Omi

It's a 1.5 storey detached house. Interestingly, when I used the RHI estimator, the kWh/yr it came up with was close to the figure estimated by Supplier BU. I understand that it's not the same thing as the kW demand but surely it would be related? Not yet but plan to do so once we have the SAP calculations done. As for yours, do you know how much heat yours is delivering? BU estimated our demand at 3.8 kW.

Ended up going with ecorend "Portland Stone" which is actually more off-white than cream in reality -- accepted by planning office with no questions asked ? All planning conditions have now been discharged. The final palette (render and stone) is:

Thanks everyone, I'll look at a mix of: Giving away Relocating Cutting down for firewood and fence-posts Really needing to watch every penny here after it turned out that getting services in will end up eating 10% of our budget.

No MVHR, the design specification is currently 5m³/h/m² or better if that helps.

We have around around 25 juvenile trees on the site that will need to be removed in order for the house to go in: They are a mostly different types of Birch with a few Goat Willows and Cherries in the mix. I estimate they were planted roughly 10 years ago and are currently around 15 feet high but the trunks are still < 6" in diameter. What's the most cost effective method of getting these removed? I'm happy to relocated them to another part of the plot or even give them away if someone wants a grown tree for their garden!

I have ASHP quotes from four different suppliers and they do not seem to agree on the sizing required. I don't have the SAP calculations at this time so gave all of suppliers the following information: Floorplan and elevation drawings - should be able to estimate wall, roof, floor, and door/window areas from these. Floor area: 210 m2 Roof area: ~200 m2 External Walls: ~220 m2 Doors/Windows: ~48 m2 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms. Performance target - Scottish Building Regs For external walls: 0.22W/m²K For roofs: 0.15W/m²K (Insulation between joists) For exposed floors: 0.18W/m²K For windows, doors & rooflights: 1.6W/m²K Construction - timber frame w/ external wall insulation Heating - UFH throughout System to provide 100% of heating and DHW Location of build - Scottish Borders With this, the estimates I have are: Supplier XK: 12 kW + 180L Supplier GR: 12 kW + 500L Supplier RG: 10 kW + TBC Supplier BU: 6 kW + 210L (Outside air temp: -5 ℃) Based on the information I've received from the suppliers, the one that come up with the 6 kW sizing (supplier BU) seems to have put in the most amount of effort into the process and sent through documents showing the calculation/assumptions made and therefore gives me the most confidence at this time. This is also the same supplier that sized and fitted @Redoctober's system. Does the 6 kW system seem reasonable? I'm just a bit puzzled since it's half of what two others seem to have estimated.

Thanks - good advice. That was my line of thinking - find someone who's willing to let me do the labour intensive parts and inspect/test to make sure it's been done correctly.

We are having the same dilemma here - Rationel vs Allan Brothers Alu-clad windows. @Jenjen - what did you end up getting in the end? Thanks!

Wasn't planning on touching any of the plumbing but thought I should at least be capable of running cables with my Electical Engineering degree ? Anyway, sounds like I need to speak a plumber/electrician and work out the best approach with them. Thanks for the advice!

The drawings we've got thus far only seem to include details of drains as far as plumbing is concerned and high level electrical designs in the form of where the lights, sockets, and switches would go (+circuits between them). So the specific questions I have are: Plumbing: Who would determine where the water supply pipes (cold and hot) go? Is that down to the plumber? Electrics: Design of the actual cable runs and distribution box, etc. Is that for the electrician? We are hoping to to do as much of the electrical first-fix (e.g., running the cables) we can do ourselved to save costs but would need some kind of a plan to work to. Thanks!

Similar question here. We've got our planning permission (Scottish Borders) and are working through the process of creating the Building Warrant drawings with our Timber Frame supplier. They do have an SE they typically work with (and will provide a separate quote for the service) but have been wondering how I might go about finding my own just to get a comparative quote for the job. It seems http://www.certificationregister.co.uk is the place to go to for finding accredited SEs but just checking if that's right? Another (basic!) question I had was - who does the detailed electrical and plumbing designs? Is it also the SE? Or someone else? Thanks!

Thanks, we did look at that - we've been finding that "Cream" according to Weber and K-Rend seem to be a lot more yellow/orange compared to Cream according to RAL -- at least on a screen. We'll need to order some samples to see what they actually look like in practice.

