Canski

Ignore. There’s loads of carpenters about.

did they tell you that it now takes 9 weeks to get a bat licence ? I got mine after 7. It all seemed too good to be true with the demo guy getting held up on another job and the licence coming in earlier than expected. It's just a shame that the solicitors took 10 weeks to get a section 106 agreement done. If it hadn't have been for that display of incompetence then we would have been demolishing before the bird nesting season.

So I got my bat licence through last week and had a demolition team lined up for tomorrow with a guy there today with a cherry picker to take batman up to take the tiles off the roof. All was running like clockwork until batman turned up and stopped work due to nesting birds. I just can't win. Back to square one with more surveys required in a months time and two months time to see if we can continue in July. I'm ready for a beer. Arrrgghhhhhhh

That’s what I thought. The roof will be lower than the neighbours fence I think.

I put mine in with the planning application. Although I aimed to keep within the 2.5 m rule here were no heights on the planning drawings and it got passed. Since then I have reduced the ground level by about 400 mm and am tempted to raise the building by about 75 mm to give me a bit of extra room inside. Dare I ?

Hi all, From expecting a very long wait for a ‘bat licence’ it came through on Wednesday so we can now demolish the old house. I spoke to my demo contractor who has been held up on another site due to newts and can start on Tuesday. So I’m catapulted from a restful break in Malta to long distance organising within an hour or receiving the licence. On the same evening that I received the licence the house got broken into by kids wanting somewhere to smoke weed away from mummy and daddy and fortunately nothing was stolen but it does alert me to the dangers of potential invasions throughout the build. The site is in a quiet residential area with great neighbours ( so far) but I would like to deter any future visits especially when we start the build phase. Can anyone recommend a decent site security camera that could then be used on the houses on completion. I will soon have power on the site ( great neighbours) and I have a 5m tall bat pole in the corner of the site with a flat top to mount a camera on.

I like the rod idea. I’ve never thought of that. I normally go with a heavy single UC with plate welded to the top. I get the cold bridging bit. The cavity between 2 beams could be well insulated as well.

That looks mint.

It looks fine to me. Let them carry on with their job. What do you do for a living ?

The guy from the electric company yesterday told me that they would have to dig the trench on my land and that I couldn’t lay a duct for them. I don’t think he was the sort of guy who would allow a duct across the road.

That’s interesting. I need to get both water and electric across a road. What’s the best way to try to achieve this ?

Yes I’ve done that and I hope that it’s accepted, but like I said they are both away for a week so I may just have to be patient. I’m not very patient though and trying to avoid another weeks delay.

Morning all. I received my full plans BC approval yesterday from the LABC. They request a full site investigation. I’m hoping to start work on site immediately after demolition on 15th May. My BCO officer is on leave all of next week and so is my SE so if I need a full site investigation I need to get on it. I have the results from a borehole that was taken about ten years ago in the middle of the site which will end up being in the middle of my plot. I sent it to my SE and he suggested 1m deep foundations with a suspended floor. The existing house that shows no sign of any movement is on foundations that start 780 mm below ground level. I have emailed the BCO giving him the details of the borehole and explaining my wish to avoid another investigation. I had a digger there yesterday so I dug a trial pit about 1.5 m long and down to 1050 mm below the GL of the new house. The ground looks very good and I have left the trench exposed if the BCO or SE want to look at it on their return. I have also exposed the foundations on the existing house. Do you think that the BCO will insist on a new investigation or will the info I have provided suffice ? I have invited him out to site to inspect. I am just trying to save some money and more importantly and delays while I wait for the holidaymakers to return.

Oh the times that the engineers drawings have turned up late and this has happened to me despite me asking beforehand. Frustrating and costly. Although it wasn't as bad as when we had a new house built up to the first lift and the building inspector decided it was a radon zone.

I had this at my mothers house a few years ago. I got some quotes in from builders I knew but they couldn't get anywhere near what the insurance companies' contractors were quoting. I couldn't understand how they did it so cheap. Not a bad job either. I hope you get someone sorted soon.

Ahh thanks @joth I missed that in my search.

These came into effect from 26/12/2022 for proposed new dwellings only. We are required to provide a 'connectivity plan' Has anyone else been through this yet ? My LABC are asking for it.

A great story with a happy ending. Well done.

Our last site was poured on the Friday and we were working on the floors on the Monday. Same as oversite concrete but due to less thickness it goes off quicker.

Yes you can bed it on mortar first but it will either have to be bolted directly to the steel or fixed with restraining straps to the face of the steel.

@Tony K what size studs are you using ?

Out of interest Did the agila (now discontinued and renamed) not have fibres in it ? did it crack ? I only ask because the last but one we did used Agila and that was the one that cracked. To be fair I’ve not seen the last one recently but the finish was awful. Thinking about it now I remember 2 previous builds with this system and the first was perfect the second was an absolute disaster with UFH pipes above FFL and blocks had been thrown in to weigh the pipes down. The site manager was nearly in tears and he was nearly all the way through the job due to the knock on effects. The contractor (against the site managers strong advice ) had hired a team of ‘experts’ in to lay the floor who were £1k cheaper for 4 plots. This gives it a 50 - 50 success rate in my book. 😂 odds are far greater in our favour when we are self builders. It’s not rocket science. Your pipes are not allowed to float. Anyway Litecast deliver on time and are very helpful and are also specifying the concrete / flowscreed / Agilia ‘lookalikes’ for my builds ( now with fibres added plus some concrete scientific techno sheet 😂 that I will post tomorrow if any SE’s would like to comment ? ) I hope this is not a signal of previous failures. Sorry for long post it’s been a long weekend 🍺🍺🍺

Metal fibres

The ones I fitted complete with metal fibre reinforced cemex had a couple of hairline cracks around some doorways but I intend to incorporate a movement joint at my 2 larger openings.