jack

You're probably not far off on the kit cost (especially if you want a lot of centrally controlled dimming), but we didn't have any professional services costs. I did the design with the electrician (who admittedly has an electronics engineering background), he did the installation, and I handled the programming. The programming really isn't difficult if you're of a reasonable technical bent. There's lots of support on Google groups and various forums, too. I'm not sure whether I'd use Loxone again. The upside is that the system is extremely easy to program, and it can be used with a wide range of other protocols. It also virtually self-documents itself as you program it. The downside is that it's very expensive if you want to use their proprietary modules like dimmers. I'd be tempted to just use the miniserver (the Loxone core controller) and have it coordinate everything else via DMX, KNX, and IP based protocols. Also, while it would be a hassle to swap in a different solution if Loxone went bust, it's still just inputs and outputs at the end of the day. I'm sure a lot of what's there could be replaced with equivalents from a different system.

Really nice to see this working. This is almost exactly how I've been considering modifying my system to allow my (Loxone) home automation system to control tank heating.

Hi Dave. When you say you "copy the image in turbocad", what do you mean? Did you try this from my first reply?: In more detail: You're using Windows 10, so use the inbuilt "Snipping Tool": I have it as a shortcut in my task bar. Open it, click the "+" button at the top left, then drag a rectangle around the part of the image you want to post. It's automatically added to the clipboard, so you can just paste it directly into your post at the point where you want to image to appear. Optionally, you can use the inbuilt markup tool to annotate (as I did in orange above), then hit the copy button and paste into your post. Using the Print Screen option is fine, but from memory, it only copies either the full screen or the current window, depending on what key combo you use. You can do that then import into something else and edit/crop it I suppose, but the Snipping Tool is a much quicker way of copying exactly what you want to share.

If the image is on the clipboard, you can just place the cursor where you want the image in your text, then "control-v" to paste. For convenience, I tend to use the Windows clipping tool to grab what I want to upload, then paste it straight in. This is by far the quickest way as it avoids saving and uploading images. If the image is a file, then first upload using this link: A preview of the image appears below the "choose files" section. Please the cursor where you want the image in your post, then hover over the image preview below, and you'll see the word "insert" appear at the bottom left. Click on that and the image will be inserted where your cursor is in the text. Hope that helps.

Welcome to BuildHub! As you say, it's best to post your question into the PV sub-forum. A lot of people don't read the Introduce Yourself sub-forum, but monitor other sub-forums of interest. Good luck.

What can you access if you take the front off each power socket? Might be some easy wins there that won't require any redecorating.

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Without watching the video, don't nuclear batteries have an incredibly low power output? I'm sure I recall reading that some deep space probes use something like this.

They were volakas marble, 610 x 305, bought from Mandarin Stone in 2015. It doesn't look like they sell it any more, but it appears you can get it elsewhere. Good luck.

I also have an MBC slab and try to do as much heating overnight as possible. I have a typical daily ripple of about 0.2 degrees as measured at the top of our concrete floor.

Have you thought about engaging a local architectural consultant to answer your questions? I'm sure someone would be happy to do so on an hourly basis.

This is more or less a duplicate of the question here: To keep all the replies in one place, I've locked the current thread and will leave it in place so people can use it to navigate to the thread I've linked above.

Welcome to BuildHub! Introducing yourself is a nice way of announcing your arrival on the friendliest and most helpful self-build forum in the UK. Feel free to provide as much or as little detail as you feel comfortable sharing. An overview of your project(s) and/or your background can be helpful (we love photos if you're okay with putting them on the internet). Sharing your general location - at a county level, say - can also be helpful. If you've joined to get feedback on a specific question or problem, please post about it in the relevant sub-forum. If you're not sure what sub-forum is most appropriate, just ask in your introductory post and someone will let you know. Posts that include detailed questions will be moved to the relevant sub-forum. Posting in the right area will increase your chances of getting a helpful answer. Not all members read posts in the Introduce Yourself sub-forum, so they may not see questions posted here. Indeed, some members tend to focus on particular topics that tweak their interest, so will only see questions posted in the relevant sub-forum. Also, by posting in the right sub-forum, the answers to your issue will more easily found by others with similar issues in the future. And finally, as explained when you signed up (and covered in BuildHub's Guidelines), BuildHub is a non-commercial forum. It is run by unpaid volunteers. If you're thinking of advertising a business, especially before you've established a decent posting history, please don't. Your post will be deleted and you may be permanently banned if it's judged you've joined just to spam the forum. So go on, let us know who you are and what you're up to.

Welcome to BuildHub!

I assume you're being rhetorical. They're charging that much because that's what the market (including the government incentives) will bear.

You set it in the lighting controller in Config, so it can be programmed before you install the strip if you want! You can set a maximum power for other types of lighting too (i.e., not just LED strips). For example, we have some wall lights that look ridiculous when driven at 100% so I've programmed in a maximum of 60%. To be fair, most of the time people will be switching scenes rather than adjusting the power of additional channels, so there're limited reasons for spending too much time worrying about this for most channels.

You can set a maximum output per channel in the lighting controller, which prevents the app from being used to set too high a value. Leave a note in the config to explain why you've done this. I did this with our one 24V strip, because at full whack it took us closer to the power supply's rated power than I was comfortable with.

I've always thought it's a shame you can't (practically) take the heat rejected/absorbed by a heat pump and use it for other things. Eg, use the cool air from heating/DHW production and use it for refrigeration, or the hot air from cooling and use it to preheat incoming water before it enters the DHW system. Same with warm/cold water going down the drain. I know there are waste water heat recovery systems, but I'm more talking about using waste water as a heat source/sink more generally. All possible in principle, but the reality is a little bleaker!

They're harder to find, but you can get DIN rail mountable versions of these. I have a DIN rail unit with four relays.

That sort of thing should be fine. If I were starting again I'd use a lot more non-Loxone components, especially DMX relays. They're very cheap per channel and DMX is reliable when set up properly, especially where you're just using it for switching.

We've switched a few lights like this for 8 years, no problem.

One extract will move very little air and make little difference to temperatures locally, let alone to the whole house. If you don't want air conditioning, think it's better to have insect screens and open the upstairs windows as soon as the temperature outside is below the upstairs temperature.

My only question would be whether you plan to terminate all twisted pairs from all ethernet cables at the 24 V terminations section. If so, how many cables are you planning to route there, and what's route are they taking? It can get very busy, very quickly when you have a lot of cables (ask me about the rat's nest that is my Loxone cabinet!), especially when you're trying to retain separation between mains and low voltages. If I were doing mine again, I'd put my ethernet terminations on the top or bottom rail so the ethernet cables don't need to travel far once they enter the cabinet. Since 90% of the time only 1, or at most 2, twisted pairs of each cable are actually used for anything, terminating as close to the cable entry point as possible will signficantly reduce the volume of cable running within the cabinet. Sorry if your plan takes all of this into account, but thought it worth mentioning given how unpleasant my cabinet is to work on given the choices I made at installaion.

300 mm is usually made up of 3 x 100 mm layers. We have similar, and I ran some cheap drainage conduit through two channels I cut into the middle layer of insulation when the guys were onsite doing the foundations. I was able to bend a reasonable radius up into the plant room. No issue pulling the flow and return pipes through later. More detail here (worth reading both threads in their entirety, but particularly the first one):

Someone mentioned this on here ages ago. I looked into it at the time and you couldn't get them anywhere.