G and J

Forgive them, they know not what you are going through (albeit voluntarily). Many years ago I ran (meaning jogged, slowly) a half marathon. In the pub a few days after I was asked my time. It was an hour forty. So one of them piped up ‘that’s not very quick’. It pissed me off. Especially as the guy doesn’t run. Took me a few days to remember to be proud of my achievement. So smile, shake your head and pity the incapable. Their inability to grasp the enormity of your achievement because they don’t have a clue is their problem. But I feel for you. I know I’ll be emotionally exactly where you are now.

Could it be as simple as just too much water has been mixed in?

Fortunately I’m too young but I could drink pints of crème de menthe! @LSB Looks like we need a table for three lol

Jeepers. Turns out I too have the required attributes to be an SE. A new career awaits…..

I think that works for when the percolation rate is in bounds. Outside that - nil points

I thought they were different tests. Every day is a school day it seems. But, for the want of a few minutes with a bucket and spade you might discover something useful and save yourself some money. I’m not talking sandcastles…

And if emotionally you do need to understand the logic behind such rules (as I do) think about the potential erosion that uncontrolled rainwater flows could cause. Houses with rainwear are very good at concentrating a benign rainstorm into a damaging localised flow.

Is this personal pref. Or a space concern? If the latter we are not having a shower unit, just a glass panel between basin and shower and we are using the wall between cloakroom and coat cupboard to take cistern.....hopeful makes most of space (which tbh is a bit of compromise but works with rest if design vs £) and means we don't have to see the wc every time we wall past the door, but always willing to consider ideas....

I did wonder. Trouble is, at the road we have an invert level of only 700mm, and the site has a slight slope downwards from the road. So if we have any form of tank the outlet will have to be pumped, which is a pain. The site is only 7m wide, so with the drains going through one side and the garage covering the other I think we will struggle to make room for one. How would I calculate how big a tank I must have?

We have a surface water drainage problem! We have just demolished a bungalow where rainwater was dumped to the ancient sewer. We are required to reapply for our sewer connection. After much too-ing and fro-ing Anglian Water have finally accepted that a soakaway won't work, as we have very poor infiltration rates. So we are going to be allowed to connect our surface water outflow to the sewer, as long as the surface water only joins the foul drain at the last manhole before the road. BUT! They are telling us that we need to resubmit a drainage plan that chokes the flow to 1 litre per second. In further discussion as we have very shallow drains they are minded to accept two outflows (one either side of our foul drain) each of which is choked to 1 litre per second. They helpfully suggested that we need to design storage on site. They also accept that as our drains are v shallow that will be rather challenging. Having spent some time googling and reading past threads we are still none the wiser as to whether this means two water butts or a 20m3 underground tank (which would be impossible due to it being a narrow site and close neighbours with virtually no foundations). Help! Where on earth do we start?

Office Christmas Party Syndrome. Everyone knows they could have done it better than ‘that idiot’. Till they try and do it.

I recently used a rental e-bike to get from Liverpool Street station to Victoria. Wow. Half the time of any other method, cheaper, and really lovely. I wonder if some bright spark (sic) might deploy a fleet of short term rental Citroen Amis in a town like the e-bikes.

Crumbs, I didn’t realise. The Guardian was my favourite too. Which paper can I believe then? I’ll read that one from now on. I will admit to sneaking a look at the front page of the Star from time to time. They are simply so bloody funny and clever too. The Lizz Truss/Lettuce thing was truly inspired - but as a poodle cohabiter (one never owns a poodle, one simply serves them) I was upset when they described Trump as “Putin’s poodle”. But it was ok. They apologised for the unintended insult to poodles.

I’m assuming that ‘lollypopping’ is to ensure good flow even if, say, two showers were in use at the same time, so for circuits where flow rate rather than hot water arrival speed is of interest. In my ever evolving mental plumbing layout (mental being the right word, sigh) I have a single ended connection from and as close as possible to the top of the UVC direct to a small manifold that serves just the sink/basin taps. Then I’ll have a sculptural Henry Moore style loopy manifold for the rest. I think I’ll entitle it “warm in the shower despite his plumbing”.

