Russdl

Our washing machine is integral and not floor mounted on the bosses insistence to make loading/unloading easier. I was terrified at the prospect of having a washing machine in a kitchen unit AND off the ground, I could foresee no end of calamity’s befalling us. Two years on and I’ve stopped checking it when it’s on a spin cycle. It hasn’t fallen out of its cubby hole. It hasn’t moved at all. Before the spin starts the washing machine turns the clothes and agitates the drum to try and balance the load. If it can’t balance the drum to a reasonable level it won’t spin. Just to clarify. The unit is specifically designed to take a washing machine and is suitably reinforced. It also has to be fitted either between other units or, as in our case, a wall and units. The wall hung cupboards have to be there as well.

Whilst the thread is drifting slightly from the OP’s original question I can say, regarding sound transfer, our experience is the air gap under the doors does not permit sound transfer as you may expect. On carpeted floors, if you close the door the noise pretty much goes away, and that is the case for carpet inside the ‘noise’ room and carpet/hard flooring outside the ‘noise’ room. However, if there is hard flooring from one side of the door to the other (downstairs toilet in our case, tiles run from the hallway to the toilet without a threshold) then that’s a different story, the gap’s not so good then, sound does find its way under that gap. I turn the music up.

I’d say “don’t” for all the reasons @Thorfun highlighted plus I guess you’d be cutting something down to do it and it would take an age for minimal gain.

You can try and add the door in the least disruptive (temporary) way, get signed off and then remove the door and flog it. We had similar requirements as our loft space is open to below with a fixed staircase. We have a pocket door to the kitchen which had to be fire rated. It is, and it is still there but it is almost never closed so may as well not be there. We do have a good smoke/fire alarm system fitted.

I think I may have neglected my pre-filters the last time I cleaned the MVHR filters. Once again the MVHR Seemed to be getting noisier, initially I put it down to me just always listening out for any noises but this morning when it did it’s morning switch from 100m3/hr to 200m3/hr it sounded like it was on boost. I went to have a look and this time remembered my pre-filter! 🤮🤮🤮 not the best photo but you can probably see that it is absolutely bogging. Almost completely blocked by all sorts of detritus. I don’t think it’s been neglected for more than 6 months so I’m surprised how bad it is. The only thing I can think of is that we seem to have had many more days of northerly/easterly winds of late (according to my gut feeling) and we have cultivated fields that side. I measured the noise with an app on my phone up against a supply terminal before and after replacing the pre filter. 41db before 33db after. Also the power draw 67W before 34W after. I must remember to keep an eye on those pre filters.

God bless the planners. God bless the architect’s… What do they actually want? I’ve never heard of that daylight/sunlight requirement before. What is it? It can’t cost £2250+ to see where sun and shadow are throughout the year? Is that what they want??

Depending on how long it takes you to finish I think moving in like that could potentially affect your VAT reclaim so check that out carefully as well.

We’re in a hard water area and condition the drinking water from our Quooker (cold and boiling) with a Combimate phosphate dosing conditioner. It’s been up and running for around three years with no sign of scale on the tap at all. Should fit your bill 👍

@Mr Blobby We used the Portman Pocket Door System. They are good but they are not without their issues though. As I said earlier I would only recommend them where they are seldom used (for the potential noise issue) or where they are the only solution and where they won’t need redecorating. Ever.

Ours disappear completely into the pocket when open and are basically invisible. To close it you push it in against a spring loaded plunger that ejects the door out of the pocket enough to access the recessed handle and pull it closed.

We have two floor to ceiling pocket doors that are pretty much permanently open, to my mind that is the best use of a pocket door i.e. where it's seldom used. If it's a door that will be opened and closed frequently then noise of the door opening/closing may be an issue. If the doors are painted (ours are) then repainting the doors, especially for the system we have (Portman pocket doors) will be pretty much impossible, I think with the Eclisse system the door can be removed from the pocket after installation so that problem would go away. As already highlighted but obviously depending on the pocket build up, services will be tricky on the pocket side of the door. If pocket doors are not essential for space saving I would recommend against them.

