ToughButterCup

Is that the guy whose wife has been desperate for some while, she's desperate to transform her home, but he never quite gets round to it? You know, the one with the ' ... nightmare hallway and awful kitchen... ' ?

You are in familiar territory. The end of one thing and the beginning of another. I hope these two resources will be of some help. You might like to have a look at this resource (The Party Wall Act ) Here's a link to the official Explanatory Booklet I suspect you might have already done this, but if you haven't...... Welcome by the way! Ian

They don't need the work @Russell griffiths. We paid £2.5k and that price included extra work asked for on the day (some extra holes)

Quite the opposite. It's a question of balance. How do you work out what to do? Network. Charm a few local builders to sniff around it. Same with local estate agents. Take a local planner round too. Listen. My fingertips are saying - knock it down and rebuild. It's likely to be cheaper and quicker. Welcome by the way Ian

I really appreciate it when members think with me. We tried that, @Onoff, and it worked - to an extent. We also tried three other ways. Sometimes it didn't work with any method, and we had to get on with other stuff. Now we face the challenge of extracting threaded bar from fully cured concrete by a self-build enthusiast who has never before used a core drill made a safe working platform at that height out of kwikstage (and appropriate fall prevention precautions) tends not to read instructions How hard can it be with that mix of online readers and a just-bloody-do-it approach? Just for the record, I went to Screwy's and told them about my Erbauer core drill set. At their suggestion, they replaced the whole set , no quibble, and in addition gave me a £5:00 credit. So I bought a scaffolder's magnetic level as well. I know SF come in for some stick, but replacing a complete set of core drills without even the beginnings of a quibble is first class. Well done ScrewFix.

Durisol North are visiting (again) tomorrow; we discussed the issue of creating online T+L materials last summer. Who knows what will come of it? Lord knows, I have enough source material to put together a course on ; How to screw up a Durisol Build In One Easy 10 week Course, (while maintaining a sense of humour) and (now I come to think about it) How to Cope with the Consequences of a Screwed Up Durisol Build (in 20 hard lessons. Lesson 1: don't use a core drill bit on hammer - the teeth fall off) There's a new build in Durisol in Lancaster starting this week. Bet they know about diamond core drill bits. Can't take a joke? Shouldn'a started should I?

Nowt. Except interstitial condensation, mould, gnashing of teeth, foaming at the mouth, hair and teeth flying in all directions. And anyone and everyone on this forum who is in the slightest interested in passivhaus shaking their head saying "Has he learned nothing?"

Back in this thread, I explained how we were going about remedial works to cope with the likelihood of further poor workmanship of our original installer . The strategy relied on installing shuttering: that in turn needed to be tied in with threaded bar. Since that threaded bar was going to be immersed in concrete, those bars needed to be extracted a bit sharpish. Of the 140 odd we installed, a few stuck fast. Today the steep learning curve on how to extract those that remained. The idea was to core from the inside (concrete) from inside - outwards and then just pull the rest of the bar out of the PIR. At first, using a 25mm core, like this I found that I fouled the threaded barrel by drilling slightly off center. So, back to the 38mm core and bingo What did I learn? Don't use a diamond core bit on hammer. You knock the teeth off the core bit. Shutter Durisol no matter what they say on their website. It ain't wurf it, mate, ain't wurf it. ( @jamiehamy, sit back and smile ) Sharp lessons in self-build: at least one or two sharp lessons a week at the current rate.

Whatcha gonna buy then? I bought a DeWalt second-fit nailer. Only because the Bosch one was so universally badly reviewed, and subsequently withdrawn from sale.

Have I got this right? You are thinking of either selling plots of land to finance your own self-build Or building some houses to finance your own build Tell us about the research you have already done. No point in us suggesting ideas you have already had is there?

OK then boys... (sorry @lizzie, @Hecateh, @Moira Niedzwiecka and every other woman in the world )..... How do you level a pump? Eh? Tell me that, now

Who is ' ...we...' in this case. TBH I am more guilty than most of the opposite

There ya go! If anyone wants to know why I keep coming back to BH, here's the answer. Thanks Nick Ian

I'd heard of the back off a 1/4 turn , but not WD40 on the isolators valves. I've just renewed the valves because the previous lot were seized solid - because I didn't know about using WD40 on them.... Hmmm. Ya dunno whatcha dunno do ya?

Here's what needs replacement. Just checking that there isn't some hidden gottcha about them.... Thanks Ian

I am pretty sure that all the main suppliers offer a table which matches their products to 'demand' . I understand that intermittent use is challenging for off mains systems. That leads me to guess that something which injects a small air 'trickle' through the liquor might well be useful. Paul Usher from Klargester has been a tremendous help to us: he was honest enough to (after two site meetings) suggest we didn't need one of his products. He also has (had?) a blog about off mains drainage. Top bloke. Ian

The cheque is in the post, @Declan52 Yer a star, man!

Just worked it out for myself. Beam on the floor on two wooden bearers Two slings in the correct (balanced) position connect pulleys (chain brake and lock) Bring in scaffold tower: bottom transom missing raise beam one transom at a time remove transoms as you go up and then replace transoms underneath the as you go up brace assembly carefully during lift twist assembly until beam is lined up place beam You got me fizzing now @Alexphd1 If you wonder why I keep coming back to BH, this thread will do... just saved me £500 (per beam) i.e £1000. (minus the nett cost of some bits of kwikstage)

6.4 meters....

@Declan52's idea... prop the standards with scaffold boards under the 'stars'

The faster I can sell it the better.

Right, that does it. On order first thing tomorrow. Jacking up beams = go on, tell me more..... How did you rises that beam? You've got me hooked now, really hooked Short trannies? Is there such a thing? Where? How? Who?

Ok, well what started as a sort of Tiggerish comment has turned into slightly more than that. Looks like a plan is coming together.

OK, I'm running a book. 100:1 you finish after @Onoff

We have bought some kwikstage. Love it. A bit of me fantasies about using heavy castors on the bottom of a standard lift , knocking up some outriggers from normal scaffold and bingo. ..... Mobile work platform. @Construction Channel will be asked to put a lawn mower engine on it, so SWMBO can move it with one hand, and @Onoff can put me some half decent flood lights on so I can work all night, @nod can pop me a temporary roof on, so I can work in the rain. Oh, how long does it take an @Onoff to install floodlights? Hmmm. Runner? Fantasy?