Bitpipe

I have low energy LED ceiling spots which run through a MK Grid dimmer unit. When they'e on a 50% or so setting, they can pulse brighter and dimmer. No other circuit is effected in the house so bit of a mystery. Spark swapped out the dimmer and a few of the ceiling units but its never gone away as an issue. Any ideas?

Welcome!

No but in general these warranties are seen as a necessary evil to allow future house sale / mortgage or meet another regulatory requirement. They are notoriously difficult to claim against and the first recourse is always to go back to your builder / contractor etc. My provider went bust before the policy went active (required BC sign off), was inherited by another firm who considered the first two years already spent and I got the basic 8 for my money. They offered a refund, which I seriously considered, but in the end decided to swallow it as we still need a mge for the next 8 years. When I did come off the self build mge, the new provider's surveyor asked 'if' I had a warranty but never asked to see it. So my view would be go as cheap as you can.

How airtight are you aiming to make your house? While you need a strategy to meet Building Regs ventilation standards, air that is free to leave your home through extractor vans, trickle vents, leaky door and window seals and small gaps throughout the fabric will also take heat with it. MVHR replaces passive ventilation with a ducted fan driven system and in additional to providing a constant stream of fresh air to each room, and removing stale damp air from kitchens and bathrooms it has a heat exchanger to recover the majority (90%) of heat from the extracted air and use it to warm incoming fresh air. It runs in a background mode (usually 30% power) and a boost mode (50%). Boost needs to be triggered either manually with a pull cord/push switch or automatically by PIR sensors, co2 detection, extractor hood activation etc. Building regs requires a max 10ACH, passive standard is 0.6ACH and it's commonly accepted that the heat recovery aspect of MVHR is only effective when you have ACH of 2 or below - that said, the ventilation will always be useful but heat recovery will be minimal. It's also a common misconception that MVHR can significantly contribute to space heating or cooling - given MVHR air movement is very low (by design) and air is a very poor carrier of heat (or coolth) the effect will be negligible in most houses but can act as a trim in a very low energy home (passive standard). To meet BR, you need an extract in each bathroom/toilet and kitchen and they need to meet specified min extract rates. You then need to balance this with equivalent supply to your living and sleeping areas. Typically this is a ceiling vent per bedroom and one per enclosed living area. You need to aim for cross flow from supply to extract and ensure that there is the regulation 7600mm2 gap under each door where there is a supply or extract. Another common misconception is that you are not allowed to open doors or windows if you have MVHR. You can do what you want, and many of us do, especially in summer. Just be aware that creating natural cross draughts in your house will take warm (or cool in summer) air with it and may undo the good work your MVHR has been doing. Although one unique aspect of an airtight house is that just having one open door does not create a draught as there is nowhere for the air to go - open a second door and you'll know all about it. You can put the main unit where you want, ideally you want all internal ducting (usually 75mm flex duct, some use rigid) to be as equidistant as possible to make balancing easier but ours is in the basement on one side of the house and we got it to work ok. You'll also need large bore ducting from outside to the unit for the supply and extract. These need to be insulated so can get a bit bulky. You'll also need manifolds to collect / distribute the flexi ducts and access to the main unit to service and change filters is needed. The unit will also generate condensate so that needs to be piped away as waste water. Vents are usually in celling but you can wall mount (as we have in our rooms in roof) and even floor mount but just be aware of the cross ventilation requirement, no good air scooting across the floor and out the door. Many here have DIY installed their systems, you can also self calibrate and 'sign off' - there is no professional qualifications required. I think that's it! My suggestion is to approach someone like BPC with your floor plans and let them spec a system for you and see if you can make it work with your design constraints.

I only have one troublesome vent and it's above my bed (don't ask). Only really noticeable at night when it's dead quiet - bit of a drone / fan hum. I think it's exacerbated by a sharp bend in the ducting just before the vent position, too late to do anything about that either. Anyway, I pinged BPC and they sent me a foam insert with removable sections for the plenum and it does work well - not completely eliminated but enough not to be a nuisance anymore.