So the hinged bit opens open and the desk bit comes down by the looks of things, a strip of veneer (with something behind it for strength) attached to the bottom of the hinged bit would mask the gap. Kinda agree with the boss, those hinges shouldn’t be visible.

@SlivenClod Our sub base was the remnants of a building site (type 1, gravel, sand etc). All manner of stuff that was well compacted and not particularly level. I levelled the spot that each pedestal sat on before placing the tiles on top. It all looks nice but if you were to lift the tiles up it’s as rough as a badgers arse underneath.

@SelfbuildNovice have you got someone onboard with passive house experience? If you do still plan to go down the route of Passive Haus certification then the PHPP will greatly inform the design. Currently your east elevation has a lot of glazing which will lead to significant overheating without suitable shading as will the roof lights over the kitchen/snug (that is likely to be a very light/bright room, do you need those roof lights?) Regarding the garage, I’m guessing it’s never going to have a car in it so is it necessary? The garage door is not the only problem regarding passive house, it’s also how you get from outside to inside without creating a huge thermal bridge at the floor. Good luck revisiting the plans. 👍

That explains the size, how come it’s not named accurately? Is that something you’re happy with or feel you have no choice over? Which is the south facing part of the roof?

@SelfbuildNovice As a new build I would have expected it to look a bit more contemporary but each to their own. In all honesty it looks like an extension/renovation project of an 80's "Executive House" where a checklist of desired rooms have been thrown in anywhere they can be made to fit but in this case it looks like most of those rooms don't actually fit or work very well. As a starter, on the ground floor; is that a garage door to access the pantry from outside? What's all that about? If that really is meant to be a garage door then that will make your passive target more difficult. Why is the pantry/utility so huge (what do people keep in pantries?) The Snug won't be that snug as it's in the kitchen and you have to go through the Snug to access the dining room. The living room looks very narrow but can be kind of expanded by opening it up to the hallway/stairs. Is that really something you're likely to do?? If you're going for passive you won't need that fireplace. Which way is south? The shadows on the elevations are contradictory.

For our Quooker the ‘hot’ water comes from the Sunamp which is a softened supply and only provides the hot water. The ‘cold’ is direct from the mains via a Combimate water conditioner and provides the cold water. That conditioned cold supply is what gets heated for the boiling tap and cooled/fizzed for the cold/fizzy tap. No scale build up from either supply and we’re not drinking softened water.

If the en-suite is tight will there be room for the pocket for the door to slide in to or will there be plumbing and stuff in the way?

Asking for a friend who asked what I knew about this company, Welink Homes. I know nothing, never heard of them and I can’t find any technical data on their website. Does anyone know anything about them?

You need to do it. There’s almost certainly an issue somewhere and you need to find out where in time for the snagging.

@pocster we do refer to it as the ‘Upstairs Basement’. I guess it’s a sign of my sheltered upbringing that ‘Hidden Pleasure Dungeon’ didn’t spring to mind when it came to the naming ceremony.

I did something very similar in our loft with a similar frame work but used timber top rail as well. It’s not decorative in any way shape or form. We used 9mm MDF for the doors which has proved more than adequate.

Can you make 1220mm doors work as that is the width of a sheet of MDF, at 1250+ there will be lots of waste and more expense I suspect. A thin strip across the top of the doors of 30-40mm would let 1220mm doors work and may give a neater finish.

I’d say so. Do that shopping around and find someone who at least knows something about one of the disciplines, preferably both.

The scenario you describe I can’t imagine it’s anything other than a water leak from somewhere, somehow. My experience is that a tiny water leak takes quite a while to manifest itself and the water is coming from nowhere near where the damp patch is appearing. Our similar damp patch was half a meter from the slow and steady drip drip and not under the wall where the drip was coming from.