kandgmitchell

Builder's merchants are there to sell you stuff, particularly the stuff they stock! Ask them whose concrete lintels they stock then refer to the manufacturers advice, decide what you need and then just tell them which one you want.

Just out of interest where the other houses given individual approvals at varying times or were they all (including number 6) given a single approval? I only ask because a few years ago near where we used to live in north-west essex a developer built two or three new houses on land that was definately open countryside on the edge of a village. How did they get that I thought? It turned out that an approval was given for four houses way back but only one was built but that was sufficient for them to argue the development as whole had begun and thus could continue........

I remember when as a trainee in north London, an elderly surveyor used to recommend mixing broken glass into the concrete when blocking up a redundant drain in a chamber. It stopped rats scrabbling away at the fill and using the void behind as rat heaven

I suspect that many council's do not want to check the extension meets all the other requirements as they see it as tantamount to a CoL shortcut. They only want to carry out the adjoining neighbour checks and leave it to the applicant to be certain it meets any other restrictions.

Just check that lintel doesn't need bonded masonry over to achieve that UDL. If it does make sure it's there and not interferred with by any dpc cavity tray etc.

It's probably cornish then......

So your BC are ignoring this in Approved Document L1 then? Historic and traditional dwellings 0.10 The energy efficiency of historic and traditional dwellings should be improved only if doing so will not cause long-term deterioration of the building’s fabric or fittings. In particular, this applies to historic and traditional buildings with a vapour permeable construction that both absorbs moisture and readily allows moisture to evaporate. Examples include those built with wattle and daub, cob or stone and constructions using lime render or mortar. and: 0.12 In determining whether full energy efficiency improvements should be made, the building control body should consider the advice of the local authority’s conservation officer. Which advice presumably is contained within the emails between you and conservation officer at the time of the works. To whose benefit is this sort of pedantic nonsense?

The centre line of the sockets should be between 450mm and 1200mm so presumably they are most convenient for a wheelchair user but this is for new dwellings.

It is interesting that the means of escape requirements in the Building Regulations mention "habitable rooms" needing access to a suitable escape route when on the ground floor or a floor no more than 4.5m above ground level. For floors above 4.5m above ground level the reference changes to "dwelling houses" shall have etc..... the implication being that whatever the use of the rooms on that floor above 4.5m, the correct means of escape should be provided. As to why no protected route was provided in this case is odd. My guess is there was an existing non-compliant loft conversion probably done without approval but some time ago. That put it outside the enforcement provisions of the Building Control system. Then some minor alteration to the loft room was proposed that did not make the existing fire escape situation worse than it already was and the applicant claimed the protection of Paragraph 3 of Regulation 4 (of the 2010 regs as they were) and the LA couldn't really not have approved it. The refusal of the LA to allow the current owner of the property a view of the application seems bizzare, I bought and completed a project that had been abandoned by the previous owners and the LA were quite happy for me to see their file as I needed to know what they had approved and what they had or hadn't inspected. The OP is the only one that can make this call but on a personal basis I'd walk away. Two reasons, 1) the real risk to users of the 2nd floor, and 2) the pain of trying to sell it again at a later stage. Not easy if in all other ways the house suits their needs. Of course, if the alterations can be done to make it compliant then a hefty discount might make up for it.....

Yes, the requirement for a raised height is in Part M - Access to and Use of Buildings of the Building Regulations. This only applies to new buildings and not extensions. Having said that I've found the higher locations much easier to use!

This is the letter content supplied by our heating/plumbing contractor: To whom it may concern. I hereby certify that all internal drainage on above project have been subjected to successful air tightness test using Bailey gauge and have been found free flowing. Pressure held above 38 after 5 minutes. In was in the pack of various certificates etc provided to BC and we had no comments back about any of it.

We used DW and were very impressed. Their site work ethic and attention to detail was excellent. They'll change one of their designs whilst we had own design and they adapted it to suit their system (that took a little time - we had to use their architect and pushed back on some changes they wanted to make). The one thing that attracted us was the speed on site, four days to weather tight and eight weeks to handover. We've been in for for about six months now and are very happy to have a warm, comfortable house. We used the Sheffield agent and found them helpful and experienced with the system.

Our kitchen supplier was a Bosch/Seimens agent so listed them in the quote and they matched well with the big sheds/on-line . My wife liked the look of the Bora hob in the showroom but it was too dear. Whilst sorting things out I found out the newer version was being fitted to the display in a few days so I asked about buying the display model, he did us a good deal on that and we bought the Fisher & Pykel fridge/freezer off display as well at a healthy discount. It pays not to be too precious over brands if there's a deal to be done!

Just think of the joy of living amongst them soon! I had a planning meeting where our scheme at the end of a cul-de-sac came up and I did my three minute bit. A neighbour whose house was opposite said his bit and he objected because delivery lorries would use his driveway to turn around. The chairman asked me about this and I explained all turning could be done within the site. The scheme was approved. Within days, despite explaining everything to them, a contractor used the neighbour's drive to turn around and stalled his all terrain forklift on it and couldn't re-start it.... you just couldn't make it up!

