FarmerN

We laid our Indian sandstone last spring, supplied by Westminster Stone. They were indifferent about sealing, but as I wanted to seal supplied “Mattstone H2O Seal 2” We only did part last summer , it still went a bit green over winter but not as bad a unsealed part. The downside to sealing was it was like a waxed car, great droplets of water collecting on the surface, the unsealed part dried out much , much faster after rain. Both areas needed a good clean this spring. Wesminster Stone recommended not using a power hose to clean it with saying this would make the surface more open by washing bits out. Suggested that we should wash when needed with proper cleaner, ( which of course they sell !) I used dilute acid , a brick cleaner, first and after rinsing, washed again with a soap bleach mix . I’m sure domestos or similar would be fine, but I used agricultural Sodium Hypochlorite mixed with fairy liquid, mixed at about 750ml Hypo +250 ml fairy to a bucket of water. Use with care splashes will sting and bleach clothes. Brush over, leave to soak and wash off with hose. Worked well for me all green washed off. Think the bleach is the important bit. Do Not mix the bleach with the acid !

Check local records, local knoledge that your water quality will be OK. I spent a lot drilling a borehole, good water supply at 50 M but it was so sulphurous it was not fit to use and treatment costs prohibitive. If you left the water in a bottle over night it stank of rotten eggs next morning. I should have guessed the water was 'special' as there used to historic health spa next door!

Our brick and block walls went up 4 years ago , 125 cavity with 115mm Kooltherm. The builders did try hard but it’s impossible to keep it flat against the blocks, no matter how well laid they are. You therefore end up with a chimney effect and therefore thermal bridging, who knows what the actuall u value is, problably 20% - 40% below the calculated value. Equally impossible to maintain the 10mm residual cavity. The builders turned up with some cheap tape for the PIR boards, I insisted on Kingspan’s recommended tape , cost , in excess of £1000.00 ! for a 210msq bungalow. The floor on the drawing was also Kooltherm, we just changed to a much cheaper PIR and put 180mm in , deeper than the planned Kooltherm but still cheaper. As we are beam and block foundations it was easy to adjust the drawings to accommodate this.

Start here? https://www.allbrickandstone.com/brick-library/ 1000+ bricks to look at. Find the best match on line, get a sample and compare. When you come to build , matching the mortar will also have a big impact.

Hi Thats exactly what we did. Do you already have Planning Permision, or have you submitted plans? Good Luck.

Cherry trees do have a habit of suddenly dying, normal life span is 10-30 years I think. Wet roots is a common problem. Did yours die during this last wet winter ??!!

Thats basically what mine said, plant, replace dead plants, suitable care etc. Fence on the other side of site.

Don't actually 'Like' last three answers but yes I think perhaps I need to get conditions applied with somehow. Thanks.

Would having planning conditions that have not been discharged be an issue if we did have to sell the house. Much more likely a future problem for my children than me. Thanks for all the replies so far.

The Planner at the time just did not want us to build so slapped on as many conditions as possible, nest boxes, bat boxes, specified materials, EV charge point, etc. No enforcement notice , yet. Fence replaces old fence and is shown on plan , but should have had permission for materials and design! I don’t think we have damaged trees or hedges, time will tell.

I’ve just been checking through the twelve planning conditions that came with the original planning permission. We have clearly failed to comply with two of them, though the rest are fine. Any advice on the best way forward now. We have no intention to sell in the next ten years , but you never know what the future will bring. 1. A six foot wooden lap board fence has been built without prior approval. We should have had written approval from the Local Planning Authority for the boundary fence. 2. The protective fencing erected at the start of the project to protect trees, hedging and their roots has been removed , again we should have had LPA written permission before fence was removed. ( Heras fencing ) We are at the end of our Build and living in the house, though not yet got all the final documentation off our builder. I don't blame the builder, think this is down to me. For a variety of reasons we hardly used the architect after the foundations went in, though never fell out with them. Now regretting this and wish we had kept him on board.

