Carrerahill

Just to insure his build while he builds I think. I shall link him here to read these himself and let you know what he reports back. Thanks

You would be amazed when that man on the ground could do, especially if there was something in it for him - Dave's approach is a good one. Then option 2. I'd write to them informing them that as they do not have a wayleave you are giving them notice that you will no longer allow the casual arrangement to permit the wires to overfly your property. See where that gets you - worked for 2 of our neighbours. BT will try and BS you, so you BS them - it works the world over from the classroom to the courtroom.

I am posting this on behalf of a friend who has just started basic works in his garden for his extension after I convinced him he could do it (he can) - he now has planning and is just waiting for a final structural sign off. He wanted to know about self build insurance for his build, issue being that he will build most of it himself, he says he is coming up against a lot of the insurers asking questions about the trades, which, in his case may be few and far between. So - for those of you who truly self built and got insurance (you see I didn't! - built now anyway) who did you approach and how do you overcome the DIY aspects...

6F2/6F5 - call demolition companies that crush and or the big building waste skip places. I got 10 tons of 6F5 for £45.00 FYI: 6F2 is basically crusher run made on site, and 6F5 is crushed elsewhere and brought it. However, I would probably redesign to save removal or material and import of material.

I know I know - it will come in handy when I actually set things up properly though, media server etc I will also patch phone onto some of them.

Yes, the fans are I think like 40mm, they are small, spin pretty fast and just wear out. Chances are it sat in a data-rack in an office for the last 10 years. I know I'd feel kinna rough if I was made to work flat out for 10 years! You can get them for a few pounds.

This is very common, take it apart, find the little fans, replace with a same voltage same size thing. I have about 5 switches which are noisy. I actually removed the fans from some and let the rack fans do the job by aiming them right across the case.

You put me to shame, I wired our place for network about 5 years ago and they are still all just hanging in the comms cupboard!

UV stable and a bit tougher, having said that I have had a piece of internal CAT5 cable strung between 2 houses via a BT telegraph pole for about 10 years without any degradation of the cable that I can see so far.

It doesn't really say that. Legal proceedings will not second guess the decision makers decision and can only deal with an error in law pertaining to the application. So if for example the applicant states they will retain something but it gets demolished etc. etc. then law can be used to challenge this. However yours is a civil matter. I understand you're upset here, I really do, but sadly the system is stacked against you. Perhaps you have a legal argument due to the green belt but sadly this means very little now and house builders and filling more and more houses with shoe-boxes made from cardboard. It sounds like planning have ruled to your benefit before by denying his application for the big extension, however he has now gone for a PD sized extension. I'd talk to them. Always try and stay onside with neighbours and be careful what you say as if you start mentioning law and they know about it, they will know you are ill informed and unlikely to cause a nuisance. You may have something in the right to light (assuming you are in England) that might be your only hope.

It only uses 2 pairs, 1 x Tx pair 1 x Rx pair - on a crossover cable these two pairs are "crossed" so that PC can speak to PC - i.e. Tx into Rx. Some of the cheap free cables with modems only have 2 pairs in the cable!! Only pins 1-3 & 6 are used on a normal network connection which if I remember correctly tends to be orange and green, so you can strip out the blue and brown. You can pull out the 2 twisted pairs, and keeping them twisted crimp on 2 plugs, or if using a patch panel terminate them like that. I have a piece of Network cable here with about 48 pairs on it, it's designed for patching panels in comms rooms, I acquired about 8 foot of it and figured it may come in handy one day, so that is 24 connections down a single cable!

It can be blinking handy to convert a single RJ45 socket into a twin on a wall plate where only 1 cable exists.

You know you can run 2 connections down 1 cable? I often patch network+network onto a single cable. People say no, never had increased packet loss on a twin circuit and been doing that since the last 90's.

I agree.

50 CAT5 cables... what are you building, a call centre? I have a fair bit of CAT5 here, every room that may need it has 1 or 2 points (only used 1 point once), but 50?!? Please do tell?

A friend of ours got PP then built an extension about half the size of his house again. BC as far as he knows are completely unaware of the buildings existence, that was built in 2004. He is still there now.

You know, this is an utter joke. Your lender would probably give someone a mortgage for a major house builder home no questions asked, which as we know have often been found to have major structural issues and mortar with little cement in it and bits that are just down right shocking, yet because it is a self build immediately it is deemed as being risky. Our extension is a quality build, a solid, well engineered thing, yet I could see me in some years potentially having to do battle with a potential buyers solicitor over warranties and what not when actually they should be more concerned about the non-BC signed off, self-certified mass produced houses built with little care or quality.

Indeed, or having enough money to heat their properties! There is also the issue with people thinking, "I am paying good money to heat my home so why would I open a window?" It is just mad in their opinion, but often heat and ventilation can, as you will know, create an healthier, nicer environment within a building. I think if people were more aware of their habits and behaviour they could save a lot of issues in their house. I am very aware of damp creators, we don't have any damp issues (as far as I know!) and I adopt good practises in my daily life to keep it this way, we are very fortunate to be able to afford to heat our house well but cooking (old kitchen about to be demolished) doesn't extract externally and I love to cook, so in the kitchen I always open the window and the difference is windows with condensation all over them, or hardly any when open. I also tend to open the bathroom window all year round before a shower or immediately after and close the doors to the rest of the house. However, I will have little 1 room MVHRs going in this summer to deal with the bathrooms.

