms. Even though it’s a new build we’ve found it tricky to work out how to run the 14 semi-rigid 75mm ventilation ducts from the MVHR to all the rooms whilst avoiding obvious ‘boxing in’ sections around and across rooms, which would have detracted from our desired clean lines. Partly that’s because it’s single storey and most of the ceilings are vaulted right up to the insulated roof. If we did another build (Mrs P: “We’re not!”), I’d definitely look to use those open web joists to good effect for ducting. But in the event it’s been left to Chris and Alan to ‘magic away’ all the ducting behind invisible false walls, whilst impacting the overall room sizes as little as possible. And a splendid job they have made of it. The ducting plan requires seven supply and seven extract ducts attached radially to two 8-port manifolds close to MVHR unit itself. We chose to site the manifolds 3m away from the MVHR unit in a void above the kitchen alcove which will hold our built-in ovens, connecting the manifolds to the MVHR unit with 160mm rigid steel spiral ducts, which themselves needed to be hidden away behind a false wall in the utility room. Acoustic insulation As noted above, Mrs P. is an absolute whizz at fitting this. I'd like to think that she's enjoyed it but, um, I'm not brave enough to ask. Anyway, it's going in to every stud wall as soon as there's board on one side to fit it against: Boarding-out and plastering The main thrust over the two weeks has been the room by room boarding-out and plaster skimming. 12.5mm board to the walls, and 37.5mm insulated plasterboard to the ceilings. The plastering team - Dan, Sam and Brandon - have been great. Particularly pleasing is that they are alert to problems and think about the finished product, raising any questions or concerns so that they can be resolved rather than simply plastering over them, so to speak. For example, questioning whether a pendant right by a wall rather than centrally in the room was what we wanted (it wasn’t, the cable had been dropped in the wrong place). We are now about 2/3rds of the way through the plastering and it's making an amazing transformation - turning a house frame into something that begins to feel like a home. Tree-planting Remember all those trees delivered in the last blog? Well Mrs P. got them all planted with the help of our landscape man Ashley, and they are really looking great. Focus for the next two weeks ...Will be on completing the plastering and then our floor tiler Steve should be making a start on the 170m2 of porcelain floor tiles. We thought about using engineered wood in some rooms but in the end we decided to have the same limestone effect tile all the way through and will use rugs to provide additional interest. Eight pallets of tiles are due to be delivered next Tuesday. Dashboard: Contractor days on site this fortnight: 42 Contractor days on site since build start: 353 Budget: No real change - still over budget but potentially using a little less of the contingency than previously. The benefit of an absent PM possibly 😉 Plan: Still on track to move in by Easter 2026. Issues and worries closed this fortnight: N/A Current top issues and worries: A fortnight ago I said "Nothing too pressing - it'll be something we haven’t thought of, probably." Well that was prescient! Current top issue: getting myself back fully fit - otherwise, how will the project manage without me?!

We went with Paul Thorney at Air2Heat, who was originally going to provide an umbrella MCS service but for various reasons (mainly to do with the warm feeling we got about his phone and email pre-sales support) we asked him to do the whole supply, install and commission for a price we though was fair, and we got the £7,500 grant back within a couple of weeks. If you're thinking of a DIY instal but fancy the £7,500 grant, speak to Paul about his umbrella MCS service - you'd still be gaining over £5k after allowing for his commissioning and certification costs.

Tbf some of the music choices of our contractors are definitely a H&S risk. Hearing and Sanity that is.

Re the unplanned extra photo at the end, just clarify Mrs. P. up a stepladder is not the next big issue or concern! 😉

