scottishjohn

If it works out ,hen I can give you details , you will understand why i want that size supply and yes 3 phase was always the plan i tried to talk to people regarding a supply this morning ,but they need too much info at this time ,so we will wait till deal is done and work on 40k as cost for the time being . I will have a 40ft high X 70m long banking that faces s/w for PV if it all works out . still needs to drop in price first I think even at that going off grid don,t work out cheaper and a turbine will cost same anyway ,and take close to 20 years to pay back --if it don,t break down very often no hydro possible unfortunately.that would have been first choice

the closest pole is a 3 phase one and to future proof the site ,as pv will be on the list at some stage , ,and its a big site +house,so large PV array is easily doable architect is saying, as a guesstimate, at this stage he would specify a 200amp supply . but yes maybe worth a "secret service " enquiry at this point to dno about costing and sizes needed

Ok trying to work out cheapest way to run 500 metres of supply to plot I have not asked supplier yet for a quote but I have been told its 10k a pole-- as i have not got site tied up yet do not want to make an official requests so looking at big swa now all the cable claculators i look at give me the size --eg 300mmsq for 415v @200 amps @500 metres for the cable ,but when i go look at cables they don,t list them that way but at as conductor dia so when i do the calc to get surface area it don,t match up correctly do they add ALL the conductors together to get the surface area ,and why not just put booth measurements on the cable spec?eg 75mm dia (4 core) =370mm2,which was the closest way i could get them to match ,no allowing for losses in cable I,m even more confused as a sparkie said he worked it for me and the cable would be 40k i did the costing numbers using a 95mm swa --biggest i could find and it came out at 14k I am obviously missing a bit of definitive info on how the equate conductor dia to the mm2 it says in the calculators

I would wait a bit -the marks are where pb joints are --so are you sure the skimming is secure+dry? one hit job?--paint it when you sure the PB is fully dry,right through and secure

terminolgy a dry mix to me ,was just the sand with what ever moisture it has +cement for laying slabs or paviors -tumble in mixer and lay pavoirs . water will not drain through once its set ,so not suitable for some places -need proper edge drains leave 24 hrs --its gone hard and don,t need it that thick if its a good base your laying on ,I had driven 20 t flat bed over it more than once never moved and no weeds -bit of moss ,but never weeds ,

it will be just a crust -by time you dig into it it will be damp , always is

from my experience using it for bedding pavoirs it goes off pretty quick the nature of cement pulls the moisture out of the the sand you mix it with + ground surrounding it , so next day its not like sand anymore only worry would it will not flow like wet cement ,so any voids ,especially under tank will not self compact like wet stuff and whats to stop you giving it a hand when you have finished by wetting it down from the top a bit if its a large amount? sure someone may give you a more technical view on it

the whole ramp subject is load of crap anyway what do they say you have to do if you are in flood zone? common sense says you build your house out of of the ground above flooding level and major flood areas any new houses the garages should be below house ,so that is the only thing to suffer .you might get a garage you can fit a car in then as well-- I also object strongly to government paying for flood damage to private houses --it was the owners choice not to insure it. I object to having my premium loaded to pay for others flood damage -i would happily take a lower premium if they dropped the flooding clause I live on a hill ,same goes subsidence +earth quake--house is built on granite rock I know they will say its a very small part of the premium for those things, burgulary is another one --it is not loaded anything like enough for the bad areas +other pay well over .any break in makes the papers here --not been any for a very long time,but they are quick enough to load you if you say you go on extended holidays a lot so it should be easy to give me a reduction --but they are quick enough to load a premium if you are in a flood area the presumption must be that everyone is going to be in a wheel chair . the common sense approach would be that private housing cannot get a grant for a ramp under any circumstances .. but cost of a ramp ,if the council has to provide one is a charge back on sale of the property when they die or sell on . not make all houses have stupid ramps or be so low to the ground as they do now..

just to play devils advocate you could argue that it is the outside ends of the wire bracing you should remove cos the internal ones will transfer heat to the concrete which is still inside the insulated outer layer and will act as a thermal store . i doubt what ever you do the effect will be measurable

you could be right ,but alot of council buildings have removable ramps at town halls and places -which are only there when they are open .and they don,t even comply with the angle so that would be a good example --only need ramp when it needs to be used

I was talking to an old mason the other day and he told me something i did not know --I know theres a lot i don,t know when they used to build stone rubble walls they always laid the layers with a slight lean on the stones to the outside --the mortar bed sloped to outside a bit so water would tend to go outwards not inwards so obvious when someone says it --no damp membranes 200years ago

did you find the screws you were looking for

when you see the number of people who don,t have a pension cos 20years seems a long way off ,then with no FIT and knowing it will take 15 years for payback --you are just not going to get the mass take up that they want. even when it was 7years that put a lot of people off. look how many people change houses cos of jobs more often than that ,they not going to do it . when i was thinking of moving i was told by estate agent to remove my solar thermal from roof ,cos it would make it harder to sell!! and my ashp+rhi +UFH -made no difference to value of house . so until perceptions change generally it is only the few freaks like us on here that value these sort of things

