Russell griffiths

Hi is it possible to revise my plans to an application that is already running without having to withdraw our first application and re submit it. Just had a site meeting with our case officer and he hinted at ways we could do things to win his favour. I personally would prefer to fire up the excavator and put him at the bottom of a big hole. ?

I have a brass stopcock (see pic) its on a 32mm main any tips on freeing it. Or can I change the internal bits without disturbing the the connections to the actual pipe. Just thinking whilst it is not leaking it is a shame to disturb it. Ta very much.

Thanks, we love it, I've nearly decided on where I would like my ashes scattered, I plan on being here a long time. If we get consent.

@Ferdinand if you look at the two Photos you can see a large Cotswold stone place, this is my neighbours 6 bedroom 4 bath house, if you look a bit closer you can see a small cabin this is my place, the lake closest the camera is my neighbours and the two lakes above that one are mine. We don't have any restrictions with room and the gravel road, as we own that as well?To be honest we own more or less every thing around us for aprox 250m in any direction. We have a very nice letter from our neighbour in full support of our house starting that he is petrified that if developers were to ever get hold of it then it would get destroyed. We always new we would have an uphill struggle with this as the lawful dwelling we have on site was achieved through the councils inability to enforce there own rules and the cabin on site should have been removed many years ago which we didn't do instead we let it out for the past twenty years with no enforcement from the council, last year we gained a certificate of lawfulness for a permanent dwelling. And we believe put a few noses out of joint at the council.

I'm not sure what point you are trying to get at @Ferdinand why do I want to extend over the lake? we have plenty of land to play with we can move the house in any orientation we need to. The main problem is that the old cabin is so small even doubling its size makes it to small, the smallest we can go to fit the rooms in we want is about 2.5 times the footprint, this is the problem the planning officer has. We have a site meeting this Friday to try and win him around. We have already adjusted the room sizes once and managed to cut 25m off. I don't think 166m downstairs is an overly large house. The thing he is doing is adding in the 46m garage and the two car ports which brings the floor area up a fair bit. When we could easily apply for a large detached workshop with no problems.

What I would add is go and buy some quality filler knives/trowels/spreaders whatever you want to call them, don't be trying to do this job with your old glue covered paint scraper. Also try to get a good finish of the knife, don't rely on sanding, get it 90%first. 4 trowels 3" 6" 12" and a 3" with an angle for corner work. If you want to buy a really expensive giraffe sander I will buy it of you afterwards as I intend to tape and join our whole house.

What is your stud size?

I do have a site plan of the whole area so I might get a nice colour one done.

Snap.

Tiling looks nice. Have you noticed any chipping on cut edges.

Does it give the impression of a green roof. As there actually raised seam metal. In grey.

So now I've finished the model of the proposed house, I'm not sure if it does us any favours. It looks a wee bit bigger than the one it's going to replace ?

You've got it, imagine gravity pulling moisture downwards look at everything so it overlaps in a way that moisture will always have a pathway down and out.

Very good???? yes, scotchbrite pad.

I did my first self build 10 years ago and enjoyed every day. But I set some rules and stuck by them. I worked the same hours I do now so on site at 7.30and off site at 4pm. Only did shopping for materials on Saturday morning and took the wife for a tour and a quick sweep up in the afternoon. Just trying to get permission for our new one now.

Can you guess what the hedges are made from.

So after a previous question. @JSHarris has a lot to answer for, my misses wants a word in his ear as the boot room looks like a bombs gone off with glue and polystyrene bits stuck everywhere. New house model being done now.

That's what I would do.

I must admit even though all our wood is free I hate the amount of effort it takes to cut and split. And I have all the fancy tools to do it as well. Ok super insulated home it is.

Ok tin hat on. Why do I need to build a well insulated house ? i have read a lot on all the houses with 300mm of cellulose in the walls and roof sitting on 300mm of eps, but the wife of the insulating guru wants a woodburner in the boot room/laundry cos it drys the washing well quick. So what are your reasons to insulate so well lets say I get wood for free except the cutting and splitting labour. Why not build a good house that far exceeds current regs and on a chilly night light the woodburner. I see a lot of articles in self build mags that all have a stonking great wood fire in the front room, is it wrong to fit standard double glazing and let a bit of heat escape outside. I will be perfectly honest we are looking at windows at the moment and I have a complete dislike to all these super tilt and turn triple glazed euro offerings. I shall sit over here and wait to be properly chastised. Russ.

i will play devils advocate here. All these answers seam to be very one sided towards the client. If he is site clearing and digging. Who is is paying the digger driver, who is paying for the muck to be taken off site who is paying the labourers wages on Friday. Who hired the dumper. If it was us coming to your job we would have all these things ironed out before we start why am I bankrolling your house build. You have every right to do a company check on him, how would you feel if he asked to see your funding in place to complete the build. I think 20% is far to much to ask, but I would certainly want a deposit of some kind to cover any expenses incurred before they occur (spelling sorry) in my experience I know more contractors who get knocked by a client than clients who's builder has gone bust on them.

Policy 22 according to Cotswold district council restricts any replacement dwelling to be SIMILAR in size to the original property. We are asking to build a house that is 166m with an attached garage of 43m we have a piece of land in excess of 14 acres. apart from our other house that is small. all property around us are large detached barn conversions or substantiall old farm houses with loads of outbuildings. Our neighbour who is completely on our side has a seven bed five bath place. Every single bit of our application makes perfect sense, the planning officer just has a hang up over this similar in size wording.

You really are a clever old stick @JSHarris do you fancy doing mine we are not that far apart

Thanks guys all comments taken on board we are covering everything that has been mentioned. Except @JSHarris I have thought about this and may have a go, can you tell me what you made the models out of.