Square Feet

It wasn't live. All is good and I still have my eyebrows. I drilled a wee hole in it and nothing came out, so I went ahead and cut out the brass tap from the lead lines.

Thank you all for the sage advice. However I am thinking of ignoring it all and drilling a hole in the pipe. 😂 The pipe seems to be lead, so it is not likely to spark. I really can't see this being a live gas line, so it's just residual gas in the pipe that I have to worry about. Drilling a hole would let it out and then I could just grind away without having to worry about losing my eyebrows.

I have this thing sticking out of the wall of a Victorian-era property I am renovating. I think the pipes are lead. The tap is about 180cm up the wall behind the front door. Is it the old gas supply line? It's not the modern one. I want to grind the tap off so that I can decorate over it, but I'm not quite brave enough without knowing what it is. Does anyone recognise it? Cheers. 5p is for scale.

Good progress. Could you explain the skim thing again to someone at numpty level? It's something I am interested in as I would like to minimise wet trades on site. Cheers

0.45 if I remember correctly. I think Glyn Hudson's was even lower, which was very strange. Here's the links. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFMlJmRiaqo&list=PLzJHPUKEmzWVlbuMLwIeT_52SooH5ROrB&index=4&ab_channel=Booglehead I think Glyn has done the numbers wrong tbh, though he is a techiehead and loves this sort of thing so it seems unlikely, but I just can't wrap my head around how he has calculated it - he claims it's 0.3Ach. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkNx2oSO-S4&t=383s&ab_channel=GlynHudson

I've been very surprised that Booglehead (a guy I follow on YouTube) and Glyn Hudson (same) both passed their pressure tests without doing what I would have thought necessary. Booglehead hadn't taped around his windows at all it seemed and hadn't taped the insides of his SIPS. The outsides didn't look very carefully taped either. He also put a lot of screws right through everything in a way that I thought would have caused leaks. Glyn Hudson got his regular town house (not sure when built, but quite old) pressure tested and that passed too. I was really surprised by that one. Made me wonder what all the fuss is about.

I've been doing a lighting rewire of an 1890's flat this week and it's been a miserable job. I've just been chasing out raggles and running cables for the spark to connect but it's an awful lot of mess, as you know already. The laths are attached to counterbattens that are then fixed to the joists, so there is a bit of space up there for new cables, though this is restricted in some places where the plaster has pushed up through the laths when wet. I tried pulling the old lead-sheathed cable through but it was stuck fast, so I had to feed the new cable through being careful not to snag on the many obstacles. It took a while and was a bit of a pita but it can be done. The wire itself was in a shocking (ha ha) state and crumbled and fractured very easily in my hands so I am glad it is gone now. If you pull the whole ceiling down it will be some incredible mess. I have done that before and it took a huge number of bags and trips to the dump to dispose of. The dust was incredible. I've also got one property where the kitchen ceiling has just been lowered and the old lath and plaster left above it and quite a lot has fallen down over the years. The framework of the new ceiling has taken the weight so far, but I do worry that it won't always and at some point more lime plaster will fall and bring the plasterboard ceiling down.

This isn't quite what I was looking for as it's basically battery to house, but it's done with a Leaf battery and is quite interesting.

Oh I do 😂 they still go on way too long though.

Oh I started watching this guy the other day. I can't believe that after his whole (self built) house burnt down he just said 'Oh well' and built another one in the same place. I don't think I am that resilient. Also - has the man not got any friends?

I think they must mean 4 months for the house to be erected on site after foundations etc. And this must be with the majority of construction work being off site and craned in.

I wouldn't necessarily knock Grand Designs - there's quite a lot of projects on there that are fantastic examples of good, simple architecture that can be built at a good price and timescale. If you go on the Channel 4 app you can find all the old episodes to watch there for free (though I think £3.50 a month for ad-free watching is well worth it). These are some episodes I like for their simplicity and being good examples of straight-forward good architecture without ego or bling. Leominster 2018 North Cornwall revisit 2015 Woodbridge revisit 2013 County Down 2017 East London 2017

Yeah, there's another channel called Break Heart Orchard with an American guy posting his SIPs self build that I have been watching and he is a bit of a 'how not to do it' guide. It's interesting to compare his efforts and Booglehead's right enough - Mr Booglehead seems to have a background in construction of some sort and it really shows. That said, Mr Orchard did build himself a house and get it signed off, so I don't want to knock him too much, even if he did then have to dismantle some of it to get his furniture in afterwards. 🙄 He is pretty humble and candid about his mistakes though. I got a bit bored with his videos after a while though as he left the camera running a bit long for me. He also talks in feet and inches which (in spite of my forum name) I find infuriating and very hard to follow. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNTohfwvpNKxHWiwDshFvx9rvGPqQ6qx_

