G and J

Do swift boxes need clearing out? I love the idea of such things but one of our basic design starting points is as little maintenance as possible and definitely no ladder based maintenance. Odd really, cos I love monkeying around at height but the older I get the more risky that is.

I prefer my cheaper and lower stress approach based on a phone call. The CIL thing is only one consideration, but you might find your area’s CIL people are just as helpful as East Suffolk. Remember to smile when you call ‘em. That smile does somehow make it to the other end of the line.

We’re facing a similar question for our build. We’ve both a garage and a bungalow to demolish. We’re going to declare a start to the CIL team (ours are lovely and helpful on the phone) before we do anything but shrub clearance. The CIL team were happy that we declared a start way too early - their attitude was better too early than too late. It’s a similar thing with our party wall agreements, we’ll be notifying of a start well before the main demolition event takes place, but there’s lots of prep to do and we don’t want to risk an accusation of starting before giving notice. We cleared trees before planning was granted, which was a good thing. Site insurance is a consideration. We’re currently insured as an empty house till mid January, and may well start site insurance then rather than renew. But that means we are wary about doing stuff that would be questionable re the house insurance before then. With any luck, we’ll have building regs approval and planning conditions sorted by mid Jan and can start demolition after that knowing we’ve got our ducks in a row.

Does that mean you are just becoming an irritating teenager?

As a kid I dismantled a flashgun. The most obvious way to remove the pcb was to grab this cylinder looking thing (the biggest component on the pcb), my finger and thumb at each end of what I now know to be a capacitor. Ouch. Couldn’t instantly let go and had to fling out my arm to dislodge the pesky thing. My hand hurt for days. Presumably this tester is a little more gentle? Of course I’m now tempted to buy one just to play with it….

Lordy. What have I done?

Presumably this tester squirts a high voltage across the probes. Is that ac or dc and is it tiny enough so it won’t act as a defibrillator? Or should you shout ‘Clear’ just before each test?

We’ll done, Ummmm, is it polite to ask what it is that you’ve created? I’ll show you mine if you show me yours…. (but bear in mind you’ll be waiting a long time to see mine!)

If you hold the two probes onto something, say maybe a piece of damp wood - which clearly won’t be highly electrically insulative, what does the display say on test? If a perfectly insulated cable gives a ‘1’ then so perhaps might a duff test lead. I would assume that shorting the probes won’t damage the device, (but I can’t guarantee it as I’ve never used one of these things so I’ll let others comment on that), but if I’m using a normal resistance meter the first thing I do is hold the probes together and ensure that the display reacts accordingly. Testing for an absence of a reading is always a bit dubious.

Your daughter is a higher rate tax payer?

+1 As an iPad junky who powers up a windows (pan!j laptop as soon as the required diagrams get above v basic I second this question.

Welcome Nottingham Ted. Surfacing as in driveways? (Of course I’m now thinking Boomtown Rats….)

My MVHR knowledge is limited to planning our forthcoming build, so please bear that I’m mind when reading the following: You state that you find the master bedroom quite stuffy. I’m assuming that simply opening windows and turning the heating up (which was our architect’s suggestion when I mentioned my intention to instal a MVHR) isn’t an option, as you’d have done it by now. May I ask how airtight your house is? I ask as I think this is a fundamental….

I am sitting in front of a woodburner, nice and toasty. The rest of the house is circa 15/16C, because it was mild outside today. I grew up in a house that in winter had frost on the inside of the windows. As kids we used the heat of our fingers to draw faces, etc. in the frost. Life was f cold for half the year apart from short burst of lovely and warm. So it’s no wonder that millions of brits struggle with the notion of continuous comfortable temperatures. I can’t imagine living in a house (i.e. the one I’m planning to build) where it’s not cold first thing. It’s alien to me. Perhaps I should cut myself (and others) some slack in not understanding how such new fangled systems will work. Perhaps I should buy a few more pairs of shorts too.

Interesting, no DPC under the block and I assume under the beam ends. So the block and beam are ok being damp? Or is that relying on the blocks or beam ends not absorbing water and hence the majority of the beams stayed dry. I had assumed as the beams were steel reinforced then they should be kept dry with their ends covered.

I don’t either, but I don’t trust my intuition on this one.

True. Fancy watching cars going round in circles. Beggars belief.

My razor sharp wit has detected that your question indicates that I have something wrong. Bugger. Where is my DPM supposed to be?

Nothing, apart from the fact that it's carcinogenic and terrible for the resources that it's production uses. Tastes good though.

We had a top floor flat in an old maltings. Vented tank in cupboard heated by E7 and storage rads. Hot water tap flow rate was pitiful as there was no head. Maybe that’s why there is a shower pump.

Then student life is very different nowadays.

We’ve got full planning permission to build it, though we’ll do it after we’ve finished the house when we know what money we haven’t got left. We’re planning it at this stage partly because it may be a good idea to do some of the bits like the foundations at the same time as those on the house. The danger isn’t that it’s not built properly. The danger is massive over specification.

In none the flats I’ve ever been involved with would permission for those kind of penetrations be allowed. I looked at this unit early on, it appeared I could run everything in our house from just two 6” holes in our garage. I believe that the flow rates needed would mean that the air speed would mean it would sound like a chip shop extractor. Not an attractive idea.

In our case the initial purpose will be a gym and workshop, with a corner hived off for a shed (with that section having its own door). However, I would like to build it to last and it to feel good and solid (yes, over engineered). So that gets us a basic sort of spec/plan. Then I scratch my chin and think, “with just a little extra effort and cost I could make it…..”. Repeat that exercise enough times and I have a plan for an expensive building with the potential for easy conversion to a guest suite (I am not sociable and billeting guests at the far end of the garden appeals) or carers accommodation (we plan ahead). Not so much requirements ‘creep’ as ‘gallop’! So, day one it needs a floor as steady as a normal indoor floor. A bit of insulation would be nice but it isn’t really essential, but fitting it later would be a lot harder. A potty would be handy, but difficult as evidenced in other threads due to the fall of our site and the fact that inexplicably, none of the neighbours have offered to let me dig up their gardens and connect to their sewers. It needs lecky, as large TVs (essential for rowing, naturally) don’t run themselves and I’ve an 18v Makita obsession to constantly recharge. Now, all this seems a bit over the top. Until you factor in the presence, literally 250m away, of a leisure centre with gym, pool, steam room and sauna that I almost certainly will be a member of anyway. Then it becomes downright silly. But I still wants it, precious.

Methinks Sumamp is akin to SIPs. Great sounding idea, lovely in theory and a compelling sales pitch, but the dreary realities are another matter.