jack

Plus by the time they've done the mist coat, they'll have loads of experience, and the top coat will look great! As others have said, virtually everyone who goes through this process has at least a couple of pain points where things feel like they're out of control and the problems insurmountable. It's rarely as serious as that with the benefit of hindsight, but it doesn't make the feeling any less real right now. I'd encourage you to speak with your other half ASAP. A large part of your stress seems to be to do with what his reaction might be. Get that reaction, whatever it might be, out of the way, so you can save your energy for addressing the real issue, which is where you've gotten to with the house. If you want help with identifying specific areas where you might save some funds, do post more details. There are plenty of bargain-hunters and serial self-builders who'll be able to point to cheaper ways of doing all sorts of things.

Unless you've been identified for metering, what you were estimated should be what you get, as the MSC installer generates all the paperwork upon which the payments are generated.

We ran two big SWAs from the consumer unit into the garage and have left then coiled there ready for when we get an electric car. Makes sense to have one to a convenient outdoor point too. We really should have run one to near where we usually park our smaller runabout car (which will likely be replaced with an electric fairly soon), but we didn't actually realise when we were building the house that this is where that car would end up getting parked!

I looked into this, as well as large insulated stores within the thermal envelope. Couldn't make the numbers work.

You'd better keep my secrets or there'll be trouble!

Personally, unless you're developing at minimal cost to flog to a mainstream buyer who won't really think too hard about what they're buying, I'd avoid off-the-peg plans. At the very least, what you build needs to take into account where the sun is, and the impact of neighbours, driveway, and landscaping needs. Beyond that, you should be thinking about whether the house suits its surroundings. If you can find a plan that does all that and suits your particular requirements for living, then in theory there's nothing wrong with this approach.

I don't know either. My guess is that gluing is slower than just dropping each board in place and running the nailer along it. I'm not at all surprised that glue gives a better result.

Ah, such an exciting time. I'm pleased to hear you have a solution to the electric cable problem. Can't see his face, but is that Darren in the blue t-shirt?

Just wanted to say welcome, and damn that's a nice looking house!

Wish we'd heard about the Egger system before doing ours. Knowing how much I've hated the squeaking boards in various places we've lived (the rental place we lived while the build went on was the worst example), I did think about getting MBC to glue to boards down as well as nailing. Unfortunately, by the time I got around to thinking about asking, the flooring was already down! I think we added around 20-25 screws per board, and that took long enough.

I met Thomas on the way out of ecobuild the year before we started our build. I was tired and annoyed by how useless a lot of suppliers had been. He was literally the last person I spoke to on the way out, and he was an absolute pleasure. From memory, he was a passivhaus certification trainer and spent a good ten minutes looking at our plans and making useful suggestions to help us achieve passivhaus numbers. In the end, the only reason I didn't go with him for our windows was that he mentioned a couple of windows the architect had drawn were too big for them to produce. Much further down the line, we learned that Thomas had spotted this issue at a glance, whereas the UK sales guy for the company we went with completely missed it, and it was only flagged at the factory while working drawings were being produced. I'm so sorry to hear of his passing. From memory, he wasn't that old.

Way less, actually. We haven't done much furnishing, and even when we do I suspect it'll be a bit quieter than his place. I really, really like it though.

Just to be clear, that's Trevor Nelson's house, not mine!

We have a full width window between our bedroom and the double height space above our kitchen/diner. It was inspired by pics we saw of Trevor Nelson's house a few years back: I think the idea can be very interesting if handled well.

One of our mistakes was being talked in white Corian along one wall of our kitchen. We have marble on our island and wanted something clean and functional for around the sink, which would brighten the area (no nearby windows) and not distract from the marble. This "easy care" product takes stains like no other surface I've ever encountered! Put a cup of tea beside the sink? Stains with minutes. Until we found that baking powder sorts it out just about all stains, I was seriously thinking about tearing it out and getting laminate. I'm very pleased we went for an undermounted stainless steel sink.

Thanks heavens for being sufficiently depressed! Seriously, if anyone's feeling really stressed, don't let it fester. Take a break if you can, talk to friends and family, get some counselling if you're feeling particularly bad, and slag off the chancers causing you grief on here. It all helps!

I can think of two specific periods in our build when I felt like that, and in both cases things got better soon afterwards. I think anyone who's built a house will recognise that feeling of despair, although you seem to be getting it big style. I don't know if it helps, but I just kept telling myself that one way or the other we'd get through it, and that once we did, the problems would become distant memories. There are still a few memories from our build that can annoy me if I think too hard about them, but they've faded with time, and left me with mostly good feelings about the process. Is there anything specific we can do to help? Might be advice, but might just be shoulder to cry/shriek on. We're with you, either way.

I'm sure she'll pick her moment...

Yours or hers?

Lovely looking stuff. I'll bet it's satisfying seeing it come together...

What, finishing a bathroom?

Yes, what a shame we got distracted before she reached our bedroom! The kids' bedrooms are virtually squeal free!

I believe all our joists are at 400mm spacing.

Thanks Peter. The current flexible drain pipe is 10mm OD, I think, but quite thick walled, so probably something like 7mm internal diameter at best. I think that with 10mm pipe and a downward slope the whole way it should be fine. Will check whether there's room for 15mm though. I wasn't aware of that. A portion of the run in clear, or some sort of shallow tray just before the drain that shows evidence of passing water should make that issue visible (helped by the fact it's salty and so will leave some residue). I'm planning this on the wall above the rising main: The water softener will be at the level of the two flexes (to be seen whether I actually use flexes rather than plastic pipework for just that bit. The vertical stuff will be copper).

Indeed. I was surprised recently when I saw the following comment in a post on a Facebook self build forum: "Our PHPP calcs are showing that our heat demand is above the 15kWh/(m²a) needed to avoid a primary heat source (currently at 21 - probably due to form factor). We don't need to achieve Passivhaus but now conscious that we may need some heat".