How well is she heating the place? Does she open windows? Even in the winter I have always liked to freshen up the air in the house and I think it pays dividends. We dry a lot on a clothes horse but our house is warm due to the near 24/7 wood burner. The RH in our house is about 34% at the moment and we dried 2 full loads of washing last night. I do however see this in our loft sometimes, it is fully insulated and lined, carpeted and what not but it is still just used like a typical loft, i.e. to chuck stuff into to "clear it away" so it has not been heated for about 5 years, result is small areas of mildew and a slightly damp feeling to the walls. Goes away in the summer certainly and it can be brushed off easily enough. I do plan to bring the room into use this year so heating it up will help. So if she dries a lot of clothes and cooks a fair bit generating steam from pots etc. then I think she needs to apply more heat, ventilate better (even open a window when cooking etc. dry clothes near an open window) or possibly think about drying clothes slightly differently - laundry room etc if available? Ask her if she sees much condensation on the windows, particularly if they are double glazed - that would possibly indicate she is not heating the place quite enough to deal with the moisture. I once read somewhere someone commenting that damp tends to be more prevalent in properties of the less wealthy and I think that is very true because generally when you hear of damp issues it is usually in lower quality housing stock that is not heated as well obviously due to cost. However, the same can also be said of those who do their bit for the environment and turn the heating down and wear a nice jumper, even a house with a water ingress problem can be perfectly fine (except directly at the damp source) if adequate heat is applied. Students can have bad habits that cause damp, we had new student accommodation we were involved in, brand new build and the heating was metered hot water, so students were not heating their rooms well to save money and they were hanging clothes to dry over everything in their rooms instead of paying to use the tumbers in the laundry room. Result in some areas was a damp problem which was initially thought to be a building defect, transpired it was money saving practises or rather cash strapped students dictating necessity - the pub was busy though!

Starting out as in, building it or planning it? If planning stage then usually work out chamber height then work up through the layers to see where that gets you, in our extension we had to work from the lead flashing down! I wanted to make the most of the height available to us to maximise internal ceiling heights. I then made the eaves of the roof as high as I could while maintaining an adequate pitch for the roof tiles I wanted to/had to use. The thing that would drive me initially in determining a wall height would be to get the existing building plan, know the existing building ceiling heights (if you want to copy those) and then draw some vertical lines across at various levels to determine where the roof abutment would be, or a max ridge height or a gable etc. depending on the orientation of the existing and proposed. I would then ascertain ground level, and finished floor level (FFL). At that I could then check the spaces available to me permit required roof pitch and that windows and doors will then fit suitability. That is a 10-15 minute basic task which is where most people involved in planning would start. There is little point in doing much else until the basics check out! I think it is things like this that sometimes people forget or don't understand which can lead to big mistakes if you try and DIY something you have little knowledge of. We had friends try and copy what I did, they ended up building an extension where the ceiling was going to end up lower than standard door height... He had not allowed for the height of his lintels when he worked it all out, so when he dropped the heights for the lintels, the lintel was going to come in about 1800mm so that his roof height remained untouched.

That reminds me, I need to pop into the pharmacy tomorrow to ask about an oil change on my car... Fairly typical of a trade who knows think they know a bit about a lot, he has heard something in isolation and become an "expert" I expect. If you are in England, part F applies here, if in Scotland it's just the Building standards. Part F I believe was last reviewed in 2010 and amended in 2013 so nothing "new". The Scottish building regs simply call for a ventilation rate and make no particular reference to type of fan or position.

Much like MoT's!

Honestly, given it's a new build, if you can I would replace it - another option is to replace a section of it and add another socket somewhere so you can make sure of the now shorter cable and thread a new bit in. Of course you can join it, but, I never like it. You could simply fit a 1G pattress box connect with Wago's and then fit a blanking plate. But then you have a blinking blank plate. Basically it needs to be accessible unless you opt for a maintenance free option. I have in the past done a staggered joint, soldered and heat-shrink it all. What the regs say: Every electrical joint and connection shall be of proper construction as regards conductance, insulation, mechanical strength and protection. Every connection shall be accessible for inspection, testing and maintenance, except for the following: (i) A joint designed to be buried in the ground (ii) A compound-filled or encapsulated joint 146 (iii) A connection between a cold tail and the heating element as in ceiling heating, floor heating or a trace heating system (iv) A joint made by welding, soldering, brazing or appropriate compression tool (v) Joints or connections made in equipment by the manufacturer of the product and not intended to be inspected or maintained (vi) Equipment complying with BS 5733 for a maintenance-free accessory and marked with the symbol MF and installed in accordance with the manufacturer’s instructions.

Are you sure? You said you got a belt? To get a belt something must exist... On your PCB I can see marked zones, which zone is this valve on - are you getting 240 across live and neutral on the board and the respective zone terminals? The next thing I would then do is confirm that the other end of that wire, i.e. at the valve is delivering power - which I think it will be given you got a jolt. Could wire damage be present anywhere? A damaged neutral/earth but an OK live would result in 0V across the 2 wires yet still very much live!

600 as 200 is peak 200 so will read a null reading, yes black to COM and red to the max 600V (there may be another terminal which will be for non-fused current measurement up to about 10A).