White Stone Effect shower tray here. The one we have isn't slippy. Set flush with tile floor, open one end and works well. Needs a scrub with soap once every couple of weeks, easy and quick to do.

We like our Sandstone paving ,Indian Sandstone from Westminster Stone, it looks great, a bit bumpy or rustic looking, which is the look we want. It’s only 12 months old. Just starting to go green and will obviously need a good clean as spring approaches. Didn’t seal it, maybe sealing would have stopped it going green.

Our Rationel alu clad /wood windows had internal split tape, then Illbruck FM330, and Compriband expanding tape as the external seal . The internal tape provided a very visually convincing seal, whether it was really needed I have no idea. We did however have trouble covering the tape with plaster and ended up putting beading round the reveal to hid excess tape on the frames. Which actually looks fine. Removing excess tape is impossible and our problem covering the tape arose through using wet plaster on the reveals not plaster board. My point is if using internal tape , as already said in earlier posts, take great care tapping accurately and know how you are going to cover it on the frames. The external Comriband tape worked well against our brick walls and looks very good. Time will till what it will look like in 10-15 years time.

Zender MVHR unit currently showing Extract air 18 deg C 53% RH Outdoor/ Sullpy air -0.5deg C 94% RH Various digital RH meters round house showing all sorts of ridiculously low figures- kitchen 21.5 deg C 39% RH I don’t trust any of the digital readings really and keep meaning to buy a Wet/Dry bulb thermometer to see what that says.

As stated in earlier posts, I thought there was some merit in having them on the same facade so as to avoid wind pressure differences between intake and exhaust . I’m certainly no expert.

We fitted two consumer boards, only one is supported by the battery during a Power Cut. The heat pump , treatment plant towel rails etc are all on the unsupported on. Ensures the battery is not drained too quickly ,leaving power for Fridge /Freezer, lighting, hub and other essentials. The cooker and all sockets have battery back up so still needs a bit of care during power cuts.

We have a Clearview stove, UK made , it's a traditional design, with direct air supply through the slab. Love it, It's massively more efficient than the stove we had in the previous house. It can overheat the room, but not a major issue, so tend to leave the room door open when it’s lit. Our house is all electric ,and it was nice to have the stove during the recent storm when the power was predicted to be off for 2 days ( it wasn’t). Being a traditional flat top design meant we could boil a kettle on it and heat a pan. I’m told you can bake potatoes in the ash can beneath the fire, but haven’t tried that yet. The ulimate backup.

How important is the Walk in shower ? You say a good sized bath so to state the obvious, a shower over the bath is the easy solution . That’s what we did and it works well. Can you put a walk in shower in another room altogether, even down stairs?

Like our White Stone resin tray. Level access. Use a long handled scrubbing brush for a once a month clean up, soon scrubs up like new.

Feel my display must be misleading , showing a COP of 6 for December so far, Too good to be true ?? My GSHP is a NIBE S1155 12 KW , with 600M ground loop, heating a 215sqM new build+ DHW December 179 kWh in 1073 kWh out. Brine in at 8.8 Deg C , main living space 21Deg C , bedrooms 19 Deg C DHW 48 Deg C

If you have a plant room or simmilar put at least one spare duct in to future proof for things you have forgotten or not even heard of yet.

Screen clearly says- " Notify Contractor. "

If it's a new build,don't forget your CIL form that has to be completed within 6months of completion certificate. I had forgotten all about ours untill an earlier thread on here, about CIL forms, a week or so ago

Love our 5m high vaulted kitchen/dinning/living room, 6m x 7m But Stone floor + quartz work surfaces mean it is a noisy, echoey room. No curtains or blinds in yet, they are being fitted next week, it will be interesting to see how they soften the sound. A few more pictures might help as well, and may be a couple more rugs. The electric Velux windows work well, complete with electric blind but manual fly screen. Flys can be an issue next to a livestock farm. If we were doing it again I think the only change would be to a wood work surface on the island, keep the quartz over units and by sink and cooker. Just putting things down on the quartz is noisy