Quick update - we have planning permission! The approved elevations are: Unfortunately we lost one of our favourite features - the arched covered entrance - in reducing the width of the gable but must admit that the elevation does look better proportioned this way. We still need to get actual stonework and render colour approved before building can commence so anticipate that our next battle will be over that -- particularly the definition of the colour "cream" which was demanded by the planner. We're not big fans of "cream" with a heavy proportion of yellow/orange so here's hoping we can convince him that the RAL colour chart "Cream" is acceptable: https://www.ralcolorchart.com/ral-classic/ral-9001-cream

Quick update after speaking to the chap at SP Energy Networks: As suspected, the local supply (transformer) is at capacity and needs to be upgraded to support the demand for the new build. He mentioned that the current capacity is 50 kVA which is shared by around 7/8 properties -- which sounds like it must already be operating close to the max capacity. Unfortunately, that means that we get the pleasure of helping them upgrade the local transformer to 100 kVA of which we will get 18 kVA. They are happy for us to do our own roadworks. This is great news as we expect that we would have need to dig up the same stretch of road to put in the water pipes. Arranging our own roadworks dropped the SPEN bill by half to £10k. This now consists of: £1250 for design ans assessment fee. It's ridiculously high but they recuperate costs for quoting/design works that do not progress to an order across those that do. £1000 for service cable connection. £650 for wayleave £5000 for laying 115 m of 185 mm (4 core) WF mains cable £2000 for transformer upgrade (18% of overall cost - 18 kVA of 100 kVA) The 185 mm mains cable will run through the property and just a few meters from the meter so that the final stretch of the connection will be made using 35 mm LV service cable. I guess we could argue for the 185 mains to end at the property boundary to save some more money but it seems like a good opportunity to just have it there for when we decide to go for an EV charging point at some point in the future. So, still massively over budget but hopefully we'll be able to come in a few £ks under the £20k originally quoted. Here's the new drawing for those interested: Now just waiting on the details from Scottish Water and hopefully things will be a lot simpler there (i.e., we can connect to the 90 mm distribution main which is pretty much at point #1 above).

Just found the drawing of the the proposed works: Is the consensus here that we just need to bite the bullet and go for it? Is it worthwhile getting in touch with multi-utility installation companies so that we avoid having to dig up the road twice? The asset drawing from SW shows a similar starting point as the electricity: Bit puzzled that it doesn't show any connections to the neighbouring houses even though they do have mains water (according to a neighbour).

Here are the bits from the quote: This doesn't include any diagrams but I received the following asset plan previously: Our site is to the North East: Thanks!

Hi everyone, I'm going through the quoting process with SP Energy Networks and have been quoted £20k for electricity connection. About £15k of that is "Contestable" and the remainder is to reinforce capacity. This despite there being an existing connection next door... We also need to get water (Scottish Water) in and expecting a similar shock. Any advice on how to approach this? Would you recommend using a multi-utility connection provider? Thanks!

Yup, got a brush cutting blade attachment - will give that one a go. Looks like it'll keep us busy for a few weekends!

Thanks - it'll be a few months before we can start on the build. Just looking to tidy things up a bit so that we can can enjoy the site in the meantime.

Hello, The site we are building on has not been maintained in a while and is rather overgrown as a result: Any advice on the best way to get this cleaned up before the build starts? We are planning to do as much as possible ourselves before the ground works start and have a petrol multi-tool and assorted gardening equipment at our disposal. Thanks!

Good advice - time is a luxury that we don't have. Anyway, thanks for all the comments everyone - much appreciated.

@Redoctober - That's a great find! Mind emailing the address over? Hope you and Nicola have been keeping well.

@the_r_sole - the houses shown earlier were to establish a point about the gable. There are others in the area (same postcode in fact) with the arch feature (though no protruding gable): @PeterW - thanks for the very helpful comments, gives us lots to think about!

Hi, Reducing the gable to the living room section is our line of thinking for the fallback position but it would likely mean losing the arched entrance which we feel adds quite a bit of character to the build (reflects a common local feature). Will be discussing this option with the designer to see what we can come up with. As for the compass points, North is up, East is to the right. Main bit of open grounds is to the East (also the best views). Hence the big gable windows on the master bedroom and doors out from the dining room on the ground floor. Thanks.

Hi everyone, Thank you for the feedback thus far. I can see that the design is quite polarising! The only real feedback has been that the gable is too wide so I assume the LPA is looking for us to make it narrower somehow. Trouble is that the elevations are dictated by the internal layout/flow which in turn is driven by the features of the site. There's farmland to the right of the plot and row of stone cottages to the left. It's also farmland across the road. The house to the rear is finished in off-white render. We don't believe it's going to go to committee at this time. The plot is not in a sensitive/conservation area. We're working with the timber frame supplier on the design and they are also the ones dealing with the planning office. They have had a good relationship with the officer for the region but he retired/moved on some time ago and now we have a junior, "assistant planning officer" looking at the applications. So we're likely dealing with someone with little experience here. Here are the internal plans if it helps: Thanks!