IanR

Looking at the shape of the stairs you have perspective on, so the ground floor, that is further away from the view point, appears smaller. Change to Orthographic.

It's both a planning and land registry issue, I believe. First, you need to establish that the Annex will be accepted as its own Residential C3 (stand-alone) Planning Unit, by the LPA, rather than an Outbuilding/Annex, incidental to the Use of the main residential property. If the latter, then it can't be sold off separately, and if then put on a seperate title a lender can't attach a charge against it to protect their investment. You need get the planning approval documents under which is was constructed, that will define its formal use. It's likely to be an annex/outbuilding, incidental to main residence. If it is then do you have evidence that for more than 10 years it has continually been used outside of its formal use, to what amounts to being a stand-alone residential property. Indicators would be it having its own entrance, its own utilities, inhabited by non family members and not "incidental" to the enjoyment of the main residence. If you have evidence of a 10 year breech, then you can apply for a Certificate of Lawful Existing Use and Development as a stand alone Residential C3 property. If not, then you'll need to either submit a Change of Use planning application, or, if the incidental use is controlled by a condition of its planning approval you may be able to apply for an S73 variation of condition, so that that specific condition is removed from the original planning app. This is definitely a subject you would benefit from the support of a local planning consultant. Once you have the LPA agreement that it is on its own stand alone planning unit, then it doesn't need to be split away from the main residence's title until it is sold off, unless you want to provide a title that a lender can attached a charge to. I do also believe the LR are resistant to splitting up titles that are to remain in the same ownership, but believe they can be persuaded to do so.

It's not a planning change that would have been required, it's a change to the Title Plan at the Land Registry that would be needed, so you may have misunderstood the builder. From the pictures, correcting the boundary to the registered position makes no difference to you in respect to the rear garden, as the rear fence appears to be in the correct location. Is it then "just" between the houses and the front gardens that the neighbours want a boundary fence erected, in the correct location. From what you have shown there's nothing that allows you to claim ownership of your neighbour's land. If a fence is to be erected, you may want to take control of that to have the "better" side facing you.

While Passivhaus targets are quoted in Air Changes per Hour @ 50Pa, as is common on the continent, UK Building Regs uses the units m³/m².h @ 50Pa, where cubic meters or air loss, per hour, are measured as a ratio of the square meters of surface area of the "treated envelope". ie the internal wall, floor and ceiling/roof area of the airtight envelope. There is no general correlation between ACH@50Pa and m³/m².h @ 50Pa, each house is different, and needs to be calculated. The Air infiltration test doesn't actually run for an hour, and it averages two tests that pressurise and depressurise the house at 50Pa and -50Pa, in the manner you describe. From memory, the tests run for about 10 mins each. If you have an air infiltration rate of less that 3m³/m².h@50Pa then English Building Control require you to have whole house mechanical ventilation. If you are above that figure, with trickle vents closed, then whole house mechanical ventilation is not required, but you will require extractors in wet rooms. The 10m³/m².h@50Pa figure you have shown is an old figure. Currently new builds are required to be better than 8m³/m².h@50Pa, although that was due to change in April this year to 5m³/m².h@50Pa, but I don't believe the update to Building Regs has been introduced yet (although I may have missed it).

Not sure why they only quote an area coverage: 115 m² I'm sure it will offer more than a ~ 10m x 10m area, but does only come with Internal Antenna (External an option) The UAP-AC-M is external antenna only and is quoted as 183m (distance). Works at around 120m for me, but is then sketchy through a hedge at that distance.

Apparently (according to badwitch.com) Y shaped twigs are just as effective - hazel is preferred though.

Then why under test conditions is it not more effective than chance?

Gemini got a little frustrated with me asking the question in different ways to attempt to get a positive answer to there being some proof that water dowsing is effective. [For transparency, I know there isn't any scientific proof, but wondered if there was some pseudo-science that attempted an explanation] A video at the supplied link was interesting:

Even if there was a force/energy that we didn't understand, dowsing could be proven to be more effective than plain chance, but unfortunately it can't.

It would need to be drawn-up in a Section. You upstairs space depends on eaves height, ridge height and foot-print depth. To get the 1st floor to at least 50% of the area of the ground floor is likely to need rear dormer(s) and gables each side (assuming ridge is running side-to-side).

Hi and Welcome. Whereabouts in the world is your planned self-build? In England, you can't have a Treatment Plant discharging within 50m of a private water extraction point, for human consumption. Even if your location allows that, it's a good rule to stick to. Does this not dictate your construction method to one of timber-frame?

