Gone West

It's not a number on a thermometer that matters, it's whatever you find comfortable that's important.

We never wear sweaters indoors, we consider them outdoor wear. When we lived in our PH we had the whole house at 23C all the time. We don't find 23C hot for a bedroom. We wear comfortable clothing indoors which for me is a T shirt and sleep with a 4 TOG duvet. We have continued living in the same way in our latest old stone walled bungalow and are reducing the heat loss to reduce the cost.

We also looked at Baufritz, back in 2009, when we were considering what we were going to build. We liked the look a great deal, and we thought the wood fibre insulation was interesting but unfortunately it was outside our budget. Only the price put us off 🥲.

IIRC, the smell of burning is caused by a duct air temperature of more than 50C, which burns the dust in the duct and causes the smell. I think our EASHP kept the air around 40C.

I used Everedge Halestem at our last place and found it very strong and easy to use. I used the deep one for the driveway and low one for the footpaths. It was expensive though.

I have used those before and they would be too rigid I think. I think I'll persevere with using hessian in some form.

That looks interesting. I guess the mesh is plastic and pinned into the soil. I doubt I would be able to buy a 25mx3m chunk.

Thanks for your suggestions. The slope has been there for at least 50 years. The ground generally is very stoney with large areas of sandstone and shale. I just want to tidy it up a bit. I would want the hessian to rot away eventually and for the ground cover to have rooted well into the soil. I would use evergreen plants, such as Bearberry, that would help protect the soil from driving rain.

Our property is on the side of a hill and consequently the garden is a mix of terraces and slopes. There is one slope which varies in height from 2m to just over 3m and has an average angle of around 60 degrees. We want to tidy up the front of the slope and I had the idea of using hessian sand bags filled with soil which would be stepped back slightly to keep the angle the same. Then the bags could be slit and planted with ground cover plants. Anybody done this before?

It's the filters that do the work of reducing pollution in the home. If you want to reduce the size of the pollutants being filtered out, use a finer filter. https://assets.spcb.co.uk/docs/specification-files/specs-filters/air-filter-classification.pdf

It's catching on, at a price. https://www.jacksons-fencing.co.uk/fencing/fencing-panels/jaksun-solar-fence

Here's a couple of ideas to start you off. https://retainingwallsolutions.co.uk/case-studies/gabion-basket-retaining-wall/ https://retainingwallsolutions.co.uk/interlocking-block-retaining-wall/

When we visited Richard Hawkes' Crossways house, there was a large pile of soil that had a sheet of plastic grass covering it.

Good to see they haven't beaten you yet 😁.

Good starting place. https://www.sealantsandtoolsdirect.co.uk/soudal-color-ral-colour-coloured-premium-silicone-sealant

We visited that house after the roof had been repaired. I just rang Richard Hawkes, told him about our plans and asked if we could have a look around. He is a very nice, helpful chap and was happy to show us the various technologies he used. It was a long time ago but IIRC the house was a test bed for several unusual things such as water cooled PV and paraffin wax phase change panels in the walls. He also used glass chippings in the concrete floor which he had polished, looked great.

Perfect temperature. It's what we keep our house at.

We used Recticel as it was the cheapest at the time.

We had vaulted ceilings upstairs and had the bedroom supply vents in the wall around 600mm above the floor. The bathroom and ensuite extracts were in the wall near the ceiling.

Is that correct? AIUI it is an option until a house is built to the new 2025 Building Regulations.

Maybe, but unfortunately developers are there to make money, not design housing estates to maximise PV output.

To be fair, adding the cost of PVs and batteries to the ASHP would make it expensive to have installed though, even with the £7500 grant.

ASHPs aren't shit, but with current oil prices, oil burners are cheaper to run.

I really like the look. Shame it's going to be replaced with bifolds. You might regret it afterwards, but we all have our likes and dislikes.

I think that's an excellent idea. I've not seen a tiled or slated roof that looks as good as the Spirit Energy picture.