Alan Ambrose

That’s tough stuff. Building work seems to bring out the worst in some neighbours. Stay as calm and polite as you can, stick to the facts and process and you’ll win in the end.

This has been discussed a few times on ‘t ‘ub already. If I remember rightly, the subtle difference between footprint and overall dimensions might help. Also, by convention, the planning drawings are an approximation e.g. they don’t include drainpipes, TV antennas etc and so some interpolation is allowed and expected. Also, a lot of drawings say ‘you shouldn’t take dimensions off the drawing’ or some such which gives you a little more scope. As always, planning enforcement is just your lovely neighbours. You could always put in a non-material amendment if you want to be squeaky clean.

There’s also quite a lot of skill required to use one well. Another vote for hire and see how you get on. Unlike a lot of hire rates, the rates for excavators seem pretty reasonable to me.

The hive mind on ‘t ‘ub regards SAP as currently necessary but useless and counter-productive. Will Ecology accept the PHPP result instead? I second your thoughts re typical contractors / consultants. There are some v good ones, but for run-of-the-mill ones, I figure I can usually equal them the first time out and then do a better job the second time. Sure, there are some skilled trades e.g. plastering, cabinet making etc where I figure I don’t. Also, you know what you want - so you avoid the communication problems and having to argue them back from their standard ways of working. Sometimes the latter takes months. Also, I’m quite pernickety so I’ll make the extra effort to get it right whereas it’s not the contractor’s house so they usually don’t. The problem then is that there’s a tendency to do everything, so I’m trying to be more conscious of supervising the bits more closely that I care about.

Yeah, second the safety concern - I think that’s a much too lightweight construction. I’m sure proper SEs will be along shortly… Maybe you can use some off-the-shelf cages and ask the manufacturers if they have any ready-made designs for the height you need? You may also need a proper base to stop the whole thing swivelling over on the corners. I see in the example Gone West gives a link to, that the posts are in 0.6-0.7m or 35-60% of the height of the fence. Seems to me that that’s a bit of a generalisation given you could be building on rock or sand.

Is the minimum spec of the cable not in the instructions? (Tried calling the distributors?) Suggest current rating of cable should be twice the demand, just as a safety factor. And yes, regarding signal and power in the same cable, you can largely please yourself with ‘extra low voltage’ - although you should be professional enough to ensure the cable doesn’t overheat by having enough capacity.

I vote for Paul’s place - probably much more interesting at the moment.

An IP17 meet, or is that too far east for everyone? I have a concrete slab and tea making facilities to show off. Attractive, no? Anyone else have another offer?

Nice

Another way of looking at the situation in the South is that the landowners take 100% - 120% of the economic gain out of the PP uplift. Because of the v low supply, the landowners price for the people with more money than sense - making any build marginally economic at best, a money loser in most cases.

>>> you have not read enough Buildhub Maybe there should be required reading of specific threads followed by a test to ensure the information has been fully understood and retained. A key part of that knowledge would be the difference between KWH, kw, kW and Kw 😄. Also thermal mass being measured in kg.degree K.

>>> Which brand do you recommend for this That bright green stuff in the image is Ubbink.

Those all sound very reasonable given the kit and skill involved.

@zzPaulzz - sorry I forgot to answer your question. I use a co called Alco Eng https://alcoengineering.co.uk for laser and bending sheet, usually stainless. And purpose powder coating https://www.purposepowdercoatings.com . But that’s largely out of habit and knowing they’ll deal with small (rather than industrial) quantities. I generally supply a design in pdf and dxf allowing for the bending characteristics, but I think Alco will do that bit too for a fee. I’m sure there are loads of other good companies too.

That graph is for the US?

>>> Seems a shame there isn't a way to run wet underfloor heating in a way that would cool the floors ? There’s lots of info here on ‘t ‘ub on running heat pumps in cooling mode. Some do it out of the box, some can be configured, some can’t.

ah thanks

It's a moral failing. Someone at the council thought 'should we try and hoodwink £70K out of a council-tax-paying 'customer' for making a paperwork mistake?'. And the answer came back: 'yes, let's try it on'. And yes, Feynman was a legend.

Nice, thanks. Assume they worked OK?

Anyone have some ballpark costs for core drilling? In particular, some 150mm holes for MVHR ducts through a 365mm RC wall?

... and which ones did you use?

>>> 3mm is 2 credit cards. Or, in imperial, about 5 miles if you have OCD. Or as I call it 'attention to detail' 😄 .

If I've understood you correctly - any chance of shaving the 3mm off the back of the tray instead?

Thanks Tom, very useful info.

As other here on BH have noted though - we British have a generalised rose-tinted view of 'German engineering'. Some of it is justified, some of it is definitely not. The German wife of a friend (they live in Berlin) tells me that the red tape in local government is outrageous and the amount of pen and paper and fax machine usage is regrettable.