Thames Water used to check sewers on individual properties when an application was made. LA's and private BCO's then started sending every application to them for checking (I can't recall what prompted that) Thames Water responded by sending back a standard response saying you may need a build over agreement, basically putting the onus on you to check as obviously they didn't have (or want to use) the resources to look at each and every one. Your drain is private until it leaves your property when it become a public lateral drain before joining the public sewer proper. Your works appear to be at least 3 metres from the public sewer (the red line) and at least 1 metre from the point where your private drain becomes a public lateral drain at you boundary. You don't therefore need a build over agreement.

You'll need sound insulation as well so the celotex wouldn't help with that. I'd refer to specifications in British Gypsum's White Book or Knauf details. Find one that suits the situation and follow it to the letter. Give the BCO the spec and that should put their mind at rest.

So Wandsworth have taken away (nearly) everyone's rights in the borough to do this in their garden?: Permitted development E. The provision within the curtilage of the dwellinghouse of— (a)any building or enclosure, swimming or other pool required for a purpose incidental to the enjoyment of the dwellinghouse as such, or the maintenance, improvement or other alteration of such a building or enclosure; or (b)a container used for domestic heating purposes for the storage of oil or liquid petroleum gas. Development not permitted E.1 Development is not permitted by Class E if— (a)permission to use the dwellinghouse as a dwellinghouse has been granted only by virtue of Class M, N, P or Q of Part 3 of this Schedule (changes of use); (b)the total area of ground covered by buildings, enclosures and containers within the curtilage (other than the original dwellinghouse) would exceed 50% of the total area of the curtilage (excluding the ground area of the original dwellinghouse); (c)any part of the building, enclosure, pool or container would be situated on land forward of a wall forming the principal elevation of the original dwellinghouse; (d)the building would have more than a single storey; (e)the height of the building, enclosure or container would exceed— (i)4 metres in the case of a building with a dual-pitched roof, (ii)2.5 metres in the case of a building, enclosure or container within 2 metres of the boundary of the curtilage of the dwellinghouse, or (iii)3 metres in any other case; (f)the height of the eaves of the building would exceed 2.5 metres; (g)the building, enclosure, pool or container would be situated within the curtilage of a listed building; (h)it would include the construction or provision of a verandah, balcony or raised platform; (i)it relates to a dwelling or a microwave antenna; (j)the capacity of the container would exceed 3,500 litres

That's what I like about this site. The advice goes from "get rid of the TV altogether" through the practical "fit behind the carpet gripper" to the high tech stuff suggested by ProDave. All of it useful, well perhaps not losing the TV, that may be going a bit far...... I'll look at the carpet edge, we have form for this this. In the last house I arranged for the re-wire to include data on one side of the large lounge fireplace because that's where we expected the TV and other gubbins to go. After a few months of actually living in the place we realised that it was the other side which was better. Luckily it was pre- new carpets and I routed out a cable route in the floor boards. It just goes to show that no matter how well you plan, it's not until you've been using a house to actually live in do you get to understand how the space works for you.

Ah, that's what I wanted to do........ bother....... Mmmm.... decorated and carpeted room in a newly finished and moved in build. I'll let you suggest that to my wife!

Hi, So we planned the new house out fully before construction including locations for aerial outlets and data. However, after moving in we have decided that the furniture layout we thought would work, doesn't. The change involves moving the TV to the opposite diagonal of the living room. We can get the TV to connect to the hub via wireless but need to get an aerial connection across for the Humax box to work. We've only been in for six months and the last thing I want to do is run an aerial cable around the skirtings to the proposed TV location - this is meant to be a clean, fresh, minimalist hi-tech home!! Can you get a gadget to jump a signal from a traditional TV aerial from the wall socket to another gizmo across the room without a cable? Cheers

"Send three and fourpence we're going to a dance" sums it up. A fuller explanation at first post would help formulate the most useful replies......

Then you need to consider the additional fire precautions as per this from Approved Documents Part B Volume 1 - Fire Safety Loft conversions 2.21 Where a new storey is added through conversion to create a storey above 4.5m, both of the following should apply. a. The full extent of the escape route should be addressed. b. Fire resisting doors (minimum E 20) and partitions (minimum REI 30) should be provided, including upgrading the existing doors where necessary. NOTE: Where the layout is open plan, new partitions should be provided to enclose the escape route (Diagram 2.2).

Not sure what you means by a "SAP's test"? How it normally works is that you submit a SAP calculation (actually it's a suite of calculations) as part of your design, this demonstrates that your proposal meets the requirements for new dwellings for energy efficiency. Then at the end of the work the process is repeated using the "as built" information (e.g the actual pressure test result rather than an assumed one). That final calculation should be no worse than the original "design" calculation. So you don't need that first SAP calculation before you appoint a BC body but you will need it when you submit your application to them.

I'd say this is pretty standard these days. Usually best to go along with it, there's not much alternative to be honest.

We used 127mm x 76 UB's and dropped the sleepers into the flanges. Painted the steels in Everbuilds Black Jack bitumastic paint first. Doesn't get sticky in the sun and I would expect the steels to last a very long time and it'll be my children replacing the treated sleepers I reckon.