Moira Niedzwiecka

Shower tray just fitted & just a bit too short. I am left with a gap of 33mm. Once tiled gap will be about 20mm. Any suggestions on what to fill it in with?

@Bitpipe Your house looks fabulous. Turf finishes it off a treat.

Thank you for all the good wishes. Buildhub has been a lifeline for me over the past 2 years. The practical aspect with the shared knowledge & experiences, but, also the support & humour.

Thanks guys. It was all really down to Henry's hard work & attention to detail. He sadly passed away on 5th March. Heartbreaking that he didn't get to see the house finished & move in. However, it stands as a huge achievement for him & it is lovely.

Had the air tightness test & EPC done this week. Not really ready but had to do it to meet the deadline for the FIT. House nowhere near finished, just plastered, have 2nd fix to do & MVHR not on yet. Air test result was 0.41 & EPC A rated at 99. (Of course if I fit solar thermal at a cost of £4000 it could score 101 & save £64 a year. What nonsense.) Huge relief. My husband would have been so chuffed.

@CADjockey I am not covering the top triangle as no one can see in. It is a landing/sitting/study area not a bedroom so not really necessary to cover it.

Hello, Sorry not to reply sooner. We used ARP Ltd from Leicester for the guttering. Really pleased with it. Very good quality. They were really helpful. I purchased directly as they are only about 30 mins away & their sales rep came out & measured up & specified what was needed. ARP also sell via builders merchants.

No problem with install. Not used yet so info on maintenance.

I have one vitra frame and one geberit frame as above both with duravit toilets. It is the flush plates that seem to be specific to each cistern. Roca also do a slimline wall hung cistern.

Sounds expensive in Milton Keynes. We have had 2 large mixed skips on our entire build over 18 months. They cost £178 each all in. Everything has gone into them including plasterboard. Most of our waste has actually been stuff from our existing house that has been hoarded for years in the attic & garage that I am determined will not follow us to the new house.

The joists are all in place but are still exposed underneath. I think I will just strengthen as much as possible. I am told that 82kg is not that heavy for a bath & a cast iron one would be about 130kg.

Thanks. I have been a bit worried about my heavy freestanding bath & wondering if I ought to strengthen the floor under it. Span of metal web joists supported on structural lam wall plate on one side & steel girder on the other with caberdeck floor.TF04 First floor joist layout 220817.pdf I would be limited with how much I could strengthen it because of MVHR ducts & pipes. The wall adjacent to Nos 5 & 6 on joist plan has OSB racking and the bath is about 1 mtr to the right of that. Bath weighs 82kg. Of course, once you half fill with water & get me in it, considerably more. Any thoughts?

What is a strongback?

Great news @Hecateh. Well done you. Teething problems will get sorted. Put the rubbish behind you & enjoy today. Celebrate & wake up tomorrow with a smile & look forward to all the nice bits now. Put rugs down, pictures up & start making it your lovely new home.

I am truly grateful for your suggestions & support guys. I was too upset last night to get my head around it. The work done so far is really good. It is the total lack of communication & plain courtesy that is missing. He has clearly taken on too much work & has put himself under pressure. That doesn't mean it is acceptable to shout at me on the telephone. He was supposed to be back next week. He now tells me that he has moved onto another job & will not leave that until it is finished at Christmas. He has suggested he may come back on 7/1/19. It was only when I called him yesterday he informed me of this. If I hadn't called he wouldn't have let me know. I have been overcharged for the work done so far & that is still not sorted out although it has been acknowledged and agreed it is the case. @Roundtuit your post is a huge relief. I had misunderstood & thought I had to have BC sign off before registering for FiT. My main problem is time. Because I work full time & days off are often taken up by hospital appointments for Henry my time on the build is limited. I work in the house most evenings after work until about 9.30pm. It is more difficult now with only task lighting. I was desperate to get the plastering finished for Christmas so I would have time to assemble & fit the utility room on days off during the holidays. It is only the hallway, d/s W/C & utility room that is not plastered, but these are the spaces I now need to work on & are at a standstill. At most there is probably 1 days work for a plumber & 1 days work for the electrician to get me to this stage. The rest can be done in the New Year. Our joiner, who is also a personal friend is back tonight. I will ask him if he can help with the ducting to the outside for the MVHR & a couple of cables ducts for the security cameras. I will call the electrician/plumbers again today to see if he is prepared to just come back for 1 day. If not I will be exploring the alternatives suggested. I was almost starting to get excited again about the house. Not felt that since the ground works were done nearly 2 years ago. Seems now back to the same old dismal slog. If it wasn't for this forum I'd have put a match to the bloody thing by now.

Thanks for the replies guys. Head of building control inspected everything before it was boarded & plastered. I have left a message asking for his advice. The plumbing is just the pipework. Nothing installed yet other than the concealed cisterns. Another company installed the UFH when they did the screed. It is not connected to anything yet.

The firm doing my electrics & plumbing has just dropped a bombshell by saying they are too busy to do anymore work on my house until January. He was actually quite rude to me (not the first time)saying that I am putting them under pressure & he had accepted other work because I was not ready for them. This is rubbish. There has been outstanding work for ages I have been waiting to be done. I am beside myself. I need to get building control sign off before Feb so I can apply for the FIT for PV. I am at 2nd fix stage but need some first fix finishing before I can get the plastering finished. I will now have to cancel the tiler as the shower try is not fitted. I am just trying to get the absolute minimum done to get through sign off. I work full time & so I can only work at the house in the evenings or the 1 day a week off I have. Would it be possible to get someone else at this stage. Will he need to issue the electrical certificate or can I get someone else to do this?

I do not think splitting the title will alter the covenant attached to your current property. It will remain on both titles. I have split my title & built on a piece of garden land that was not attached to my existing property, but, was on the same title. Even with a new title number all of the covenants & rights from the existing house remain.

Thanks Lizzie. We are getting there at last. Good progress inside, largely plastered & starting 2nd fix. Staircase going in this week. I'll post some pics.

They are powder coated steel posts in Antracite 7016 to match the windows & guttering. The timber frame company supplied glulam posts with galvanised shoes but we thought they were too chunky. The structural engineer calculated what gauge steel we needed to support the overhang & I had them made. Can't wait to get the landscaping for the entrance done & remove the bubble wrap.

We couldn't find what we wanted in both looks & thermal properties without spending an eye-watering amount of money. In the end we opted for a plain triple glazed door to match the sidelights & glazing above it. Works well for us as lets a lot more light into the hallway. Our front entrance is behind 6ft gates, so not visible from the lane outside.

Wow Pete, Love it.

I have just installed a ceiling extractor above where my kitchen island will be. Ceiling will be dropped above the island to zone the space a bit more in the large open plan room. MVHR extract is about 1m away & top of ceiling drop has been left open on that side so recirculating hood will vent on that side. I was unsure whether to have a hood as the ceiling hoods are so expensive, but decided to go ahead. I bought an Innocenti hood from myappliances for £449. I was not sure what it would be like as about £1000 less than most others. I am really surprised & pleased with it. Very sleek & really good quality. Similar spec as far as extraction & noise to much more expensive ones.

I am just trying to sort our staircase out. After many permutations I have put in an extra step, 14 instead of 13 with a going of 226, rise of 189 & 39.89 degrees it has a nice width of 950.

Our plasterers have recommended 15mm. Especially on the large open plan ceilings so there will be no sagging. They will also cut full boards around the windows so there won't be any joins at the corners of the window openings.