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No, we didn’t switch it off. We didn’t think to switch it off as the water went off without warning.

I agree, but No, we didn’t do anything.

We have a Vaillant Ecotec 637 system boiler that is about 7 years old. Was working fine until last night when a leak at the local water main caused Thames Water to switch the water off for the whole street without warning. It was off for about 16h. When they turned the water back on this morning we noticed our boiler wasn't working. We tried turning the tap that feeds it with water, that didn't seem to do much. When we switch it on, the blue LED screen just flashes with the word "loading" coming up on the screen, as it makes an intermittent whirring sound. It doesn't progress beyond this and just keeps doing that until we switch it off. No actual error code, nothing in the trouble shooting area of the manual. Any ideas?

Yet another european product that is in short supply in the UK. I was going to fit Mottez anti vibration matts under my washing machine, tumble dryer and dishwasher to reduce the noise/vibrations and stop the washing machine jiggling about. But screwfix is out of stock (and has been since December). Anyone know any other suppliers or alternative products that worked well?

I think the answer your question @CharlieKLP will depend on whom you ask. Because everyone is different and has different wants, needs, budgets and constraints. People will also have different expectations, depending on their own previous experiences of professionals. Ultimately, to the complex endeavour of building a house, which lets be honest is part engineering, part art and a hell of a lot blood and sweat, an architect can be many things: a designer, an artist, a project manager, a coach, a diplomat, a technician, a generalist and/or a specialist. The exact ratio of art to engineering will depend very much on the customer. My advice would be to be honest with your clients. Focus on what you enjoy the most, but be honest about that, whilst finding solutions for the things you don’t really want to do. So for example, if you only like being involved in certain types of projects, reject all others from the outset. If it’s more about the elements of a project, team up with others who can do what you don’t like doing. I consulted a very well regarded award winning architect who had done a couple of local projects as well as his own studio in ways that blew my mind. I knew I had to have him involved in my project. I approached him and pretty quickly realised I couldn’tafford him. But he was such a nice guy and so clearly a genius that I walked what he could do for us for the money I had. He suggested I pay him £1,200 just for the initial concept. This was some of the best money we ever spent. He met with my partner and I and asked us lots of questions about how we live, what are our gripes about the house, what were our aspirations for it. He asked about our budget and timescales, whether there were any plans to work from home in the future (this was pre pandemic), expand our family, hobbies etc. He really got to know the way we live and the way we wanted to live. He even set us homework. After a couple of sessions he set out two options for what we could do with our 1930s house, in some hand drawn scale sketches. Both were viable and both achieved our aims, albeit one was a bit over budget because it involved ripping out the staircase and installing a new one in the middle of the house. But it really opened up our minds (as well as the house) as to what we really wanted and what was possible. Now some will criticise him and say he should never have temper up down that path… but ultimately it was our choice. But we wouldn’t have had that choice if it wasn’t for him. As we couldn’t do the whole project with him because he was way out of our price range, I took his sketches to a much cheaper architect, one that I didn’t know much about other than he was young and cheap and not very experienced. I lucked out because this architect has done a pretty amazing job for us. But his inexperience sometimes comes through, and whilst I don’t regret going with him, I do miss the more expensive guy. A month or so ago, I had a few issues that I needed a second opinion on. I went back to the expensive guy for a one off consultation. He talked me through it, or as he put it, “coached me through” the decisions I needed to take, helping me appraise the cost benefit analysis of different design choices. In doing this, he made me raise that the recommendations my actual architect was giving me were the correct ones, but the more experienced chap had more than just experience. He had a way with people, a bit like a therapist, a bit like a friend, whilst still calling on impecable architectural knowledge. But even the more expensive guy had his limitations. I know he doesn’t do any appeal work, preferring his clients to use a planning consultant for that. I also know he always insists on getting a proper measured survey from a particular surveyor. And maybe that’s one of his benefits. He knows what he is God it and he sticks to it. If you team up with the right people you could do the same.

It’s looking very nice! Good luck with the next steps.

So just to clarify: your advice is that I should NOT do this?

I was hoping an experienced tiler like @nod might be able to comment on the following. My architect has had this crazy idea that the rather wide step running in between our lower ground floor and upper ground floor should be clad in terrazzo, and that the two tiles covering the tread and the riser should be mitre cut (45 degrees) where they meet at right angles. This would actually look really good because the upper ground floor is already going to be covered in terrazzo, so if me manage to get terrazzo on the riser as well, and mitre the join, it will almost look like one giant block of terrazo is resting on the lower ground floor to make the upper ground floor. BUT… although the terrazzo tiles are 20mm thick, won’t they chip when we try and mitre them? They are 600x600 tiles, so not sure if that makes mitre-ing even harder!

