Declan52

It's hard to guage how much you can save especially when you watch building the dream. He usually comes out with you could save £100k but during the build they end up blowing the savings on better fabric of the house and then whatever fancy bit they want in their pad and if anything is left it goes on the kitchen and bathrooms. But they end up with a higher standard of a house compared to a bog standard turnkey builders finish plus there house is exactly how they wanted it. If you where to just build a normal house that just passed building regs and put the cheapest materials into it ESP kitchens,bathrooms, flooring,tiles and doors then you could easily save a lot of money. Me I reckon I saved maybe £65k. Got the site for free, site next door when for £35k the week I started mine, and saved approx £30k doing all the work I done. But it took me two years working seven days a week with only the frost stopping any work,loved them few days off, so I was basically slave labour.

I don't have much on the worktop where I would put it as it's over the sink. The other corner where the kettle and toaster sits is a completely different scenario.

If you can do split panels with another fine lady on the other side you could be the ham in the worlds best sandwich.

They are only prototypes so depending on demand they will tweak how they are done. I want it at the sink so I assume it's like the TV's you get in showers or they are covered in glass. Some stuff is definitely a bit Chav but the options are endless They do shower screens as well I think.

So how do I do this kind of kitchen splashback on a budget. Rough costs for this is £100 per ft. http://allthingsled.ca/2017/01/11/jan-11-17-kitchen-backsplash/

Building the dream usually covers more of the actual build and goes more into details ESP the heating of the homes. Grand designs is more focused on whatever the wow feature of the house is and gives hardly any details unless it's about who is pregnant/broke/hasn't a clue/sick/stressed out or to much money.

Dear wife is heading to the plumbers merchant to see if she can get a washer, if not will just change the unit. It is one of them 1/4 turn jobs as I had it of and looks clean enough just worn away compared to the downstairs one I also checked.

Main parts that will leak are around your lights and at the wall ceiling junction. First step would be to strip out whatever insulation you have in the loft so you can see where and holes or cracks are. Cracks can be easily covered with good airtightness tape with particular attention to the joins at the wall plate. Holes where cables are coming through the plaster board you can squeeze silicone into the conduit or use the tape again. For spots I used clay plant pots. Looked into all kinds of pretty made units but they where very expensive compared to the 89p pot from b&q. I then used a grinder to cut a notch out of the rim for the cables then sealed the pot to the ceiling using the tape again. There will be some bits usually under your water tank that you will have to use expanding foam to fill gaps as you can't get at them to use tape. Don't forget the seal on the attic hatch. I done all these steps in my last house and it made a real difference to heating upstairs. Took me a good two days. Once done then I rolled out all the insulation again .

We have a push button type cistern that won't stop filling. I have took of the right hand bit with the upside down bucket and it has a rubber washer that looks a bit worn, been in over two years now, so is it just as simple and cheap as replacing the washer or is it the complete unit that needs changing.

Do you not find after a few mins of vibrations you have the urge to drain the vein. Old age and vibrations ain't a good mix.

Very lucky a good friend broke his arm doing the same thing.

Nothing wrong with over thinking as long as it doesn't get to the stage where it's border line obsession. Nothing worse than lying in bed trying to sort out stuff in your head about what is going to happen the next day. I totally understand why some people just pay a builder to do a complete build just to be done with the stress. Some people just can't handle the stress that every build brings while others love it, freaks!!. Me I loved the dirty bit of my build right up to where the choices for kitchen and bathroom stuff needed made. Not my cup of tea all the tramping about showrooms being asked do I know what I want. Give me a deep mucky hole in the ground any day.

I took the hard plastic bit of the end of the hoover hose and put the flexible bit as far in as it would go. Got about 1500mm down the duct. When I put my hand in most of the dust was in the first 200mm not much after that.

Put it this way if that 32t rig sinks and topples over as it will be very top heavy when the boom is up imagine the size of the crane or cranes you will need to get it back up. Sign the cheque for £400 and get the ball rolling.

Can you get the piling company to recommend someone who they know does this test. As you say it's only a few hundred instead of maybe a hell of a lot more of the rig starts to sink to one side.

We used to use the old Landover we had to do this test. You are really meant to use a larger machine like a 15t digger. You jacked the back end up and it tested on a stand that had a circular plate on the bottom. How far it sunk was what you used to determine the settlement of the ground. It's a half a day test so shouldn't be that much. Ask can try use your digger for a weight instead of hiring in a larger machine. Ask will dpc testing do instead as it's basically the same thing. All they are looking to know is will their pilling rig sink when they start working.

The only thing my quartz worktop didn't like was oven pride. The wife had the oven bits in the bag cleaning away but there must have been a tiny hole and some of the solution leaked out and has left a stain. Apart from that I have always tried to set hot pans on a trivet but sometimes I forgot but didn't do any damage.

I went with ATS truss in Portadown but I had prices from Murdock's, Quinn's in coalisland, Haldane fisher, Hawthorne in south Armagh and a few others. I also have a vaulted section over the stairs which was a cut roof. It is only 2.5m wide and took the joiners as long to do it as spread and brace the rest of the truss roof.

When I priced mine up the price of steel made a cut roof over £3k more expensive. Send your plans of too a few truss companies and see what they price it at. I got five quotes for my roof before I bit the bullet.

Could you not just use attic truss on the whole roof and just a small bit of a cut roof over the reception area.

Are the steel beams going from gable to gable resting on a few internal walls along the way. Hard to make out on my phone as I dropped it yesterday and it's screen is a shattered mess!!! If so could you get away with 150mm on the gables and 215mm on the internal walls where two beams meet.

Normally go that route if you are holding up concrete slabs. If it's only going to be a truss or even a cut roof its a bit overkill. You can use 6*4 blocks if it's holding up slabs. If you go that route it will be twice the amount of blocks plus twice the motar bill plus twice for the bricky to build them walls so think hard as it will definitely add up to the costs.

The condensation is rising and hitting the felt so if you have maybe 2 tiles at the bottom of the roof and 2 at the top front and back this should cure it. How many vents will depend on how wide the roof is. Can you look under the first row of tiles to see if the is a eaves strip vent. Should look like this. http://www.plasticdrainage.co.uk/1m-continuous-eves-vent-strip-10mm-8531.html

You need a breeze to be able to blow through one side collect the moisture and out the other so have a look to see if the insulation is touching the felt at the wall plate stopping the air getting in. A couple of vent tiles would be a quick fix if you can get onto the roof without killing yourself.

No matter what method you pick you will need to make sure the base is sound. A min of 200mm well wacked in stone or you will end up with ruts as it starts to sink. If you are going for tarmacing then you will need kerbs or each time you drive over the edge it will push out and break off. You don't have to use an actual road kerb, not much fun to lift, I am just using concrete garden edge set 70mm high. Cost £2 each last time I bought some. For concrete you can shutter the sides so it sets and being stronger at the edge it won't need a kerb. I would def put it lay it in bays, much easier to get perfect and if it cracks is only a single section to replace.