Benpointer

Option 4 or 5 will surely lead to Option 6 in an uncontrolled way. If you really don't want to rebuild, then Option 3 but aim for more than 50mm EWI.

Who could possibly begrudge their financial adviser creaming off the 3%?

E=mc2 ?

I think the acoustic clouds are a little more sophisticated - they hang at a set distance from the ceiling and absorb noise both coming from below and also rebounding from the hard ceiling. Cork tiles? - very 70s 😉 - and are they really that effective at noise reduction? I gained a little understanding of this topic when I was helping our village hall improve its acoustics. Apparently, it's all about the Reverberation Time (RT60, the time it takes an initial sound to drop by 60dB). It's very easy to download an app to your smartphone (e.g. ClapReverb) and test this yourself. Here's a site that explains more: https://commercial-acoustics.com/reverberation-time-graphic/ For homes an RT60 of between 0.5and 0.8 secs is ideal. Community spaces can be ok at higher levels and I was intrigued that you can tune the acoustics of restaurants, for example, depending on how 'buzzy' or intimate you'd like them to be. Our village hall had an RT60 of 2.3 secs before we fitted the clouds and 0.9 secs afterwards. Lots of villagers noticed and commented on the improvement. If anyone has an issue with echoey rooms, I'd definitely encourage you to download an app and test the actual reverb time. Then maybe put in some extra soft furnishings, temporary wall hangings, rugs, whatever you might be happy to live with, and test again to see what difference it makes.

Great replies everyone, very encouraging, thanks! If anyone is suffering badly from acoustic issues we used these 'acoustic clouds' in our village hall - not cheap (£6k fitted, though a Lottery grant covered the costs) but very effective. However, a village hall, where you might get 60-80 people chatting over wine at a social evening is affected by acoustic issues much more than a domestic house, I should imagine. https://www.woollyshepherd.co.uk/acoustic-clouds/

Thanks John, that's all very encouraging. UFH was the second item on our requirement list, after high levels of insulation and just before MVHR, so we should be ok on that front. Very good point about lights - we are more wall lights and table lamps people but it would be an easy mistake for us to make. Cheers!

Hi All, Our architect is working on detailed plans for our self-build, aiming to submit for full PP early in the new year. Site has existing PP for a chalet bungalow but we want a single storey house (I am a full-time wheelchair user) of a more modernist design... so new plans. Mrs. P is very keen on vaulted ceilings in the principal rooms, which is very fashionable right now of course. Our design is currently looking like fairly shallow 25° pitches for the roofs but across the widest span (11m) that still gets you to over 6m at the apex, if the edge ceiling is 2.4m. I like the idea of tall, airy rooms but worry a bit about the acoustics and whether the height will seem in some way a bit 'weird'? I am just wondering whether those who have experience of high vaulted ceilings have any thoughts, comments, suggestions, things to avoid or consider, etc.? Many thanks!

Depends if it ever gets used 😉

We did a very similar supply and extract in our kitchen diner (6.1m x 5.3m) and it worked very well.

Not an expert but from our experience of 15 years with full-house MVHR I'd say three things: We installed the unit in our service cupboard - noise has never been an issue in normal operation they are very quiet. Putting the unit in the loft will be a PITA when you have to change filters (every three months or so in our experience) put it in the airing cuboard if it will fit, or anywhere where you can easily get to it. Your inlet and exhaust locations look good to me.

Both the MVHR units we have had in the past had automatic summer bypass included by default. The issue is "If the indoor air is warmer than the outdoor air..." that's precisely when summer bypass doesn't operate (at least as far as I am aware) because 95% of the time you want to keep that indoor air warmth to cut heating costs.

I'm learning a lot here, thanks all! What happens to the MVHR when you are operating the UFH in cooling mode? Presumably it has to still run, to remove the excess humidity. Does it switch to summer bypass? And would it in fact be better if it didn't, if the air outside is hotter than the air inside, it would be quite nice to exchange that heat from the intake to the exhaust. Too many questions buzzing round my brain!

Am I right in thinking that a fan coil will have its own condensation collection and therefore require a drain connection? Also, that a fan relies on an external feed of hot or cold water to do its work - so it's effectively a radiator* with a fan? (* I use the term 'radiator' in the CH heating sense.)

Apols all, I know this is a huge thread but... what was the answer to the original question "Which ASHP are set up to cool"? Also, do they all only cool through the UFH loops or can they run cooled water through fan coil unit with condensation collection? I am worried that a cold floor on a hot humid day will just cause condensation all across the floor. Apols for the dumb question - trying to understand if I need to specify a separate aircon system or I can get the ASHP to do that for me in our new-build for which we are at the early design stage .

Pah! that's taking the easy route. You should put the pipe it goes into on the lathe and cut a female thread in it 😜

The oil-fired hot water system radiators in the house we are currently renting are heating air which rapidly radiates half its heat out through the windows conveniently placed directly above the rads. Why do people do that?

That's a great explanation Steamy, but I must take issue with one point: "So while we like to think of thermal energy transfer as conduction, convection and radiation, it is really all radiation." Convection is surely a bit different because that is primarily the movement of material rather than heat.

No worries - take it from me, living in the Blackmore Vale addles your brain 😉

"Dorset Council does not operate CIL in the former North Dorset area and mitigation required to support the needs of new development is secured through section 106 legal agreements. " https://www.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk/w/dorset-council-community-infrastructure-levy Edit: Could your plot be just outside the old North Dorset District Council area?

Good point but fortunately there's no CIL in North Dorset.

Yes, it's 1.5m distant at the closest point. Presumably though if the original rotted, I'd be allowed to repair it like for like (or perhaps WRC for pine)?

Some pics: 'Classroom' on left, TPO'd oak behind, garage on right. Extract from topo survey, 'classroom' shown as 'STORE',

Apologies for this I will try to be brief: Our plot has full PP for a 160m2 3-bed chalet - not started. The plot also has two existing buildings on: 1) A 9m x 5m timber frame 'classroom' - was used for dog (owner) training - pitched felt roof, eaves 2.8m, ridge 3.9m. 2) A 6m x 6m timber framed garage, pitched felt roof, eaves 2.3m ridge 3.9m The current PP shows those two buildings but makes no other reference to them - importantly they don't have to come down as part of the PP. We are going to submit revised PP for the house because we want single-storey - we do not plan to propose any changes to the two existing buildings. The 'classroom' is within the canopy (and no doubt root protection area) of a neighbour's oak which now has a TPO. I doubt we'd be allowed to knock the 'classroom' down and rebuild in that area because of the oak tree. I want to repurpose the 'classroom' as a workshop, ideally before our house build but potentially afterwards. So my question is: what can we do to the classroom without obtaining PP (and ideally BC)? E.g.: Reclad it? (It's currently clad in ropey, rotten, softwood T&G.) Repair the frame where needed? (There's bound to be some rot here and there). Insulate it? (It's lined with plasterboard inside - not sure if there is any existing insulation.) Replace the roof with an insulated, tiled roof? Replace the wooden floor with an insulated, concrete or screeded floor? New windows? Basically, I am happy to keep a building on the same footprint because we'd never be able to use that part of the plot for building due to the TPO'd oak. But ideally, we'd put a more substantial, better-insulted, better-built building on the same footings. Any thoughts? Thanks!

Getting a coper pipe vertical? Do it by eye, shirley?

Reinforced concrete ring beam* on top of the slab in place of the 2 courses of brick sounds good to me. (But I am not an engineer.) (*Well, u-shaped beam as I assume you'll want to drive in without going over the bean on the door opening.)