jamiehamy

When I worked in car sales, we had a great boss, really chilled and reasonable. He told us of the night two customers came in complaining about some light scratches on their car. The background was they bought a car that was a few years old and were not happy with a lot but ended up demanding that any tiny flaw was fixed. Tommy had had enough of them by the time they came in that night to complain about more trivial things (if they wanted a perfect car they should have bought a new one) . So he sat them down and told them he would fix everything they wanted, even although he disagreed with them. He had one condition. They had to go up to York hill Sick Kids Hospital and visit for an hour or so. Only then would he authorise the work. Never saw them again. You'll find your own way of getting perspective but once you do, it'll all seem a bit brighter. I often say to my other half when we have problems that we're pretty lucky to have them in many ways - the real hardship of having Windows two shades of grey is none at all. So we can't afford the UVC until nearer Christmas? Poor us. It's probably why we've never been too stressed with the build. Hopefully you'll end up in the same place (metaphorically!).

Rotten news - BUT if you stick with this, you will look back in only 5 years from now and see significant upsides. We've been lucky enough to finance our build without relying on banks - so it's going to have taken best part of three years of weekends and evenings. But the end is in sight - mortgage free. So you've had a set back - have a look back and work out how much interest to u are not going to pay. That will bring some relief right away. Also - you're half way there. You really are. A couple of months work and you'll be water tight of a form then you can plan and prepare for the next stage. You're all in now - you're not going to give in because you'd spend the rest of yours days wondering why you gave up. People ask us how we do it and as time we've realised it's just our lifestyle now. It's tough but never a chore. We work at our pace. As much as we need a break both of us, any time off is not spent relaxing because we're thinking of what we could be doing on the house. Hopefully that'll be you - the house will be your lifestyle for the next while-lifestyle being a choice. We're all behind you. We want to hear the end of this story and are prepared to wait - even as long as @Onoffs bathroom! Good luck Ian.

What concrete mix did they use, do you know? I raised a question about slab levels in another thread - keen to find out what mixes the rolling floors used. There's got to be a better solution to this - too many people with uneven slabs! What's the common denominator?

Hmm, can't see a real benefit here unless you need to penny pinch or chasing a golden u-value. Difference between 150mm(100+50) XPS icf and 200mm (100+100) is £10m2. I worked out a £5m2 for Recticel foil faced 50mm board. Add in long screws and time, I can't see this being advantageous tbh. Don't forget time overall - could easily be best part of a week for one person doing this. There is not time premium on thicker icf boards.

I think it's that - maybe bordering on a bit obsessive. Your points have been made and there for consideration - it's maybe that you're coming across a bit strong tis all!

This thread is getting dull. It's turning into 'Cons of Durisol'. @najem-icf. I sense you have an agenda here. 11 posts and you're trying to discredit Durisol. I don't care whether you are right or wrong, it's not a good look mate.

@JimG. Regarding securing things to icf walls, we opted for battens inside to which plasterboard is then afixed. This gives us the option of fixing to the. Plasterboard or if additional strength needed, to the battens (placing additional ones where needed). For Polarwall, there are plastic rails every 300centers vertically that are pretty robust and can be screwed into.

We started off planning timber frame and ended up with ICF based on recommendation from a friend who used it. No regrets at all. We used Polarwall which is a very different product from Durisol. We did the house and just finishing our garage. Would recommend it.

Hiya, not got any of my books but that price at various glance does not seen unreasonable given the scope of works involved (I. E not just bnb). Facinated to know why planners would prefer bnb! I've no idea why they would care! Do you have the House Builders Bible? That should give you a reasonable baseline for the items listed as a starter.

We have 4 fully reversible - two as shown because of weight, two upstairs are because we wouldn't be able to use the turn function - it would block a passageway. Profile wise that's a good question. Various is the answer! Not that many people would ever know but they are all different. Some out of necessity because of the different styles, but we have two different profiles on what are effectively the same TnT windows. Our French doors downstairs are entirely different profile to the inwards opening doors upstairs - I. E a completely different design. We went with Janex and had a lengthy catalogue of issues many of which never got resolved (we gave up and settled after 9 months). I wouldn't recommend them. The windows individually are lovely and high quality but as a package, they couldn't deliver the goods. Literally and metaphorically.

Ditto - we're built into rock with soil/stone backfill. Alan at Polarwall said they'll take worse case that water pressure builds up and it has to resist a head of water. Makes sense - building could be there for 100 years +.

