Stones

The problem here is the lack of plasterers. Tape and fill wad really the only viable option for me, but I did strike it lucky and get the best regarded taper on the island ( it certainly shows). Depends how the skirting is fitted. All of our oak skirting was scribed to the flooring to avoid exactly that issue. Time consuming but one of those small details that lifts the overall finish a few notches higher.

In our case, the shadow gap was required to perform a particular function - to allow kitchen cabinet doors to open freely. A couple of thoughts / questions about using shadow gaps instead of skirting boards: Assuming you have a service void behind the plasterboard, how does one close the void between the shadow gap finishing bead and the floor? Presumably something needs to be done otherwise you would see battens, and potentially the structural elements of the walls if the shadow gap is any more than a few mm? Is there also not a risk that even if very airtight, on a stormy day the pressure differential will increase air leakage and you'll get drafts coming through the shadow gaps?

I highly doubt they would accept that VAT was reclaimable on the whole. I would be inclined to try and identify what the cost of comparable quality / brand induction components are, deduct from the total and claim VAT on the notional extractor element. An explanatory note would be invaluable. A useful comparison could be a downdraft / worktop pop up type extractor.

Old credit card - brilliant suggestion - perfect for a small job I've got coming up.

How long has the cladding been up? We have larch cladding on part of our house, which has been up for over 12 months, and that is still in the process of transitioning from fresh to weathered. At times it hasn't looked great, but that was early on in the process.

Hi and welcome. As @Nickfromwales says, we've done a few builds as well, albeit one ahead of you with 6 in total. Like you this has been over the last twenty years. Our first 4 were to the prevailing building regs, albeit we did install MVHR on our 3rd build 14 or so years ago. Our last and current house are a step change in terms of more focus on fabric first and performance. Like you, I've always gone down the main contractor route, for the reasons you describe, and to ensure I was able to maintain a helicopter overview and strict quality control as the builds progressed. That's not to say that I haven't undertaken work on our builds (I have) rather it tends to be those tasks to which I could undertake easily and to a standard I was happy with. Agree completely about making decisions early on, and sticking to them, to avoid the additional costs of undoing work already done.

I would agree that temperature suggests the sensor is downstream of the heat exchanger, and looking at the internal component diagram, that does appear to be the case, which leads me to believe that the rotary heat exchanger is operating under some form of proportional control and hence not providing full heat recovery. The odd thing is the position of the supply and outdoor sensors shown on the diagram... Supply air flow is at its lowest setting, and balanced room to room according to the suppliers plan/figures. I can't answer that one, but can probably find out. Do you have one of these units?

@IanR, @JSHarris According to the controller, its not in summer bypass mode. Supply air temp was 9C, Extract temp was 11C, outdoor air temp was 4C, RH was 72%. Weather wise, a clear, bright and still day. I'm not sure where the extract sensor is located within the unit - measuring the temp of air extracted from the house or the temp of air being exhausted. The house is of the same construction and insulation levels as mine. UFH throughout and whole house temp at 21C. Reading the manual again, the only other thing I can think of are the frost protection settings, which are related to RH as well as outdoor temperature, although I do still wonder if the proportional temperature settings I referred to earlier, are part of the problem. What I will say is that appears to be an overcomplicated system compared to the various counterflow MVHR units I've had over the years

A bit of an update on this, was out having a look at the installation this morning. A couple of minor tweaks required in the ASHP setting, but in general that appeared to be working well / as one would expect. The MVHR, is only delivering supply air at a temperature of around 9C, despite the target supply air temperature being set at 19C (electric heater disabled). The only setting I can see that may have an impact on this is the Temperature Control function (page 25 of the manual below) from which you can: Set the proportional band (P-band) range for PI controller. Default value 5°C. Set integral time (I-time) range for PI controller. Default value Off. Shows output signal presented for the supply air temperature controller http://catalogue2.systemair.com/FileHandler.axd?hash=i5xyl6WZaYShkC8GeJSvsg!! The manual isn't very clear on how to set the P-band (i.e. what setting deliver maximum heat recovery) so I've left it with the owner to experiment on both the P-band and I-time settings and report back.

Not sure my island paradise compares...at least, not weather wise. I take it cooling and humidity are the main challenges you face?

