Faz

The windows have to fix into something . Your spec presumably assumes they are fixing into the cavity closer if they are sitting 100m from the facing brick - not something I would want tbh.

This! You surely can't be having both? And you also have to allow for diversity. To give you an idea we are taking 23kVA for 3 large 4b detached houses (with gas CH).

Nothing wrong with a bit of steel mate. I am brick / block but the principal remains. Do you really want structural timber below ground?

What power did you request on the application? Assuming that you are not using electric heating you should get away with 6 kVA or so allowing for diversity (that would be a circa 10 kVA supply pre-diversity.

The thing is that working up quotes is time consuming and comes at a cost - if someone has gone out to 4 suppliers you (in theory) have a 25% chance of winning the job - if they have gone out to 20 then this becomes 5% - how much time and effort are you going to speculate on that one?

I have been to the Electrolux factory and have seen Electrolux / AEG and Zanussi products (these were fridges) rolling down the same production line with different tinted plastics going into each - you pay your money you take your choice....

If you want to go to Potton (Kingspan) I would strongly recommend that you visit their show homes at St Neot's. My experience was that they were ok at first impression but walking around I thought wft more and more at column / layout positions. I went through their entire portfolio (probably 200+) and found them all problematic with similar issues. I ended up getting a basic design off this lot - House Plans UK, Architectural Plans And Home Designs - Home - House Plan UK (houseplans-uk.co.uk) and adapting the hell out of it. Going out to suppliers it is a mistake to go out far and wide - these people talk to each other. Go to 3 - 4 tops. If you are not happy then go to a couple more - don't splash it across the market as no-one will be interested.

I used Harmony Timber Frame for our last penthouse scheme in Bromley and they were pretty good - Harmony Timber Timber Solutions, Harmony Timber Frame, Ireland. It was around £40k supply and install for 4,000 sq. ft. of apartments.

Did it myself - here is an example of one (the agreed costs go in another column) - PURCHASE ORDER NR: RH/PO/004 DATE: //2020 DESCRIPTION OF SERVICES AMOUNT Plumbing and heating services with parts and labour included (unless as Excluded below) as follows – Plot 1 Plot 2 Plot 3 Price excludes sanitaryware and brassware which are client supply items. These items are to be called off at least 2 weeks before they are required. Works to be completed in accordance with the NHBC Technical Manual – details can be found at https://nhbc-standards.co.uk/ Payment on 14 days of invoice in accordance with the attached payment Schedule. £7,496.69 £7,496.69 £14,553.37

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You have to make sure you follow the process to the letter. Form 2 Assumption of Liability followed by the Form 7 Pt 1 self build exemption. Then you have to serve a Form 6 Notice of Commencement before you start works followed by the Form 7 Pt 2 once you are done. Failing to serve the Form 6 before commencement invalidates the exemption. The CIL exemption on mine is worth north of £35k so it is important to get it right!

Hi all - sorry been on site all week and haven't had time to drop by here. The copper pipe is the gas pipe - runs underneath to poly top sheet and gas membrane. Brickie - you are spot on mate - there is going to be a lot of ground to make up. The issue we had is the planners insisting that FFL was 300mm above ground and then the next 300mm constructed using flood resilient construction. Our solution was to jack up the FFL to over 600mm above ground. Anyway - good progress this week - membrane completed, screeded and the blocking lift nearly complete - back on site tomorrow to finish off.

Just by way of an update, we are up to splash on all 3 and the gas membrane is now completed throughout (final plot completed yesterday after I took the photo). UFH on Monday and concrete screed Thursday. Need to spread out the A142 mesh for the garages prior to Thursday and then a day back before Christmas to get the foot scaffold in and that wraps me up until 2021 - happy days!

Can't see that you are going to have a problem provided you are careful excavating around it - your concrete will stop short of that level and you can just stick a lintel over it when building the walls.

The other thing to think about is whether you are actually going to sue one of these people - having undertaken various litigation in the past for work I hardly think it likely due to the costs involved. I now generally contract subbies by using Purchase Orders qualified to works (referenced to the quote), works to NHBC Technical Manual standards, specified amounts, payment intervals and payment times. 1 page and it's all there. If the worst came to the worse and I had to litigate then I would rather have that than a JCT or anything like it!

