Bancroft

If you're planning a modern, well-insulated and ventilated house, the likelihood of wanting/needing to open an upper floor window are pretty slim so, personally, I would see this limitation as being of minor importance. I'm actively trying to make more windows fixed closed to stop my wife from randomly opening them and ruining the MVHR efficiency!

I've heard/read of people having issues getting buildings insurance for self builds that are fully clad in timber. Most of the posts I've seen on this site are a few years old and so quite soon after Grenfell when the insurance market was still in flux. We're planning on building a 210sq m single storey house in ICF with a metal seamed roof. At the moment we're planning on 100% timber cladding but I am considering the option of about 40-50% seamed metal cladding on the rear of the building instead for ease of getting insurance. Has anyone got any recent experience of how insurance companies are reacting to buildings totally clad in timber?

And suffer the abuse of everyone telling you you're a Festool Fan Boy! I take a pragmatic approach to tools - generally speaking, the greater the accuracy required and the closer the tool is used to the final/finished product, the more I spend on it. So I have everything from Festool down to Machine Mart Clarke tools.

Car EV batteries are generally said to decay by 1% per year so I would have thought that would be a good figure to start with. Recycling? I asked this question to a friend who is in the EV car world and he said yes. There is a cascade of ways they get re-used (eg they go from car to static storage, then to less important storage facilities etc until finally broken apart for parts) and I imagine that the options for re-use and re-cycling is only going to grow. Costs generally seem to be coming down - at the same time as efficiency is going up. So the chances are in the future you'll probably pay the same cost but have something 2-3 times more efficient.

From my limited experience I think this could be a key area for you to focus on. A few wider thoughts: You will need to be clear about your niche. How are you going to differentiate yourself from a planning consultant or normal architect? Most new self-builders won't know what they don't know. Human nature makes us fell safer doing what we see others have done so they will naturally gravitate to the norm - ie an architectural firm. Perhaps a survey of Buildhub members to find out their experiences of their journey and where they felt they would have benefitted from some independent help. Have you considered working alongside an architectural firm (or firms) as their self build expert? Taking Mike's point from above you might be able to create a symbiotic relationship with a company that works for both of you. In my experience, and reading of other's experiences, architects get very excited about the design stage but interest drops at an alarming rate as the project approaches the point where a spade hits the ground. You could work alongside them in the early stages then take over as the project develops. In practical terms, although you say only 2-3 clients at any one time, will that give you sufficient income and how are you going to be able to service them? The chances are they will be spread across the UK so you will need to factor in travel and time away which will eat into profits/make you more expensive. Regardless of the route you take, running a small business is as much (if not more...) about marketing and sales - especially in the early years until you have built up a reputation. With a business such as the one you propose you will need to maintain that marketing/sales effort because the likelihood is 99% of your clients will not be repeat customers so you will always be searching out new opportunities. (An alliance with an architect(s) as suggested above might help this issue). Apologies if that all sounds a bit negative but I've worked with a lot of embryonic businesses and these are just some of the realities. Despite the negativity/realism I do like your idea and think that if you can crack the niche and find a simple, powerful way to market to your ideal clients this could be a really good business idea.

Water can drain too quickly for the percolation test. We have a clay cap about 3m deep above a bed of chalk. This excludes a normal drainage field so we're looking at a concrete ring soak away. In the clay, water sits there for days. But, once we did down to the chalk, it drains too quickly. The solution being proposed is to dig out the clay down to the chalk and then put a layer of sand at the bottom. This will allow percolation into the chalk but slow it down sufficiently to be within the correct range.

We bought a trendy tumbler composter many years ago (not this model) - complete waste of time and money. The benefit of having an open to the ground Dalek-type composter is it allows worms and bugs to naturally get into the composter and do their stuff. A tumbling type with no connection to the ground does not. So, either you manually introduce worms/bugs or add in some special fluid from the manufacturer (for a small £££ of course...). Just get a Dalek from B&Q and, if you feel it necessary, add some foam around it to help heat it up. Our Dalek has been fed with all our household waste and some of the garden trimmings for nearly 2 years now and has never needed emptying (laziness has stopped me removing the mature stuff to use as compost - if I need that I'll go to the stables next door).

Apologies - missed your post. Solar conduit is just the cable in from solar panels into the house as we're mounting them on the carport roof rather than the house. Broadband is Openreach. I haven't spoken with them yet in detail but, talking to others, it seems that fibre and electric can go in the same trench. Two things to be aware - they still do need to be about 300mm apart and also check that the fibre cable isn't sheathed in anything that is metallic (apparently some are but I can't verify that).

Does it really need a dedicated software package? I think I'd be tempted to take a screenshot of one of your other plans which shows the whole plot, put it into PowerPoint, then add lots of different coloured blobs to denote trees, bushes, flowers, and other elements of the landscape. Put a key on the side of the drawing to show broadly what each area is (eg flowerbed, driveway etc). Then add an accompanying text document explaining what's in the flowerbed etc. similar to the attached document. (I know nothing about plants but a bit of Googling filled in the gaps between 'I want a wildflower garden' and a long list of impressive sounding Latin names...). I strongly suspect there's a lot of 'bullshit baffles brains' when it comes to planners and their Conditions. If something looks like it's been thought through then they're less likely to question it. Plus, to be fair, spending a bit of time on research (as opposed to learning a new software you'll never use again) will be useful and quite enlightening (who knew apple trees had different rootstock types which impact size of tree and harvest size?). Landscape layout details.docx

I presume the pump they supply is their own (ie you can't pick and choose)? If so, does anyone know if theirs is a copy of any of the more popular/common ones - most ASHPs seem to just be re-badged versions of the same thing.

