Ed_MK

I Bet! its the "colour of the moment" ...everybody wants it Bit like Sea Bass was the only fish you could eat 5 years ago and back in the 70's when a teasmade was a bedroom necessity in 5 years i can hear ..."Her indoors" saying ....when am i going to sort out that "snotty" paint <sigh>

When you say a GOOD price ....I might be a little daft on mixed paint. but does 5L for £85 sound a good price ...? I have never bought a MIXED before and when i think about 5L my mind tells me it should be around £30-£40 (sigh)

Hi Peter it says exactly this 5LT Zinsser Allcoat Ext Satin - water Based Pastel Base - 14C35 @ £84.00 +VAT Advising to use with 5LT Zinsser Cover Stain white @ £49.95 +VAT apparently Brewer are Family Business with over 150 branches ... hmmmmm....but so is:

The wife really liked this Chartwell Green colour. So the windows that we are ordering are stated as this colour. but its NOT a RAL or even a REAL colour ...so we are having to Mix (never done it before) Apparently the closest match is 14c35 Which is £84 for 5L from Brewers ! ..not including "special primer" I mean every external beam and any other woodwork is supposed to be painted with this stuff. Can this price be right ?

agreed I would level it on the grounds of a crime against architecture. It looks like a 1990's office entrance ..that some donkey has added a few bay windows by accident. and as for them dorma's ..they look "stuck on" ...they appear to be manufactured with the same material as a stealth aircraft ...(intentional?) ...but sadly it failed will this be on grand designs ? ....not as long as i have a hole in my ass-phalt suggested improvement option 1

ha they have taken the document down

That new premix mortar. How does it compare pricewise to "ye olde method" ...oh and does anyone know a way of avoiding that AWFUL white glaze "salt" you get on a lot of new brick jobs? ...I was told one that it is because the bricks are too "new" ....but how can this be avoided

Well i wasnt planning to is that what happens these days ? No piles of sand and ripped bags of cement and empty bottles of fairly liquid? where have the 70's and 80's gone ???

thanks Peter, yes basically a ground floor skin ...but a decent chimney as well (and internal fireplace component (2.7m wide) i think the last brickie said 6500 bricks all told

We may be a bit far north for the London boys. also i heard they was on MEGA bucks inside the M25 <kerching>

Hi All I thought I had all my trades "lined up" for the next 3 months ...but for some reason the Bricklayer (really nice guy too) has gone AWOL ..No returning calls and no answered emails ....so its been like 2 weeks of trying so ..... does anyone know a good brickie ...(pref with experience working on timber frame) in the Bucks, MK area thanks In advance Ed

Well technically the meters are at the side of the house .... Just in the drive and then around the left hand corner ....they will be close to the corner too as thats where the boiler and other stuff is ... its hard to be too much closer ....even if they were on the front ...they still have 10m of driveway to cross and before that a 8m run in from the road

its tricky as the main waste (due to all the bathrooms and kitchen, etc is on the FAR side. the utility room is ALSO on the far side ....home to our leccy meter and gas meter. so its a good 15m around he house to the border, and another 30m tot he road where ALL the services are. Best explained by this piccie My idea was to dig a trench with enough fall for the sewer, then get that and the water in at about -750mm, then backfill a bit and then put in Gas, elec ...and some sort of "ducting" at 450mm so I could pass a telecom line through .....later it would be a BUSY hole ...but does that matter ? ..I was going to cap abpve the pipes with some protection in case of anyone digging years later ..still deciding what with

Hi all as you MAY know my house is on a very "funny" bit of land and the gaps at the corners are a little (ahem) tight I need to connect to services water, elec. gas (and telecom?) I am connecting via a service trench on our parents land to the road at the front (we are on land behind them) The total length is about 40m (to the kerb at their side the meter boxes are at the opposite side of our house..so that accounts for a bit of the above 1. with the above utilities (once i get the relevant meter boxes in) can i a) just run the correct service pipe ...yellow blue or black down the existing trench to the border 40m away ? b) as it has to go essentially AROUND the house (as I am presuming it can't run through the foundation) what are their rules on turns and bends? gas worries me a bit to be honest

Thanks I do need to get some work done on "the highway" connecting from my border to the Main Sewer Anglian Water have been very helpful ...apart from the bloody fees LOL but i think their list of APPROVED contractors in this area is a little sparse, perhaps outdated? despite the date on it I dont think it has changed in the last year I have been looking at it http://www.anglianwater.co.uk/_assets/media/Contractors_List.pdf I take it as connecting to their Main manhole there is no other way than use APPROVED from this list ...or are there other options ...that won't involve me having to get various certificates applications and all the other jazz I think may be required

Just going over my new sewer application form. quite straightforward But has anyone seen the section about the specs of an "adopted lateral" apparently it has to be ..... "capable of demonstrating a jetting resistance of 4000 psi (280 bar) without damage when tested in accordance with Section 6.10 of WIS 4-35-01" hmm....I am hazarding a guess that normal 100mm sewage pipe will not suffice I have tried to search Google ..but cannot find any at all

Another one ... concerning the Waste/Sewage pipework . the depth of the first (highest) wastewater inlet will be from a pipe just under the block and beam . Now it runs around the property, picking up the various outlets and then ends in a manhole near my border i always hear talk about sewage pipes being a MINIMUM depth ..something like 700mm down. But can this also apply to the pipes around the house feeding he manhole or is it just AFTER the manhole toward the main drain ? Looking at plans my Block and beam TOP is about level with the outer brick DPC So the BOTTOM of the Block and beam will be 160 lower ..almost at ground level If i presume the waste pipe comes through this and them turns to the next junction then this first invert will be about 110mm-150mm BELOW the Beam and Block Bottom So will start its run at 150mm below the ground level (technically) ?? With various falls at 1:60 and 1:50 it eventually should be at almost 700 when it enters the last manhole. Is this fine ?

