Roundtuit

I reckon you need to get yourself round some other sites and see what $h!t some of 'the professionals' call acceptable. Then will you be able to appreciate what a dog's bollocks job you're doing! I think a lot of us diy'ers torture ourselves over minor detail, simply because we don't have the experience to know what's minor and what isn't. That's where the collective Buildhub wisdom steps in...😃

Just made a switch, and today's joint lucky winner is.... @JSHarris Thanks Jeremy, and apologies to the Octopuses; close, but no cigar...

Fair enough, but my point was that the RHI wasn't a significant part of the decision making process, and any payment is considered a bonus. Focussing on pure economic grounds is fine for a theoretical debate, but as you know, practically, many other factors come in to play. In this neck of the woods, we're not exactly at the cutting edge of plumbing and heating technology (..they're still whingeing that they can't use lead anymore...), and I'm happy that I couldn't have got my house plumbed, an ashp system and all sanitary-ware installed in an appropriate timescale for significantly less than I paid. A 'non-MCS' install wasn't really even an option. That's not to say it can't be done, just that I couldn't do it, after factoring in all else. I have no doubt that my plumber added himself a nice bonus to the cost, but it appears that's standard practice for quotes for self-builders. Some you win, some you loose... Anyway, I offered-up my costs to the community on request, and hope that other folk can save a few quid on that!

No. I spent £17k to get my house plumbed and heated so I could live in it.

Heat pump is 16kw split system for heating and hot water. I suspect it's oversized as the plumber couldn't get his head around anything but bog standard building regs (originally, he wanted to install 2 heat pumps; 14kw for heating, plus 4kw for hot water). The heat pump wasn't itemised, but the total cost was about £17k. That includes all of the plumbing inc fitting bathroom stuff that we sourced, ufh downstairs with stats in each room, radiators upstairs, 300l cylinder.

We've recently had our ashp rhi application approved, which amounts to about £5.5k over the next 7 years (270 sq m, EPC A). I just consider it as a bit of a bonus for building an airtight, well insulated house!

I used 40mm of pir on external walls (as I was lining the inside of the timber frame with 40mm), and the edge roll stuff on the internals with 50mm poured screed. The screening guys ok'd it (in fact, they fitted it for me). It's been down over a year and it seems fine. At the risk of stating the obvious, depending on how you're building, you might just need to bear in mind that the perimeter insulation thickness will limited by your internal wall/skirting finish, unless you're floor coverings will be ok laid on a strip of insulation round the edges!

My quotes were supply-only, based on the sizes in the plans for the timber frame. Before ordering, I re-measured on site to check that a) the frame was to plan, and b) the brickies had made the openings in the outer skin match the timber frame. I was confident that the measurements were correct (- they were), but I'll admit to a few sleepless nights. As often, it just comes down to what level of risk versus reward you're comfortable with, but as @pocster said, you need to be sure there are no 'unknown unknowns'.

Interesting. When I bought my windows 2 years ago from Rationel through an agent, they came in at £11k less than my next best quote, for an arguably better product. I was told at the time that they were so competitive as they'd opened a new manufacturing facility and needed to put some volume through it. Don't know if it was true, but I do think there is an element of being in the right place at the right time when it comes to buying windows.

Induction hob. It's the future!

Not sure if it's been mentioned, but my understanding is that commissioning should be done on 'boost' settings, so that might influence the size of the system, and noise levels during normal operation should be much reduced.

Viridian Solar are worth a look. We've got a 4kw Clearline Fusion system; can't comment on the finer points of performance, but it looks good and I only had to run the ashp about half a dozen times for dhw between June and September last year!

From memory, about half of the (large single) garage walls were hollow panels of approx 1inch timber batons with 3mm asbestos cement boards fixed both sides. The rest of the garage was timber and rusty corrugated metal. It all went in a day, for about £600 plus vat I think, via two blokes, a chainsaw, sledgehammer and crowbar. And I swear, they were proper demolition contractors and licensed waste carriers!

As above, potentially you can diy it, but disposal is a pain. To be on the safe side, I decided to get licensed professionals in to take down an old garage at our last place that had some sort of cement board walls. The guys who turned up to take it down were fully equipped with shorts, t-shirts and sunglasses as PPE....

We had to get permission from the local internal drainage board, but no EA involvement.