HerbJ

Presumably your neighbour has the right to have the free passage and running of water ( and maybe also soil, gas and electricity) from his land by and through the channels, drains, cables and pipes running through your land. If so, a right was probably also granted in favour of the neighbour to enter your land for the purposes of maintaining, repairing and renewing the water pipe ( and any drains, cables and pipes, making good any damage caused). It's worth checking....

It's good practice to take photos of all the 1st fix electrics ( and plumbing and ducting and ....). Our electrician took a complete set of photos,of the 1st fix together with dimensioned locations of loudspeaker cables, including location of nearest joists for positioning speaker cutouts) that had been left in the ceiling for later connection. We're refer to it a lot for various things.

Just request a copy of the restrictive covenant from the buyer's solicitor on which they are relying for their advice to your seller.

I included temporary construction stairs in the TF contract, having seen the benefit of what @jack had installed. MBC bought cheap stairs from the nearest BM and they were in place from the very beginning, We removed them when we were ready to install the permanent stairs and MBC collected them, taking them to their next job,

i agree. Let's see if we can get an harder water sample. For everybody's information, you can normally get an analysis, like the one the above for my Post Code, on your water utility company website. It's the results from their regular testing. A water hardness testing kit is available at Screwfiix https://www.screwfix.com/p/bwt-water-hardness-test-kit/48679?_requestid=331736. It's a simple kit for checking that your water softener is working satisfactorily..

I'm in Berkshire and our water is hard, but not really hard. - 8 or 9 Palintest tablets ( indicating Clake Hardness 21--24) using a standard water hardness test kit -. The softened water is at 1/2 tablets. Just checked online with my water utility, Affinity Water and they detail the following for my Post Code:: HARD WATER The area supplied by Affinity Water has 'hard' water. The hardness occurs naturally and is characterised by the presence of high levels of calcium and magnesium, which are good for healthy teeth and bones. CALCIUM 114 mg/l Calcium is the principal constituent of hardness. TOTAL HARDNESS 285 mg/l Total hardness is usually expressed in terms of calcium carbonate and is measured in milligrammes per litre (mg/l) which is the same as parts per million (ppm). The recognised classification scheme we are using is: 0-75 soft, 76-150 moderately hard, 151-300 hard, 300+ very hard. Your water is hard. Degrees English (or Clarke) 19.95 This hardness measurement is used on some British appliances. Degrees German 15.96 This is used on some German appliances. Degrees French 28.5 This is used on some French appliances. MILLIMOLS 2.85 mmol/l Millimols per litre. Some appliances refer to water hardness in millimols per litre (mmol/l). FLUORIDE 0.137375 mg/l Fluoride naturally occurs in the water in many areas. Affinity Water does not add any fluoride to your water. Fluoride is measured in milligrammes per litre (mg/l). I can send/bring samples if this gives us what we want for "hard water" sample. I 'm happy to assist in organising this.

So, we could arrange for six samples. Maybe, as follows: 2 samples from Lizzie ( outside tap and the Halycan product) 1 sample from Lizzie's neighbour 1 sample from a soft water area ( Wales?) 1 sample from a hard water area 1 sample of softened water produced from a water softener in the same hard water area It would need a little bit of organising, but nothing that can't be arranged. When???

From Wikipedia - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_water "Soft water is surface water that contains low concentrations of ions and in particular is low in ions of calcium and magnesium. Soft water naturally occurs where rainfall and the drainage basin of rivers are formed of hard, impervious and calcium poor rocks.[1] Examples in the UK include Snowdonia in Wales and the Western Highlands in Scotland. The term may also be used to describe water that has been produced by a water softening process although such water is more correctly termed softened water. In these cases the water may also contain elevated levels of sodium and/or bicarbonate ions . Because soft water has few calcium ions, there is no inhibition of the lathering action of soaps and no soap scum is formed in normal washing. Similarly, soft water produces no calcium deposits in water heating systems. Water that is not soft is referred to as hard water. In the UK, water is regarded as soft if the hardness is less than 50 mg/l of calcium carbonate.[2] Water containing more than 50 mg/l of calcium carbonate is termed hard water. In the United States soft water is classified as having less than 60 mg/l of calcium carbonate.[3]" So, the results from the proposed testing will be very interesting!

Their Website claims that it does produce softer water Quotes from their Website Wake up to softer water!Your hard water solution is here.. really here! As it uses no chemicals, adds nothing and takes nothing away, our water conditioner is a completely natural way to soften your water. Your cleaning products and toiletries work better with softer water as there’s no limescale to kill the bubbles. Because of this you can use natural products as they’ll lather well. Cleaning is easier – even cleaning your car is a joy – and you won’t be left with unsightly spotting. Even your plants will thrive as they more easily absorb the mineral rich softer water you get with an Halcyan Water Conditioner.

