Gone West

We had a semi with the same layout as you back in the 90s but without your small white extension. When we sold it the new owners build a single storey extension with a ridged roof across the whole of the remaining width of the back of the house and joined it to the existing extension with a valley gutter.

We bought an aluminium Speedy scaffold tower 5.5m many years ago for our build, £700 IIRC. It was one of the most useful tools we bought and we have kept it.

I had 15mm OSB3 racking on the outside of my TF covered with membrane. I then had 50mm thick Rockwool RW6 slabs fitted between 100mm battens which left a 50mm gap which was covered with another membrane and then the timber cladding.

I did all my own plumbing in a replacement new build in Kent and didn't bother telling Southern Water I was doing the build. I had already had meter fitted and just replaced the pipework my side of the meter.

IIRC that's the one my neighbours had and I couldn't hear it behind a 2m high solid fence and it was 2m the other side of the fence.

In 2017 our as built SAP came in as an A95 without any PV and we had electric heating. We did have high insulation and air tightness values. We used electric towel rails in the bathrooms and an EASHP as backup heat in the MVHR.

We must of just been lucky because we ordered a bookcase and bathroom cabinet a couple of weeks ago with four day delivery.

I know I'm a cynic, but my opinion of planners is not high. If you withdraw your application it's less work for them and if you submit another application that could also be refused. I would stick with the original application and find out the reasons for refusal.

Hi and welcome to the forum. Good luck with the build.

Not really without a lot of work improving the insulation levels and increasing the size of the radiators to compensate for the lower water temperature. Saying that, there are oil/ASHP hybrids which use the ASHP for most of the time and have the oil kicking in when higher temperatures are needed.

We have just moved into an old stone walled cottage that has an oil fired AGA Redfyre cooker that does the CH and DHW. It's about twelve years old and we are going to have it taken out and replaced with an external oil fired boiler. We are removing it because we don't use the ovens and it's bulky and noisy as all oil boilers are. Have you lived with an indoor oil boiler through the winter.

My ducting was 750mm deep and came up through the floor slab and I didn't use any insulation. In reality I should imagine it depends where in the UK you live as there would be a big difference in ground temperatures between Truro and Inverness.

I used 110mm soil pipe with large radius bends as the ducting for my mains water pipe.

We stored our DHW at 45C in a UVC and didn't bother with the legionella cycle. It worked fine with the thermostatic showers and the bath thermal mixer.

At my last house our neighbours had a Nibe ASHP fitted which was 2m away from our fence. We lived in a quiet rural spot and standing next to our fence it was inaudible until it went into, what I guess was, defrost mode, when there was a hissing sound that lasted a couple of seconds.

I don't have personal experience but I remember reading on the Green Building Forum several years ago that a chap in Canada insulated an old house behind lath and plaster walls and it was effective. IIRC the person was Paul-in-Montreal.

@AnnaKH Three and a half years ago we self built a timber frame, timber clad house. We recently sold it and IIRC the first people who were going to buy it had a mortgage with NatWest which they said was ok with the construction. Unfortunately they couldn't sell their house so we accepted an offer from another buyer who also didn't have a problem getting a mortgage. I don't know who their lender was but there were no problems. We also heard that getting house insurance would be difficult but we had no problem with Aviva.

I used PU glue for fixing my timber studding plates to concrete floor. It also sticks metal to concrete. https://www.axminstertools.com/titebond-greenchoicetm-polyurethane-construction-adhesive-310ml-pack-12-tubes-718696

My mate converted a barn with vaulted ceilings. He didn't want wall lights so wired 5A round pin circuits in most of the rooms and even had floor sockets for free standing lamps.

I used Soudal MS Clear for sticking down the toilet pan in the wetroom at my last place and had no problems for the three years we used it. https://www.soudal.co.uk/pro/products/sealants/hybrid-sealants/soudaseal-ms-clear

My son has this flue arrangement with his WBS.

I think the builder is referring to Compriband expanding foam tape which would be ideal for that purpose. It comes in different widths and thicknesses. The thickness size is for example 3/10 which means when rolled up it is 3mm thick and then it will expand to more than 10mm but if less than 10mm it will be air and watertight.

At our last house we were supposed to have roof drainage dealt with on site but there wasn't enough room so I spoke to the local highways office and BC, and as a result we were allowed to discharge onto the lane. This then ran down to to a ditch a couple of hundred yards away.

Good luck trying that. At my last place after the planners had vetoed another design I asked them what they would like, and was told it's not our job to do the design, just to consider yours.

When we built our last house we designed the bathrooms ourselves and used Bathstore for all the fittings. They were well made and I would use them again but I'm not sure whether the current incarnation of Bathstore at Homebase is the same as the original.