All suppliers recommended us against TnT for the two 1550s we have, so they are fully reversible. Work fine but a bit heavy. We considered splitting but was not the look we wanted.

Polarwall. We used it for the house as well(ground floor walls).

And vertical rebar.

Pic of rebar detail.

Pretty much. Has the engineer provided the details of the reinforcements? Or just a 200mm core? We've just about finished our garage walls with mesh up inside the 250mm core. Was very straightforward. Rather than try build with mesh itself, we used rebar and tied it as we went up. The slowest part was the tying - lesson for next time is to hire or by a tool for it as it was very slow. Attached pic shows how we did it - braced from inside. We had rebar sticking out the slab 500mm. I put. down three courses of Polarwall before sticking the vertical bars in and tying. Then we laid bars on each course of icf ties as we went up. The ladders slipped over the top of the rebar and down. Financed permitting we will pour in the next few weeks.

That's exactly what our guy has done - totally smooth to the edge. No bead or door lining there.

Fwiw, the guy we are using is charging £450 for the big rooms I. E 5mx5m, walls 3.3m high. Smaller rooms are £400 I think. Guy works with another plasterer, they work from 10-finish, normally 4pm. Finish is superb. Think that works out around £5 per m2, although he doesn't quote per m2.

Good job!

Was genuinely thinking more like this. Would do the job in jig time. https://www.hss.com/hire/p/htc-gl270-grinder

Not acceptable - how someone walked away from that thinking it was acceptable is beyond me. I'd go so far as to say it's appalling! It's one thing not having it level but that's not even flat. However don't be downhearted, it all gets covered up anyway. Builder should be hiring a concrete grinder to smooth it right down. As far as he should be concerned, it's got to be flat and level. Onus on him to sort and not get out of jail because of efforts of a follow on trade.

@lizzie - we all have these moments, plenty of them. But there are solutions, it just sets things back and possibly results in a bit of a compromise. But you will get there in the end. I can guarantee you that one day soon you'll look back and feel a sense of pride and achievement that you simply will never get from buying a new house. Not only that, you truly have achieved something most others wish they could do but can't for various reasons. You are right about differing views however, but over time you start to apply your own logic and that helps you decide. That's not to say everyone is right or everyone is wrong, but in my experience, always add your own dose of common sense in and you'll generally get there. No-one will ever know the effort you put into it - but you will. And no-one will notice all these 'mistakes', compromises or workarounds. I can point at two windows next to each other that are a different shade of grey and say 'look at that' and no-one has a clue what is actually wrong! When I explain they say they thought that was supposed to be like that! Chin up - persevere and you'll get there!

Hi folks, I expect I'll get lots of different answers but keen to hear what people use. Rolling onto completely smooth new plaster (uh-huh, I know I said I would tape and fill - I am - in the smaller areas) - want to make sure the rollered on paint is as smooth as possible. Reading online I can't find a consistent answer - so - brand and roller - what do people here use for emulsion? Thanks! Jamie

Following this thread with interest - I've never put a level on our slab and have since sold my laser - I can tell it's slightly out in some places (When I did stud walling I could sometimes have 5mm difference but never more), but nothing that's ever given me cause for concern thus far - wait til I start tiling! However, interested because the garage slab has a distinct wave in it around the middle - the concrete pour was not ideal and as a result it's along the lines of what some people here have - mainly in the middle but never going to cause me an issue because it's jsut a garage. The garage was poured with standard C35, vibrated and bull floated (and of course they added bloody water). The house slab was laid Agilia - which comes out like very runny porridge - it got one float and that was it. It's a bit rough on the surface but overall, the levels are pretty okay. So my point/wonder is this - how were all these uneven slab poured? Using standard concrete or a more modern mix like Agilia (which is not actually self levelling, but self compacting) which may go a long way to getting a more even slab? The guys who did our mix had the lasers all setup as per a normal pour but I wonder if the better level is down to the mix, or just the crew? @Vijaythinking of you here looking ahead to your slab and the large floor area? I suspect that Agilia is still treated as 'new fangled' but I'd be interested to know if the likes of MBC use it or give a blank look when it's mentioned?

2 years? I'd be writing to the MD if my boots lasted anything like that long! We've bought several 'Site' brand boots from Screwfix but they dont last long, a year max I'd say. Trousers we have tried Snickers and Site - neither seem particularly durable and again, probably a years wear out of them. Boots are certainly a must for outside (hiking type for us) but once wind and water tight, we've found steel toed trainer tye shoes better.