Two weeks since the last blog and there’s a lot to cover - but lots of pictures too, so persevere! The main issues and concerns two weeks ago were 1. how well the airtightness test would go, and 2. keeping ahead of the plasterers. The good news is: both of those concerns can be consigned to the bin. Airtightness As previously reported, we had engaged Aerobarrier to test, spray their magic mist, then retest the airtightness of our house. Prior to their visit they asked us to send video walkthroughs of the house. Because of concerns we had about how well the airtight membrane had been fitted and taped, which the videos did nothing to dispel, I asked Josh from Aerobarrier to plan some extra time for them to re-tape some of the wall ceiling interfaces, for an agreed price. The Aerobarrier team duly turned up as planned - Josh plus two others. After a few hours taping the house, the initial airtightness test gave a disappointing if not entirely surprising 3.2 ACH - go enough to satisfy Building Regulations but above our target of 1 ACH. But after running the acrylic misters for a couple of hours the airtightness improved to 0.8 ACH - an 80% improvement which we are obviously very pleased with. Aerobarrier left the place quite tidy, they had masked the horizontal surface on window frames, door handles etc. The only weird result was the screed floor was left as sticky as a dodgy Wetherspoons. A week later and the stickiness has more or less gone though. No photos of the process in action I’m afraid, tricky to get inside with all that mist flying around. First fix electrics …is now complete! Power, lighting, PIRs, smoke detectors, data cables, room stats, TV… there are a lot of cables threaded round our walls. We’ve had a great team plugging away at this for a few weeks - Nick, Martin, but especially Darren, who installed the majority of cables and boxes, have done a super job. Carpentry In parallel our two chippies Chris and Alan have been making sure various false walls and ceilings have been put in place ready for the plasterers. They have also fitted three of our four pocket door frames - just one more to install next week. Somebody also needed to run the MVHR ducts and fit the vent plenums to the rooms the plasterers were planning to start with. This seemed like a golden opportunity for Chris and Alan to acquire some new skills. I am not sure it was high on their wish list to be honest but they cracked on with it nonetheless. Regular free breakfast baps still works wonders when you’re asking people to go the extra mile. Acoustic insulation I could see that Mrs P. was itching to get involved with something and fortunately someone needed to push all the Rockwall acoustic insulation in to the internal stud walls. Luckily as it’s Rockwall rather than glasswool no further itching was involved. Anyway, Mrs. P has done a great job, as you can see. Plastering All of the above were things we needed to have done (or at least done enough) for the 8th of October, which is when our plasterers Dan, Sam and Brandon were booked to start. They duly turned up as planned and we had enough of the rooms ready for them to get started. In the plan, all the carpentry work would have been completed before the plasterers started but they seem happy enough to board out then skim one room at a time as the carpenters keep ahead of them. The initial focus has been on the boarding out bedrooms 1 and 2 and the bathrooms and the early progress bodes well for the rest of the task which we aim to complete by the end of October… ready for the floor tiler! In other news… Our timber cladding has been delivered. We’re using Brimstone Ash from Vastern near Swindon https://www.vastern.co.uk/timber-cladding/brimstone-ash/ which we will be having fixed vertically. Once Alan and Chris have finished all the internal work required for the plasterers the plan is for them to move on to the external cladding - assuming they haven’t had enough of us by that stage. More breakfast baps may be required! We have also had a number of trees delivered, which Mrs. P. was strangely much more interested in than she was in the pallets of plasterboard or multi-finish skim! 🤷‍♂️ And finally, I have bought a new toy… a Topdon infrared camera to plug in to the iPhone. Cue quizzical look from Mrs P. “er… and you needed this for what exactly?” Good question Mrs. P, but I have at least been able to check that the UFH loops are all working: During the next two weeks... … we hope to be getting plastered! Dashboard: Contractor days on site this fortnight: 32 Contractor days on site since build start: 311 Budget: No change - still over budget but within contingency. Plan: Still on track to move in by Easter 2026. Issues and worries closed this fortnight: How well the airtightness test will go. Keeping ahead of the plasterers. Current top issues and worries: Nothing too pressing - it'll be something we haven’t thought of, probably.

I'm blaming autocorrect! 😉

Yes, sounds very similar. I also have a concern about the paint blistering, hence the question - in the hope that someone has done this a few years ago and report on their experience.

Ok, we may have made a mistake but we've had the concrete block wall below DPC rendered with a sand and cement render. We did this because concrete block walls don't quite cut it aesthetically. I am confident there is no bridging of the DPC. Above the DPC sits our timber frame finished externally with a ventilated cavity and either STS cement boards + thin coat render, or vertical timber cladding. There is a 45mm horizontal gap with inset mesh between the rendered blockwork below DPC and the external wall finish above DPC. The DPC itself overhangs the rendered blockwork by 20mm or so, so we're confident there is no bridging issue. The blockwork below DPC supports a ventilated block and beam floor as well as the timber frame, and is thus itself ventilated on the inside. My question is: How to finish the render? Can we leave it unfinished? Can we paint it with a breathable masonry paint like Sandtex? (We're thinking a darker colour might look better.) Will that below DPC render inevitably 'blow'? Thanks as ever for any thoughts or suggestions. Some pics. Before: How it looks now:

Wow! That's impressive! Very rapid build start to finish. We'd seriously considered MBC but in the end went for a cheaper option. Overall, we're happy with our decision but I seriously doubt we've saved that much money overall.

We hunted around for the best price for 75 sheets of 18mm class-3 exterior ply and because and my local builders merchants, Sydenhams, came up with £28.74 per sheet ex VAT. Very good boards they are too. Best of all they have kept the price for the extra sheets I have bought in 1s and 2s. Appreciate you are nowhere near a Sydenhams but I assume other local BMs might do similar for a bulk order.

