redtop

so had them delivered today, thing of beauty ? Anywhoo, I will be feeding them from one end only, and will put a short bit of copper on the other to support the manifolds. Here is the stupid question:- what fittings do I need to feed the water in and for copper at tother end? these are the bad boys https://www.jtmplumbing.co.uk/pipe-fittings-c433/hep2o-brass-manifolds-c661/hep2o-four-port-valved-manifold-15-tm-tf-fp-p21691

e have 140mm rockwool between the studs of the external frame and then 140mm of woodfibre insulation on the outside of that, then VPL, battons and cladding. Moving inside from the rockwool we have vapour proof OSB, 25mm battons for service void and then plasterboard. I wouldn't want any insulation in the service void as I would be worried about condensation issues, plus I would worry about removing the point of the service void in the first place (easy for services installation and later changing). We may use insulated plasterboard

don't take my comments as anything related to best practice lol, plumber I aint!

I have painted OSB board with bitumen paint successfully, its cheap and tough as. Wouldn't hurt as belt and braces

anyhow, to answer the question ? I have just got a new echo show 8 and whilst not 'party' loud it would be enough to annoy other people in the house at full volume. Amazon are also doing a new speaker the echo studio which whilst expensive would be plenty loud enough. I also have a sonos but will probably get rid and stick to amazon now they have the studio out; very impressed with the echo tbh. oh, I got the echo show cheap as a bunde deal when I bought a new cctv camera D

I am just re-doing this part of my plumbing. Had muck in the system which was causing predv to 'leak' water through and pressure kept increasing so have taken everything of following the stop cock to clean and re-do it a bit better. Anyhoo, looking at your setup I cant see the double check valve that should be fitted following the stop cock; I could be wrong though as trying to learn and am certainly no expert in plumbing!

we have a large balcony of our bedroom, yet to see if we use it however I tend to feel we will; seem to spend more time outside the current house than in so lots of outside sitting areas more important than internal space tbh. we are in cornwall mind, so its very mild but can be wet. issue with our build was the massive overhangs required steels, and we didn't spec thermal breaks so a super efficient house has gone out the window with lots of steel penetrations through the timber frame. then again we are windows open all the time, doors left open and heating hardly ever used type of people (in a 'normal' 70s house) so probably wont be an issue in practice

so we have an external cabinet, earth rod powering a small consumer unit, for temp power. when I get sparky round to fit consumer unit, 1st fix etc do I also have to get western power out again to connect the proper earth so the earth rod can go, or does the sparky do that?

this is one of the best and simplest descriptions of the roles I have seen!. We had all of that except the QS. In our case the architect led with planning, liaised with the SE and from that led with BC. We did end up with lots of steels due to the architects fancy overhangs, but we like it so that's fine

yep, I have loads of photos from the start and would be happy to document it in a blog. I think there are a lot of lessons learnt (well has been for me that's for sure)

access is either via road, 6ft wide and v sharp bends; Toyota hilux is about it. Other access is down a steep footpath, but can park easy to within 50m of house. Everything has had to be dropped at my renatl and moved in the hilux or hand carried down the path (that's how I did 240 joists!) Moved over 300 sheets of insulation this way on sat. its 2 acres in totl. Why? Because its a 10 min walk to Looe beach in cornwall, secluded in our own 2 acres. but access is crap lol

and one from Nov last year...

quick update, since our rogue builder departed (police, trading standards and local MP now all involved) we have had some help from a local, brilliant, builder with od days but mainly done it ourselves on evenings and weekends. Now getting roof firrings on, then boards, VPL, insulation and roofer coming 3rd Aug to fit EPDM (the fleece backed stuff). Also windows started being fitted today despite the fact I havnt yet put the external (140mm woodfibre, battons, counter battons and cladding) on yet ? But I can fit it to the windows so that's fine. Drains done, water in house and electric ready to go in. so slowly getting there. Also got to catch up on noggins, etc. A coupld of these pics are from a couple of weeks ago ?

just looked at these, brilliant idea. Are the receivers easy to fit? D

yep that's what ours is basically, watertight shell so they can see all the building structure (joists, roof, etc) and then completion; sorry if I didn't make it clear. No chance of getting a van on site, access not good enough. In any case why would I when we would only be 'out of rules' for a few weeks. If push came to shove I will put a tent up in the garden. At the end of the day, assuming you are paying CT but living in a house they deem isn't habitable because we have, for example, no working kitchen BUT do have fresh water, toilet, shower, watertight shell, etc. What would they be able to do in a 4 to 8 week period?

we have a different issue in that we have to move in on 1st Oct (or move to another rented for 6 months, just because we are 2 months short of being done). We will have roof on, windows in, working toilet and shower and temp rigged electrics but no CH and no fitted kitchen. I am trying to avoid anyone telling me I cant habitate the building and if we do get told we cant am relying on getting the main stuff done (be a couple of months) before they do anything about it. Plan is to get the next BC check once roof is on and windows in and before we move furniture to the house. The next visit following that is when plasterboard is up, etc so we should get away with it. Its a remote build and you cant just drive by to check on progress. Don't mind paying CT however do want to avoid being told we cant occupy, D

backer board only because tilers have reported cracking if laid direct onto insulation boards, even though they say you can. I suppose I could use a decoupling mat. No rpice for backer board yet, but I guess it wouldn't be cheap. Maybe I could go to 60mm, will know more next week when windows and doors get fitted. I was against spreader plates as people say they squek, also by using the insulation solution I get a bit more insulation; maybe not much but every bit helps I guess. But depending on the spreader plate cost it could be a fair bit cheaper, P5 board isn't expensive

supply only and covered 88m sq

so a summary of best practice is:- wunda do some good stuff / good prices. Don't use their wilo pump / manifold instead use the Ivar as its better at blending at low temps which provides risk reduction in the case of the ASHP going nuts and salus auto balancing valves are brill.

we have a suspended timber ground floor with 200mm insulation between joists and another 50mm below them (the whole ground floor is lifted off ground on steel posts). 18mm plywood is structural floor and I have 50mm to play with to final floor level. Tiles will be 15mm. So had quote from wunda at 3.5K for pipe, manifold, pump, associated bits and bobs and their 400 grade (high compressive strength) grooved insulation panels. I wouldn't tile directly onto these and want to fit tile nacker board (and then decoupling mat). I need to do something else, its too expensive. I cant get pumped screed, access really bad. One idea is to use cheaper grooved insulation with timber battons onto which I would fix tile backer board. or I could clip pipe direct to plywood, batton and use biscuit mix but lots of work as would have to buy bags of sand / cement and barrow it in (cant get a dumpy bag on site). Also of course theirs the extra weight and the biscuit mix would only be 25mm thick, cant go anymore or would exceed 50mm to final floor finish. Any bright ideas guys?

these come with the Grundfos pumps but I have seen the wilo ones seem to be preferred?

right. so digger experience. dug 20M of drain run, had a bit of a bend but managed to get pipe to fit ? 2M deep at end, about a foot at other but now covered with more soil so a couple of foot or more down. managed to get slope pretty even by eye which was a miracle tbh. Hand shovelling stone in was hardest part! now all filled in and running fine. Started digging out a slope to create a flat level for garden. getting ground level with digger is hard compared to digging trench but a few days work would have taken weeks, at least, by hand. in fact not sure I could have done it given how hard the ground is. best 250 quid ever spent

have you been down to my trench ? slip coupler on order

so when I have dug my trench and connect the 2 ICs together with the UG pipe... how do I manage to given the pipe goes into the coupler, up to the stop and so on, so how do you fit the last bit of pipe given it will be cut longer than the gap so it can fit into the coupler....