Hobbiniho

you could send stu gray an email, he is the panasonic dealer for the north of scotland and the islands "info@heatorkney.com" he would let you know how expensive they are, although i think they are ~£500 each so not exactly cheap

i presume you have come across the panasonic aquarea air rads and filed them in the "too expensive and complicated" group, i have them fitted although using them for heating, they are a lot more aesthetically pleasing then what i was thinking they would be, although they arent running yet

you say that the roof has already been fitted? how do you propose to get the SIP sections into place? i presume the plan is to make the timber kit on site within the building so they can just be stood up in place? you cant do that with SIPS

i am particularly intrigued as to how they think you can get a wind turbine for £1500 , on my EPC it shows the indicative cost of a wind turbine as 15-25k which is more realistic if a bit low, but it doesnt factor into account the large amount of land that you need to site the thing in the first place

ASHP is permitted development class 6H in scotland as long as it meets certain criteria, the most important being the MCS sound calculations https://www.gov.scot/publications/guidance-householder-permitted-development-rights-9781780456836/pages/8/

i have worked on a few houses where we didnt build the upstairs, we did however put all the materials for finishing it off upstairs, this was so that the client could get the vat claim on the materials

just noticed on facebook a post by a local builder, turns out they have bought a new nail gun that uses wooden nails and have used it to hold on cladding, it appears to work quite well, and i can confirm about the problems with rusting stainless nails the problems with living in a marine climate. theres a quick video on facebook to show it working https://www.facebook.com/BA-Builders-shetland-LTD-226214484102464/?__tn__=kCH-R&eid=ARCrWTNdNpOwX1wQCr6gSGkoZtktBLY6huQnhuw2qG2IkkZJZk78X0T3qSddPDNyA71L8pxPFpmC8J8r&hc_ref=ARSbyVC-0GNkKfsPQCZRmupovzJxBYsKW7BO7ghbmz0k_WWKGGdGu75S6Mo-Phxphr8&fref=nf&__xts__[0]=68.ARBqB-KAQZ-HpEACbOxHfyixPxpwwsgsM-pEY9l7bAYKBVQ2CcxEGiD181nZkyAG4H-Il4Hd-kxA0EoWMgDx6452LCo2Ok4Or8eKDwhF7ZVYkdBq7SPZt9JhUy3HPLS3HriBatsETeWdagJ8AZn9G5iBY9ukGfIgEpW2CxznG1pJ9GWV4KDrcU--Roz5if8bkwMgeTVUr2aIFUX7CcxCRqJcy_l5yqNYv_ETLwZ7siRJjJm26a6RBJF7l81LdVVusABIyzDDXcXg9X7Fgaw-JGGt3jOyzmpq2nkaEo8SSearcTZQb1eZPrLiuSaPGQsOWcIOIixtZmH8QXDUxSd8IpOcfrqvDqwDFKROkf2RqxYPV-AVWVms0cub8l3P5e1jE8kLGNCJai7c2B9-DvWFTYNxoyKJv-YvpMWF2I4vzDZxrUE88X94sLwMRmpXfIVrR0RRPTFj4x-HzQfCeny54wK_22xQ0otx5_Ob4Uxgkyi4BZPxggeLylYASt20AjvntF-oEZoVTfwaEdsQd5e6jRPREg https://www.beck-lignoloc.com/en

this is how i would do it if it was me, providing you have the depths to be able to do it, there is no need for loads of inspection chambers as long as you have rodding points as shown, you should not have a run that you cannot rod as you are talking about foul drainage you want to keep is simple, follow the "KISS" principle, straightest shortest route, least amount of joins nice shallow angles , your shyte does not need to do a full lap of your house

this is the exact reason i will never have solid wood worktops, as you have found out they need care and you cant leave anything on them or you will get stains, get it stripped and some osmo applied

interesting project, you could look on your local council planning website to find applications for houses near you for new houses and see if they show the activity spaces, this is a house local to me and you can clearly see the activity space marked, i think you will struggle with a bathroom that small https://pa.shetland.gov.uk/online-applications/files/ADBC1F1FC4F23C6516588E3211B0E4B3/pdf/2019_049_AMSC-1-50_SCALE_GROUND_FLOOR_PLAN-289861.pdf "activity spaces" sizes can be found here as well as other guidance etc https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-standards-2017-domestic/3-environment/312-sanitary-facilities/

yes complete pain in the arse but easy enough, in my case i was a first year apprentice joiner (back in 2006) i was given the job of fixing door stops to the floor the day before handover of a house , we needed to remove skirtings, lift the laminate flooring, lift the chipboard flooring dig up the biscuit screed, then had to wait a week for the couplings to arrive, my supervisor wasnt impressed it would be a lot more difficult in concrete as you would need to make sure you dont damage the pipe when digging it up

dig it up cut it and install a straight coupling, ask me how i know this

do you struggle to hit the head of a nail with a hammer , i must say that i had a preference for a hammer tacker over a staple gun, but i was using it day in day out, tried a few different ones but the arrow ht50 as posted above is the best hammer tacker you can buy, hammer tackers are much faster than a staple gun

i normally use batt strap cut down to size should be a couple of £ for a 1m length. usually 1 piece top and bottom on both sides and if the window is over 1200 wide then it needs 1 in the middle at the top normally lined up with the mullion, same if they are tall then need one in the middle at the sides, if they are really wide for example 3m then i would put 2 along the top, i just had a look at your blog and see you are timber frame, up here the windows get battens fixed to them at the correct offset for the cladding then fixed to the house, this means there is no need for batt straps and makes the window install that bit more solid