An alternative we've used before, to make sure our interior plans would work, was to use Lego (handy having kids with a plentiful supply) to form the footprint, partitions and scale furniture. Easy to move things around and get a feel for what it's like. If you don't fancy building a model, drawing out the floorplan on a sheet of A1 paper / smaller sheets taped together, and using cut outs of furniture to the same scale still lets you play with the space and move things around.

Welcome. Which tropical island?

I used SketchUp to create a scaled floorplan, and some 3d images of the exterior and how it sat in the landscape, to show the concept / what we were proposing, to our planning officer. I then paid someone I found on one of the freelancing websites to draft that floorplan into a full set of plans / elevations. Cost me £150 IIRC. Details in my blog

A warm welcome. Looking forward to hearing more about your project.

I bought Grohe showers from here: https://www.plumbingforless.co.uk/showers I'm absolutely delighted with them (would even go as far as saying the best showers we have ever had)

An alternative could be a crane and hopper to lift the concrete to where you want it.

We installed our first MVHR unit 15 years ago, in a then just to BR house. The difference in internal air quality and no condensation vs the previous non MVHR house we had built (and every rental I've been in since) was huge. For us, MVHR is worth every penny on that benefit alone. Savings from heat recovery is just a bonus. I wouldn't consider building a house without MVHR.

+1 It's unlikely he'll be bothered, and the worse he'll do is ask you to confirm in writing that he isn't responsible for any warranty issues / sorting out any problems with it.

We had initially specified 200mm full fill rigid insulation between rafters and 25mm across rafters for all our vaulted roof areas. I swapped it out to 180mm earthwool batts and 50mm across the rafters. The U value wasn't as good, but given the running cost difference was only £18 a year, it was going to take well over 40 years before there was any payback. I also concluded that the mix of insulation types gave better decrement delay, and would avoid the requirement to have to foam in each and every board between rafters.

That's certainly my suspicion. As I say, I'll have a better idea of what's going on next week.

30 + kWh per day more than anticipated, which immediately suggests they electric heater in the MVHR being the culprit, as it's rated at 1.6 kW. That's been meantime disabled, but supply air is only being delivered at 14C, which again, looking at the manual, suggests the MVHR remains in its default settings. I'll know more when I've actually had a proper look. It does seem an odd design of MVHR for a domestic application, with another component that could fail.

Or crane concrete in using a hopper?

I've been asked by another self builder to have a look into why their heating bills are significantly higher than they expected. Part of the task will be checking the setting of their ASHP package (which is the same as mine). They also have the following MVHR unit https://www.systemair.com/xen/Villavent-UK/Products/residential-systems/rotary-units/side-connected/save/save-vsr-500-4f645bb8/ A quick look through the manual indicates it has an inbuilt electrical heater, which immediately raises the possibility of settings being in conflict with the main UFH heating from the ASHP, but also some strange defaults for an MVHR. I'll know more when I've been and gone through the settings next week. I've not come across a rotary heat exchange MVHR before. Has anyone any experience of these / this unit and any particular advice / knowledge gleaned from experience?

In many places, yes and mobile packages (sim only) keep dropping. Not sure why the same isn't true of fixed line charges dropping. The issue of course is the patchy mobile reception some people (like me) have. It's a bit of a balancing act here, I can get reasonable reception at home/on the road/at work with one network, no reception at home be great reception on the road and at work with another and so on.

Sounds a lot like our connection. We are 300 or so yards from the new Fibre Cabinet but our distribution pole is connected to a different cabinet 3.5km away. It is a simple engineering fix, i.e. new cable from cabinet to our distribution pole would cover those houses currently excluded. Interestingly, was having a chat to a friend of mine whose daughter works for OR. She is specifically employed to deal with elected members trying to push for connectivity for their constituents. Guess what, the most persistent ones get what they ask for... It'll be interesting to see what the legislation proposes and the get outs for OR. The Scottish dimension as proposed in the draft 2018/19 budget "We are committed to building on the success of our existing broadband investment programme, which will deliver fibre access to at least 95 per cent of premises by the end of 2017. We have set a new commitment to extend coverage even further to ensure that all premises in Scotland are able to access superfast broadband by 2021." Good news for me if that is the case, Superfast being defined as 24 Mbps.