I did exactly the above on our current site - we were not concerned about defraying / avoiding the CIL though as we kicked all 3 off at the same time - mine got a £32,000 CIL exemption and the others were payable by a different party (my company).

I would suggest you do 2 Form 2s - 1 for each Plot. Then a Form 7a for the Self Build only and a Form 6 for the Self Build when you start - can't see that that would trigger the liability. Even better if you could do each Form 2 in different names - a company or someone else.

They wouldn't refuse permission but will condition it so that CIL is payable. If the sum is big enough they allow you to pay it in 3 or so installments depending on the Council. What it won't do though is allow you to complete the house and sell it before the payments are due. Not a fan of CIL as it is generally a slush fund for the Council to use on pet projects that rarely benefit the areas where the money has been raised. At the end of the day it is a land tax and should be treated as a straight deduction on the price paid for the land if the asking price has not taken this into account.

That is everything. We have our own telehandler and welfare unit tbh which saves a fair bit of money on hire charges. One thing I would recommend is that you look to buy rather than hire if you can - as an example. on our last job, we needed a pallet truck - the hire cost was £250 per month - I bought a new one for £250 and it is still with us today. Same with the telehandler - the hire cost for our machine is £1,560 + VAT pcm - I bought ours for £26,000 + VAT. Even if we knocked it all on the head in a few years we would probably be able to sell this kit for pretty much what we paid for it. As you say, 3 are just about enough to start getting economies of scale - you should have seen the prices we were paying for materials when we did 88 flats! High end wall tiles that retailed for £14 a tile we were buying for £1.82 as an example. We are still able to leverage previous scale on this job a bit but flats demand rather different supplies than houses in the main (acoustics and fire ratings / separation etc). My advice is to spend your pre-mobilisation time in getting prices - you can never have too many. Once you get on site you just want to be calling stuff off that you have priced and not be getting into the position of seeking quotes as you just don't have the time to properly assess it. Final piece of advice is to be a bit vague with the site name / details when you get brick quotes - the merchants try to register the site with the brick manufacturer and all of your subsequent quotes will be worse. That saved me a world of pain as the first 3 quotes I received were for more than £1 a brick - finally got a decent quote at 44p with MKM which we snapped up.

I am doing a build of 3 in north Cambs of around 6,500 sq. ft. and the costs are going to come in at less than £100psf.

I would have thought for the ground floor you would build sleeper walls on 450mm footings where required which would then allow a standard beam and block floor solution - must be cheaper than going for steels.

To be honest, if you are considering operating the digger you are going to have to go off and get a ticket to drive it on site - my telehandler course and ticket cost £1290 plus VAT and I imagine it would be much the same for a digger.

I had the same problem on groundworks - I don't know what is going on with these lads but suspect the furlow scheme has a lot to do with it to be honest. Went out to 9 companies and not 1 came back with a price. Hired in a chap on a day rate in the end to pull the foundations with a 23.5T machine who was fantastic. Where abouts are you? We still have a problem on drainage made a bit worse as I have ripped the guts out of the groundworks package - easier to deal with I suppose as the problem is smaller. We will get it sorted.

Thanks for the thoughts guys - we had a long lead in on this job so I spent the time getting most of the prices together from all and sundry. Quite useful as I now have no spare time at all even getting up at 5am! Brickies rocked up today and the rain cleared up as the trench blocks arrived and we are just about out of the ground on the first plot - you get through a fair bit with 3 laying and 1 mixing! I reckon that we will be out of the ground and waiting for the beam & block (well poly in my case) by the end of next week. Floorspan are on a week or so lead on their eFloor so I will need to pull the trigger on that one soon. Turns out that Cambs Water intend to connect up the 3 supplies starting tomorrow - they didn't tell me - I heard from the next door site - ordered a load of 25mm mDPE pipe this evening for the job as you want to minimise connections if possible but it won't be here until Thurs am - I think the water board are just going to have to suck it up. tbh the guys doing the connections next door seemed fairly happy to spend a lot of the day sitting in their van so I can't imagine it is going to be a problem.