@Redbeard Fred Drift is my friend, rambling fool that he is, but I learn so much as a result… As for range anxiety for cars, we would suffer from that. But then, before I bought one I worried about a cordless drill running out of battery before I’d finished whatever job. One ’Light Bulb!’ Moment later, I realised I could swap to a second battery. How about if they build a big version of my Makita 18V battery and design lots of vehicles to take them. Then we could lease the batteries and do an automated swap in service stations. Instant recharge. Just a thought.

And then you find the plot, and everything you’ve decided (both design and construction wise) goes out of the window and you start again. But you start again from a more knowledgeable position.

Naming your tools! Honestly - how daft is that. As I go to site this morning in Skooby Skoda, (Trevor the trailer lives on site now so no longer commutes) I’ll have a chuckle about that, and again when I tell Sam Spade. I share your satisfaction, it’s a nice start to our build.

I used to read the Guardian, but I realised I was just constantly reading opinions that matched my own, so it wasn’t challenging my thinking, though it was comforting. So there is an argument methinks that runs along the lines that if one reads stuff you don’t agree with it helps develop a balanced world view. Despite that I gave up on newspapers and now I read buildhub. Much betterer.

We could easily have fallen into that rut. However, I think I’m the other extreme. I'm too willing to stop, retrace, refine, improve, etc. That spills over into knob polishing very easily. But as a founder member of Obsessives Anonymous…. (@zzPaulzz - please can I see the alternative spiral pattern when you have it.)

If we are giving a Papal style welcome, please may we use a telehandler to carry him in a chair - my back still aches from space work.

👆👉💪😊 Can you really be sure of that?

I’m Wally the warm water molecule. And I’m going to describe my morning commute. I spent the night getting warmer and warmer in the big space, we call it the coil cavern. It’s nice swimming round the coils, as the thermals are a bit of a funfair ride. Someone turned a tap on and I happened to be near the hole in the ceiling, so I got sucked up. The first bit of metal tube was vertical but still lovely and warm. And we moved at a good pace so it was fun. We got quite roughly jostled at a sharp 90 degree bend, I got an elbow in the eye. Not happy. This metal tube was horizontal and still as warm. Then it got odd. I got wrenched downwards into a tiny plastic tube. The speed! Wow. But I must have been near the front as I got progressively cooler as the tube went on. Then by the time I hit and fell out of the metal sluice gate thing I could feel a migraine coming on. Later, as I serenely swam round with some cold water molecules and detergent strings in the big, calm, luke warm pool, I was told that my hot water team got there really quickly and were still nice and hot. I know that in a while the chrome rimmed hell hole will open, sucking us all into the underworld. And who knows how long before I’ll be reincarnated back to the warm coil cavern. But for now I’m enjoying swimming round with the suds. All I have to do is avoid that big pink thing in the middle. (I thought I should look at this from every angle, and the lesson? Maybe I should put bends in rather than elbows to make the water journey more comfortable. Being serious I take your point @Nickfromwales re cold water volume in a heat trap. We’ve just been discussing it and as J has pointed out, the UVC is in a drying cupboard, so the heat isn’t wasted. All those litres of oil weren’t entirely wasted, we always had a nice warm airing cupboard - and being 60s kids that felt right.

So I don’t have to allow room between UVC and anti thermal loopy thing and manifolds then. Good news. Thank you.

My heart sank as I started to read your blog as I (J) have fallen for a russwood option and given our site will definitely need a hi-ab delivery that we haven't fully bottomed out with them yet. So far they have been great to deal with so I am pleased to hear they were in practice. Like you our final choice may have to be "refined" to match funds, but all of the examples I've seen (not in person) of finished projects look great. You're speeding along...well done.