Thorfun

not necessarily... ufh pipes are relatively inexpensive to purchase and laying them is pretty darn simple. i've just finished our ground floor with 1.1km of ufh pipes and it took me a working week with occassional help from my wife on the staple gun labour costs are the killer in a self-build so if you can do the work yourself then you'll save bucket loads. i think with material costs the way they are at the moment £1500/m2 is pushing it but you could get to not far off that which is why i don't think you're in cuckoo land. using ICF will be a quicker shell build but be aware that doing the work yourself will take a LOT of time! so if your wife won't wait 18 months and you're not using a main contractor then i think that'll be the sticking point rather than funds. 😉 don't let some naysayers on here dissuade you from self-building. it's not a great time to be doing a self-build due to material costs but i don't think they'll come down much more and never back to the previous levels. i'm just sourcing plasterboard for our build at the moment and there's currently a shortage and a 2-3 week wait, and we all know that shortages of materials can potentially lead to price rises! we're not finished with our build yet but it's a stupidly large 450m2-ish property with a basement and i think we'll be coming in at about £1800/m2 including professional fees but excluding plot. we've done a lot of the labour ourselves (battening for the external cladding, ufh, insulation, VCL, plumbing, Velux installation and more) but it's taken us over 2 years to get to the stage where we're interviewing plasterers.

let me start this with the obligatory 'i'm not an expert' arse covering...... 😉 afaik you can get 3.68kWp per phase without G99 (i believe you still need to submit a G98 though?) but your installer is saying you can have 5.88kWp. that's why i was questioning if you'd done a G99 application and the DNO have come back saying that was your limit. so, again afaik, on a 3-phase system you can have 11.04kWp system with a 3-phase inverter so 3.68kWp over each phase. we have a 3-phase connection but our whole house is being run on a single phase. as such i didn't want a 3-phase PV system as 2 of the phases would simply be exported leaving only 3.68kWp to run the house. and as much as 3-phase smart meters should let you perform net-metering i just didn't believe it. and so we decided to put in a cheeky G99 application for 10kWp array and 5kW battery on a single phase and it was accepted! hardly anyone around here has solar PV so i think we got lucky with the area. but we now have 10.5kWp array with a single phase 10kW inverter so it should generate our house's daily needs in the summer and still fill our battery and car and any left over can be exported on the SEG. obviously, if you're running your house on 3-phase then our situation isn't relevant. 🙂

whoops! i seem to have missed the bit where you already said it was in-roof! 🤦‍♂️

Where did the installer get those max array sizes from? Was that after a G99 application? also , it’s hard to compare the price as it’s short on detail! In-roof/on-roof, hw manufacturer etc.

Afaik the woven fabrics do let water through but at differing rates. The white stuff lets more through again. I did find a research pain the subject once upon a time but don’t know where that is now. the data sheet for the fabric should have details of water permeability rates. might’ve been this one https://onlinepubs.trb.org/Onlinepubs/trr/1981/827/827-001.pdf

you can get hybrid battery inverters that will do the pv and battery but I'd already purchased the Solaredge inverter with the PV system. there are many on here, @Nickfromwales is one, who would recommend you go for a DC battery system especially if EPS is not required. @pocster is also having fun with a Solaredge battery and Powerwall combined system. I believe he's thinking of a second SE battery so might be worth getting their opinions as well. if the wait for the PW2 wasn't 18 months when I was looking to get a battery system installed I'd have simply gone with that. but it was and I didn't want to wait so went the route I did. but it's a much larger field of options and probably more joining the arena all the time, it's more than my little brain can cope with!

honestly don't know. my installers did the G99 application and I've not worried about it all since then but I presume so as I have a 10.5kWp array with a 10kW inverter. I started a whole thread on the subject of placement. in the end I put the inverter and batteries in the basement next to the CU. happy reading. 😉

I had to cut back on spending so I only bought a single SPOD and 2 x 3.2kWh Greenlinx batteries but I have it in mind to expand that when I have some extra money. having 2 x SPODs and enough batteries would give you 7kW discharge rate. the export is not capped nor dependent on the battery system. this image shows today where I was exporting 8kW to the grid after the car had finished charging. I find the system pretty good to be honest. like I said, I'm a bit miffed that I can only have 13A max as an emergency backup supply but we have very few power cuts and if we do at least that'll be enough to keep the lights on. afaik the SPOD isn't limited to Greenlinx batteries. I bought directly from Big Green Beard and they also offer other batteries but the Greenlinx ones are the ones they recommended to me. I believe that max 2 x SPODs can be chained but a call to Infinity Innovations should clear that up for you. I had this data sheet sent to me which might help. Squirrel Pod Information-1.pdf

me too

the beauty of self-building is you can do whatever you want (within regulations of course). we're using Loxone to control our lights but will have physical switches in all rooms wired back to a central location. the idea is to not actually ever use them though as the HA should cater for most situations. 🤞 but I wouldn't use wireless switches in a new build when it's easy and quick to run cable. in a refurb though I can definitely see the benefit.

should be about our timeline as well.....not including the basement of course. that'll take as long as @pocster's whole house

🤫

and going by what I've seen you come up with on here I'd have to agree! 🙂

June

I'm just trying to portray an element of solidarity with you by not posting any progress. don't want to make you feel bad.

<sarcasm>best £25 I ever spent</sarcasm> ffs.

We have no supply or extract in our entrance hall (also vaulted) which was designed by another company. So sounds like it’s normal to not have MVHR in a hallway.

I wanted something that could power the house in a power cut. Tesla Powerwalls had stupid lead times and so I went for a Luxpower Squirrel Pod with HanchuEss Greenlinx batteries the maximum 13A in a power cut is a little limiting but I’m planning to ask the sparky to wire lights and a coupling of emergency sockets to the EPS. but you’ll find that answer to your question depends on who you’re asking! If you read the threads in the battery forum you’ll get a good understanding of the sort of response you’ll get. 😉

these were exactly our thoughts and why we went one ring per room. that way if a room trips it doesn't take out the whole floor or any other rooms.

why no rings? all our lighting is radial but our sockets are one ring per room so kind of a halfway house. seemed like a logical compromise to me and my sparky.

Apart from the theft aspect isn’t it really expensive compared to other covering? We had some lead work on our roof and the rolls of lead were costly.

I’m confused. You want to use lead on an entire flat roof? Didn’t even know that was a thing

But then the screed wouldn’t cover the conduit and I’d still need a ‘hole’ deep enough to house the spotlights. Pretty sure the extensions were the only and best solution! Just would’ve preferred not to have to pay so much. Or that the wife hadn’t packed away the 3d printer.

ordered. to be delivered tomorrow. they're still stupidly expensive. thinking maybe I should've got the 3D-printer out of storage instead but too much to do and not enough time.

F*****g peer pressure. If I’m £25 short to finish the house I know who to blame!!