Thanks Dave Well the trench is 1.5m long x 0.5m wide by 2m deep i had to fill it for ages as it was draining away quick ...but it finally slowed I put 2 sticks in at 25% and 75% height and filled to first stick and waited until i could see the second stick it took about 45 mins ..to be exact 47.5 so 2850 seconds So what do you make of it PS there are only the 2 of us. but i suppose the house could take 4/5 ..but i am still struggling to see how it affects a rainwater soakaway

Coming to think of it why is there a P value at all ?? why would the number of people in a house be relevant to a rainwater Soakaway

Actually ..i MIGHT have got it ! apparently the SP Value is calculated by the amount of time it takes to lower the level by 1mm So mine was 2880 Seconds over 1000mm (or there about) so thats 2.8 seconds per mm ?? (does that make sense) ..value for V Area (A) = V X P X 0.20 So if i presume they will expect my house to be capable of living 4 people (P value) then the above comes to 2.24m3 2.8 x 4 x 0.20 #### I mean it ties in with the above ...2.4m2 (ish) not so sure of the relevance of the "F" number though Do these figures look good to you guys ?

Actually reading up online .,.i think this value is the "Soil Infiltration Rate" I wonder is there a correlation between this and the mystical ""Soil Percolation Value" ?

PLEASE PLEASE I AM GOING INSANE !! (well Ok not really, but close) I am trying to do this soakaway calc and stuff to tie in with the first calculation LEGIT As i would like to understand it rather than copy or guess ...am i mad ? Well i will tell you where I am The roof area is 135m2 (vertical area, as you guys pointed out) I have been advised that a good calc for this is Roof Area * (50/3000) *the 50mm is hourly peak rainfall (apparently) not sure what the 3,000 means perhaps getting it to seconds ..i think ?? but then i get the figure of 135*0.0166 2.241 Which I think equates to 2.241 Litres or (2.24m3) For ease of working ...lets say i make this 2400 OK then in i plug this 2400 into the trench calculation as 2.4 and i get the following presumptive of a 1m square hole 2.4 / (3.142*r Sq) 2.4 / (3.142*0.5 Sq) 2.4 / (3.142*0.25) 2.4 / 0.7855 =3.055 Deep So basically 3m2 of Crates will cover it ? Does all or any of that make sense to you guys ? and if it does then i hope i have done the porosity test right too !? this damn F number apparently F= Volume of Hole from 25% to 75% / (half internal area of hole inc base )x seconds from 75% to 25% full My trench is 0.5m x 1.5m and it is 2m deep So this comes out as: 0.75 / (4.75 x 2880 seconds) 0.75 / 13,680 0.00005.48 or 5.48 x 10(to the power of -5) m/sec So what is my F rate represented as 5.48 ? and if this is the case ..what do i see things online saying the number should be between 15 and 75 ? PS i got the equations from here http://www.polypipe.com/sites/default/files/percolation_test_datatsheet.pdf

at that price PLEASE PLEASE tell me ...I am looking at close to £800 including the Vodka

Actually Ian, yesterday I actually spoke to the lady at BC ...she is VERY nice! Some of the things they have asked, they are going to "conditionalise" them so work can continue. I am not making excuses for them, but they are VERY busy around here and every 100 yards houses are literally going up. It was timescales that irked me ....and the fact that my groundworkers got nervous and pulled off due to the letter i got . But its all back on now ! I have been told it is NOT easy around here though, so at least now i know...Firm but Fair is the term that i would use (from my experience so far) But if anyone is thinking they can "wing" it, cut corners, put in a few fudgy bits and hope that it will just get stamped on a Friday afternoon by a tired clerk back from a pub lunch ....then FORGET IT. Milton Keynes is not the place to start

Hi Peter, When i say "move" ...I wish i COULD I have already had the initial plans "shrunk" across the width to fit. I am working off the external masonry dimensions, as thats all i have until the foundation guys finalise the drawing for base I know along one edge (where the trees (bushes) are i have 1.8m from external masonry finish to the fence) and so about 2.5m from the closes actual bush, on the other edge i have 2 "corners" that are actually 1.2m from the boundary fences on each end. the land is an oblique diamond shape so i cannot move the house left or right at ALL So I dont really have anywhere to go ..If i move the house closer to the fence, I may "tickle" the RPZ of the hawthorns and if i move it further away then I am not leaving enough "gap" at the corners I originally was trying to keep a border of 1.5m all around ...which is possible...but with all the talk of roots and stuff i was considering asking groundworkers to shift it about so that i could grab literally a few INCHES at the tree side So as you can see move is a strong word for this situation ...I think