Spinny

It is quite a piece of work to create a meaningful budget and to stick to it. Our original builder had a QS draw up a line item budget for our extension/refurb contract but with estimates for the plumbing and electrics. I insisted he got quotes for those items which came in a lot higher than his estimates. You need to either have a pretty good idea of what you want to do and the relevant prices, or be defining a budget and then constraining your choices to fit within it. These days there are lots of items where choice and affordability can change the price by multiples and huge amounts of that choice. You should have a window and door schedule and cost that up, a steels and lintels schedule etc etc. You are bound to want some labour too I'd have thought - some things require multiple people, some particular skills, or placing risk with contractors. As it's your forever home you will need to phase it appropriately. Are you going to be living there, or when would you need to start living there ? Living on a building site is not much fun, but makes it easy to be around as much as possible. Are you trying or willing to do it over 1 year or 5 years or even 10 years ? Do you have a partner ?

Yes.

Think you need contingency regardless, otherwise as soon as some problem comes up you are stuck. I doubt the market will value a half complete project at much more than an unstarted project. How would you phase the work ? If you run out of money what is best - a whole unplastered house, or some rooms complete and others not started ? Are you going to sell it or live there forever ? No Electrics or plumbing ?

I am just wondering how feasible it is to run wires inside the profile next to the strip itself. I plan to use 10mm strip and profiles only 12.6mm wide internally and wires would need to be kept from blocking light from the COB somehow.

Yes understood, but two different GIO's from the controller could be used with two data wires, one connected to each half of the LED strip at the centre of the combined run. Each half would then effectively be a separate strip running in opposite directions. Combining them in WLED means logically reversing the direction of one strip in WLED and then having WLED concatenate the two strips. Chat GPT thinks this would work for some light patterns but not for others.

Yes that thought has occurred to me now. Discussed it with ChatGPT who thinks it will work but some running patterns etc would still not work properly and this is a known limitation of WLED at present. So it seems it would be best to still feed the data wire to the Data Input end of the strip. ChatGPT suggests using a fine wire for the data feed which would still need to pass down the profile in front of the LED strip to get soldered onto the connector on the front of the strip. Pic shows my cable, so either run a wire (or all wires) down the profile in front of the strip to solder onto the front. But not obscure the COB light itself.

I plan to put an addressable 24V COB LED Strip under the edge of a kitchen worktop inside a recessed alu profile. It would be easier to run the wires to connect to the strip away from the very end. Does anyone have any experience or comments on whether this can be done ? I suspect power can be connected to any contact point on the strip although I have never seen an example where it is done this way. But with a third data wire driving the addressable IC's would this still be possible ? Or does an addressable strip rely on the data feed being at the very end to drive the IC's in sequence along the strip ? Normally the IC's would say begin at 0 and run to say a length of say 70. but could you connect the data wire at the centre and somehow run from -35 to +35 ? Will be using a WLED based controller. Has anyone wired an LED where they had the wires somehow fold through 180 deg to run back behind the strip before exiting the profile/channel ? ( @cedricuk any info on this ?)

Of course you should tell the planners, otherwise you are breaking the conditions of your planning approval. Once you have formally informed the planners by whatever is the correct method at least you are behaving properly. One window is getting bigger by being extended down to floor level - if I were your neighbour I would call that a material amendment. OK I suspect you don't have any neighbours ? Just follow due process, that is what it is there for. At the end of the day, changing plans during a build, is changing plans during a build, and you can't really argue against accepting any consequences which flow from that - be it doing some paperwork, or proceeding at some likely minimal risk. Who sized those windows ? If it was the architect I would speak to them, to create the revised drawings and ensure they don't have any counter arguments.

Do you have any photos of the joists after the remediation work you did was done i.e. before you put the new flooring down etc ? From your photos it is tricky to see exactly how the damp was getting into the joist. The newer sister joist shows damp in the bottom 75% extending from the end through to where the bifolds are. I presume the newer joist originally reached all the way to rest on the wall but the end had completely rotted away ? Clearly the older joist was very rotten in that corner. So (a) it may (most likely) be that damp was reaching the joists at their ends through their bearing onto the wall. That is the bottom of the wall in the corner there and the ledge the joists sit on was getting damp. Then in the absence of any DPM between the joists and the masonry the damp was sucked into the joist ends and then down the joist length. or (b) it may (perhaps) be that the older joist is in contact with the masonry under the bifolds ? Or in contact with something on the possibly damp earth underneath (rags, or rubble, or timber shavings) ? Thus the older joist was getting damp and passing the damp into the newer joist by contact. I presume when you did your remediation work and replaced the rotten joists that a new DPM was put along the bearer wall the joists sit on, and really ideally up the very end of the new joists too? I presume all the damp rotten wood was removed and ideally the new joists treated with preservative/wood worm treatment ? I presume the only point of contact for the new joists would be at the ends on top of new DPM and there was no direct contact anywhere else such as under the bifold ? In your photo with the torch it looks as though there may be an aperture under the floor there through the dividing wall with your neighbour ? If so there may be passage of air via such a hole. It is even possible that damp is getting into that corner area from your neighbour's side - take a look over at what is on his side - a leaky downpipe, gutter, a gully drain ? When you lift your astroturf is there any/more evidence of damp near that corner ?

They are also labelled as 3000Kelvin colour temperature which is on the warm/organgey end - not ideal for task lighting, you would be better off with 4000K+

HATO appear to make agricultural lighting. Do yours look like this...https://www.hatolightingsolutions.com/hwdk-c-led/ ? And if so... So quite probably you are seeing the full brightness (unless perhaps they are second hand and someone might have changed the default setting.) Looks like they are 60V constant current LED strips rather than the more normal constant voltage type. Good for chicken sheds apparently.

And...

So...

Yes those joist pics are too compressed down now to see the detail. Looks a bit like ours, is it a 1930's house ? We had some damp in ends of joists adjacent to our porch (see photos) but not as severe as yours. Cut the ends off worst ones, some sistering, and modified joist layout with a hanger off the other wall. Ours was due to water getting through under the porch because the ground slopes downhill towards the house at the front. We have yet to get a new outside ACO type drain in ourselves. The original DPM directly under the joist ends was disintegrating (old bitumen felt type stuff). New DPM put in under and over the ends of the retained/sistered joists and everything treated with a boron woodworm/preservative. Nearest u/floor air vent was blocked with newspaper, which they apparently used to do in 'olden days' to try and keep warm. So cleaned that out and other bits of rubbish to improve air flow.

What is the makeup outside then ? Do you have a timber deck under the astro ? Then concrete or earth or something under that ? Is the astro fixed down somehow or can you peel it back ? Maybe you have some photos of before the deck and astro were put in ? Any photos of what the rotten joists looked like ? Did you have problems before they were put in ? Any air bricks down there ? Where is the DPC because ends of timber joists should be on top of DPC/DPM ? Any mold on the bottom of the wall inside or staining outside ? Presumably the joists run front to back in the room behind the bifolds ? I just think you need to be as certain as humanly possible about the cause in order to specify the best fix.