Russell griffiths

Our wooden reveals where pre fixed to the windows but I didn't mention that as I thought it might confuse the issue.

Just interested in people's opinions has anybody got all there plans ready for planning, and then completely changed their mind on design? we have spent 6 months getting everything ready and I'm now unsure if the house we have designed will fit in with the surroundings. If I ditch it and start again it will cost me aprox £5000 to start again but if I push on and build it I may have a very expensive show piece that I don't like. Anybody else had the jitters this late on?

This is how ours where done in oz. timber inside reveals was a finger jointed pine, with the architrave of your choice. I actually liked it compared to the standard plastered reveal. It had another benefit if fitting blinds it provided easy fixing points.

I wouldn't use an aircrete type block if rendering, they suck the moisture like crazy and can be a pig to work with. Ok inside as plaster takes to them so much better.

Has anybody used an acid etch. It's used in Australia to scratch up the surface of new polished floor slabs before tiling. Works a treat.

This was going to be a question I was going to ask, 1, where is the water coming from? 2, how are you going to keep it in the hole? 3, as far as I see it if you dig below the water table it will fill up on its own, but it will go up and down as the water table does. Your water will disappear two ways. One evaporation, two it will run out the bottom and sides of the hole. So you really need to do a bit of testing. Dig a few test holes and see what the ground is like. We are on gravel with a very high water table, as you can see from my pics we have more trouble trying to keep the water out than keeping it in.

Is this for an on ground floor or suspended. If on ground as in on top of a concrete floor then can you not hand form it in screed. I have done this a number of times and it is the norm in a lot of other countries,

If going for crushed concrete you need to be quite specific as to what its content is. I have just had a load tipped and 90% was crushed brick after a rough level with the digger and a bit of rain it has turned into red coloured porridge. I stopped the other trucks coming and looked for a different supplier. It was £10 ton which is fairly reasonable but no good if it turns to custard after a drop of rain.

Fill it with fish and you won't have a newt problem anymore. Yummy. Be prepared to get muddy it's a bit of a dirty job

Do it don't tell anybody. We have 3 lakes and a number of large ponds, every time we look into getting consent for something it ends up costing us a fortune. Tell nobody don't upset anybody doing it and get it done. The one in the pic is about a third of an acre, took a week with a 14 ton machine. No spoil left the site cost £1400 to dig and about £200 to plant it and re,seed around it with a wildflower mix. But then again don't listen to a word i say I'm just a bit dodgy. ?

What is going on in the picture with the patio door in that looks like a dip of around 20mm is your slab that far out of level or is it the camera angle. The rest of it looks horrific. With regards putting a straight edge on it and measuring under it this is only any good if the slab is level in the first place, adhesive is not designed to compensate for an unlevel floor slab.

Right I'm no expert but I have built a house that had pvc edge beads and was painted afterwards. We used a scotch bright pad and normal sandpaper to rough up the beads before we rendered, we did not have any problems with an acrylic exterior paint sticking to it, apart from if it took a big hit from something. As as for the silicon I think you will need to get a stanly knife out and do a lot of rubbing with your finger. It does come of pvc very easily just going to take a while. How big are the gaps between the beads? Is this where the silicone has popped out? Like the look of the bricked up window? Its too late now for you but for for anybody else reference you can get a special spray adhesive just for pvc trims.

Sitting here talking to the father in law (retired electrician) and he said they used to fit all metal boxes on a batten between studs and that the plasterboard boxes where only used to add additional sockets when you couldn't get behind the board. You live and learn.

Can you not just chop the stud off and put it in 50mm lower.

Have you got a pic of this dave. If you are fitting the boxes to the batten how is the plasterboard going on, or is this just a counter batten

Get some ply sheeting in to hold the corners. If you lose a corner it will take ages to clean it out and more cost in concrete.

That's good news it may seem like a minor issue but I was actually hating the thought of having sockets half way up my walls.

Not sure this is how I would go about it. Why are you fixing the boxes to the batten I would personally have a lower batten and a higher batten with a service void between, you then use a back box designed to grip on the plasterboard. If you draw your wire runs on the wall before you should be able to avoid any drilling.

You're an absolute font of knowledge @JSHarris ?

Ooh er. Never heard of a heat collector mat. Our other neighbor has 4 pipes in 200 m loops, I'm starting to look into your heating system @JSHarris at the moment. Still loads of research needed. I may start a new topic.

I will pop over and see Anthony and see what he is using, we have also thought about heating from ground source in the lake as our other neighbor has done, but not sure yet as he had to install 800mof pipe which took up a large area of lake bed.

This is the basic outline. We have just over 11 acres, but 8.5 of that is water ?

Anthony Edmonson. By any chance. If so we are just over the road.

Another pic to give you a better idea. The area is in the Cotswolds it's a system of gravel pits that where dug in the late 40s, we own the lake immediately in front of the cabin, this lake is aprox 7 acres in size we have 2 other lakes on site, the build plot is aprox 1 third of an acre, I don't see a problem finding a space that is 10m from water but it will probably mean having to put it under the car park. I will get the hydrology guy on it, we have had a full topo survey done and we actually sit at 88m above sea level, the lake surface is aprox 600mm below ground level and the soil is 200mm topsoil and then gravel. The lake fluctuates by about 100 mm in the course of the year and has an outlet into a small stream at its furthest point from the house site.

Thanks for all your input guys. Thanks to @JSHarris for his explanation on how this all works. @ProDave I'm going to have a dig around on Friday to check level of water, i will try to up load a pic and it will probably explain why our water table is so high. If you look at the wooden looking building with the car parked in front this is where we are trying to get consent for the new place,as far as the leach field goes I have no idea where it is we have owned the site since 1991 and the septic just does its thing, I get it emptied every 2 years. We have loads of space for a new one, we also have a company working with us on flood risk assessment and disposal of rainwater and it was them that suggested the biorock as they said the cleaner discharge means we could stick it different places. I will go back to them. For the money they are charging they might as well earn it.