jack

Good point. My electrician didn't charge VAT because he was below the threshold. We bought stuff ourselves for him to install (under his guidance), and then claimed it back at the end.

We have cabling to all TV points in the house. We did use wireless before I got everything terminated, and suffered the usual occasional loss of connection (need to reconnect by putting in password, etc). Solid as a rock since we moved to wired. Same with my kids' Xbox. The worst offenders are printers. I've always had problems with the connection reliability of wireless printers. Hard wiring them makes the experience a lot more pleasant.

If someone just supplies materials, you have pay the VAT and claim it back once the house is complete and signed off. Supply and fit, and most types of labour-only, must be zero rated at the time of supply. You can't claim back VAT on labour, so it's important you get it zero rated by the supplier when it's invoiced. You can reclaim delivery charges for materials when you claim for the materials at the end. You can't get VAT back on services (eg, surveys, architects) or hire (eg, scaffolding). It can get a bit complicated: hire a digger, you pay the VAT on the hire and you can't reclaim. Hire a digger with operator on the same invoice, they should zero rate both the hire and operator. Hire a digger and pay someone separate on a day rate to drive it? Zero rate the operator, pay VAT on the hire and can't reclaim. I've heard it expressed as taking the lowest VAT rate of any component on the invoice, and applying that rate to everything else on the invoice, which is why it makes a difference whether the operator and digger are invoiced together. I'm sure someone will be along to correct me!

I suppose it's possible Loxone will one day start demanding ongoing fees for the software (app, miniserver updates), although I've had it for over 6 years and there's been nothing to suggest they're planning to go this way. Their disengagement with the DIY community is more to do with the fact that they no longer directly sell or support the product themselves. You can still buy it through resellers, and there's plenty of support around on the Loxone Google Groups forum (and probably others). Personally, I think their miniserver and programming environment is a great combo. You can avoid the rest of their expensive proprietary hardware by sticking to DMX for outputs (dimming and relays). There are other options for inputs, although I don't recall what they are.

Welcome. I didn't know Theben did that sort of thing - interesting. I have an 8-channel Theben dimmer as part of my Loxone installation and it's been solid. KNX is supposed to a mature set of protocols with excellent interoperability between brands. Do you have any idea what went wrong?

I wasn't referring to your measurements, I was just giving a hypothetical example of why there's more to stair design than stair angle. The 260mm I referred to is just the floor-to-floor height (2.6m) divided by the number of rises (10), in my example.

I know you aren't saying otherwise, but stair angle isn't the whole story. You could have 10 steps over, say, a 2.6m total stair height, but the 260mm rise would be completely unworkable even at 38.5 degrees. There are some interesting notes on the topic of stair comfort here. Personally, I think that if you stick with commercial, rather than residential, guidelines, you won't go far wrong.

He means that the rise and run should be consistent throughout the stair, not that they should be the same as each other.

There are a number of tribunal cases where HMRC looked up the date a new build was added to the council tax valuation list and used that as the date of completion.

I don't specifically recall. It may have been to do with wanting to let people post about their general tax situation without it being visible to casual visitors.

I believe you may need to have 10 posts before you can access the VAT Reclaim Queries & Guidance sub-forum, but it has a lot of discussions about the risks of claiming VAT after you've lived in the house for a while. For a while there, HMRC was outright rejecting claims from self-builders who'd lived in their house for even only a few months before claiming, even if they claimed within three months of obtaining a completion certificate. I get the impression the tide is turning following HMRC losing some tribunal cases last year, but it's still something you need to be mindful of.

Any use?

Who told you you need to do this? I've never heard of any such thing. It would take an awful lot of odd things to happen for a piece of rebar to become live inside cured concrete, and then for someone to come into contact with it. In fact, our electrician used our house for his periodic inspection for ELECSA (or whoever he's with), and they told him he was overdoing it by earthing all the steels in the house.

The Siberian larch wasn't quarter sawn, it was flat sawn like the Scottish stuff. Same supplier (Russwood), same machined profile. When we were first making inquiries, the supplier specifically warned that there'd be more movement over time with the Scottish stuff, and I have no reason to doubt that.

We got samples of Scottish and Siberian larch and left them outside for a few months. The Scottish stuff cupped badly across its width, whereas the Siberian stuff remained almost completely square. Perhaps we were unlucky, but unless a very rustic look is desired, I wouldn't be considering Scottish larch.

I don't recall.

Remembering names has always been a serious issue for me, and it's absolutely been getting worse over the last few years.

You're welcome.

I'll probably get my HA system to control it, which perhaps counter-intuitively might make things simpler. Still requires some upfront thought.

Good point. If I were still building, I'd definitely be grabbing this deal, despite already have two batteries, an impulse driver and a heavy drill. A lighter drill like this would be ideal for lighter-weight repetitive jobs, plus as you say, having two drills is useful anyway Also, 5 Ah batteries are great if you ever plan on buying battery-powered garden tools, or use heavier power tools such as a circular saw (mine chews through battery life like no-one's business).

Yup. The question is whether I actually need to heat outside the off-peak period.

Yes, a COP of 4 isn't very likely during that time of the year, so it's slightly cheaper to use the immersion off-peak than the ASHP during peak hours. The main question will be controlling it all, and keeping it simple.

Interesting you found this to be the case - I'm planning on trying this out next winter. I'm on Octopus Go, and my peak rate electricity is about to go from 13.8p to nearly 30p per kWh in May. The off-peak rate is only going up from 5p to 7.5p, to there'll be an even bigger incentive to push things like heating into the four hour off-peak window. I need to do some maths, but the modest reduction in COP caused by a slight increase in flow temperature will be swamped by the 4x cost difference between peak and off-peak rates. The only question now is whether our 5 kW ASHP will be able to both heat our DHW and put enough energy into the slab during the four hour off-peak window during cold periods. I suppose we can just add a bit more if needed during the day.

Very possible. I've seen dumber behaviour from eBay buyers!

To give some idea of how good a deal this is, Screwfix is also selling a single 5 Ah battery for £100. A pair of these batteries on Amazon is £150, so as you say, it's literally a free drill and charger on top of a better price than you'd generally be able to find for just the batteries. If anyone's thinking about getting into the Makita 18 V ecosystem, this would be a great way to start.