I've been enjoying watching this guy called Booglehead's videos of his SIPs self build on a stunning site in Tasmania. He built a metal kit workshop on site first and made a basic flat in there for him and his wife to live in during the build. He has then been building the main house with SIPs with occasional help from a friend and a few specialised tradespeople here and there. It's a near-passive house, on one level with MHRV, zinc roof and a large carport. I like that he is just the right side of bonkers and talks in metric, though with it being Australia the regs are a bit different. He does have an alarming habit of creating cold bridges with the enormous bugle head screws he is so fond of and the house isn't to my taste, but that's the beauty of self-build and the nature of local vernacular I guess. Obviously you need to watch the videos in the playlist in reverse order. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzJHPUKEmzWVlbuMLwIeT_52SooH5ROrB&si=1bo9fsoDs7syy5iO If anyone else has any YouTube playlists to add to this post that would be great.

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Oh I have! This was just an example of what can go wrong - there are plenty more out there, but I couldny be ar*ed linking to them all

I think you should watch this before settling too much on ICF. I have picked SIPs for the same reason - I think I can build them myself. ICF seems like a stressy disaster waiting to happen. https://www.channel4.com/programmes/grand-designs-the-streets/on-demand/58244-001

It's good to add this to your profile as it does make a difference when folk are replying to your questions.

Hi. You are going about things exactly the right way. I'm twice your age but going through a lot of the same thinking and practical steps. It's all good. Your work setup makes the whole thing sound very achievable - hopefully it isn't the winter that you are free to work, but those aren't so bad in Kent so it should be ok either way. I guess if you have time and energy then the only other magic ingredient is money, so keep working hard and saving as much as you possibly can. You will need it all! I am finding these books completely invaluable for my research and they really make me feel like I could build a house tomorrow (or at least plan one effectively). https://www.firstinarchitecture.co.uk/books/ I would also recommend watching lots of eps of Grand designs. I don't have time to link to the good eps just now, but Joe and Lena, South London is one that springs to mind that you might find inspiration in as Joe sounds like a similar guy to yourself. You can watch these for free via the Channel4 app. I would really recommend paying the £3.50 for a subscription though as the ads all magically disappear. Grand designs The Streets is also very good - don't overlook that one. Good luck.

This stuff can work well if applied properly. You do have to be extremely careful to seal it all up well though. I used it on one job where the stone walls (50cm thick) were saturated and would have needed a year to dry out properly before plastering otherwise. The scale of what you are dealing with might be beyond this product though and you might be into more specialist basement tanking territory. Good luck. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185157727730?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=Zd1bKbOWRrm&sssrc=2047675&ssuid=KWF4Zlu-Rge&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY ps - the plugs aren't anywhere near as exciting as they look 😉

That's really interesting thanks. I could live with that - it's not ideal but would be ok in the interim. Nice one, cheers.

Here you go....

.... and I could power the garage build like this..... You can't pull high voltage that way but it would be enough to charge tool batteries overnight, run a few lights and so on.

Thanks Rob. I am not under any illusions and am very much looking to establish whether it is possible rather than proposing it as a finished plan, so thanks for your stats - those are very useful. I am indeed very frugal with leccy and gas, but a lot of the point of wanting a passive house with PV is so that I don't have to watch the pennies quite so closely in future and can live in a bit more comfort. The figure of 3.28 Kwh/day is genuine as it comes from a year's worth of leccy readings for my 150sqm double-upper flat that has terrible insulation in the upstairs part as it's basically a shed dropped onto the roof. Because I am in a flat I can't charge my car at home so those figures aren't included. I live alone but with my son here on uni holidays. We both use computers, TV, nintendo etc but all our lightbulbs are led and I turn them off behind me wherever I go. Our shower is run from the tank and only uses electric to pump it, not heat it so that makes a big difference I think. I use the airfryer as much as I can and avoid running the 'big oven' wherever possible. I suppose the whole point of wanting to do without grid leccy is that I hate paying the standing charge and being beholden to price fluctuations. It would also make quite a few cheaper remote plots viable if I didn't have to pay for a connection which is why I am going into this in detail at such an early stage (don't have a plot yet!) It may well be that I will have to get a grid connection for the house but I am viewing this as a two-stage project where I move onto the plot and live in basic accommodation above a self-built garage at first. I would put solar on the roof of the garage and house the battery inside. This way I would hopefully have enough power to live (frugally!) and power all the tools, lights etc of the main build. And if I didn't then I could nip out in the car and juice up so that work didn't have to stop on site because I had run out of power. From what you are saying this plan would be workable I think.

Nice one thanks. I will check those out. Not having hot water is my biggest fear!