Gone West

150l/day is for all water, not just hot water.

Welcome to the forum, and well done on your self build. We built a timber frame, cedar clad house and had no problem getting buildings and contents cover from Aviva Insurance.

It was taped up while we were fitting it so it didn't get scratched.

Our sinks are Schock black granite composite. Wendy likes cooking, but we're not slaves to the kitchen and the dishwasher does the washing up.

Is that another window outside the window with the blackout blind? Is that an inside area? I'm puzzled so I'll go and have another Southern Comfort.

I used Rockwool RW6 as EWI on my house for it's acoustic and thermal insulation qualities. It's a rigid board though and won't behave like the 'orange stuff'. https://www.rockwool.co.uk/product-overview/slab-products/rw6-en-gb/?selectedCat=downloads

We submitted a lot of B&Q till receipts with our VAT reclaim and they were all accepted. B&Q asked me if I would like to open a trade account so I doubt you would have any problems setting one up. I always called myself 'SelfBuild' and it was accepted.

I don't think there's that much wrong with it. I would probably do something similar with a 110mm AAV in the loft on top of the stack and a 50mm AAV where the washing machine is. I did go a bit OTT here fitting several AAVs to build in a bit of redundancy is case of failure. The green is 110mm and blue 50mm pipe.

Do you need the roof windows? If they are poorly fitted single glazed and you have enough light without them then remove them and insulate the whole ceiling. Without knowing how the roof has been constructed it's a bit difficult to recommend the best way to insulate. Maybe use a small metal detector and magnets to find fixings in ceiling so you can find rafters and noggins then blow in beads?

+1 If possible removing the stack and reinstating the roof is a good idea.

Both links worked for me.

'Escape to the Country'? possibly. I know what you mean. They've always got to put their stamp on it. Don't know how you could redesign a certified PH easily.

We're hoping to do that one day. Welcome to the forum by the way and good luck with the project.

We've found that we are now looking at tenths of a degree differences whereas in the old bungalow we were looking at several degrees difference. I think you are right that we are being too fussy but it's surprising how quickly the body adjusts to 'requiring' constant warm temperatures.

Looking back at what we spent, the TF with insulation and installation came out at 25% of total build cost.

They may look the same but is the glazing the same. The new ones may have different coatings or better gas.

No vacuum, most likely air or Argon.

We didn't have that problem in the old bungalow with the single and poor double glazing but we do have the same problem on our triple glazed windows in the new house when the weather is still and cold. It's worse on the north facing windows. As soon as the wind gets up it disappears. It's possibly worse for you because the stream could raise the humidity around the house. It means the windows are working well and it should only be a problem in certain weather conditions.

Wendy used to do a similar thing, with twigs from the hedge, every Christmas when we were in the bungalow.

I just produced a spreadsheet with tabs in build order for each aspect of the build and a breakdown of estimated costs and actual costs for each tab.

Welcome to the forum. Last year we dismantled our old bungalow that we had been living in while we build the house in the garden. We missed the caravan stage fortunately as it took us eight years to build the new house. Good luck with the build.

We've always found Sennocke to be helpful and they said we could convert to a different type of cover when necessary. They are more expensive but as they seem to be able to cover most situations it's easier for the first year.

For several months between site insurance running out and full house cover we had uninhabited buildings insurance. This is usually used for renovation works on unoccupied rental properties. Ours was with Sennocke Insurance and was a couple of years ago.

Exactly, we've appealed three times and won each time.

They replaced all the poles around here last year and IIRC, in the orchard behind us, they used a Land Rover with outriggers and a lift on the back with chains which they wrapped round the pole.