ToughButterCup

Keep it simple. Ask a couple of well - regarded local firms to come and 'have-a-look-at-the job'. No exploratory work ( as in "Well to answer your question, we'll need to take this out and that down and fiddle with this" ) . Listen hard to what the people say. You'll learn a good deal from those conversations. Then get back to us and we'll make it all much more complicated than it needs to be. 🤔

Sane living means ease of use. And that means efficient storage. Efficient storage means reduced self-build stress.

Manager ? In reality I'm the resident labourer, and got fed up falling over stuff left behind by others. So the role evolved into - every day- clearing up after everyone else. Clearing up is a very necessary job: bit like oiling the cogs in a machine. Clearing up wet concrete has to be done at the time - but mostly you cant do that. So it needs planning for. @TerryE's suggestion saved my sanity. I would have blown a fuse if I'd been faced with @Spinny's ermmm, dump We have about half an acre, so a good few nooks and crannies . House is about 10 by 10m I think it was @TerryE who -years ago - suggested self builders make a storage plan - so I did. Very glad we did TBH.

Washout is useful. Now, 5 years later, I find myself wishing we had more. We built a 10 by 8 , and 6 inch deep lined pit. The resulting washout area became a useful base for all sorts of things during the build after concreting. And then, when broken up it was piled up out of the way. We found a use for very last bit of it.

How about cover as many car parks as we can with solar PV.... ?

Welcome. How much of a slope? A gentle slope is a massive advantage. 1 in 1 , not so much. We used about 2000 (ish) tonnes of MoT1 and other stuff ( dig-out from elsewhere) to make the raft sit 'comfortably' Tell us about your slope please! Ian

Ahhhh, thats nuffin ..... 🙃 OR Take your pick. Exactly, @saveasteading I'm so glad - in retrospect - that our two disasters were dealt with by a properly professional company. Because they discovered more incompetence and rectified it - and here's the kicker ... for less than the original company were attempting to charge me. They were going to take me to court for non-payment, until I sent them the security video evidence. Its an ill wind that blows nobody any good To your point @saveasteading: I wonder how the repair in the first post was financed?

I used a pair of these for a year, until a pair of wrens nested in them two years in a row. They tucked themselves up underneath the cross-beam where the legs attach to the beam. The following year the (same?) wrens decided to use the padlock cover I welded onto our container doors. I know when I'm beaten.

Christ @SteamyTea , what size stiletto heels do Cornish folk wear down your way ? Judging by the three that are visible above the glass in the photo they'd fit Shrek's missus !

Plant pots on top of the glass right? Have they been watered recently? If so, temperature difference

Two Bosch workbenches. PWB 600. I've had them since 2016, been outside in all weather for almost every day since then . Cost £80 ( then) I'm going to replace them with the one @Nickfromwales suggests because the replacement cost of the Bosch is now £120 - at least Dick Turpin had the decency to wear a mask.

"Freedom Citizens, Freedom. Come the revolution we will remember..."

Language matters. Reading it with care matters more. Thats why any text should be read with polite, respectful scepticism. Hardest of all is reading ones own words with the same detachment.

Its worth doing a @markc above anyway because stainless set screws reduce the annoyance of lifting the I/C cover when - several years later - you're in a hurry to get it lifted . And, of course, the slot for the screw driver has been buggered. Might be worth a Torx screw head (?)

Thanks @SteamyTea . yes, it is useful Ian

Skips: I hate them. Specially this one: after ten years at this game, the last one (maybe) And I love them (other peoples). The day before they are picked up, I dream about them. Sad Bastard ======================================== Monument to ten years toil You hold the decade carved from sleep, Heavy tax of muscles, laughter, cash, and tears. Buried in your belly, dark and deep, Miscut rafters from the early days, Hardened mortar from a novice phase, (I know how to mix mortar now) Are stacked like layers of a lifetime spent. Each rusted panel of your hollow frame Has watched us age, yet stayed the exact same, (apart from the rusty bits) A silent witness to a spine well-bent. Ten winters bit our hands upon this ground, Ten summers scorched the dust into our skin, While every spare pound that our pockets found (well some of it was found down the back of someone else's sofa) Was swallowed by the walls we stood within. Now blueprints yield to final, finished stone, ( well cladding aksherly) And you receive the scraps of what has grown, ( to be fair some of it was rotten) The final clearing of a warrior’s field. Go ride the lorry down the tarmac track, Take all our toil, don't look back, For out of waste, a home is finally sealed. Still not signed off. Stuff it. Ain't gonna sell it anyway Little Miss Muffit. ( her from the LPA) Now other peoples skips - I just love em.

Selected with care and a view to the long term, plants are the best shade. But they weigh much more than I thought they would.

I didn't know that a meniscus had an arse. Ya live and learn dun'tcha....

As @Russell griffiths above. Gaulhofer 4.5 meter window -open 10mm for the last few days and locked in place, right next to the dog's cage. Why 10mm? So the bloody cats can't drop blood-soaked presents off for the dog, just outside her cage . little sods.

Thats the one big lesson for self building

Ughhh @steamy, genuinely sorry for you this weather: my son's pub kitchen is hot even in freezing weather. Not funny.

Working on the shady side of the outside of the house after about 9am. We both like the heat, SWMBO quite happily in her greenhouse (!) - I couldn't stand that. Sleeping is OK - blinds down all day and veranda doors open all night. Workwear Running shorts : nowhere to put my phone - so my watch has separation anxiety every few minutes No built-in knee pads : we now need three kneeling pads - but I can never find one No pockets : drill bits and screws line up along my lips - not long before I swallow one I expect Sandals : no toe protection - suddenly very fussy about dropping stuff Angle grinder: sparks look like fun normally, until the hot metal chipping stream fizzes down your leg and some of them get trapped against your skin under the sandal strap SWMBO feels sorry for me - jugs of iced water

Sometimes - with care - a heat gun (hot air, not a flame thrower) will loosen things up a bit

Ummm, how many of us have been looked after in hospitals by British citizens, how many of our parents are looked after by immigrant Care Workers? Without them ... ?

Culture cannot be lost. Ever. It simply is. The key issue is who is examining it and why. The motive underlying the examination is important. British Culture is not static. It is not fixed. It is - and always has been - an ever changing mixture of things. In culinary terms, its a Full Rolling Boil. And it always will be a mixture. The good people of Honiton took lace makers from Flanders into their community ( bobbin lace) in about 1500 ( Hence "He's spinning a yarn" today) . Or have your knuckles rapped as a child when the school teacher saw a child dropping a lace making bobbin. The rapping was done with a bit of wood. 500 years later the closest we get to their influence is a bit of fine lace and a couple of pithy sayings. And how many of us have not been really glad to see a Polish plumber ? Or a Philippino nurse ? Or a Ghanan Care Assistant? The UK has been immeasurably enriched by immigrants: over time they've contributed to our culture - not all of them, but the vast majority have come here and been a net contribution to the GDP and the Tax regime here. We can't lose it (British Culture) because - it - changes minute by minute, day by day. Culture is the very essence of Change being Normal.