Gone West

Friends of ours built a house in 2011 and used Nu-Lok with their built in PV modules and have been happy with the system especially because they claimed the full FiT payments.

When I connected my metal shed to the house supply I used a TT system, (think that's the correct term), with an earth rod which earthed the metal shed and the supply.

I am not an electrician! but was wondering how it is all earthed.

We have a similar problem. Our sensor is above our front door and out of line of sight of car headlamps. When a tractor goes past with high level lights, which are out of line of sight of the sensor, the lights come on. I traced it in the end to a reflection off a front window and onto the sensor.

@Bartholomew Looking at the link you posted it says:- 'We have seen many people try and save time and money by leaving the frame in when they try to block up an opening but this never works.' I would use concrete blocks, you can still put cladding on.

Welcome to the forum and good luck with your project. Everything is fixable, just might cost a bit. Show us pictures of what you're doing to the bungalow, we like that.

I don't know much about building basements but it would be useful to know whether the water table height varies over the year. If it drops a lot in the summer, as it does around here, then it's much easier doing that type of work in the summer.

That is the water table. When you dig the hole and remove the soil hydrostatic pressure pushes water into the hole in the same way that a spring finds a weak point and comes out.

I have a ground floor stack for a single toilet and basin that has a 50mm AAV and it's worked fine for three years and the BCO didn't say anything about it.

I agree, but not everyone is so lucky.

I would remove the door and frame and use concrete blocks tied to the existing wall to fill the hole.

There have been several prior approval applications for Class Q GPDO around here where it's quite relaxed and depending on your LPA you might get away with the Class Q conversion taking more than three years but I wouldn't rely on that. It's clear in the regulations that if a Class Q prior notification application is approved the applicant has three years to complete the conversion. With a planning permission the applicant has 3 years in which to start the conversion and once started can take as long as it takes to complete it. A full planning application would assist overcoming this strict and very tight build schedule but could be more hassle.

I designed our system and there were no problems with BC.

Our house has 350mm of Icynene in the walls and roof and the smell disappeared a day or two after being installed.

Correct, but that's what I found, in that Engineers seem to have their own vocabulary for fixings and the the rest of the world use different terms. Other than Engineers if it's got a self tapping thread, it's a screw and if it's got a machine thread it's a bolt. If it's got a self tapping thread it's got a point on the end. It doesn't seem anything to do with the type of head, or length of thread except for Engineers who can call similar fixings, bolts or screws because they have different heads.

When doing it on brickwork it chips off all the distemper and leaves a surface ready for plastering.

In our last house we had distemper on the brickwork of one wall which we wanted plastered so we used a scutch hammer with a wide comb.

Something odd going on.

If the flow temperature is 54C and the bare floor temperature is 23C then it seems to me that there is a lot of heat being lost downwards. An explanation for that, is as you suggest, that the sound insulation is preventing much of the heat from reaching the floor. It would be useful to have a drawing or details of the whole of the floor construction.

There doesn't seem to be a consistent definition on the internet although the fact that a screw has a self tapping thread and a bolt has a machine thread is often mentioned. So the length of thread on the shank seems irrelevant. "Although coach bolts and coach screws are distinct components in their own right, the two do share a number of similarities. The most notable similarity is the head shape, which is domed, or mushroom-shaped, in both instances. Both coach screws and bolts are also best suited for use with wood." "However, a key difference is that coach screws feature a self-tapping thread. This means that these screws can create their own threads in timber, ensuring a more seamless installation. On the flip side, carriage bolts have a machine thread, meaning that they always need an adequately-sized pilot hole to be drilled into the material before installation."

If it's threaded with a point on the end it's a screw, without a point it's a bolt.

Our windows are grey, RAL 7037, inside and outside with the window board and paintwork white and the outside sill matching the windows.

A very true statement. I hope you manage to get it sorted to your satisfaction. We had a tall narrow window opening in our hall, which was supposed to be central, put offset and we made them alter the timber frame so it was in it's correct position. You have to be watching them like a hawk all the time, very stressful.

I looked into ST when I was designing my house. Didn't think it was worth it for me because roof access would have been difficult but I thought the drain back system was good. https://www.viridiansolar.co.uk/resources-3-6-solar-thermal-plumbing.html