FarmerN

I've just had connection in a temrorary box moved into the house by SPNetworks. They cut the temporary supply cable put an underground joint in and ran it to house, so the box is now completly redundant. I am no electrician and my school boy electrics is now clearly redundant. The cable used is single core + the armoured sleve, so two stands only !! I have no idea how that works. We have a large all electric range cooker, 3 to12 Kw GSHP, ( seems to use under 1 Kw when running) MVHR and a car charger is a condition of my planning. I wait to see what happens when we finally live there. The bit that will make it really interesting is SPNetworks keep telling me I have a 25 KV transformer, even though the plate on it says 15 KV. ! It also supplies one other house

Trying to do exactly that at the moment, I want to run DHW at 43-45 C but told its almost impossible to buy a thermostatic shower mixer valve that will give me a hot shower at that temperature. I want to stick to a thermostatic valve, not manual, to deal with the 55-60C temperature of the weekly sterilzation cylcle.

@PhilT In another thread you posted this. Please can you tell me what shower tap you use, is it thermostatic? I'm having very little luck asking manufacturer which valve to use for a low temperature hot supply to shower. The replies I have had so far seem to want a big differential between hot supply and shower delivery temperature.

How did you go about finding the leaks during these diagnostic air tests, and how long to allow? We have a 215qsM bungalow under constucion, with large kitchen living space with vaulted ceilings.

Thanks for replies. My feeling is to do something at junction, either foam or paint or both. I'm bothered if I follow nods advice and leave it until airtight test, after fitting skirting, it will be much harder to rectify any air leaks that I may find. I really don’t know how much the wall floor junction normally leaks air, especially with beam and block. I keep wondering how much time it would take to make a rig with fan to depressurise the house, so I can go leak hunting with a smoke pen or whatever. I am guessing the professionals want to come, do test and go, without really looking for source of leaks.

Screed has gone down today over UFH , next is wet plaster on block walls, how do I deal with airtightness of plaster to screed junction. We have a 25mm perimeter upstand and an expansion strip between screed and block wall, so plenty of opportunity for air leaks down to the beam and block floor. How should we deal with the wall floor junction? Neither the builder nor plasterer are keen to plaster right to the screed, they both want the traditional gap behind the skirting board. Builder of course says “ stop worrying , the DPM is well taped to the DMC , of course it will be airtight”. I on the other hand have a major concern. We are having MVHR. How should we deal with the wall floor junction? Plaster to screed? Airtight paint? Blue foam in gap ? ???? Thanks

Good to hear. Could you tell me make and model of shower mixer Please ?

Thanks for replies. Sounds like a real issue, I'll email a couple of manufacturers and see what response I get. I came to another shower mixer valve ,on line, with a minimum hot supply of 60 deg C! With an ever increasing proportion of water heated by heat pump , sounds like the shower mixer valve manufacturers need to up their game. Am I nuts even thinking I only want to heat the hot water cylinder to low 40s Deg C ? Like a lot of things in my new build , GSHP, UFH, MVHR, PV, Batteries, triple glazing, I have no experience at all and will only find out what we should have done when we have been living there a while. Live in a huge old farmhouse now, damp but extremely well ventilated ,no central heating just log fires so a bit of a change coming for retirement.

I hope,my DHW is to be heated by GSHP as far as possible, so I think I want to run at as low a hot water temperature as possible in the cylinder. The plumber suggested today that a lot of shower mixer valves would not work at a low hot water supply temperature, he said some will not turn the cold off completely within the mixer. Is this true, do I need to chose a mixer carefully ? It will be surface mounted mixer due to wall thickness. A lot of the time there will only be two of us using water off a 300 litre tank , so thought I would be running it at a temperature in the low 40s. Pushing it up if we had a house full. I did look online at mixer valves and one cheap one specified a minimum hot supply temperature of 55C . I was horrified ! There will be a sterilisation cycle.

Furness bricks will send you a list of sites in your area of recently built houses , useing their bricks. Good to see how they look when built. Mortar and pointing also has a bit impact on appearance. We had a slightly coloured mortar, looks great but a real pain to match when you want a small quantity for odd bits at the end.

