Bramco

Cheers!! And commiserations about the break-in. Quite a concern for anyone doing self build if you aren't on site. Simon

Also, check out this blog -> https://tech.scargill.net/pivpn/ Simon

You can ignore any comments, even from Parish Councils unless they make 'material' objections - material objections are to do with the planning laws. Most neighbours wouldn't know a material objection if it hit them in the face and Parish Councils are not much better. If the comments are about views, loss of value in their property etc. then they have no 'material' value. If they are about things like loss of light, there are rules for this that you can check etc. But never forget that the planning officer assigned to your case can make subjective decisions, as @joe90 said - fitting in with the local vernacular could be something they pick up on. But we have permission to build a 2 storey tin shed between 2 bungalows on a lane of (ex) council houses and the officer said it was great that someone wanted to build a contemporary building - mind you, that was after we won the appeal on their first attempt at getting it right. ? Good luck Simon

@JulianB is there any chance you can upload the diagram in whatever format you drew them in rather than a pdf? I could do with plagiarising it for our set up - plagiarism being the highest form of flattery ? Thanks Simon

Looks awful - and I know it's not yours but anyone that does suffer from algae like this on render then try MMC-pro, it works a treat. Obvs make sure if you can that you get the cill design right in the first place so it doesn't happen Simon

Useful site - https://www.energy-stats.uk/ Simon

Duh! Good point!! Simon

@ProDave thanks, that's the route we were heading down. @PeterW also thanks, especially for the contact at Cylinders2Go. Not sure though why you would want such a large cylinder - there will normally only be the 2 of us and it seems wasteful (and expensive) to have the ASHP heating 4 or 500 litres in the winter when the PV won't be delivering much. We were thinking of a 250 litre tank with maybe a couple of Willis heaters in parallel for the rare times that both sons are home with their partners. Under normal circumstances you wouldn't need the Willis heaters and 250 litres should be enough for the 2 of us. Simon

And the flexi tails rot and slowly leak, causing the metal casing to rust and eventually to give way - result - a massive blow out. make sure you know where your stopcock is! Of course the rust could just be from condensation but either way it's a massive pain if it happens. Go copper!! Simon

Apologies if this has been asked before and if it's in the wrong category, but our M+E consultant is recommending a Vaillant ASHP which I'm fine with but when I look at the Vaillant UVCs, I'm concerned that they won't get the best out of the solar PV diversion. Most solar PV diverters have two outputs, so that once the first output has stopped accepting energy the second output is activated. So if you are doing what most people do, diverting to an immersion in the UVC for hot water, you'd ideally want to have 2 immersion heaters in the UVC, so 1st heat the top of the tank, then when that's hot start to heat the bottom of the tank. The Vaillant UVC has one immersion in the middle of the tank - so only the top half would benefit from the solar diversion. An alternative would be say the Gledhill StainlessLite Heat Pump cylinder but that only has a single immersion heater point which is at the bottom - theoretically better because on a good day you could heat all the tank but not on a marginal day as you'd only warm the whole tank up a bit. Anyone know of a cylinder suitable for ASHPs with 2 immersions - middle and bottom? Thanks in advance for any help. Simon

Depends where you are! Two pre-application advice request down and the nearest we got were some emails defending their initial position. Not a sign of any discussion and absolutely no time to meet us. I'm also guessing now that even if you are in an area where they do this properly, they won't meet you because of Covid, so the best you'll get would be a phone call. Simon

We used some with quite thin gauge galvanised wire. They are great in that the wire of the basket isn't very obtrusive but you do need to put in horizontal ties about half way up to stop them from bowing outwards. I made a jig with 4 screws, so I could bend wire to the right shape to make the ties. A flat topped 'n' shape with the legs bent back up to form hooks, then insert them from the back and hook the legs round a couple of horizontals. The width of the top of the 'n' needs to be just over the width of one square if you see what I mean. Also, if you look at some of the instructions, they'll have you spiralling wire around joints to keep them together - this is really hard and it's difficult to get a good join - things tend to be a bit sloppy. Where it didn't show I used cable ties - worked a treat and gave a much better join. We got ours from fine finish metals 6 or 7 years ago and there haven't been any issues with the cages. We have Scottish cobbles in them and they can tend to go green after some time. If you spray them with MMC Pro algae remover - it's sold in a blue 5 litre plastic flagon and works a treat for removing green algae. We also use it on areas of the render that tend to go green, i.e. behind plants etc. Magic stuff!! Simon

Anybody heard anything further about the scheme? Or was it one of those vacuous promises government seem to get away with without actually putting anything in place? Simon