You might be able to get to the 1 bed 2 person requirement of 58m² with a 2 story chalet, depending on how much area was lost on the 2nd floor due to restricted height, but you wont get to the 2 bed 4 person requirement of 79m² unless the local vernacular would allow a modernism/brutalism, flat roof style.

For new builds the National standards are a minimum and they're mandatory (in England). Councils can set a higher Minium if they wish, but can't accept lower. 40m² allows a 1 bed, 1 occupant house. I believe that would restrict you to a bedroom between 7.5m² and 11.5m² in size. If you went larger than 11.5m² it would be considered a 2 occupant home which requires 50m².

I'm not sure if restricting your potential clients down to a niche area is a good plan for a new business. You should consider casting your net as wide as possible, until you're able to generate enough work within the niche you wish to specialiase.

Mine is a Glulam ridge with I-Joist rafters. Design by CTD.

You could try Cullen Timer Design, but not sure if they'll be cost effective for just the roof. Typically they Design/Engineer the whole frame.

Based on the above, your neighbour is misinformed when he says: Unless he can park in such away that you can stil access the land under your ownership, with a motor vehicle.

Nope, line loads are used to calculate the loads the walls put into the foundation. ie. 10kN/m = just over 1 Tonne-force per meter length of wall. Edited to add: From the Drawing

The drawing Key helps you here: First figure is dead load, second is live, the units will be kN/m.

It sounds like you were attempting to offset the new residential area with the existing agricultural area, for the purposes of CIL. Is that what you were attempting? Unfortunately you can not do that - for the CIL calculation the council wants to know how much additional residential area is being created by the proposed development. You can only offset an existing residential area that you are demolishing for the proposed development. Can I ask why you are not applying for self-build exemption? or are you and the council is confused?

Are you able to measure CO2 levels in your house? The BC requirement for mechanical ventilation when you are under 3m³/m².h@50Pa infiltration is a really rough proxy air quality. For your own benefit it would be better to know the CO2 levels without MVHR and if it goes above 1,000 ppm then you'd be better off having MVHR, and if above 2,000 ppm it would be a health risk not to have MVHR. I've tried running without the MVHR on between Spring and Autumn, and I don't like bathrooms not drying out as quick as I've got used to, even with a small window open...

Sounds like you should park in front of your garage, until you get hold of the Title to prove access rights. Assuming the Garage was there when you purchased the property, it would have been your Conveyancer's job to ensure you had Access Rights.

What is it you want to do with the CAD software? If you want visualise the staircase within it's environment, then a lighter-weight software such as Sketchup will be quicker to learn and it's polygon/tessellated database is sufficient for the task. If you wanted to create photo-realistic rendered images of the staircase then Blender is a good option, and completely free. If however you want to create an Engineering 3D model of the staircase, with accurate models ,thicknesses, fillets, holes with the ability to build associated assemblies, with a catalogue of stock hardware (bolts, nuts, screws, rivets etc.) and sub-assemblies where global changes to the staircase automatically update through to all parts in the assembly and the ability to develop blanks of folded brackets, cutting lists, weld details and associated 2D Engineering drawings that update when the 3D model changed, then you need a NURB/Bezier based CAD system, which will tend to have a steeper learning curve. If you are wanting to create something that was going to be manufactured from, at a fabricator, then I'd be looking at a mid-tier CAD system such as Solidworks, Creo, Solid Edge etc. most of which can now be leased monthly. Free for 6 months is OnShape, which gets close to these systems for the basics. However, if you're going to just do this once, it may not be worth the trip up the learning curve, there's a lot of content in a design like a bespoke spiral staircase if you want to fully define it "in CAD" and have a workshop manufacture it for you. In this case I'd suggest a seasoned professional.

I don't know of the Internorm "thermoplastic insulated threshold", but the image above shows it taking bolted/screwed fixing so I'd put the brackets on to the threshold and suspend the lower portion in air, where you are going to cast the raft. Put some threded bar through the holes in the (initially) unattached end, using a nut either side to hold the threaded bar in position, then cast the bracket into the raft. You'll have to temporarily, externally, back up the threshold so that it doesn't move during the pour.

While the Plan you attached is "to scale", it's incorrectly called out as an A4 sheet size. Image below shows in the bottom right hand corner that I have set the scale in Acrobat as per drawing 1:500. Units are mm The 50m scale on the drawing measures 49,920.09mm However, the above is directly off the digital file. If you do as the drawing states and Print to A4 it won't be to that scale since the sheet size is actually 594 x 841 (A1) not 210 x 297 (A4), as defined in the file's properties: So, while your Architect has made a mistake, the Council are being a little picky. All dimensions they require are called out on the drawing. They don't need to "scale" anything.