Russdl

A Combimate solves the potential problem of drinking softened water whilst still keeping lime scale at bay. (There are probably other water conditioners out there but I don’t know of any).

As it’s a new build do a warm roof, put the stairs in and floor the loft. VAT back on all that. Great easy access storage space and then stud walls and windows at a later date if the mood takes you.

As well as the Combimate for drinking water we have a MiniMax (aka Harvey) Water Softener for the rest of the house. These water softeners do not require a mains connection, but do require the block salt being topped up every few months. I highly recommend the set up for an effective defence against hard ‘as nails’ water. None of it is cheap in the short term, but even factoring in the salt/phosphate refills I reckon it’ll end up a very reasonable price to pay in the long run to keep the lime scale away.

@canalsiderenovation I’m guessing you don’t have anything to counter the hard water? As it seems you have a working Quooker/Cube combination for the time being and their after sales service is pretty good perhaps you should tackle the hard water issue first as that is going to kill any replacement boiling water tap you install. We are in a very hard water area as well and we have a Combimate in line before our Quooker. So far have had zero scale issue in 4 years (but we have enjoyed Quooker’s after sales service for numerous other faults - we’re on our third Cube already!!) If you were to go down the Combimate route and still decide to replace the Quooker then at least the replacement tap wouldn’t be killed off by the hard water. The Combimate can do the whole house or just one appliance, as in our case. If it’s just for the one appliance then you only need a half fill of the Combiphos balls every 12 months which would cost around £17/year at current prices.

What could possibly go wrong? (I’m delighted to report that somehow nothing went wrong)

I presume it’s still in its box? Get some rope attached around the box for starters - something to grab hold of when gravity tries to do its thing. My son and I dragged a similar heavy Lusso bath upstairs during the build. We laid scaffold planks on the stairs to make a nice smooth slope and then push/pulled it up, belayed with a rope secured at the top of the stairs. In the photos you posted it doesn’t look like the belaying option is available without trashing your finished walls/carpets, but plenty of muscle as a backstop should work just as well. As we got to the top of the stairs with the bath at a precarious angle we lifted the last two scaffold planks (joined together after the bath had passed) to get the bath horizontal and then slide it sideways onto the landing. Looks like that may not work in your case because of the bannister but you could probably get the bath vertical at the top of your stairs and then with all the muscle around and rope around the box manoeuvre it into the bathroom. Piece of cake!

@Selfbuildsarah that went well didn’t it. ~~~ I don’t have a pie chart, but I do know that the pie I envisioned for the whole project wasn’t big enough, fortunately we managed to find enough extra pie to finish off. That doesn’t help does it.

It looks like two things going on, it’s got wet at the bottom and soaked it up, as @Brickie says, there should be something other than render for the first 150mm up. The other, and most obvious damage is coming from the water tracking off the slabs down the mortar lines and straight onto the render. You need some kind of drip edge under the slabs to stop the water tracking back to the render (plus the mortar needs to get to the end of the blocks). it looks like there are some weep vents in the wall, do they weep or are they blocked/just for show?

How many times a day do you use the kettle? In other words how much is each ‘boil’ costing? No idea what our Quooker cost to run a day producing, on average, 8 or 9 cuppa’s. Perhaps I should monitor it.

I guess that’s to the 8/8th not 8/7th?

Not much. Here’s ours being put together over a terrible sub base and the finished article from a few years ago.

+1 for the pedestal option. I put an ACO drain up against the house and underneath the patio. My pedestals are sat on the ACO and the tiles on top of the pedestals, finishing within 10mm of the window frames. No visible drain.

£?

Is there such a thing that does a decent job?

As expected, they don’t give them away! As I’ve got some bits and bobs lying around I’ll go with rebuild and if that fails reconsider the pro version.

Thanks @Mike, everything was originally built around replacing a 90° bend so that if I screwed it up I could remove my Heath Robinson filter and refit the 90° bend - so the 90° change of flow direction is one of the few certainties. However, I could refit the original 90 and cut out a bit of the straight duct flow for one of those boxes you linked to. I've never seen those before but I suspect they don't give them away - or the filters? I'll take a look.

@JohnMo thats interesting, thanks for the link. @Nick Laslett that would prove difficult to get an airtight seal on the current boxes. I was thinking I could do with something like a ply backed PIR - which of course I've now discovered does exist! As I have a sheet of insulation left over from the garage build I think I'll experiment with the local reinforcement idea, or maybe make my own PIR backed plywood sections, or perhaps a combination of the two. What would be the best way of adhering foil backed insulation to plywood?

My MVHR pre filters have been a rip roaring success save for one aspect, they need to be insulated. To that end I'm going to be remaking them but what material should I use? It needs to be: 1) A great insulator. 2) Easily cut and joine/fixed. 3) Less than 60mm thick. 4) Relatively smooth. 5) Relatively robust (clasps will need to be fitted). A sheet of PIR or similar fits the first 4 criteria but falls down on the last. Does anyone have any good ideas for the perfect material or am I going to be heading off down the MDF or Ply box that is lined internally?

Get a Samsung ‘The Frame’ TV. Satisfies both requirements. Looks like a picture/painting when off (obviously a TV when on) and fits flat to the wall.

Laser level?

Will a film affect your desired solar gain during the winter months? An external shading solution that can be removed when not required would be your best bet. Can you mount sail shades?

@SteamyTea follow Poc’s advice.

And that.

External shading really does the trick. Right now it’s 32 outside, 23.5 in the double aspect - lots of glass - kitchen and 22.8 in the shaded hallway. No cooling of any description apart from running around to open doors and windows when it cools down at night and leaving the safe ones open all night before running around and closing everything up in the morning when the outside temperature exceeds the inside temp. Also MVHR on minimum during the hot day and maximum over the cooler night.

@mjc55 I used foam glass for our detached garage slab, which may be relatable to your pod. Basic details here: