Andeh

Will try and post up more pics when I find a way to shrink them below 2mb!

After a career setback over the summer, I needed a project so built myself an outdoor shower. it works really well. Id like to still be able to use it over the winter when I truly hate myself, but I'm trying to think of ways of winter proofing it. The hot and cold feed are in 25mm walk thick insulation outside, and 10mm thick through the unheated single garage. My concern is around the valve mechanism and how insulate it, per pictures below? I have isolation valves inside the house, and intend to fit drain valves on the hot and cold pipes below shower AND at the lowest pipe exiting the shower valve at the bottom. Just welcome any other suggestions!

300mm pipe spacing does seem big, on tile flooring you'll notice the heat spacing unless you have really thick screed. Id opt for smaller and dial back the temp.

Yeah we had similar positivity with quooker several months ago, light weep from one of the joints, and despite being out of warranty, and without quibble, sent out nigh on everything for me to diagnose and replace myself. Wasn't a big job at all, but was a relief when I thought it could become expensive. Very happy with them.

I'm in exactly the same boat myself, so watching with interest. I figure a battery and AC inverter standalone, doesn't interact with my PV and the FIT meter which monitors them... So I hope not an issue!

Thank you! That clear and helpful - that's good to hear, as I ran CAT6A to the meter cabinet just in case I ever needed something in there. Now I just need £10k for a decent setup!!

Yeah, unsurprisingly I'm still learning my way through how the system all sings together. We have a single garage next to the house, and the only cables between the two (in ducts, buried) are 2 x 7kw armoured and 2 x CAT6A. In the house we have an inverter and 4kw of solar panels, in the same utility room as the fuse box where the CAT6A and 2 x 7kw cables terminate. Tieh solar panels are tied to an old school 80p/kw FIT which we do not want to lose (!) hence being ok with 2 x inverter for solar and battery. I'm trying to work if there is any blockers to installing battery and inverter in single garage, making use of the 7kw cable and if any other ancillary control cables can use the CAT7A... Current clamps etc? Fogstar batteries very much looking at the size and price point is like, of around 16-20kWh storage. Hopefully this is clear!

Thank you! What's the Comms between battery and inverter? I installed cat6 cable alongside my armoured cable, between house and garage, where I want batteries installed . Is there any system which uses cat6 for the Comms?

With UFH you need to assume constant heat to make the most of it, otherwise a cold slab just takes too long for weekend working. We put in two over sizes radiators, on their own zone off the ASHP. With insulation all round (except the slab), and within an hour it's toasty warm for that sudden bout of working or playing on there!

Any form of garage or workshop only do 2 part Epoxy resin/paint. The normal single tin garage floor paint can be extremely weak, with warm tyres simply peeling it off. Once you've made that mistakes the effort of removing it to enable a proper replacement is massive. Having made the mistake myself, it took nearly a dozen hours with a floor grinder to remove it all. Since then, I swear by 2 part Epoxy paint, and over 2 garages, daily used by two cars I've found it extremely resilient.

If you do manage to route out a new one, having two strip lights is even less shadows!! Surely the self adhesive ones only sit a few mm proud, and would never be seen unless you stick your head in the cupboard?

It's sad, but I do see it as a tax on stupid people. Better they learn their lessons on a £xx posh fan, and feel cheated, mugged off & embarrassed then when they fall for a dodgy email and take a £xx,xxx hit which the bank then refunds - at the rest of our expense.

Id be looking up if there are any sink hole type construction projects in the wider national area. Surely the approach to resolving those is not dissimilar to what you need to achieve here? Id be looking for engineers or companies which have been involved in those sorts of projects, and see their views on it.

But with batteries, smart grid, vehicle charging, vehicle2load, import/export and smart tariffs.... The peaks and troughs of weather dependant generation can be smoothed out quite easily. Why form a strong judgement, when you only understand part of the topic?

Please let us know how you get on!

I went through the same worry OP, where I wanted full flush and it's about 5mm low floor to sliding doors inside, and 15mm outside. The outside as we added a third slider which added a lip as the door sits over it's track... And I forgot to check. Haven't thought about it in ages....

Especially the pesent isnt dead enough, and has just enough energy to make a run for it. I never wanted the ruddy cats in the first place.

You're already in the top 0.1% of air tight homes, spending £2,000 (and £2,000 of TF money for use elsewhere...) to enter the 0.01% of homes is not worth it IMO. Future sellers won't care, friends and family won't care and realistically you'd never notice the difference even if you really really tried on a really windy day. The second anyone opens a door you've undone several hours of airtightness anyway. Ours is at 2.7 (no sniggering at the back...) as a hugely volumetric bungalow with several sliders everywhere... And despite wibbling about it for years, and being obsessed with trying to seal everywhere that I could.... Its fine...

That is lovely!

Sorry to hear it OP, these houses can be such a massive emotional and physical heavylift.... But the shitshow will be temporary and the satisfaction and enjoyment is a lifetime. I promise you it is all worth it in the end, but you do need to smile and endure.

We did, is just stick 20mm PIR against the external wall, and ??mm at the bottom of the cavity and then back fill with concrete. That way you've mitigated the worst of the thermal bridging and have a strong support throughout. Wish that's what we'd have done, but I was away with work and due to 2.4 x 8m sliders they backfilled entirely with concrete due to worries about the weight and movement destabilising. It's held firm, but we do have a sizable thermal bridge now.

Natural movements between the two supports would be more of a concern then the raw bridging abilit I think. Slight cracking and debonding on one side could be an issue?

Great write up! On my to do list ia find a way of both buttons doing a full flush, and ensuring the full flush is indeed a FULL one. Young kids means they only press the button once/lightly/at random, and the waste never fully goes.

It's coming together well. Don't forget internal lights and cabling for it. Maybe an armoured cable up and over for vehicle charging point in future? When we built our place we did the garage a similar height, so I could get my land rover in the garage, with a roof box on, and so it could be opened inside the garage for loading before and after holidays. I was worried about how much it would impose on the rest of the house (bungalow), and whilst it probably does a bit.... You forget about it amazingly quickly.

We have a Monarch midi system, which 3 years in... Just works well! Id recommend it