MikeSharp01

We have had a somewhat tragic event with a single friend of ours getting what looks like early onset dementia, Consultants appointment in next couple of days. We have been up working with them, and their immediate family, to sort things but one area maybe has a solution but I cannot immediately see it. Essentially they cannot control their TV anymore - it all works fine and the remote is perfectly normal but the buttons seem not to mean anything to them any longer, 'which button do I press to watch' so I thought it must be possible to remotely control a TV via their internet connection for them or install an ALEXA like system so they can just talk to it to make things happen. I have seen a harmony hub which might do it but I was wondering if there was another way or any experience out there. It would be good if we could control their heating and monitor electricity usage etc, all of which I could do but need a way forward for the TV and we can probably hang the rest of it onto that. Any thoughts?

Have you had a scope on the hdmi signals to see what signal loss there is? HDMI is not a fool proof standard and it was developed to cope with 1080p over a max practical distance of 50ft IIRC. As the demands of 4k and 16k grow on us it won't cope over even that distance so I would build a space behind / beside the TV to put the boxes and run a fibre cable to your router it is unlikely that terrestrial broadcast will get much beyond 4k in the medium term satellite will and if you have a fast enough broadband you might get beyond 4k.

Welcome to THE forum for self builders. Sounds interesting, budget should be OK for a modest property as long as you can get plot with services for under £200k leaving you with £250k for build and at £1500 /m2 you should get 150 m2 property with some contingency.

I guess getting the frame up and watertight would be good.

Not much but a slightly bigger one will run cooler as it won't be working so hard. As Dave says it won't be smooth but it will run just fine.

Thanks chaps - body swerve time me thinks. So as a starting point, and in an ideal world, we need to be looking for: inverter controlled & reversable. For us 5Kw should be stacks.

Anyone got any experiance of the Fairland Orilux 5.2kW Air Source Heat pump. Looks like a good deal on ebay at £550 so might invest if no adverse comments although it has no cooling option according to blurb.

welcome to THE forum, sounds like a long(ish) gestation but you seem now to be 'on the road' [Although perhaps off the rails], good luck.

Is the system 2.5 years old or did they move into the house 2.5 years ago with an existing system, Sorry of I missed an answer to this question.

How frustrating. Just a couple of thoughts - hire a photo spectrometer and pop it onto the colour you like (you can get this done free at some DIY stores if you have a sample as they can scan it), push the trigger and you can get all the colour info you need plus a load of other info you don't. Alternative would be to buy a stack of tinted glasses (Rose tint won't do it for green) which make all the green spectrum look grey and offer them to visitors, wear them constantly yourself of course. There will be a solution that does not involve a new window.

Welcome to THE forum - but I guess you knew that otherwise why pop up. Good luck with the project, sounds interesting.

This should be good?

Not sure if there is a standard detail for this but if there is it will require you to block the end of the joist and take the main load underneath the bottom flange.

Yet another monopoly - dont get me started. How about getting a company to do both and just throw your 'as designed' away or perhaps theirs if you can see the traceability back to your original. It won't be that different I suspect. Our predesign SAP was done by email passing of documents so could have been done anywhere in the UK.

Welcome to THE forum for self builders? Sounds like a fun project looking forward to hearing more and pitching in where I can.

Sadly Dave it already is a computer although I agree the form factor makes using them pretty miserable for this sort of thing. Can I ask where you sourced the panels?

Electrical: Existing is overhead to the plot boandry. Who do we contact? (Local Power network company they will sort the connection to a fuse on your site, then you need an energy company to install the meter, just ask for an account, our new connection from a pole on our land was £800 and the meter was free from our electricity supplier,} Water: I believe it goes under what will be the front of the bungalow: who to contact?{The local water company but if you are building over such a pipe you will need some expensive design work, cheaper to move the house back!, they will give you a price to install a connection to a water meter.} Sewer: I believe the mains is out in the middle of the road: who to contact. {Local Water company again - same issue if building over a pipe.} Telephone/broadband: no idea where this is placed: who to contact? {Just find a provider - Virgin, BT, Sky and they will sort it with Openreach - might not be cheap though depends as there is standard charge but it depend son how far.}

Hi - and welcome to THE forum for self builders. We are building a passive standard house in East Kent and I suspect we now lean rather more with @TerryE than we did when we set out in terms of certification. Our architects are not PH certified bit I decided we could deal with that as we wanted quite an avant guard design from their stable and the PHPP software is not complex to drive after a 1 day course I felt I could probably tackle the main work, avoid the key pitfalls and get it verified by a PH designer.

One wonders, knowing the answer in the back of ones mind, if CGT is reversible, in the sense that recent falls in house values allow you to claim -ve CGT. I doubt they would go for it.

Yes I had not considered that you are now officially in an earthquake zone, so you need to check that your SE has; the relevant experience, has designed with the 1 in 100 year event (or whatever) in mind and PI insurance.

Again not quite true. Screws are not nails they are usually of different materials, have a smaller cross section at the root of the thread, and behave differently to nails in this instance and twist nails are not crude screws.

Not quite true as some holes are for manufacturing purposes so don't need nails and some are for temporary fixing although these are usually left filled anyway, look at the manufacturers data sheet. For Simpson stuff they point out the what the different holes mean (round, diamond, oval, Triangle) and whether they need to be filled or not and under what circumstances.

The manufacturer will give you a nail (so the twisty nails are a must) pattern depending on the load / situation. Think this might point at it albeit from perhaps another manufacturer: https://www.strongtie.com/products/connectors/wood-construction-connectors/technical-notes/face-mount-hanger-loads

That is spanking small crushing Peter.

Watch out for the tax person (used to be a man, now more appropriately gender neutral but still as difficult!) as you will create a second home for yourself and may need to sort that out and there will perhaps be a capital gain crystallising if you are not careful. in your shoes I would be talking to a professional, in my shoes I should be talking to a cobbler.