Cpd

Sorry but being a bit slow on the uptake... is this pre filter on the outside air coming in or pre filter on the extract from say kitchen ? And if kitchen where would these be fitted ? I was intending to put a recirculating hood over the cooker and an extract in the stairwell as there is a fire door at the top and heat and escaped cooking smells could accumulate. I like the idea of potentially preventing the mvhr pipe work getting dirty. I use pre filters on our dust masks and they are great at prolonging the life if the main filter by a long way and can see how this could be a great idea.

Yes i am stuck in Germany while my better half and the kids are in the guts of the bad weather on the west coast of Scotland..... find out on Sat how they and the buildings faired, its a total wind funnel my place......

Just an update. Have been busy working out and recording all the existing and intended layers of materials that make up my cottage, this will (with a bit of help) will give me the details i need to enter the data into Jeremys spread sheet and work out my space heating requirements. I am now trying to get all my ducks lined up to go hard at it this spring and summer with the hope that the end will be in sight by the end of summer...... I overstepped by making it unliveable in the frustration that is caused by scratching round the edges and now need to get things back under control. The very basic idea is to re insulate the inside with calotex and then osb and plaster board, obviously there is a lot more to it than that but dont want to bore you all to death with my long lists of wall and ceiling build ups.... But the short of it is Walls Ventilation gap between outer stone work and inner framing 50 x 70mm internal framing infilled with calotex 70mm calotex over frame Osb Plasterboard The upstairs has Vaulted ceilings and these have been filled with 170mm of calotex with a further 25mm over the rafters, osb and plasterboard When i have worked out my heating requirments with the help of Jeremys spread sheet i will then start to look into the UFH layout and DHW.

I am adding 25mm of calotex to the underside of my rafters which have 170mm already in them. I will then be putting up osb and then plasterboard. My question is should i use everbuild pink grip or soudel low expansion foam to initially hold them in place. I imagine i would cut the sheets to size, foam or pink grip the sheet and push it into place, temporarily fix a batten across to hold the sheets in place until its all finished and then remove battens and foam up the gaps, cut back and tape the joints. Its just a matter of what would work best on that initial pushing up into possition. Once the osb is screwed up its not going anywhere. Or should i be using something completely different? Thanks in advance.

Just going to say it out loud, its really easy to rip the siht out of a place but can be very expensive and very time consuming to rebuild it to even basic passable levels. I dont know your story but i think you need to take a step back and take stock as this looks like a whole massive can of trouble. As a teenager i brought my first 1975 landrover for £500, it looked great, but good quality aluminium body panels look good for a very long time, it had no MOT i was just stary eyed and over enthusiastic, it was not until i took it round to my best mates dad who was a really good agricultural Machanic that the truth was laid out in simple facts. It was a total and utter wreck and the best thing i could do was walk away. But that was not an option i wanted to take and spent the next two years rebuilding it....... i learnt a lot and that experience has got me out of a lot of trouble over my life. So back to my point, this is looking like a massive job and you need to work out how the hell you are going to get it under control, if you only have a small budget then your going to need to price the whole lot up. Need to do that anyway. Whats it going to cost to just get that place to a minimal rentable standard, do you have the time and skills to do the work, if not the budget is going to sky rocket. It really looks like the condition of the building is potentially terrible, and righting terrible can cost a fortune. You must understand what you are dealing with before you start spending money, i have made this mistake twice in my life and am still working through my second overstep. You need to ask some hard questions and get some straight answers, it looks like a money pit and i am just trying to warn you of the potential nightmare that this could be if you dont go into it with your eyes wide open. Ok thats that of my chest, i dont want to sound dour but i would not like to sit back and say nothing and potentially see your project crush you in more ways than one. I am talking from hard experience. I would say good luck but.....

Great looking project, i was sailing round Eigg this summer and used to help the gardener way back when Schellenberg owned the place...... many great experiences there and my first real bad experience with whiskey..... teenage years. Look forward to seeing the build come together.

Not sure about that modern blue downpipe ........ the building looks great, love how the insteped corner works, it makes the whole building so much more interesting and inviting, really good.

You dont need to ventilate directly below if you use the corect membrane, not sure which would be best for noise as no batten = direct noice tranfer into timber sheeting and battens create a break between sheeting and tin BUT create a space that could act like a drum ! And make the noice worse....... lots to think about and as i said i am very intrested as i have future projects that will have corrugated tin roofs and i want to make them more acoustic sealed than my calotex roof. Using diffrent density insulation will help as it absorbs diffrent noice wavelengths or some such technical term...... i think there is a lot of merit in using blown in cellulose as its so good on so many levels, due to location this just would not be possible for me but i would use it at the drop if a hat if i could.

Sounds like you both have a lot to offer from some intresting areas, welcome and look forward to hearing more as you move forward.

Well i can tell you what does not work, my room in roof has calotex in between the rafters 190mm fully foamed and sealed and you can still hear the rain beating down, i intend to put acoustic plasterboard up but this will be to little to late. Abstract thinking only tin roof attached to battens BUT with an acoustic dampener between the top batten and the cross batten cross batten breather membrane timber sheeting rafters 50mm breather gap dense acoustic rockwool batt 100mm timber fibre board to the inside face of the rafters calotex over the rafters vcl somewhere.... within one of the top layers service void if needed osb acoustic plasterboard You could take it all the way to the inside of the rafters and then wait for it to rain and make a decision on the final build up, adding in extra measures if required. Decoupling the plasterboard on professional acoustic hangers would be the final big step. As i said i am just thinking aloud but will be intrested to see what others come up with. Just read jsh post and that seems a lot easier but then i dont do things the easy way......... still learning.

