jack

I say this often enough that people probably think I'm getting a kickback from manufacturers, but shower waster water heat recovery units offer one of the cheapest ways of bumping up SAP points. As others have said though, it's concerning that you're short of the minimum points if you're building with any thought for the future. Having experienced underfloor cooling over the last couple of years, I personally would include cooling of some sort (whether ducted air or underfloor cooling) as a minimum for a new house.

I think that's right. From memory, they seemed hugely expensive for what they are.

Yes, I regularly think what a shame this is.

I run my supply temp at 15C. I get a breath of condensation on the manifold - never any droplets. I came in having been out for a bit this afternoon and it was like bloody heaven walking in the front door. Can't recommend it highly enough.

5.9kW for us as well. Our panel angles knock the top end off a bit, but we do get a good spread of generation across the day. I also need to spend a morning scrubbing the panels. I was up there last week and there's some minor algal growth on some of them that won't be helping matters.

I have the DHP481 too. Apart from being a little heavy if you have to do a lot drilling, or drilling at awkward angles, it's an absolute beast.

I've had and periodically abused a Makita DTD129Z brushless for about five years (possibly a precursor to the brushless model you mention above, but it's so hard to tell with Makita's bewildering array of overlapping products). It's probably my favourite tool.

My parents bought a house with a built in Miele. Despite drinking a reasonable amount of coffee, they ended up getting rid of it due to the amount of cleaning and maintenance required.

I just turn ours on by hitting the "mode" button on the standard controller. Normally at this time of the year it just does hot water, but by cycling through modes I put it into hot water/cooling mode during hot weather. I leave it on during the daylight hours so it mostly runs off PV, and turn it off in the evening. Downstairs in our house is very pleasant at the moment. Probably about 20 deg C. Upstairs is getting a little uncomfortable - I had to get up and open a window at 3 o'clock this morning because it was too warm even with no sheet over me (my wife was sleeping soundly under a duvet!) It's time to start paying more attention to purge cooling in the early evening and mornings again.

If I could drink just three a day I'd be a happy man. No such luck...

Exactly the same as me. One coffee early in the day. Definitely nothing past lunchtime or I'll be staring at the ceiling for an hour when I go to bed.

Try having both!

In the nicest possible way, do you have enough fingertips remaining for them to be reliable advisors?

Despite having my own grinder and a decent espresso machine, I'm slowly winding back the amount of caffeinated coffee I drink. I'm at about 50/50 caffeinated/decaf and expect to be caffeine free within a week or two. I'll see how it goes - I do love good coffee, but if I can adjust to just drinking decaf, I think I'll be better off given how sensitive I am to caffeine's effects. My missus seems completely immune to caffeine, so she'll continue to inhale it for both of us.

Bear in mind that larch is a high-silicate timber. Although it may not seem particularly hard, it will wear blades out pretty quickly. I have no idea what "quickly" means relative to the job you have planned, but it's something to keep an eye out for.

... vs remortgaging with another lender after completion.

12? Ye gods that's a lot! I'm very caffeine sensitive. More than one decent coffee a day and my sleep quality drops, and I'm more prone to becoming anxious in stressful situations.

PV is great if you can afford it. In addition, have a look at shower waste water recovery units. They're possibly one of the cheapest ways of getting a few SAP points.

Same with me. 3.5 years of leaving it on the low setting, and zero issues with moisture. Bathrooms are always completely dry within hours. I only use the boost if I'm cooking something likely to set off the fire alarm (eg, steak cooked on a hot griddle).

Can you install a tank somewhere and fill that up slowly or in bursts, then water the garden from that? You wouldn't need much storage if you're able to replenish fairly consistently.

No, I haven't checked. It's definitely a relatively low priority task for me at the moment! Checking it would involve undoing some screws to take off a panel at the back of a cupboard in our utility room, then accessing a rodding point with a light (and possibly a camera if it's too hard to get my head up into the space).

Listed? Or listing?

The music is a nice touch. I was wondering whether you might go with this.

I wanted to include some second had stuff in our house, but: - You need to be organised and very patient - the right stuff comes up rarely. - You must be flexible - the perfect stuff practically never comes up! - Whoever is installing it needs to be willing to work with second hand stuff. It just didn't work out for us in the end. I'll build another house one day, maybe when I retire, and I'll definitely be taking a very different approach compared to the current one.

Parents in law were burgled last year in spite of an alarm being installed. They went in from a first floor balcony, alarm immediately went off, they went through all the upstairs drawers and cupboards at high speed looking for jewellery and watches, then checked the study for valuables. Interestingly, they left two decent laptops in the study and a credit card that was sitting in clear view in a desk drawer that they opened. According to the police, this is the current MO. At least around our way, they don't want electrical goods, because they're too hard to flog without risk.