Given the ex-MOD contents of his garage, I believe Jeremy may have created a rip in the time space continuum and catapulted himself to another era.

I have had several pints with him and he is very, very sound. He took a 60 mile detour once just to drop off an unused tub of waterproofer at my build and would not take a penny for it, ditto some 16mm pex connectors that he posted out. Also the time he spent building and sharing SAP models, calcs, etc on this forum were significant. He often admitted that he found it difficult to read emotion into online conversations so sometimes came across as aloof, which was unintentional.

Dr Who has the same issue. Its why he/she gets through so many assistants.

Obviously too late for you but this was one of the reasons we went with suspended timber floor over the basement ('open box' construction). Basement slab sits on 300mm EPS with 200mm applied to outside & meets the insulated layer in the twin wall TF above. We skipped any UFH (or any heating) in basement and it's always sitting at 20oC or thereabouts. Put alu spreader plates on GF joists, pipe and then the 18mm OSB deck on that, leaving out a strip of OSB where the pipes hopped over the joists at each end. Added 9+12mm cross laid ply to that as sub-base for resin floor (which sits on 6mm rubber crumb mat) so the whole build up is about 50mm thick. Works fine, floor is soft and warm underfoot when needed - as we're PH standard, heating is rarely on. I was worried that if we heated the top of a concrete box, we'd end up heating the whole structure over time. I don't think we saved any money in forgoing the top of the basement box as the walls needed to be thicker and stronger as a result (300mm vs 200mm) so probably the same amount of steel and concrete plus the cost of a steel web over the floor and joists.

This looks like a 1980's Tardis interior.

My tiler had OCD, the way he lined up the recessed flush plates with the rest of the tiling is a thing of beauty.

I remember the first night we spent in our van, was blowing a hooley - didn't get a wink of sleep as was terrified the van was going to flip over. Needless to say, it didn't and we 'enjoyed' 18 months in it. Quick tip - use a dehumidifier over winter to keep the interior from getting damp - LPG hobs & fires emit a lot of water vapour which condenses out and feel cold in the morning. You'll know if your van is getting out of level due to sagging props as the UPVC doors will start to bind and won't open easily,

I know, called them again yesterday and the guy I've been dealing with has left but he was confident they'd stand by their commitment to resolve. Sent a long polite email to the other director with all the key events and photos summarised and now they're coming to site next week for another inspection. Anyway, didn't mean to hijack your thread! Will come visit when lockdown allows

Two different things in play here that I see. 1) generating sufficient detail to satisfy BC - while it's nice to tie all of this in a bow, most of them can deal with bits and pieces from different sources. They will know what they need. 2) generating sufficient detail for your contractors to build to. If you're using a turnkey service (like a TF) then they will produce their own details, however other trades (windows, roofing etc) will want to understand how they interface and in the absence of an agreed detail may not do it the way you wanted. If you're going down a more traditional route then full drawings are essential.

My architect wanted £15k for BC drawings and discharge of the planning conditions! This was the point where I stopped being a client and took a more hands on approach. I used an independent assessor and they were very helpful with the DIY approach. I used a package TF company (MBC) and submitted their detailed drawings & calcs to the BC who was more than happy with them. Did similar for the basement design we got from our SE (I did not use MBC for a traditional slab). The rest of it was easy enough, probably the biggest effort for me was a draft EPC using the Stroma tool and a tweaked model posted on here etc. At the end of the build, the BC was equally helpful in giving me the checklist of things they needed to sign off the build (e.g. test certs from electrician etc..). Planning conditions were also easy to discharge once I'd received the archaeological and ground investigation studies - our LA charged per submission so I just sent in one big doc that covered everything and even got my fee back as they took more than 12 weeks to approve. So best place to start is to ask your BC what they need to see and / or send them what you have from the TF company.