The downside of this is if you are going with a combi system, your hot water might take quite a while to get from your loft to your kitchen tap. Have a think about a place which is centrally located to all the most commonly used outlets.

I still think it's more likely to be the enthalpy exchanger as i just think they are not suitable for this kind of climate, unless there is a very good reason you don't want to over dry the air, like you are providing a ventilation system for a respiratory ward in a hospital or for a tropical greenhouse. And I'm stubborn. lol.

Veissman do a very nice storage combi that might give you the best of both worlds as it's a combi with an integrated storage tank that has something like 100L capacity. See if that meets your needs. If not, definitely get an unvented hot water cylinder. For a big house like this, you might also want to think about a secondary loop?

I have a similar problem, but at the opposite end of the scale. I have quite a long 40mm sink waste pipe, about 1m then a 45 degree bend, then about 30cm then another 45 degree bend, then a long piece which about 2.6m long. The 2.6m long piece looked rather straight and level so I took a spirit level to it and it dos have a fall, but not very much. Maybe 1:100. Is that enough?

That’s easy to solve. Buy FD30 with clear glass, then after you get your certificate from BC, add some opaque film to one side of the glass.

Yes, but I see this as helpful in a shower area as they provide grip. In theory, you are probably right. But in practice I don’t see why that would be the case. The shower room in my car is on the first floor of the old part of our house. Everything has settled and I’m not expecting any movement.

We cast a concrete step today in between my lower ground floor and my upper ground floor. It is approximately 19.5cm in height (riser height) and 29cm in depth (going). It has a 110 waste pipe running through it which we are using to supply air to our wood burning stove. here is an approximate cross section: It is rather long, as it runs along most of the width of the entire house, about 7.75m I would estimate. How long before I can lay a floor finish on it? We are planning to install 20mm terrazo on it (which is highly porous and cannot be sealed until after it has been laid) at one part, and microcement on the other part. Both of these materials require the subfloor to be dry. I’m concerned this is going to take ages, as parts of this step are 19.5cm deep of solid concrete.

Welcome! This does look like a very big ground floor. I would be minded to locate the study elsewhere (ie on a different floor or instead of the “living room “) and have a proper utility room, with space for a water tank and maybe also an accumulator tank if pressure is an issue. I would construct the utility room with very good sound proofing and keep all laundry machines and maybe an additional undercounter fridge or freezer in there. not sure of the utility of having a shower room on this floor. Will people come down from the upper floors to use it? Looks like a great plot, with fantastic potential, but I feel the layout, particularly on the ground floor, needs some tweaking. I’m not a fan of bifolds. Have a look at sliding systems. there are lots of things you can do with the roof if your extension. Will you be getting a pitched roof instead of a flat one? Seedham on top?

Or use giant tiles. We are effectively tiling our whole shower area with three massive tiles. So only grout lines are in the corners.

Is that Topcret?

Were you advised/informed by the vendor that an enthalpy exchanger was appropriate for your home? If so, could you try and make it their problem and see if they will swap out your heat exchanger for a regular one, even if only on a trial basis? Alternatively, do you have summer bypass? If so, would activating that put the exchanger out if play so that you can check whether that is the cause? Obviously that wouldn’t be a permanent fix, but might be a useful diagnostic test, though I confess I’m not entirely sure how the summer bypass works.

I was suggesting purchasing a FD30 door that already comes with a light, then adding to it.

Returning to the point of @Russdl’s original thread, I wonder Russdl if the issue is that you have an enthalpy exchanger when you don’t need one. This article, suggest you don’t, assuming you live in the UK of course: “The average relative humidity in the UK is between lows of 70% and highs of 90% which is considered high, suggesting humidity recovery is not that big an issue in the UK” https://cvcsystems.co.uk/relative-humidity/ Maybe the solution is to swap out the enthalpy exchanger for a regular one.

Thanks. The wood has been in the house for about 3 weeks already, albeit it is still in its polythene and cardboard wrapping. Why should humidity be lower for installing a bonded floor? Is the concern that if it is too high the bonding won’t glue properly? I will increase the UFH temp if i can persuade the builder to. I mentioned it to the foreman, but he wasn’t keen. I guess his boss is liable if it causes the screed to crack, so they must be being risk averse.

But I don’t think that matters. The door will still prevent a fire from passing through it for 30 mins, even if the glazing bar on the side of the fire burns quickly.

Following with interest. I’m finding the same issue, and unless one goes bespoke, I’m finding the only way is to purchase a FD30 which is sufficiently similar that it could be added to to make it look like the style you are going for. So in your case you could buy a plain door with a light in it, then add the four glazing bars onto the door. Not ideal, but i haven’t found any manufacturers doing this, other than an American based outfit, which does not comply to the same FD regs as the UK.

The manufacturer will just say the floor had to be dry. So not really that helpful.