Russell griffiths

What I will say is, have you priced up those I joists thinking this will be a cheap way to build a wall I think is wrong. I have just had my i joists for my roof delivered, the cost of the i joist instead of standard timber was far more than double the price. Looking at an mbc twin twin stud wall, this is a cheaper method, it sticks to standard cls sized timber with spacer blocks. I joists are exspensive.

Just because the field next door is good for strip foundations doesn't always mean that yours will be. You can have rock in one field sticking out of the ground and peat in the next. This is also very true, with my situation I found my closest neighbours had piled, and the house500m away was on piles, and 200 new holiday homes being built where on piles, so it sort of dawned on me that’s what was going to happen.

We have just finished our icf, we went with nudura very happy with the outcome, nudura rep. Steve burgess 07703565594. Structural engineer. Anthony Bartlam 01527835000 having looked through a lot of companies portfolios I can’t see any reason you can’t build what you want with icf.

You may find with lead you get a bit of staining, ask him about patination oil.

I have used aluminium and liked it.

When I started thinking about foundations I walked around all the neighbourhood and looked for anything that was newly built, I talked to all the owners to find out what they had done for foundations, I asked 3 different neighbours and got the same answer from all of them. Why dont you do a bit of legwork, and ask locally.

We have had 3 different ecology type things that needed doing, all by different companies as I didn’t like the first 2, you need to find a very tame one who won’t find a thing, you then need to prep your site so that there is nothing to find.

When I had my topography survey done, the surveyor said it will take you a year to get planning, i replied, watch this space mate I will have it all sorted in 6 months 16 months and £14600 later I started the foundations.??

Yep as above thats another grand you will wonder why you had to spend

I did have to push him a bit, I’m afraid I’m not scared to ask a dodgy question or two, I like to get a feel for the bloke on the end of the phone.

So am I ok to give the epc bloke just enough info to meet regs, but then install what I want. Fyi, I won’t be selling in the next 15 years so not worried about re sale effect

All the house I joists are 69wide. The garage being a wider span stepped up to 96mm, I have had a shit day cutting them, I’m so glad they weren’t speced all over as it would have been hell.

Can anybody tell me more about epc certificates and rhi payments i have been talking to a co to day about ground source heat pumps, off the record it sounded as though he told me that if our house just scraped through building regs, then it would get a larger rhi payment than if it was a super dooper insulated thing. As usual to me, as I deal all day in common sense, this made no sense to me. He told me to get my epc to just pass building regs but then build the house better and don’t tell anybody.

If you had seen me cutting my 96mm wide I joists with the chainsaw you would have had to look away.

Bloke in Swindon has it for £10 a panel. Are you near by.

Have a look at how a Velux roof window opens, that could solve it.

Your learning keep it up. ??

Hi where are ya.

Let me know if you get it, as I’m a bit of a computer thicko.

Hi, I have just had an e mail with this exact thing in it send me your e mail via pm and I will forward it to you.

From my research when I was going to do timberframe that looks spot on what I would say is use a specific product for the cill pan, just wrapping your external membrane into the opening will not do, it needs to be fully waterproof. A lot of literature i read said a good belt n braces approach was to tilt your cill plate 5degrees down so any water getting to the cill pan gets gravity to pull it outwards.

So if the builder has a preference, what don’t you like about his choice? I agree about trying different things, but it seams as though you are going into such fine details that you may be missing some big points usability from the people doing the build would be very high on my list. Imagine getting half way through and having a row with the builde, him saying I can’t stand these crappy blocks you wanted them I wanted to use the ones we had previous experience with. It happens, as for steel verses plastic, believe me when that concrete goes in and drops 2.5m vertically it sticks to everything i had a bit of a brain faid on mine and forgot to put in a beam pocket, so had to chop it out with a kango a week later, that wall was the most solid wall I’ve ever had to cut a hole in, the concrete was stuck fast in every nook and cranny it could find. Shrinkage away from any of the internal steel reo or plastic Webb’s completely non existent.

Have you forgotten where you live ?? I would think it will all be ok when you get the doors open in August if your worried give them a wash down with a bleach solution and let the wind blow through.

A funny thing happened this week, I had a lad visit my site to collect some blocks I had left over, we got chatting and he said that he has had to Change block supplier half way through his build as the quality of the blocks he was getting was so poor. This must have been a massive decision to make, and not something that was easy to achieve as the two makes where not at all compatible. So go and look at some builds that use the blocks you want to build with. Talk to the lads doing the build and get their opinion. Dont go by the crap in the brochure.

If your engineer is familiar with ICF then what has he worked with previously what ones has he had dramas with who is building this ? why not ask the builder what one he wants to use if you are not building it, then tbh your opinion doesn’t count for much, ask the guys screwing it all together what they want in a system. Having just put over 2000 screws in my icf I’m glad I didn’t have to screw into metal webs.