I have been somewhat ill over the last two years and four months ago i started a paleo ketogenic diet that eliminated a vast amount of everyday food, i am not miraculously cured but i am better than i have been for two years, time will tell but so far i am amazed at what just changing my diet has done to improve my health.

Sealey AK4701 Cobalt Drill Bit Set 19pc Metric very good about £30 off amazon have not managed to blunt one yet

Treating it will keep the wow factor if treated with the right sort of oil, someone will be along with the brand i am sure.

If there is no food supply they would most likely be dead already, they must have a way to get food and water, so as you say probably through the vent holes, hopefully an easy fix

A very detailed inspection of the outside of the property will be required, including and areas Outwith the building but conected to the building such as services hatches etc. As previous comments, block up all potential problem points and then set a bunch of traps, not poison in my opinion. They will be hungry over the next few days. After catching them all just wait and listen, if all quiet then job done, if not further inpections and repeat from the beginning until the desired outcome is gained. In some of the less likely places i jammed in stainless steel wire wool pan scrubbers and then squirted expandable foam into a the compressed scrubbers, this stops both flys and wind and extends whe metal life considerably. It would be obvious if mice were trying to gnaw through and a more permeant solution could be implemented as needed.

Maybe not the best solution but when i decided i did not like the “natural” weathering on my larch clad building i painted it with a brown wood preserver, l love the neat look that the one colour brings to the building, so.... you could paint it with an anti fungal /coloured wood preserver and save a lot of money and time.

Yup had the same problem in my very cold bathroom, put a fan with overrun timer in and undercut the door, we hang the floor towel on the back of the door and as the air is sucked from under the door it helps dry the floor towel, one less wet item to cause problems.....

Great stuff just saved £68 on a new dust extractor x3 new saw blades and x2 makita batteries.

As previously mentioned compressing the acoustic slab is counter productive. Upgrading to acoustic plasterboard would be a move in the right direction, detailing is essential if you want any measures to work to there full potential. It all comes down to what you want in regard to the acoustic performance of your build.

I much prefer the slab as it can be cut really accurate with a sharp knife. as mentioned you do not want both sides touching. In my ceiling / first floor i put 50mm acoustic roll then 100mm rockwool RW3 slab and then another 50mm of the roll stuff, then a 50mm air gap and then the chipboard floor. However as previously mentioned if noise reduction is very importent to you then you need to look at a specific solution designed for this. Remember that flanking noise if not addressed will make nearly all your efforts for nout if you do not take it into serious consideration. I would recomend the dense slab in your walls, carfully fitted with a gap on one side or other. P.s remember to use lots of acoustic mastic around and in all gaps.

I really really like the look of the photo @Russell griffiths But how on earth do those massive H beams not cause a world of trouble..... i know its the design you like and am sure you would not make such a thermal bridge ! But its still impressive.

@PeterW i geuss i am always over engineering things...... comes from spending a lifetime building stuff that has a life expectancy of hundreds of years..... photo example. Unless its “bomb proof” i start to worry...... just got to get over it as best as i can. My idea with the 6mm ply was to try and get a slightly more robust feel to the floating floor. Whats your opinion..... i can take it. Down stairs Floor build up living area aprox 4.8 x 4.3m Concrete slab Calotex 90mm Bonded to flooor with foam 20mm underfloor heating pipe boards bonded to Calotex with foam Thin underlay as recomended by heating board website...... possible 6mm ply floating on underlay 16mm solid strand, tongue and groove bamboo flooring fully bonded to ply with flexible something or another..... I have not come to a conclusion about the kitchen area 4.12m x 4.3m (considering tiles as i have quite a lot) or the open corridor 4.3 x 0.9m that leads from the front door directly to the stairs on far side of building, was considering some sort of stone slab Effect as it is only 5m long x 900mm wide and will be where the coats and boots get dumped... more research into this. Could you recomend the type of foam as i have only used Siroflex Expanding Foam, Gun Grade. Not rushing into this as i will need to buy materials as and when i can afford them but i want to know exactly what i am going to use, where it will come from and how much it will cost. As always. Thanks

@willbishNo it is due for delivery in the next few days..... was just reading through @PeterW recomendation https://www.wundatrade.co.uk/shop/home/20mm-eps-400-overfloor-board/ and just trying to work out the best possible outcome with a MAX floor build up of 130mm so far i had Insulation 90mm (probably two layers with cross battens) attached to floor Some sort of sub bace wood under floor 18mm attached to battens Wunda underfloor heating board 20mm glued to sub. Floor But that only leaves me with 2mm ! For my final floor coverings! Go figure was just about to go back to the various threads on floor coverings and see what my options are. Would really like to use the underfloor heating option downstairs, sure it would satisfy @Nickfromwales a bit better than the large radiators i had thought about..... still working on a bunch of data for @JSHarris to help me with actual heat requirments, nearly there. its a long project but i want to get it as close to right as i can and the help here is just fantastic and a little humbling.

I think that most people would have different levels of input and reward needs as we all have different personal situations that have to be met, me i have no money but i can at least quirky holiday accommodation in return for a helping hand with a task i have very limited skill in. It will be intresting to see what others have to say.

I think its a great idea, i am so far away that i expect i would have to entice people with free holiday accommodation and world class views, then i could show them some stonework tricks and when we are tired go and look at the complicated stuff......