Great news! I'm still trying to schedule my render replacement, contractor has agreed to do so 'in principal' but still trying to nail them down to a slot.

Been there, NASA grade tolerances between the unit and carcass. The resin floor was top coated after the units went in also so extra challenge. I think I used two sheets of stiff but thin plastic from some packaging to create a slip joint between the feet and floor, lots of effing and jeffing but got it out (and back in again).

I used an engineer (Tara) who is now at build collective in Bristol. They specialise in ICF and underground structures. SEs don't need to be local, many here have used SEs based in Ireland. It's not mandatory for them to visit site, especially if you've had a good detailed survey done (topo and ground investigation).

I've had this a few times on our Gaulhofer slider also, but only if it's blowing a proper gale. Sounds like it may need an adjustment. How did it perform in the airtightness test (or have you not got that far yet)?

I believe if you don't have planning to demolish then they can make you rebuild to the original design. However unless you're in a conservation area or the property is listed then hard to see why they'd refuse.

Well, it's your house but you've secured a loan on it so by demolishing it you revoke the contract and they ask for immediate repayment of the loan. Ask me how I know this

Welcome, I'm in Berkshire M4 J8/9 so pretty representative of the type of area you're looking in. We (and many others here) bought a tired existing house and demolished it to rebuild. Land is very rare and if you find it and can afford it, ask why no-one has developed it yet for love or profit. If you buy and demolish, you will have all services and access established (can cost you many tens of thousands to get to a green site). You will also qualify for the same zero VAT self build scheme. Very likely to get planning (unless its in a conservation zone, listed etc, in which case look for something else). You are paying for a building to flatten which can be a bit mind bending and you need to get a self build mge or use your own funds for the actual build as no lender will countenance this (ask me how I know ). However you can still buy with a standard mge initially and live in it while you develop and get approval for plans so a standard 2 year mge commitment is fine, just don't do a 5 year fix like I do and then try and wriggle out of it without a redemption penalty.

Would you be able to use this area for something post build or would it be incorporated into your final landscaping plan. A big concrete slab may or may may not be that useful post build whereas hard standing can be knocked about and the area returned to soft landscaping etc.. Our caravan sat behind the build area as we had major groundworks (basement) and needed crane for the frame erection etc and did not want to be in the way of any of this. Just about squeaked it out post build so keep that in mind also Proximity to services is key, foul drainage is probably the trickiest as power, water and telco can be made to go anywhere. We paid £500 to get our van sited and levelled, it's a skilled job and as Dave says, doing it for two halfs is even more critical.

We built with Ecology (nothing but good things to say about them) but once the build is finished you move to their discounted SVR (depending on your SAP / PH cert)and it's not the cheapest - from memory 2% more than the general lending market. If you plan to re-mge in the 10 years thereafter then expect the lender to ask if you have a warranty. I say that advisedly as I was asked by the surveyor when I did it and said 'yes'. But he never asked for details or followup so I suppose I could have been dishonest had I not paid out for a warranty. If you sell in the same time period then your buyer's solicitor may ask for same - I believe there are other options available should you not have one (indemnity policy??). I am under no illusion that they're likely not worth the paper they're printed on wrt claiming for issues and I had an opportunity to get a refund when my original provider went into administration just as I was obtaining BCO sign off to activate the policy. I hummed and hawed and decided to stick with it as it was sunk money (not that I wouldn't have minded £4k back) but wanted to retain flexibility with mortgaging for the future. I guess it's a view on what is the warranty cost as a % of age savings over 10 years.

Did they contribute to its cost? No? Too bad. We needed to put up a few fence panels post build to re-establish some privacy after removal of a large bush and until hedge grew back in a few years. Did cheapest we could find and explained to next door that if they wanted better to chip in. Never heard about it again. On the other side we contributed to some replacement fencing (3 panels out of 10) due to it getting damaged during the build (was a bit knackered anyway). We had a bit more say in that. Still fugly though