Nick Thomas

I feel your pain. I've got a similarly demonic chimney and have resolved to take it down this year (it's wrapped in tarp at the moment). Nothing worked to stop it from leaking.

Heh, I did a small repair on my sister's brick-built porch made of "london brick" back in May, which I think are the same thing. To add to the varieties you've researched here, the original work was done so that the frogs were facing each other - i.e. you got a diamond-shaped void filled with mortar every two courses. I assume it's like this all the way up the porch. I was not expecting that! The diamonds came out of the bricks very easily, so I decided to re-use them, copying the original method. It was an absolute pig to get the "down" frogs filled when I was replicating it (I had/have no idea what is correct, of coursE). Oh, and these bricks also had two different face textures - smooth vs. wavy imprints. I was focused enough on the frog situation that I didn't notice that and put them all in back-to-front 😬. My sister was kind enough not to insist that I re-do it. It's a world away from your bigger projects, but I enjoyed reading your research and thought this real-world application might amuse you. Have some before/after pics! You can see a bit of spalling on a few of them too 🤷‍♀️

The rain came down and the wall stayed dry, so I went for it: First time plasterboarding. Still need to tape&fill but reasonably proud of it. Lifting that middle piece into place by myself - several time, to adjust the fit - was an absolute killer. Time for a beer I think.

Aye, definitely the plan when I've got a bit more time, I don't want to put myself under pressure with it when we're definitely leaving on the boat on Sunday . I can probably make it back a bit later in the year, but wanted to give it every chance of staying dry until then. So I've applied copious butyl tape to the cracks, knocked off the chimney pot, fitted a chimney cap to the hole, and wrapped the whole thing in tarp. It'll do for now.

Got the chimney capped, but I'm pretty sure that won't solve the problem. The corksol hadn't stuck well to some parts of the capstone, so I went up with a wire brush to clear it off ready for a different water-tight coating, as I'm pretty sure it's porous, to find... The south side - the one where rain causes the strongest leaks - is to the right in this picture and the crack extends about halfway down the chimney stack. It wasn't like that two years ago; it's new movement/separation since then. Just. What. I've got until Sunday to do something to this. New plan is to knock off the chimney pot, to get a nice cuboid shape to work with, then drape it with heavy-duty plastic sheeting, ratchet straps near the bottom, pop some concrete blocks on top to hold it in place. Then come back another time and demolish the stack down to well below the crack. I could pop a new cap on the new level, or get it below the existing roof and have the roof cover it, I suppose either would work. Happy to take suggestions for other ways to do it ^^.

Just ordered some https://www.jewson.co.uk/p/gyproc-thermaline-pir-2400-x-1200-x-38mm-BGB28492 in anticipation of being able to make the leak go away. It's not a lot of insulation, but I'll feel better with an air gap between it and the stack - and *any* insulation on this bit of wall is an improvement. Butyl tape to go all around, and i guess for the seams between the boards. I'll probably lay them lengthwise, so the joins run horizontally. I guess I need studs going up the centre of the wall and along where each seam will be, for screwing into?

Well, we're up now and here's the first bit of progress. Fire out, mantelpiece off (I was worried those two would be hard, but they were easy \o/), mouody plaster removed. Will have a go at capping the chimney tomorrow. Christ on a bike that wall is bad. Doesn't matter though, the gap between the two wooden uprights is 1700mm so I can just slap plasterboard in front of the whole thing - with insulation behind. The inside of the flue pipe is dry as a bone - I had soot coming down it while whaling on the wall. There were streak marks all over the outside of the flue pipe though, and there was plenty of rust too. Turns out Nome of the guttering or soil stack was replaced when the scaffolding came down though. So that's an unexpected extra job. Still, the top and bottom of each pipe is established so - famous last words - how hard can it be? Tomorrow, onwards.

In general, analyses of English regulation conclude that there is much less of it compared to other western european countries - e.g. https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/law/research/centres/chrp/publications/tennants_rights_report_final.pdf - or the IPPR one. And of course, the level of regulation hasn't stopped the sector from doubling in size over the past twenty years.

Incredibly dodgy in places, but I did get it done, back at the end of May ^^

Thanks; yeah, entirely possible that we've missed something. If so, it'll become obvious when the rain continues to come in, and I can get on with those more drastic measures... So, pics. Exterior: Probably the best pic I've got of the top of the chimney stack, partway through a great deal of work. It's less awful than this now, honestly, but still... what a mess. It currently looks more like: (We didn't *just* cover up the awful with a layer of waterproofing, we also remedied the fabric). And interior: The only thing that's changed there is that we've stripped off the rest of the plaster. It was ruined anyway.

In 2011, ~17% of households were privately renting. In 2021, ~20%. In 2001, <10%, I think - although I'm lazily piecing together two different datasets for that one. It's allowed to change over time.

