-rick-

This maybe a bit harsh but they look like a guy in his bedroom has cobbled together some pc water cooling parts and fans and 3d printed a case for them and has now set up a company to sell them. (I've not looked hard at them and they are probably doing it properly but they have a very 3d printed look). Pretty much any unit other sold as an FCU will support going below dew point. That's the primary market after all (proper air con performance). It's only a relatively small market of eco warriors and retro fit installations where below dew point is a problem so that will be an afterthought. So trimley have identified a market opportunity. Shame about the design.

I'm guessing you didn't insulate your pipes (and a condensate drain) to give you the option of running a little below dew point if the need arose? What is the FCU you are looking at? Guessing supplier didn't want to sell to non-installer.

IMV the A/C unit would be much more unpleasant due to compressor noise. Would likely keep me up at night (light sleeper). Quiet fancoil will be much nicer.

The AI is sending you down the wrong path (slightly). That particular unit doesn't need you to fiddle with gas at all. It's definitely diyable. Downsides are it requires two 100+mm holes in the wall (and thus mounting to an external wall) which unless you are very careful is going to mess with your air tightness. Equally, those holes will provide a route for external air into the unit bypassing insulation/heat exchange. It won't get into the room but in a tightly insulated house it may create a cold area in winter. Those two holes also bypass your insulation for sound deadening so you are likely to hear the outside more directly in that room. Finally, the compressor is in the internal unit so these will be louder than conventional split A/C (or water based fancoils). Given the temperature has now gone down and you don't have to rush, I'd take a step back and look again at fancoils. See if you can make progress there. Failing that, look at proper split A/C units (likely requiring an installer - but the units are cheaper so overall cost of that install vs this unit might not be huge). What's the issue you are having with fancoils?

Well that's a much more substantial workshop than I was expecting from your previous posts. Barn vs 2/3 car garage. To cost effectively make that space warm? Build a room within the room for the work area and heat/cool that, don't heat/cool the storage. Even a large tent that you can move about if needed to contain the air of the area you are working would help.

I really like that house (though been a while since I watched the video). From my memory of it I think they made it work by: 1. Having plenty of previous experience. She is a designer with experience of remodels and IIRC her husband has industry experience of some form. They have worked up from from smaller remodels and projects. 2. From that previous experience they have a well established network of trades they can trust. These trades know they are reliable customers and this job is not a one off so they get better attention to detail and less 'risk' mark up for an unknown customer. 3. She seems really detail oriented, focusing on lower cost ways of achieving a result. But even with that focus, they had the money to spend to address issues as they came up (and trust in their trades when the trade needed more).

And that brings us back to mains sockets with USB-C. The vast majority of them will be more basic chargers so basically the same as a USB-A fast charger but with a usb-c connector. So that means even if you have a socket with a USB-C you can't necessarily plug your higher power device into it and charge at a reasonable rate. All devices have to support the lowest power standard but a laptop would take hours upon hours to charge at that rate. When I say higher power device, obviously laptops but it also applies to tablets and even the big high end phones. Anything with a big battery wants a higher power charge.

For laptops, monitors, etc. The charger will be physically quite a bit bigger if it's putting out that much power. I'd guess the more commonly available ones will go up to 30-60W max. If you have a USB-C laptop charger that will be 60-150W probably.

Double C no question. USB A will hang around but anything new will come with C and adapters are easy to get. Having said that, personally I wouldn't get socket integrated USB at all. The prices are high, standards change, the standby energy use of them adds up and the risk of them breaking/costing you more money during their life is not great either. (Some types of electrical testing done during EICRs and fault investigation would require all these sockets to be disconnected before the test is run, that's going lead to the electrician charging more). I'd rather get something along these lines for when USB is needed (not a recommendation just result of quick search - in fact not sure the foldable pins is a good idea). https://www.amazon.co.uk/TEKRAT-Charger-Foldable-iPhone-Samsung-White/dp/B0DNRLYSZ1

When I mentioned thickness I was thinking of 0.7mm as the standard but you can get thicker. 0.9/1mm IIRC

Not sure about manufacturers but two things I've found in my research: 1. Can get different thicknesses (I'd prefer thicker but it's obviously heavier, harder to handle and more expensive) 2. You can get different coatings on the panels. I think typical panels have 20-25 year coatings but you can find more expensive options offering up to 60 year coatings. Though the longer lasting coatings might have less colour choice. As usual with me, no practical experience just commenting on research I've done for myself.

PassivHaus is a means to an end. The goal being to tread lightly on our planet and minimise carbon emissions. In a way it's a little dated in the sense that to achieve that goal it can (depending on situation) be cheaper (financially and environmentally) to put more solar panels in than do some 'heroic' engineering to achieve a set energy use per/m2. (heroic in some buildings who's architectural concept didn't consider passive standards so now an energy inefficient form has to be forced to be energy efficient - not saying that's your case). Being a sealed box is overengineering, building to a passive standard case study of balancing lots of variables and moving forward with the most efficient way to achieve the goals. Over doing it likely just ends up consuming more carbon in building materials and a lot more money in consulting fees. Once you have a target, there are often multiple ways of achieving it. For example, solutions like Aerobarrier can bring low air tightness scores for much less effort than traditional methods. It needs a good base, but the most difficult part of airtightness is the bit that Aerobarrier does in it's sleep.

In some cases. Definitely easier for a developer, housing association, etc, where the design costs can be spread over multiple properties. Not an uncommon situation. I'd guess the majority of self builders who want to design to passivhaus standards fit in this category (though sounds like your issue with the door is a bit exceptional, either bad advice or just bad timing - needing to meet a specific but also new spec - regs on fire doors have been changed recently and maybe the market hasn't caught up yet).

well it is Buildhub It wouldn't bother passivehaus standards or likely building control (as long as the wall was built to the right standard) but for me a concern would be whether insurance then considered the garage part of the house. I want a garage partly so I can do hobbies in the garage that I wouldn't want to do in the house (and I'm pretty sure insurers wouldn't want that either). So for me, keeping a completely separate building has advantages there, far enough away from the garage that if I screwed up in some way and there was a fire in the garage that it would not affect the house in any way (and thus the insurers would not have to worry about that). Edit: If you just want to park a car in the garage I don't really see an issue assuming planning are happy.

To be clear when I said robot mower I was thinking of a fully automated set and forget thing. For 6 acres they are still expensive but sensible 4 figures not 5. But they are only going to deal with grass and similar so to get started you'd need something heavier and then rely on them to prevent anything coming back. (They go out every day to keep things under control)