Gone West

Welcome to BuildHub. It sounds like you've got some useful experience, but if you get stuck, there's plenty of people who will help on here.

You could use Cedral Click cladding instead of timber cladding. I have recently used it and if you want a painted timber effect it's very good.

We moved into our new timber frame, timber clad, self build in 2018. We had no problems insuring it, neither did the new owners in 2021 have any problems obtaining a mortgage or insurance when we sold it. Regulations may have changed in the meantime though.

You would be right to, if you hadn't designed the house to have only a very low heat requirement. MVHR does only move relatively small volumes of air, but if that is all the house needs, no problem. There are people living in places as diverse as Inverness and Penzance so there are significant variations in heating requirements due to climate, not often mentioned. There is not a single solution for all designs. Fortunately, UFH is not the only way to heat a property, so it is comfortable. Before I built my low energy house, I too visited PHs that weren't comfortable, and they had UFH. It is not too onerous to meet the threshold criteria for a PH, but they can be bettered, reducing further the space heating requirement.

As I mentioned, the Genvex Combi 185 is a MVHR with a built in EASHP. The HP heats the 185l hot water tank and provides warm air through the MVHR. I bought my Genvex direct from Denmark many years ago at a fraction of the cost from THE.

I designed and built a PH that didn't need conventional central heating. It was heated using an electric towel rail in each of the three bathrooms and by warm air heating from a Genvex Combi 185. The temperature of the whole house was kept at 23C. It only worked because the house was only 130m2, had good air tightness and very good levels of insulation. It was a very pleasant environment to live in.

I'm using a Predator saw/knife to cut mineral wool insulation and it's suprisingly effective. It's a tough material, a lot different to EPS/PIR. Worth a try for a tenner from Amazon.

This could be true! https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/ed-miliband-warm-homes-solar-power-energy-bills-b2892047.html

Yeah, that was ten years ago. Before we moved, I had a blog on here.

I would go back to the tiler you originally hired and ask his opinion. If he accepts the other tiler was working on his behalf, then it may encourage him to sort it out.

I would never get involved with Planning if I didn't have to, as in my experience they're a bunch of morons that just cost you money. Short and sweet, and just my opinion.

We've been watching 'Yes Minister' and 'Yes Prime Minister' on iPlayer recently. It shows that off exactly. Just as brilliant the second time around.

Not completely. I have a SOLAR iBOOST which has two outputs, although the instructions say they are for two immersions, I don't know why one couldn't be used for electric UFH.

I just used a WorkMate with the jaws around 40mm apart and rotated the downpipe as I cut it with the hacksaw.

In the Lindab instructions they specifically say not to use power tools for cutting. The reason they give, is that using power tools destroys the galvanising around the cut. Apparently if hand tools are used then the galvanising is able to 'creep' back over the cut surface and maintain rust proofing. We didn't have any rust problems after six years.