the general rule of thumb for domestic dwellings is if a 100mm sphere can pass through it it will fail, you also cannot generally build the handrail with horizontal battens as kids will use it as a ladder, that photo will fail as the complete right side is unguarded and there is also an unguarded area on the left at the window, the rise looks too big aswell i think a 100mm sphere will pass through under the tread

no i havent heard one running but they quote 40dba when they are going flat out, and 19dba on the low setting, they are over specced so should run at a low speed, i will just have to wait and see what they are like. i have a feeling the fridge and dishwasher will annoy me more than the radiators

yes i am getting the loan, it was a complete pain for me to get quotes as i live on an island (shetland) and there are only 4 MCS registered plumbers, and none of them could( didnt want to) give me a quote, i eventually got a really helpful plumber in orkney to get me a quote and he uses a local plumber to sub contract and only because i know his son , it has been a complete pain to get it all sorted, i started the process in october and am hopefully getting the second fix done in a couple of weeks, i had quotes for fitting an oil system and these were more or less the same as having an ASHP system installed, this is a retrofit replacing storage heaters and my RHI payments are maxed out, if you are building a new house with a small heating demand it might not be worth the extra cost of MCS accreditation

my house was built in about 1880 ish its made from beachstone concrete, i am having a panasonic aquarea system installed, the radiators in the 2 upstairs bedrooms are just normal triple panel 900x600 radiators, the living room/ kitchen downstairs has 2 fan assisted radiators and the back bedroom/ walkin wardrobe has 1 fan assisted radiator, to be honest i could have got panel radiators that would have done the job but it was on the limits and the living/ kitchen area is 9mx 3.7m with 3 outside walls and the kitchen half has no wall space so it was more a case of being able to "move" the heat around more efficiently plus the fan assisted rads are designed for the lower flow temps, i am aware that the panasonic rads are quite expensive but im sure they will do the job well, i will just have to wait and see

up here BT supply ducts if you ask nicely and 25mm water pipe fits in them nicely

i can remember going to work in a house and we were told to take our rubber boots with us, should have clicked that it wasnt for the downpipe clearing but for the inside work, the guy had hens living in his house, the smell was unreal ??

i cant see it unless you are going to be physically doing the work yourself and even then you would struggle, one of my best friends who along with myself are both time served joiners build his own house it was a 100m2 3 bed timber frame, timber clad bungalow, the site was free as he got it from his parents, he physically done all of the work himself (excluding heating and electrics) including making the kit with calling in favours from family and friends paying in tea and biscuits and time paid back in favour (he still owes me about 5 days labour), and he just managed to do it for £1000/m2 you need to listen to people on this forum, with a 200k budget you will be able to build a high spec 100m2 bungalow or a a lower spec 135m2 bungalow

jsharris has a heat loss calculation spreadsheet that is very good, i used it to calculate the heat loss for the property that i am refurbing to give me an idea of what i was dealing with and it was almost exactly the same as what the plumber got when he specced my system, i used this website to give me my u values http://www.vesma.com/tutorial/uvalue01/uvalue01.htm the real plus point about ASHP is the RHI payments and is the reason i am fitting an ASHP rather than oil, i am changing from storage heaters run on total heat total (no) control. The capital cost for me to install both the systems is the same but as i live in scotland i am getting an interest free loan to install the ASHP and the RHI payments i will receive will basically pay for the system over the 7 year payment term, RHI is good for older properties with poorer insulation and higher heating needs as the more energy you need to heat the property the more money you get back, if you are not looking to get RHI payments then it might not be worth it as you will have to change all the radiators with an ASHP and this can be costly, i had to have 3 fan assisted radiators specced as it was not possible to get the heat output i required from a traditional radiator in the small amount of wall space i had availiable there is a topic below this one about oil vs ASHP which is worth a read ?

18mm mdf, even moisture resistant is quite flimsy, what width does your jambs need to be? i usually used 115/145/195x 21 redwood cut and planed to size for door jambs as it is quite sturdy but even then they needed to be well packed an secured, i also would not be making up frames without the doors as it is quite difficult to get it packed exactly right, its also easier to pack with the door in place. i would be interested to see how you hope to achieve your shadow gap, you also say you are going to create a rebate using 12mm mdf but there is no facings to cover the join between the 18mm and 12mm mdf? are you hoping to use filler to cover this join? correct i have howdens oak veneer mdf door jambs but they are 30mm thick so not nearly as flimsy

what arrangement are you having where the barge meets the fascia? do you have a soffit? photos would help, if hes fitting the fascia he will just have to leave it plenty long to enable it to be trimmed back when you decide where the barge is going without you telling him exactly what thickness your barge boards are going to be i can understand his frustration, if he doesnt overhang them enough you wont get a drip and it will leak in, and if he overhangs them too much you will have an unsightly overhang, which could cause problems for it catching too much wind??, is it hit an miss cladding or flush? i presume you dont have an overhang on the gable end

the middle of the waste comes out and the flooring goes into the trap then a cover plate is screwed over the top and sandwiches the flooring in place, they can be a bit tricky and you need someone fitting the flooring who isnt useless https://www.google.com/search?q=akw+medicare+waste&rlz=1C1NHXL_en-gbGB781GB782&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiy4a7ssMLiAhWQVxUIHV3RBooQ_AUIDygC&biw=1920&bih=937#imgrc=q5pD-fCJ-EThrM: