jack

If it's usually only during short periods (eg, when it's cold overnight) that it's struggling, a buffer tank could help by allowing the ASHP to use its excess capacity to heat the buffer during warmer periods, for use during the colder period where it would otherwise struggle. However, this only works when there's enough time for it to catch up during warmer periods. During a long cold spell, it likely won't help much if at all.

I don't think you need aircon to get the benefits of running MVHR in summer. On a hot day when it's cooler inside than out, opening windows is just going to let the heat in. You're better off keeping the windows shut and the MVHR on (ideally on as low as setting as possible while keeping the air fresh) to maintain the temperature difference as far as possible. Once the temperature outside drops below the temperature inside, you can either open the windows (hopefully you have insect screens!) or turn on summer bypass if you have it.

I don't actually know whether that's the right term. I just mean trowelling on some sort of plastering product (could be lime, clay, cement-based, whatever) and flattening it as best you can while leaving some texture. A house I rented many years ago have this sort of finish over blockwork and I quite liked the effect. Cheap and easy to experiment with, at least.

If I ever build another house, I'd consider looking into some form of rough plastering, possibly using lime. I think a slightly imperfect finish looks great (better than the nearly-but-not-quite perfect a lot of plasterers will achieve), and unlike "proper" plastering is something you can learn to DIY reasonably easily. Materials are cheap too. This would potentially work well with woodcrete, although you'd need to think about how you'd run services.

I can't comment on the windows, but it sounds like something was going on here. No-one goes to this much trouble in broad daylight to break into a random house in a generally safe area unless they know something about who is living there (or what might be onsite). Could be anything - Facebook photos showing or discussing expensive watches or jewellery, eBay sales of similar, or possibly something more nefarious (doesn't take much imagination). Have a look at https://www.police.uk/pu/your-area/ to get an objective measure of the real risks in your area. That said, there's nothing wrong with getting things secure up-front.

Yes, exactly. Not sure whether it's worth going to the trouble of installing a full manifold at this stage - is there any way to just connect just the radiators of interest with new temporary pipework, ideally in a way that let's you continue to monitor flow rates? Also, I notice you have an IR thermometer. What's the temperature at the inlet to the problem radiators?

Can you run something temporary (and above-floor) to the distant radiator to see whether that improves things? If flow improved, it would at least suggest an issue with the pipework.

Hi George Welcome to BuildHub. I'm not an expert by any means, but a few things jumped to mind. How old is the pipework? If it's old, was it properly cleaned and flushed when you had the ASHP installed? If it's 22mm everywhere, I can't imagine you having much of a restriction based on furring up, but who knows what crud might have gotten stuck in it from old radiators over the years. Are the rads ASHP-compatible (i.e., designed to run at lower temps)? If they're old, were they properly cleaned when the ASHP was installed? Perhaps it isn't the flow, but that you're losing so much heat on the trip to the distant radiators that they just aren't capable of putting out much energy. 45°C isn't a lot of temperature to work with even with good ASHP-compatible radiators, so losing even a few degrees on a long, uninsulated copper run could make a difference. A bigger pipe is actually worse in this situation, because there's a larger radiant surface area, and the water is moving more slowly for a given flow rate, giving it more time to lose heat. I'm sure someone who knows a bit more about these things will be along soon. @Nickfromwales @PeterW @ProDave

Wrong part of the body, surely?

So do I.

I now know all I need to know about you, thanks.

Open fires are categorically one of the worst things you can do for the environment. They produce more of the worst kinds of particulates than just anything else you can do, as well as being a ridiculously inefficient use of fuel. MVHR isn't the issue. You're planning to poison yourself, your family and your neighbours based on some romantic notion that could be 95% satisfied by a decent woodburning stove (ideally you wouldn't have one of those either, but I appreciate people want to burn stuff). I just can't fathom the logic.

Yes, but he's a highly experienced builder and worked his arse off.

Had exactly this discussion with my older boy last night. The other thing that's worth considering is how easy a job will be to replace over the course of a few decades. It seems unlikely that electricians and plumbers are going anywhere soon, but a lot of desk jobs can - and will - be outsourced (unless they fall within some sort of regulated profession).

100% agree. I've put it to my kids that they'll likely get more job satisfaction and earn more money if they stay away from most desk jobs.

Yup. I have two friends who are trying to move in time to get the benefit of the stamp duty holiday. One would likely have moved around now-ish anyway, but the other has brought forward their decision to move by at least six months, if not more. Unfortunately, I fear you're right. I've long thought the lack of respect for vocational jobs is a serious failure of our national character. Many seem to believe that anyone working in an office is immediately in a "better" job than someone working a trade. Doesn't matter if the office job is a junior admin role or the trade is difficult and highly skilled, the office is still perceived as superior. I've been haranguing my kids for years about the downside of working in an office environment. Whatever they do, I hope it involves more than sitting in front of a computer screen in a beige open-plan wasteland.

This would have been a more convincing attempt at trolling if you'd toned it down a bit.

Did you cross-check the exchange rate?

We were outbid twice by developers for the bungalow that we eventually bought and knocked down. The first time it went off the market for several months then came back, the second it was off for a few weeks. I think the sellers were done with developers by the time they sold it to us. That was in 2012 though, so slightly different market. Eventually, something always does. Good luck!

Oxides of carbon will do that to you!

Works like that on PC too (as I just learned!)

Interesting. The email I received yesterday includes the following sentence: "Based on our latest calculations, you're actually using an average of £135.30 more each month than your monthly payments account for, and currently your account is not at the balance expected for this time of year." We have a lot of PV, and we're electric only, so there's a huge difference between what we use in summer andb winter. I assume a system somewhere has put December's numbers into an algorithm and decided that we're going to get behind at some point. What I'm frustrated by is that the email doesn't include any real information. As I said above, they want to change my direct debit from £82 a month to £140. Based on my annual usage that's utterly ridiculous. There're other reasons I want to leave. Despite several attempts, they still haven't managed to let me access the app for both electricity and PV readings. I'm also slightly wary of just how much a force for good they really are, based on a number of stories that have appeared in Private Eye over the last few years.

That's what annoys me about Good Energy. They ask me for this (optional) reading, and most months I go the effort of giving it. But they don't actually use the information to vary the amount they take. I really have no idea where they get the numbers they quoted in today's email. My current direct debit is £82 a month, which is about right over the course of a year given my expected annual electricity charges. They're now saying they want to bump this to £140(!) a month if I make a £240 balancing payment now, or £157(1) a month for a year to catch up as they put it (or, more accurately, get them as far in permanent credit with my money as suits their preferences). All this with no information or explanation. @ProDave, please PM me your code. I'll use it if I go with Octopus once I've had a look around. Thanks.

I'm happy to do all of those. It's just the monthly direct debit being based on some opaque average that is clearly designed to keep me permanently in arbitrary deep credit that annoys me.

I'm about to move away from Good Energy, who we've been with for a few years. There have been a number of issues leading to this, the latest being how they've handling a request to increase our monthly direct debit. Long story, but basically they emailed me today to say that my direct debit isn't enough to maintain a "credit buffer" over the course of the year. They don't say what my current balance is, what my current direct debit is, what they expect the credit buffer to be, or how they've calculated anything. So this is the final straw and I'm moving to another supplier. What I'd really like to do is just get a bill every month or quarter and then pay it off in full. I don't want to pay some monthly charge based on estimated annual usage. I haven't changed supplier in years - how common is it to have payment terms that let you just pay your bill in full each time it comes out? Thanks.