Try Furness Bricks.

He has a legal right to send water down hill ! You just might end up with a flooded garden again if you sent him a bill!!

Looks good. Drain is shifting good amount of water, has to be worth the effort. Better than my bodge jobs.

Personally I would go for out side as this will avoid creating a step inside, smooth plastic or steel rather than twin walled, as I think the twin walled would have a lot more friction to being driven into the ground.

The size of the pipe suggests to me its more than just a land drain. I would guess it’s been from an old building or tank or perhaps a spring. Or perhaps a main with other pipes or a ditch emptying into it. In England it would be rare for a land drain to be more than 4 inch diameter and most only2 to 3 inch, maybe things are different in Scotland. As for a solution to your problem, I only have a ‘bodge fix’ that works in our ground. Find a pipe that will fit externally, at least a meter or so long, fit it over remaining pipe and drive along that pipe with a piece of wood and sledge hammer. The further in along the pipe it goes the better. If you have rocky ground probably a waste of time. If you think the pipe has any major long term use may be worth jetting it, with an agricultural high volume jetter rather than domestic, low volume high pressure one. Try the local agricultural contractors.

Plans started 4 years ago when we were going to get a big payment for GSHP . We also have a field with wet sand a meter or so down so near perfect conditions for GSHP. Also wanted all plant in the house, to make use of all 'waste' heat from machinery , and didn't want a big white box in the garden. My main concern now of GSHP over ASHP is avaliability of service and spares in the future. I hope my set up is there for the long term ground pipes 50+ years, heat pump 30 years? The digger to lay 600m of pipe( 3 x 200M runs) cost me £2,500.00 so not dear , laid pipe at 1.4m deep 1.2m apart in 6 trenches about 5 meters apart. When he had back filled the grass was still there where the spoil had been stacked ! Pipes and manifold cost on top of this so not cheap all together.

Thanks for reply, makes good sense, I’ll look at the layout and see how it works out. The heat pump installer has suggested not having a buffer tank, I rather favoured one as I am guessing much of the year we will have ufh on in bathroom and shower room and nowhere else, but I don’t really grasp the pros and cons, of a buffer. The builder had the ufh layout done by a design / supply company. A lot of the supply pipes go through block walls which I was surprised by. One group of 3 supply through in one point along with the 3 returns. The max loop length is 90M off 150M coils, pipe spacing 150mm, because of room sizes, means rooms have 2 or3 circuits each room. The plant room is to double as a drying room, so has a MVHR extract, we have made no provision for a tumble dryer, as we have never had one where we live now.

Hi first real post on here, I have found the information gained from site invauable, Thanks. New build bungalow, beam and block floor , 180 mm PIR insulation over screed to be around 70mm depending on tile or carpet finish. UFH by GSHP so hope to run at low temperature, supply pipes as low as possible, below 30Deg C ?? The feed to the manifolds from the buffer vessel/GSHP are well insulated. Is there any need to insulate the supply pipes to indervidual rooms in the screed, especially where they are grouped together, down one wall the plan shows 4 suppy,4 return pipes laid close together in the screed? This area will be tiled. Few more details of build 200m2 bungalow, masonary constuction throughout, wet plaster , 125 cavity wall, 115mm Kingspan insulation in walls, Rational tripple glazed windows , MVHR , GSHP. PV in roof panels. 200mm PIR in ceilings or roof. The ufh pipes and screen are due to go down in a couple of weeks. Plenty of mistakes made in construction already and it will be interesting to do the airtight test , that is the bit I have had most trouble comunicating with builder. However overall I am absolutly thrilled with the build so far.

As you say , you shouldn't have had to pay in the first place, so the full amount back seems reasonable to me. Did the pole supply just you , or just run across your land as part of the mains. I have a pole in the middle of my garden I want moved, but its a spur supplying just me and one other so they are saying I would have to pay full cost to have it moved. Again no wayleave.

Try googleing the filter No. or Winget dumper model + Hydraulic filter, there's bound to be a 'will fit' filter avaliable.