DavidO

I think you’ll find that solicitor was lying. An example of just one of the motivations to consider doing it myself!

Morning All…. Does anyone have experience of, or any opinion on, DIY conveyancing for plot purchases?

Helpful….Thanks!

The water sounds rather expensive compared to your other utility charges? Is it Thames Water in Oxfordshire?

Thanks Dave….We don’t actually have any quotes yet. I’m trying to get a feel for the connection costs in order to calculate what we can sensibly afford to offer for the plot. It looks like most of the connections should be through an existing boundary wall into a back alley behind a neighbouring terrace; so hopefully short runs in a very quiet spot 🤞🏻🤞🏻?

I last built in 2012 and am now seriously committed to bidding for another plot. I need to quantify service connection costs, which seemed pretty reasonable first time round but seem to have increased by much more than inflation over the last 13 years? Can anyone give me an updated steer on likely costs for what look like straightforward connections to water/sewers/electric/gas in an urban setting where all the main utilities are close by in a small market town in Northumberland?

Have you resolved this yet? Handmade/traditional tiles tend to be made by small local operations, so knowing where you are building would be important

Hi Andy The wall uValue was 0.14 and the windows are double glazed (though quite well specced for the time, we do have uValues for them somewhere if you’re interested). The big win for us had been airtightness, which tested at 0.296 from memory.

The problem with both the blue and white versions is that the “ribbed” structure creates turbulence within the air-flow which results in increased noise problems and a higher power consumption to move the volume of air you need to achieve satisfactory ventilation + both of those problems will be compounded if the pipes have a smaller bore. The other longer term issue is that the ribbing tends to result in the accumulation of dust/debris within the pipes increasing the risk of mould/bacterial growth. Basically the smoother the internal surface of your ducting the better. The only advantages I can see for flexible ductwork are ease of installation, which I think is only marginal in reality, and a price differential, which is probably also marginal when weighed against the whole system and long term running/maintenance costs.

Bin them....!!

????

I think perhaps you might have missed the main point I was trying to make (for djcdan rather than you) which is to guard against the potential trap of losing sight of the big picture as a result of focusing on the minutiae of the calculations. Depending on where you start from, and what you’re aiming at, there are usually lots of alternative routes to achieving an acceptable SAP score. The important thing is to make sure that whichever of those routes you consider they work with what you are trying to achieve.

Very sound advice! Agree 100%

Agree 100%......Our build/size/heating configuration is very similar to bitpipe’s and (7years in) our bedrooms are consistently comfortable with no installed heating.

Completely agree with this and other posts suggesting the same/similar. So.....given that you are where you are, spent your money, and presumably don’t want to rip out your brand new ASHP and start again, the first and most practical question is can you do anything about the heat requirements of your house? You don’t mention anything about existing insulation/airtightness in your opening post, but that’s surely got to be the place to start? First seal any obvious drafts. Second investigate/seal less obvious sources of air leakage (almost certainly lots in a 1970s build...... service pipes/wiring which enter through external walls/floors/ceilings....suspended floors, particularly timber, which have almost certainly shrunk/sagged, and all the points at which they meet the walls. Third, can you improve insulation of the external shell? Look at the ceilings first, floors second, and walls/windows third, depending on what you find. The more you can do to narrow the gap between your heat requirements and the capacity of your ASHP (at sensible cost) the more comfortable you are going to feel.