Plan is to hang the door to open outwards (with a suitable locking mechanism!)

It's the other way round Viking own Norrsken. Norrsken made no secret of this in our dealings with them - quite the opposite, they flag it as a strength.

Week 18 - Progress on many fronts It feels like the build has entered a different phase now that the structure is fundamentally in place and watertight so I am going to drop to fortnightly blogging, hopefully with enough progress to ensure there something to cover in each blog: Since the last blog (week 16) we’ve been busy on a number of fronts, a lot of which is geared to being ready for the plasterers who are due to start on 8th October. First fix electrics I think we must be closing in on a kilometre of cable now installed: power, lights, room stats, data, PIRs… there seems to be a lot more to do than there used to be when we did our last big project. Our electrician Darren has been toiling away every day and making good progress - he’s certainly far enough through that for the plasterers to start. Not very photogenic though, first fix electrics, but here goes anyway: Carpentry We’ve got a surprisingly long list of jobs that need to be done by Alan and Chris our chippies, including wall and ceiling battening, walls and ceiling studwork to create space for ventilation ducts and plumbing, pocket door frames. A bout of covid has put them behind schedule but they still seem (reasonably) confident they can be ready for the plasterers. Double-skinning the wall between the Bed 1 ensuite and Bed 2 - to allow for a bathroom niche and for sound insulation between the rooms: Top part of wall is external, so has extra insulation; lower part is not (it's a complicated roof!) but has extra studwork to avoid a step in the wall: MVHR Mrs P. and I decided to have a go at fitting the MVHR unit (ok, I decided, Mrs P. humoured me). Through the outside wall: Reaching high enough to cut the holes for external ducts is surely what a scissor lift trolley was really invented for: The scissor trolley only gets you so high but never fear, I bought a new toy - a bargain Nano Power Tower for £305 off of eBay! Next project: wheelchair ramp to get onto it. Moving on - remember the zinc roof? Well, so did we. And now the render is dry, Tom from Wessex Metal Roofing came back to fit the down pies and remove the remaining plastic protection. We really like the roof. And the drainpipes: Garden started! Well sort of… the paddock area has been seeded. Before: After: Watching grass grow - far more interesting than watching paint dry. We’ve been shopping We’ve decided upon and ordered all our bathroom fittings from Island Bathrooms in Salisbury. We liked the service from them and the prices seem quite keen. Previously, we’ve used the likes of Victoria whatsitsname but it was quite nice to have someone who was prepared to come and look at our bathroom spaces and advise accordingly. We’ve also ordered our kitchen appliances - nine in total. I created a list and sent it out to eight suppliers, a mix of the big online retailers and some local. In the end it was Knees Electrical who are online and quite local (Trowbridge) who came out best, both in price and helpfulness. So with all that spend, it was nice to receive our £7,500 BUS grant for the ASHP. I was quite impressed at how quickly we got it tbh - thanks once again to Paul Thorney at Air2Heat for getting the application through promptly. Ceiling insulation Week 16’s blog ended with the note that we had had to part company with the contractors who were supposed to fit the additional ceiling insulation. At that point we’d abandoned plan A and were looking at plan B - ask the plasterers to fit insulated plasterboard, or plan C skip the additional roof insulation. In the end we have gone for plan B and will fit 37.5mm insulated plasterboard to all the ceilings to ensure we meet the building regs 0.16 u-value. I had thought that the blown cellulose within the roof would have been enough but there is no heat loss modelling readily available for open web joists filled with blown cellulose so we have to fall back on treating them as solid timber joists, which brings the roof u-value down (or up rather!). The safe solution, which our SAP man is happy with, is the extra 25mm of PIR from insulated plasterboard. So that’s what we are doing. Even with the price of insulated PB, it still works out cheaper including fitting than plan A. Next two weeks: The next two weeks should be exciting if things go to plan. We are due to have our Aerobarrier airtightness test and remediation done on 6th October. I honestly have no idea how it will go. I have doubts about the quality of the work done by the membrane team (the team we parted company with) but I am hoping Aerobarrier themselves will improve any deficiencies. The plasterers are due to start two days later. Before then the first fix electrics should be completed, studwork should progress as will routing the internal MVHR ducts, largely through that studwork. Looks like we will continue to be busy! Dashboard: Contractor days on site this fortnight: 15 (I'm not counting Mrs P!) Contractor days on site since build start: 279 Budget: Slight improvement - still over budget but within contingency. Plan: Still on track to move in by Easter 2026. Issues and worries closed this fortnight: Replanning the approach to ceiling insulation. Current top issues and worries: How well the airtightness test will go. Keeping ahead of the plasterers.

You reckon? Can you point me at who else is selling the Norrsken P33 window?