I notice a lot of cladding going very close to ground IMHO that is not good idea when it rains you get the splashing of water and muck on to the boarding think you need a good 12"of stone or something at bottom or your cladding will get dirty and discoloured over time , maybe a grass edging next to house of something soft that will stop the bounce back,certainly paving or anything hard will make it worse very common in scotland to have 3 courses at least of "fyfestone stone" before render starts and that will be over hanging the stone work i think that is why they do it -rendering stays nice and clean old stone cottages the bottom of the wall is always discoloured when they render to ground ,not quite as bad if a border of chips or something

so whats the answer

the horror stories on auto wiring are more of the twisted together and taped variety or "scotch loks" and bad earths .hence why with a new stand alone ecu system I always made a new loom. or take it somewhere else too many instances of old std looms giving strange problems, nearly impossible to trace cos of so many splices hidden away inside loom and old age of std loom - trying to save customer money always back fires on you with these sort of things. I finally decide not ot modify std loom when a 3year old car was showing a 5v drop on injectors under full load it was a type of car i had done many times -so down loaded a map --after modfiyng std ecu connector to take my ecu - ran it up and it was weak as water at full throttle -adjusted fuelling ,then checked map iwas running nearly twice the opening time on injectors . lot of head scratching then but a volt meter on injector --at idle 12v -rull power 7v - problem traced to a bunch of splice in loom --looked perfect -car was only 3 years old - that was it -new loom every time after that then i found other cars with same -by doing volt test at injectors solve alot of bad running problems on std cars then as well

thats cleared that up then . they only read part of the section then -- or maybe council don,t trust their men /subbies to make proper joints the joint they found was one I did when doing light switchs on landings for this 3 storey house as you couldn,t turn lights off for staircase on all floors when we got it and yes it was crimped and heat shrunk .

I can,t but i can tell you form experience with a house we rented to council for battered women +kids their sparkies came in had all the switchs out etc and found a good jointed cable and told us that was illegal and proceeded to pull a complete new cable in at their own expense . I queried if they could not use a JB --yes but only if it servicable --which inside a wall is not It could be a common sense thing ,but not the impression they left me with . we all know that any joint no matter how well made is the most likely first place any problem is going to happen . unless you got a 150m run of cable why do it anyway ?

plastering into the wall breaks all sorts of rules ----NO JOINTS in cables especially not in walls I don,t make the rules and i,m sure it will be fine - tell you how silly it is my brothers garage next to mine (we were partners till he retired) was just sold when we built them we had just one mains supply to building and 2 meters one for each ,so there was major 25mm swa cable going from one building to next up in the purlins new man wants to move meter and get his own supply good says i -then his meter will be in his building sparkie came to look at it and I said "you got a winner here -you can drag that SWA back to your side and it will be long enough to go to new supply coming in your building " NO -can,t use that cos its old colour wires --what says I!! put a sticker on it --no not allowable on a new installation says he so thats about £600 of cable he can,t use fine says I , will pull it back my way for use on maybe my new house 45m of 25mm swa is worth saving

that's the way i would do it on a car where you get oil +water ,not sure any need on house wiring --bit OTT-, and coloured coded as well !!, not up to date colours though.LOL all depends where it is and definitely a no-no having a joint in a wall of any type most would just fit a junction box and fix it to a beam if you can get at it later - I like the crimps with heat activated glue in them for cars ,then the heat shrink on top of that .to be honest with the glue crimps there is usually no need for the extra heat shrink ,but it looks pretty ,if you haven,t seen it you can get heat shrink sheave which also has heat activated glue inside it as well ,but gets expensive self amalgamating tape is good also for water proofing if you forget to put outer sleeve on before jointing ,but you would never do that !!

everybody to their own --I like it simple only need side cutting strippers and linesmans pliers ,screw drivers ,all insulated VDE type in the belt to do everything .. i use one of those type of strippers for the delicate ecu wring ,as that is a bench job ,most of it ,not up ladders and things .

LOL -- 240v just wakes you up a bit 415v is the one you DON'T mess with not even sure you would get a belt with the modern auto breakers in the consumer unit . when still in manchester my best mate was sparkie and he rewired an old house i had,and of course bonded to the bath etc . long story short --we had a bet he would stand in bath and drop a live cable in while he was standing in it . which he did and won a fiver from me - never got a shock cos his earth bonding was good + electronic circuit breakers kicked in on consumer unit he did recheck it before hand though !!

think you trying to automate something that is not needed 10"linemans pliers to cur the T+E to length snip center of outer insulation ,pull back earth to slit the outer insulation then side cutters with notch to strip back conductors i can do it quicker than i can type it

lucky for me my sparkie has been a customer of mine for a very long time --,i will be consulting with him before i start anyway and take his views on everything,so i will be like a subby to him anyway pretty sure he has all the tickets needed he could even inspect my petrol station which is a very different thing than a domestic build due to explosion risks etc . time will tell ,even if all i can do is pull in cables and he has to terminate --that will do .thats where most of the time is in doing first fix and mounting boxs ,etc etc

thats what i have done in past and will do on next job --pull all the wiring in and get it tested + signed off at finish