Alan Ambrose

>>> But it isn't intelligent . It gave me a quote but then I asked a person to confirm if it knew what it was doing. ie it asked silly questions. Welcome to 1984, expect a lot more of this (:

>>> even with extra liquid the SLC has not created a level playing field and in some places I'm 4mm out Well I'm sympathetic 'cos I've been there before. I wonder whether a very low viscosity product will work? Or a careful re-application of the same product, just in the areas that are low, with some sort of tamping bar to get the level. Should adhere better if the original hasn't dried out I would think. That's only my guess though...

>>> Most of populated Canada is South of the UK. That's just spooky - they have snow and bears and everything...

Curiously, another article on California electricity suggesting that (a) there will need to be a big capital spend to support EV charging, and (b) the kW price will stay stable. BTW I think California is interesting for us - while 'special', it is an innovator, so the UK could follow suit, say, 10 years later. https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2317599121 BTW this isn't behind a paywall, just press the 'show more text' button. Summary below: Two researchers at the University of California, Davis -- Yanning Li and Alan Jenn -- have determined that nearly two-thirds of [California's] feeder lines don't have the capacity that will likely be needed for car charging. Updating to handle the rising demand might set its utilities back as much as 40 percent of the existing grid's capital cost. Li and Jenn aren't the first to look at how well existing grids can handle growing electric vehicle sales; other research has found various ways that different grids fall short. However, they have access to uniquely detailed data relevant to California's ability to distribute electricity (they do not concern themselves with generation). They have information on every substation, feeder line, and transformer that delivers electrons to customers of the state's three largest utilities, which collectively cover nearly 90 percent of the state's population. In total, they know the capacity that can be delivered through over 1,600 substations and 5,000 feeders.[...] By 2025, only about 7 percent of the feeders will experience periods of overload. By 2030, that figure will grow to 27 percent, and by 2035 -- only about a decade away -- about half of the feeders will be overloaded. Problems grow a bit more slowly after that, with two-thirds of the feeders overloaded by 2045, a decade after all cars sold in California will be EVs. At that point, total electrical demand will be close to twice the existing capacity. The problems aren't evenly distributed, though. They appear first in high-population areas like the Bay Area. And throughout this period, most of the problems are in feeders that serve residential and mixed-use neighborhoods. The feeders that serve neighborhoods that are primarily business-focused don't see the same coordinated surge in demand that occurs as people get home from work and plug in; they're better able to serve the more erratic use of charging stations at office complexes and shopping centers. In terms of the grid, residential services will need to see their capacity expand by about 16 gigawatts by 2045. Public chargers will need nine gigawatts worth of added capacity by the same point. The one wild card is direct current fast charging. Eliminating fast chargers entirely would reduce the number of feeders that need upgrades by 12 percent. Converting all public stations to DC fast charging, in contrast, would boost that number by 15 percent. So the details of the upgrades that will be needed will be very sensitive to the impatience of EV drivers. Paying for the necessary upgrades will be pricey, but there's a lot of uncertainty here. Li and Jenn came up with a range of anywhere between $6 billion and $20 billion. They put this in context in two ways. The total capital invested in the existing grid is estimated to be $51 billion, so the cost of updating it could be well over a third of its total value. At the same time, the costs will be spread out over decades and only total up to (at most) three times the grid's annual operation and maintenance costs. So in any one year, the costs shouldn't be crippling. All that might be expected to drive the cost of electricity up. But Li and Jenn suggest that the greater volume of electricity consumption will exert a downward pressure on prices (people will pay more overall but pay somewhat less per unit of electricity). Based on a few economic assumptions, the researchers conclude that this would roughly offset the costs of the necessary grid expansion, so the price per unit of electricity would be largely static.

Ask these guys maybe? https://www.loftsolutions.co.uk/shop/velux-spares/velux-external-cover-parts/

I do buy the idea that the grid is a big fat fixed cost and it may well need enhancing to support peak usage. So, we'll end up paying for it regardless - whether that's in higher per kW prices or connection fees, even if we're individually using less grid energy. We might end up with something like internet ISP charging where it's the size of the pipe that's the costly thing rather than the amount of data. So, the idea that overall electricity supply costs are going to get cheaper is questionable even if the per kW cost becomes very cheap sometimes. Anyone know how the full cost of home PV compares to the full cost of grid PV? That is, how much more efficient is it to do it in bulk?