We,ve recently sold an apartment in Torquay, using a local solicitor. The fees were £635 +VAT plus disbursements etc. They were very competitive and reasonably efficient.

The concrete in my foundation didn't go off because of the conditions on the day. Late August, warm, very humid, little sun, lots of cloud cover and no wind! The late concrete deliveries pushed everything back. We managed to float it until we finally called it a day when we ddecided we couldn't get it any better. To be honest, the worst area was the garage ( the last area to get concrete fill) but it was not too bad and you would never know, now that resin floor had been applied (after a good grind and resin filling of minor imperfections where the odd piece of aggregate was loose). The rest of the floor was reasonably level and we laid 110m2 porcelain tiles straight on top for most of it and 50m2 engineered oak boards on the rest- 10mm max out worst across 15 x 12m or so

Roller shutter doors are very widespread on the continent. I have been looking at a very good site in Germany, which does all the parts for every kind of sunshades, blinds , shutters, garage doors, sun sails etc - see https://www.jalousiescout.de

I forgot to say well done and keep going..... Great blog!

Been there, got the tee-shirt. Our floodlit powerfloating experience was caused by concrete turning up late and the weather conditions. No floodlights, just the headlights of a MBC van. Brendan, MBC working at 2200hr on a Friday, kept going with fish & chips

I also had to replace GAULHOFER window cills, because I messed up the depth dimension on quite a few windows. I was recommended Spectrum by my Gaulhofer window Installer, who had done a lot of work with them. With his contact, they gave me a very quick turnaround time and a fair discount. Good quality. I used them for some other pressed aluminium finishing around the garage doors and other places. Marc Everitt Spectrum Installations Limited Unit 7 Springfield Industrial Estate Newport Shropshire TF10 7NB Tel: 01952 814116 http://www.spectruminstallations.co.uk/cills.php

Another problem solved! On to the next one....

Totally understand. I was just curious....

This is a bit subjective on their side... What was there a definition for commencement of cover in the Policy Documents?

We have Gaulhofer windows and most our windows cills were the wrong size - my fault, as it turned out! Anyway, we had the replacements manufactured in the UK and didn't reorder from Gaulhofer , as this was lot cheaper (though we did get a healthy discount because our installer had done a lot of work with them). They also made a lot of other aluminium pieces for the garage and so on I will pull out the supplier details, if it is of interest. They manufacture cills for other window suppliers - Internorm etc

What a great project! Love the stone work - very jeaalous

Just for completeness The Policy was issued on 26/06/2015, with the Applicable Endorsement stating "The insurance will commence on completion of the Residential Property, the issue of the Approval Certificate and the payment of the premium in full. The Certificate of Insurance will then be issued in confirmation. " The Building Completion Certificate (the Approval Certificate as defined in the Policy) was dated 25 February 2017 and sent to the Insurer ( via my Broker) in accordance with the Policy on 27 February 2017. I received the Insurance Certificate as part of an updated Policy Document on 8 March 2017. As noted above the Insurance cover was valid from 25 February 2017.

That would seem to be a mistake and it certainly needs clarification. I have just checked my Insurance Certificate issued for my Residential Latent Defects Insurance Policy and it commences on the date of the Building Completion Certificate, for 10 years.

Our build is at the other end of the scale. We're down in the SE, where plots are very expensive and hard to find - we bought a house and demolished it. So my plot was 50% of the total build cost, approximately.

We have 2700mm downstairs but our rooms are smaller than 9x5m but 2400mm would have been claustrophobic We 2500mm height upstairs and this works well in bedrooms. We would have gone a higher, eepecially dowwnstairs but had to maintain a ridge height .

i have a resin coated garage floor that was applied by a specialist contractor,who normally installs showrooms, warehouses, coldstores etc. I found a contractor who was willing to do my 37m2 garage after he done a 1000m2+++ TESLA showroom. I paid him cash and it was very good, for a garage. I just had to wait a few weeks for them to be in my area and they finished it over two days, with less than 3 hours on each day. They spent a lot of time grinding and cleaning the surface and filling small holes.imperfections, before applying the resin. The garage floor was an MBC installed insulated raft and didn't need too much work. I've also applied my own resin floor for a double garage at my previous house. It's not difficult but best results come from surface preparation and practice @Bitpipe has a resin floor for his entire ground floor. and I think he's very happy with it. I am sure he will be able to provide details