👋I've mentioned "the house up in Shetland" a few times on this forum. We bought it and moved up there in 2017, fairly quickly discovered water was leaking in through the chimney stack, and then failed to fix it, or get it fixed, in a whole variety of ways between then and now. We moved back down to Yorkshire a bit over a year ago, with it still unresolved (it was the least of the problems with the house at that point) - but this weekend I'm heading back up there to try to get it sorted once and for all. I've got a week 😅. Throwing words and plans (and, when I get there, progress) in here to keep myself organised - but feel free to chip in if you have ideas or see a question you want to answer 🙏. The house itself is a suspended timber frame bungalow with an external block skin, harled, and now with a layer of corksol on the exterior too. The chimney stack is twin block (except for a bit that would have originally been the fireplace - that's a single block between the back of the fireplace and the outside world), effectively built into a cutout from the timber frame on the east gable end. The roof is Decra, and there's lead flashing around the junction between it and the chimney stack. The coping is cast concrete (now also given a coating of corksol), then there's one pot with a fairly rubbish bird screen on top of that. At some point the fireplace was removed and a wood stove + flue was installed. When it rains, water seems to ingress from the flue, rather than from the roof. For ages we assumed it was the flashing's fault, but the last thing we tried was to take up and re-do all the flashing and surrounding roofing, which didn't improve matters. When the water does come, it appears inside at the junction of the roof and chimney stack and spreads out from there - but it also seems to travel down the outside(?) of the flue all the way to the bottom of the stack. One consistent datum is that the leak only shows up when the rain is coming from west/southwest -> east/north-east - i.e., when it's *not* howling against the gable end. I've been over that side more than once as well; for a while, water would soak right through the blocks when it was coming ifrom the east, confusing matters. That's stopped now, at least. Current plan, on the assumption that the top of the chimney pot is how the water is actually getting in, is to remove the wood stove, stop up the flue, and put a cap on the pot. If that works, I can then slap a layer of insulation against the (previously plastered, now exposed) block wall on the inside, plasterboard across the gap in the timber frame to get a nice smooth wall, and then forget about it forever. If that doesn't work, I'll honestly be at a bit of a loss. As a "joke", I suggested demolishing the whole stack a couple of years ago... Will get some pics up later today, they're on the other laptop.

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2023/jun/28/high-mortgage-rates-forcing-sellers-to-accept-lower-offers-on-homes-zoopla Does seem to be happening a bit. The big question is whether the landlords swithering about cashing out decide to do it before the trickle becomes a torrent or not. The CGT moaning isn't actually a barrier to getting out - it's a reduction in windfall cash, rather than a cost, so only really affects those who are, uh, allergic to contributing. The number of houses in existence stays about the same either way, of course, so any artifical shortages induced by market failures can always be resolved through the judicious application of planning.

Oi, that's my late mother you're talking about. She could never afford ten cars.

I've got one in the car, but never got around to using it. That efficiency number is quite upsetting.

Eh, they don't forbid you from making overpayments, they just levy a small fee for the privilege. I think my nationwide ones were 1% of the paid-off balance? Something like that. Cheaper than paying the interest, for sure, but I'm not about to reach for a calculator.

The hydraulic ones are DIYable. Scarier than a chainsaw though. Random example:https://youtu.be/r5zYdxFv9iI?t=594 I have one of the dinky electric chainsaws - cut down a small peach tree with it today (the last owners had planted it far too close to the foundations, in clay soil 😞). Honestly perfectly safe if you're not being stupid, but I did have some trepidation the first few times.

There are organisations attempting to tackle retrofit. Carbon Co-Op and People Powered Retrofit especially come to mind, for instance (other retrofit providers are available). Without political will, they're not going to make a huge difference, is all.

"Some"? https://nitter.net/sweatystartup/status/1667530395204694016#m - it's not exactly hard to find.

They ended up doing it brick by brick with a bolster, just... gingerly. Left me with a nice pile of bricks. I cleaned them off by hand, and today started building back up. Got 39 laid with the mortar that was in stock (I'm lazy and didn't fancy mixing my own, so went for those 20kg sand/cement dry mix bags): 4 more bags of mortar coming Tuesday, I should be able to get it finished then. It's not perfect, but I'm feeling quite pleased with it. The insurers offered a cash settlement of £550, minus £200 excess so £350. I saved ~£100 by re-using the old bricks, the mortar is coming to about £120, so I should have some cash left over afterwards. Maybe a celebratory BBQ once I'm done.

Some proportion of the properties sold will get a more comprehensive retrofit - either by owner-occupiers or by landlords willing to accept a finer margin - so it's not zero-sum with regards to housing stock quality. As to your dilemma, you probably want to go down each of the listed assumptions in the EPC and see which ones you can document as being better than the assumption. https://files.bregroup.com/SAP/%23RdSAP Conventions 11_3_from 01 March 2022.pdf lists a whole bunch of things you might be able to work on, too. Wonder if any EPC assessors give you the full worksheet?

I did my install piecemeal, which I would definitely not do again. Plan it upfront, get the G99 upfront if your plan requires it, then get it all done in one go, including battery if you want one. All I can say in my defence is that I was rushing to get something installed before winter 😅. If you're going MCS, a tariff like Octopus Flux will mean it's better to export to the grid at peak, then import electricity off-peak. You don't pay VAT on exported power, of course.

I ended up wimping out and leaving it. Insurers have got a subcontractor who has a subcontractor they're sending out to demolish it tomorrow, so will see how they approach it.

I had a Yard Force SA650ECO back in 2020. The garden wasn't really suited to it - slopes, in particular, gave it trouble, but it also struggled to get between the two zones, through a relatively narrow corridor. It was great when it worked, but I had to rescue it from itself most days. Neighbours and passers-by were absolutely entranced by it, though.

As I say, it's like a wobbly tooth. To be more precise, mild pressure can get the whole pillar to pivot back and forth around that brick on the right hand side, the one that's still vaguely in line with the wall. No idea what's going on in the crack, but it's not stable. If it were, I'd be nibbling away at it from the top down, for sure. Insurers want to have a claim assessor look at it... on Wednesday, which adds another complication. Pretty uncomfortable leaving it like this for that long.