Just out of interest who supplied the 3 immersion heater cylinder - we're looking for a 2 immersion heater indirect cylinder with the immersion heaters at the middle and towards the bottom, so excess solar PV can go in the middle until it is up to heat and then at the bottom. Simon

Agree - at 6 it won't 'see' what the boiler is doing which is all happening further up the tank. Also on the key, it's pretty clear - 9 is labelled boiler and 6 is labelled solar Simon

Interesting - everyone we've spoken to says you need the 18mm ply or OSB. From a lay persons perspective we couldn't really see why this was necessary - unless it is a way of trying to prevent 'oil canning'. If so it's an expensive way of doing it! Simon

So doing it right is speccing the right VCL in accordance with the level of humidity and leaving a ventilated gap? Or is there more to it? Is this an issue only with standing seam? We were looking at Prefa standing seam but have gone back to what was on our planning application which is corrugated steel for both the roof and the cladding. Mainly because of the cost of wrapping the whole thing in 18mm ply or OSB to support the standing seam. Our timber frame co will install the VCL and 25x50 counter battening. The plan is to then mount purlins and the corrugated on that - the corrugated would have the inside coated with an anti condensation coating and of course the whole gap behind the roofing and cladding would be vented (and insect and vermin proofed). Has anyone done this? Any advice? Simon

And 1TB of storage is less than £50, so file size really isn't an issue. Anyone wanting to get a handle on their consumption and generation should decide whether they are happy with low resolution data or real time data. I've found it very useful to have the real time data and have data since 2016 and the disk it is saved on is . Simon

There are versions around with and RS 485 interface which give instantaneous power. The issue with a pulse output is that you're only measuring power in chunks, a 1000th or 100th of a kWh (depending on the device) and to see things in real time you need the instantaneous power reading. Simon

If you can put a clamp next to the the one you have in the CU already then you would be fine. Gives instantaneous power consumption. Simon

Which is the issue with the system - as someone who has applied (at least in our area) you are only allowed 3 minutes to state your case. Objectors can also have 3 minutes. But...... The committee then debate things - and in our case, they are seriously not au fait with planning law - it's all 'well I think xyz' etc. and if the chief planning officer has recommended refusal, then he'll egg them on. If on the other hand he's recommended approval then he'll gently teach them a thing or two.... And yes the chairman has generally taken a position in some pre-meeting with the head of planning. In our case it was recommended for refusal but one quite senior councillor pointed out the stupidity of what they were saying, it ended up 5 for and 5 against and the chairman voted against - we resubmitted, our champion was on a skiing trip and the councillor who was sitting in for him was one who had voted against the previous time and someone else was back and it was a draw again - and the chairman voted against AGAIN!!! The appeal inspector was polite but essentially said - I don't know what on earth the council are on about - permission granted. There have been some twists since then - we had outline but on trying to talk to planning about what we wanted to do a contractor was assigned as planning officer who pointed out that the original application wasn't valid because the red line didn't show access from the public highway - it's on a private lane..... the law actually says that the red line 'should' show access to the public highway, not that it 'must' another few months of stress..... DON'T GIVE UP!! simon

If they are contradicting their local design guidelines they'll be toast at an appeal - it's just deeply frustrating that so many applications end up at appeal and often win because of some numpty in planning. Don't let them win!!! As a couple of other posts said - persistence, persistence and keep grinding away at them. Do you get an opportunity to speak at a planning meeting? If so, petition the planning committee members by email - simply point out how contradictory the recommendation is against the policy. And don't worry about the objections - they only have merit if they refer to planning law, i.e. overbearing, green belt issues etc. if not they are simply ignored (or should be). Simon

But modern transformers for charging our phones etc. are generally always on and if they are solid state don't really do anything until they are asked for energy - do they? It's the old style power supplies based on wound transformers that are 'always on' and losing heat. There's precious few of them around these days - silicon being cheaper than copper. Or am I mistaken? Are the transformers for LEDs still wire wound? Simon

There are several other OTS solutions with wireless switches, Philips Hue, IKEA etc. Do the regulations have anything to say about a 24V or 12V circuit? Would this be another possibility for the light switch? Switch after the LED transformer. Or do they say you can't have light switches unless they are switching mains for some reason? Simon

Sounds like the time we went away for Xmas from our terraced house in Sheffield. We only had gas fires in the downstairs rooms in those days - mid '70s. It took a good 3 days or so to get some heat back into the house. Chilly times - dressing in the morning in front of the electric fan heater.... Simon