I haven't looked closely at the depth of Surecav so thanks for that heads up. Given the choice, I'd rather go a little OTT and make sure everything stays stuck to the building rather than find it peeling away (or, worse, pulling the ICF foam away from the concrete).

Wouldn't have thought the load would be an issue as we're only looking at 300mm but I was wondering about how deep the battens for the timber cladding above would need to be in order to ensure the flint was inboard of the cladding. Do you mean faux flint? We're looking at real flint as a first choice but I am aware that flint brick slips are available and might be an option.

Talking with our architect today I mentioned this issue and he pointed me towards a product called Surecav. They have used it with a number of different external materials including stone and flint and seem happy with it. Anyone else got any experience with this product? https://www.surecav.co.uk/flint/

Would tile adhesive be sufficiently strong/permanent for an exterior subject to rain/snow/sun/freezing?

Was this to help take some of the weight as you built up and add additional purchase points?

Foam

We're planning to have timber cladding around the main part of our ICF build with a 300mm flint 'splashback' on the lower part of the wall (between the bottom of the timber and the ground level). What is the best way to secure/cement the flint pieces to the exterior of the ICF wall? I'm imagining some sort of scrim secured to the ICF which the mortar can then be worked into - but how is the scrim securely attached to the ICF?

This looks like a boilerplate response - very similar to what our planners sent to us. We had already submitted a plan but they didn't seem to realise that. When we pointed it out they came back with more rubbish and gobbledygook. I emailed them, dissected every point they made and showed how we had already answered their questions (which, from your plan I think you have already done similar) and asked them to respond to a whole load of questions about the inaccuracies in their responses. They then responded with "...on reflection we think your original plan satisfies the requirement so we will sign the Condition off". If you were to go back and start asking difficult questions (for example about how and why HP01, 04 and 05 have any bearing on the landscape plan) I think you might find they capitulate. And if they don't then at least you have more clarity about exactly what it is they DO want. Sometimes I think they only do this as a way of demonstrating that they are 'doing their job'.

"There won't be one home, but millions of different types". Not if the Barretts, Persimmon and Wimpeys of the world have their way! Interesting to see the glass with embedded LCD so that it can be clear/opaque - didn't realise that technology was so old. Shame it hasn't got more widespread use today.

I have no idea; she didn't elucidate beyond what I quoted and the problem went away so I didn't enquire further. I can't help thinking that the whole BNG saga is going the way of the nitrates fiasco and that, at some point in the future, it's all going to blow up when Joe Public realises what's going on. As an example, we (the local village) used to have free access to a small river and water meadow here within the South Downs National Park. People used to go there on sunny afternoons to picnic and have the occasional paddle in the stream. It's out in the country so never any bother with bored 'Yoofs'. Then, suddenly, the whole area was fenced off and signs went up. Apparently, Biffa - out of the goodness of their heart and for no other reason than being a socially responsible company - had purchased the land in order to make it into a wildlife sanctuary. To protect the wildlife this required them to fence off the area so that it wasn't disturbed. Cue lots of unhappy people. It wasn't until recently that I realised that this was probably just Biffa offsetting BNG as part of a planning application for a new waste site. Now, multiply that by every new planning application being submitted across the UK (especially from the big developers) and suddenly we have a countryside that no-one has access to.

Slightly off topic but relevant I think. Our Planners started asking for us to update our BNG. I got back in touch with the Environmental Specialist who did the original one and she responded: I would be happy to recalculate the BNG for you however since I wrote the initial report the government have produced and then latterly updated, guidance which now confirms that BNG cannot be provided within private gardens. This includes all the hedges, trees, grassland etc. With regret I could not now write a report confirming BNG is achievable in a garden so you would need to secure offsite BNG. As she's the expert I can only take her word for it. But this does seem bonkers. Seems like the new regs are being made to support multi-build developers and their mates who are setting up off-site biodiversity offset sites. Luckily, when I went back to the planners and questioned their logic for a new report they caved in and signed off the Condition without needing a new one.

Kudos to you for trying in the first place! I do a lot of woodworking and I've tried a few larger resin projects - and now know why those lovely resin dining tables cost thousands! I find resin horrible to work with - messy and difficult to get a good result, even with smaller pieces. If you are trying again, perhaps look at some of the different types of resin available as they do make a lot of different compounds for different purposes. West System and Total Boat are two of the biggest companies that I'm aware of and they both have a whole suite of different compounds for different purposes.

We're now at the stage where we're about to create the detailed technical drawings for our new build (RIBA stage 4). We're expecting to have the full gamut of modern house stuff (ASHP/Aircon/MVHR/Solar etc). I've identified the different providers/systems I want to use for most of the systems - and they're all different! My question is - how best to integrate the design of all these systems into the building in the most effective/efficient way. Do I go to suppliers of each system and ask them to design their bit - or do I find a company that specialises in taking all my preferred systems and creating an integrated solution? I was planning to do the former but an architect I was speaking to yesterday implied that the second option was 'the norm'. Does anyone know of companies that will do as the architect suggests and that they can recommend? Or should I proceed as I planned?

I think I need one of these to go with my laser cutter and new CNC machine. My wife thinks different...

Have you fitted wireless switches in your new build/refurb project? If so, I'd be interested to hear about your experiences - good and bad - especially over time. On the surface (pardon the pun) they look like a good idea but I wonder about their reliability and, once you've bought and fitted all the support modules/controllers, cost versus normal switches. I can see huge benefits for those renovating and stuck with limited fixed cabling opportunities but, for a new build (with electrics planned intelligently), I wonder about their viability/value.