Gone West

We were going to have a deep bore soakaway which would have discharged into the chalk 47m down. Unfortunately the chalk was water bearing and we now have a well and borehole.

Thanks, that's a brilliant idea. I often wondered now to create a floating staircase in a timber frame.

I like the stairs as well. I don't suppose you have a picture of the other side of that wall before it's been covered. Is that wall thicker than standard?

I use this. It's called Neverbend but I managed to bend it digging a trench. I was trying to lever a block of concrete out without realising what it was! http://www.wickes.co.uk/Spear+Jackson-Neverbend-Professional-Fencing-Grafter/p/131972

I've not used CT1 or Sikaflex so can't comment but this is the one I use and haven't had any problems. Carpenter friend was impressed with it's adhesive qualities. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SOUDAL-FIX-ALL-CRYSTAL-CLEAR-SEALANT-ADHESIVE-MS-POLYMER-COMPLETELY-TRANSPARENT-/181107513495

A little light reading? Hybrid MS Sealants.pdf

Excellent. I didn't get it the first time I read it!

Just a thought, but if it's a very small hole with a flap of material remaining it may only leak significantly above a certain pressure.

I think Tooway satellite broadband are national and they do VoIP for telephone.

That will be interesting. I was told the first time by Openreach they would mole under the 4m wide lane to my property, then a few weeks ago I was told it's not their policy to mole. I've made a high level complaint which is being investigated at the moment so it will be interesting to hear the result of both of our cases.

With all due respect, your comments above show you are only qualified to judge your own mistakes. If I had seen the side of the hole partly collapse there is no way I would have gone down the hole for any reason. That was the most ridiculous dangerous mistake you could make in that situation. If you knew there was danger of collapse why would you go down the hole? My situation and yours are different on so many levels they can't be compared. In my case the hole had been dug a few days before and the tank lowered in and removed before I installed the angle irons. As you say it's a good idea to know your ground conditions before doing the job.

Dangerous, a bit over OTT. The ground conditions are obviously very different, certainly no rocks or stones here.

Yes it was interesting, the water table varies a great deal around here as well.

I found not having legs on it an advantage because with one pivot point it was easy to level and then wedge in place. It doesn't need to be backfilled with concrete, only type 1 because it is chained down to four horizontal angle irons banged into the side of the hole. I did put a layer of dry mix over the top, but then I always tend to over engineer everything.

That's amazingly similar to my WPL Diamond DMS2 except mine doesn't have an integrated pump housing. Does that mean the housing has to be removed to have the tank emptied?

Yes it's our first self build but before that I renovated a Victorian farm workers cottage completely, doing all the work myself and found that more enjoyable.

We've been building for six and a half years now and it took years before that getting planning permission. For the first couple of years of the build it was a novelty and we took Jan and Feb off and went away for a break so it wasn't too bad. Since then we realised that losing two months every year was go to make the build go on for ever but not having a break was making the build a real struggle. A couple of years ago we tried to sell it half built, and had a surprising amount of interest, but having to demolish the bungalow put people off. We're resigned to having to finish it now but there is no pleasure in building it any more and with hindsight we should have given up when getting planning was so difficult. I don't want to put you off because everyone is different, as are their circumstances, just think hard about now much it means to you, to do the build. Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

I made a simple ladder stairway out of 4 x 2. It is about 700mm wide and fixed at the top. The BCO checked it was fixed and was happy for all to use it. It's been there for six years no problems and hopefully in the next couple of months will be replaced with the proper staircase!

When our frame was erected I asked for the OSB racking to cover all the openings as well. I had a simple plywood entrance door. The OSB was covered in Protect TF Thermo membrane which kept the inside dry over the winter. I routed out the openings in the spring and covered them with polytunnel plastic leaving the bottom with an overlap and open for ventilation. It seemed to work well. A friend, building at the same time, did not cover the openings and the wood fibre board around the window reveals got soaked and broke up.

I think 315mm is the circumference. 315/Pi = 100

I laid porcelain floor tiles that were roughly 700 x 470 x 10mm which is ok if the floor is flat. I laid them brick pattern which is also ok as long as they are good tiles and not banana shaped which causes problems with 50/50 brick pattern. An alternative is 70/30 which evens the curve out a bit.

I thought it was difficult not to get a pass as the threshold is so high. It depends on the type of construction TF, brick & block etc as to where you might have significant leaks.

Stop it. This is all making me worse. I've been trying for years to stop putting things in straight lines and keeping symmetry. My other half is always having a go at me about it.

In my area there is a company using WiMax which a lot of the locals use because we're out in the sticks and broadband is slow. If it's difficult to get an Openreach line it's an option which isn't too expensive. I don't know if similar options exist in other areas. http://www.vfast.co.uk/packages/ http://www.vfast.co.uk/voip-phone-service/

How does having floor sockets fit in with the recommendations in Part M stating sockets and switches should be between 450mm and 1200mm above floor level?