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These are the Blum hinges. All made by Blum, but middle one is slightly different to the other two - this middle one was the additional one they installed on the snagging visit a month or so ago. I have asked them to return to fix this issue, as well as a couple of others, but there’s not been a response, despite me chasing. It’s a shame the aftercare service is so poor.

Won’t the piece of wood just crash with the cabinet frame? Could I ask the joinery to cut the door so that instead of 26mm thick it is 18mm thick? That would remove about a third of the weight. Another solution is to find some sort of specialist hinge that could cope with this weight. Anyone have any experience of such hinges?

We have an MdF cabinet door that is 79cm wide and 39cm high, 26mm thick. It sags, presumably because the width of the door creates too much weight/moment for the hinges to support the door straight. i raised it with the joinery that made and installed this for us and they added an additional hinge, so that there are now three hinges. That has not made much difference, after a few days’ use it sags again and starts to hit the frame. I have adjusted the Blum hinges, but this also doesn’t seem to make much difference; it’s almost as if the hinges don’t have enough adjustment to them, but I suspect they weren’t designed for such a wide door. Photo below. Thoughts as to a possible fix which doesn’t involve cutting the door into two?

Wasn’t really worried about it now. But I was 4 years ago when i started researching it, and still was 3.5 years ago when I had to make the decision, so that’s why i went with gas. But everything is pretty much setup for converting to something greener in the future, so one day we will hopefully change it. Reading the news article I posted just reminded me of my worries…

Ok, good to know that when my gas boiler eventually needs replacing in 15 years or so, I will be able to find a near silent ASHP.

The main issues that put me off installing a heat pump in my renovated home was the noise and the cost. Both are discussed here: https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/27/pump-up-the-volume-the-trouble-with-noisy-heat-pumps Just wondering how those that have heat pumps here dealt with the noise issue and whether now that you have lived with your heat pump, particularly in summer, you are happy you made the decision to go with a heat pump.

You are probably right. But given it is a fire suppression system, and given my house is by far my largest asset, I probably shouldn't be doing anything that will invalidate the buildings and contents insurance.

You are held hostage forever. Otherwise you have to live with the bleeping alarm. Total gotcha for me. I think the service is about £160 a year with a 5 year “service plan”. It’s robbery, plain and simple.

Yes, it means it’s past its deadline for an annual service. Only way to switch it off is to get it serviced by imist at a massive cost. Otherwise known as daylight robbery.

In what sense? Our oak staircase is very quiet, only real noise is that there are a couple of treads which creak a little bit, but nothing major.

I spent a small fortune on my staircase. Three flights in solid oak, stained to match the other oak in our house. Looks great. Bank balance still hurting.

Why? What’s wrong with oak?

You could apply for retrospective planning, then if they reject you, you could appeal. I can’t really see any reason why a brick wall is preferred by them and it’s possible the appeals officer would not be able to spot the rationale for the presence either. Are you in a conservation area?

Not sure. Building regs notice was served when we started works in late 2020 and certificate was issued in March or April 2022, so whatever breaker was mandated by the regs which were current then.

Looks like an alien invasion to me.

I now understand the correct terminology to be “trip”.

Relatively new 1000W zanussi built in microwave. Is actually 2.5 years old or so, but is so crap we hardly use it, maybe 80 uses since installed at most. Today, for the first time ever, it lost power. I went to the consumer unit and saw that it had cause the dedicated fuse to “blow”/“switch”/“break” - I’m not sure of the technical term. Easily fixed, I just flicked the switch and it’s all working happily again, but I just wondered why this happened? There is also a fused switched spur between the CU and the microwave, local to the microwave - I guess this is additional safety.

You are correct that one is free to end the contract and move to another provider. But you cannot end the contract prior to 12months AND move to another Octopus tarriff. The termination provision provides: 11.1 You may end this Contract by giving us 28 days’ notice provided that: 11.1.1 Either another supplier takes over supplying Energy to the Premises by the end of your notice period, or the supply has been disconnected by this date; and 11.1.2 All sums due by you to us have been paid. I'm quite loyal to Octopus as I think their customer service is very good, so I'm not sure I would be happy to just switch to another provider, unless there was a big saving.

Been offered "Octopus 12M Fixed" as follows: Any thoughts on whether this is a tariff worth fixing into for the next 12 months?

You may as well put a note on the car windscreen explaining that the work WILL commence and if their car is in the way, the work could accidentally damage it. I can’t see how there is much to lose from putting that there. As for shifting it yourself, I can’t identify any criminal issue. Moving it might give rise to the tort of unlawful interference in goods, but as long as you don’t damage the car, there isn’t any loss that they could actually claim. There is no applicable precedent from the following, but I thought I would share it nonetheless as an example of how out of hand these things can get:

Actually, the plinth/support will be about 5cm recessed under the base, so I'm not sure I'll even see it. I might not bother caulking the hole after all.

Not with my wood-working skills. The diagram I've drawn is oversimplified somewhat. There are twice as many changes of slope to the skirting, than shown on the diagram.

Well I certainly don't manage it, but I guess you are right that it's a switch. Seems to be working ok for the moment. Let's see how long it lasts... Are you sure this works with the era range? according to Sonos's support page (https://support.sonos.com/en-gb/article/choose-between-a-wireless-and-wired-sonos-setup) the ERA 100 & 300 won't support sonosnet, so I'm not sure how linking one speaker to ethernet (which I understood creates a sonosnet broadcasted by that speaker) will help given the speaker that was droping out prior to me spending considerable time tinkering is an Era 100. There is a new app upgrade coming out tomorrow which I'm worried will f**k everything up further... I could hardwire my Beam Gen 2 if I bought a switch to split the only ethernet port I have in that area (currently being used by the TV). For a new Sub, I'm not sure of the ideal placement, but I thought Subs could pretty much go anywhere, so i didn't want to be limited by where I have an ethernet port. I really don't have that many spare ports in convenient locations... we planned on having one for each of our two desktop PCs and one for each of the three possible locations in the house where we might want to watch TV. In addition we have one for each location where the APs go, and as those have built in switches, that creates a couple more ports there.

I’m laying a shelving unit directly onto some skirting in an alcove. The skirting is 12cm high and about 22mm thick. I will have some support battens, also 12cm high that will run along the floor so that the unit is not supported just by the skirting. Because of the shape of the skirting, I will be left with an awkward gap, shaded red in the diagram below. Is this gap/hole too big/deep to polyfilla?

depends on: how you define "drying", how humid the building site is already (for example if airtight and MVHR is already commissioned (which is unlikely) you could whack that on max and this would likely speed up drying time); and how bothered you are about having a degree of moisture there trapped after you have sealed it - If it is sealed properly, it's probably not too much an issue, but I think allow at least 1.5mm a day drying time.