>>> I do wonder how many people who pay by direct debit have over paid. Oh yes, they take the .... mickey, have mine on pay-actual-usage-at-end-of-month to avoid the BS.

All the suppliers are fairly hopeless, I had one who took 4 visits to swap out a 3P meter. And another where I accidentally exchanged some digits in a meter reading … apparently ‘using’ 2 years of power in one month. Their system wouldn’t let me, or apparently any of their staff amend the reading or put in a lower reading the next month. Yes, that’s right, their system designers hadn’t allowed for anyone ever putting in a wrong reading. It took nine months and a letter to the CEO to sort that out. In the meantime, I was being pursued by collection agencies for a couple of £K.

Borrowing or renting a thermal camera (and turning the heating up for a few hours) may well tell you where the pipes are. And then maybe burying the cable in a bit of 20mm plastic conduit.

I should have said that it was our paddock so there was never going to be cows there. We didn't, but you could always fence it off I guess.

Hmmmm, interesting: ... lots of solar capacity brings higher electricity prices: https://energyathaas.wordpress.com/2024/04/22/californias-exploding-rooftop-solar-cost-shift/

In a previous life, we had a PTP plant installed out of the curtilage in a bit of paddock. It wasn't my building project, so I didn't follow the detail - but this didn't seem to cause the planners / BC any problem.

You don't like it then?

You could present the sellers with the problem and your view of it and allow them to investigate whether they have any solutions.

Or stainless, lots of yacht parts made like that in stainless.

>>> this one is going to be the last house I build just wait until you get the bug . have a great view to share?

>>> But i dont have any real means to compare the output of the 2. Suggest light will be ~proportional to area, so 14" will let in roughly twice the light of the 10". Our eyes are a bit logarithmic though, so perceived extra brightness might well be < twice. Does that help any?

FYI Octopus Agile is 13-21p 'off-peak' today, 26-32p 'peak' and 'peak is 4-7pm.

Ah the old 'I made this but can't remember how I did it, where I sourced the parts from etc'. At least you remember what it's for . Been there, done that. If it's this bit (below): Some kind of 'rod end', 'threaded rod end', 'eye rod end' etc? e.g. https://midwestcontrol.com/shop/CRXL-12-1

I might get a new fitting, preferably Plasson,and try again. Btw there’s some special plastic spanners that work well on those fittings. I don’t think the tightening torque makes a difference though, it’s the o-ring that counts.

I nominate @SteamyTea as BuildHub treasure of the month.

Couple more possibilities - pipe wasn't deburred and/or o-ring is torn (look closely). Star washer thing is a bit snagged or on at an angle. Took me a while to figure out that the seal on these is only the o-ring. Any tape / gunge is just covering up a bodge and there'll be an underlying reason to look for.

Ah I just read your post again - the situation is a bit complicated. This is a matter of timing and/or of paying the CIL on what might be a self-build for someone else? Amount not high enough for legal work? No harm in arguing the point with them. I've actually found the East Suffolk CIL guys to be OKish, although they're clearly a revenue raising department.

Ah, that old trick. Which Suffolk borough are you out of interest - East I think? I think I might have seen that property for sale a while back - mill is very beautiful, with a mill pond, not so far from a train line? >>> Don’t know if we have any redress. Yes, I think you do and I assume the amounts are large. Suggest engage a CIL lawyer asap. There's some discussion on BH about finding and using one. CIL seems to be one of those things that unscrupulous councils take the piss out of. Put one foot out of wrong will ya - that's you nailed.

As a follow on (as is common here with the post-and-dash brigade, we have not heard again from the OP)... I'm finding this strategy is working with the PHPP calcs - so I can try out the variations of brise soleil, external blinds, low-G glass etc ensuring that I limber under the PHPP overheating limit. I'm aware though that this is a somewhat fragile strategy (the PHPP overheating calc itself is a bit fragile anyway) and, in practice, reducing the glazing a bit might make the chosen solution a bit less brittle. This does also force you to start selecting particular frames / glass / blinds for the modelling, which I guess is good.