MikeGrahamT21

The insulation... Is that full fill? If so, does it have a High Impact Plastic face to it?

Yeah, I already have a 'fruitful' relationship with this neighbour, we haven't spoken for years and I certainly can't be bothered opening that can of worms again. I'll see what happens when I switch the system on and take it from there.

Perhaps get together with some/all neighbours and force action en-masse against the builder, some sort of group litigation?? It won't be free of course, but you could all share the costs, if the problems are essentially the same?

mine don't come off, they're glued on, bit of gripfill ? First photo ones have been on since 2012

Yeah? How so? I think they really finish them off nicely. You could always get some of the iron on melamine strips and use those if you wanted?

No its pre finished. If you've ever had laminate worktops, its basically just the same as that, but not as thick. Can send some photos of mine if you want?

Duraboard gets my vote every time! Melamine faced Chipboard, real easy to keep clean and doesn't scratch easily unlike PVC.

What have other peoples experiences been on your estate?

I feel so sorry for you having to go through this, I have personally never seen anything quite as bad! While I was reading through my reaction on it all was knock down and rebuild properly. There will be even more that is wrong that you can't see which will all get covered up again through the fixes. I have no idea if this is a possibility or not, i suspect they will really push against it, but I don't see any way of sorting it properly without doing so.

i've certainly seen underground water storage tanks like that before, or maybe septic tank??

You've got yourself a double height entrance hall there! ?

I've got another problem to contend with now, not only the smoke from the multi fuel stove, but now my neighbour has just decided to install a vent from his cooker hood, comes out of his wall like a jet, straight onto my driveway, can always smell what he's cooking, stinks! Can see me needing a charcoal filter when I eventually get it fired up!

True, but it will be a far smaller contact area than before, so will go a good way to reducing noise (id say you'll easily achieve a 75% area reduction compared with the current plaster). You can also put a hefty bead of silicone behind the batten before you screw it on, to soften the contact that it does have further.

Do you have a chimney breast in the house? I found that although in my semi-bungalow that there is a cavity between the houses (which was empty, now filled with party wall insulation which I had blown in), the chimney breast was solid between the two properties, and i find this is where the most of the sound comes through, but obviously depends on how your house is built. I plan on using 50mm rockwool between battens, and then soundblock plasterboard on top when i eventually get round to doing it, only this one room tho and not a massive area so shouldn't cost me too much, and i'll be doing the labour myself. Yeah floor joists is the other, they are often pushed into the walls too far, and touch the other houses blockwork, as I've been replacing mine i've ensure they are in just over 100mm into the wall, but not touching the other house, and that seems to have helped too.

? This is when you employ a fan which is continuous trickle extract with humidty boost!

+1 for humidity sensor, work so much better.

Yeah this is definitely normal, i get it every time i do something! Perhaps i'm just a disappointment lol! It wears off after a few weeks, hang on in there. I always say DIY isn't how good you can do something, but how good you can cover your mistakes up so it appears to look good to the untrained eye...now your all going to think my house is falling apart lol!

Forgot to add this one, not plumbed in yet, but this will be done tomorrow afternoon.

If you paid a plasterer to do the original job, then it should be well in the remit to have them back to sort this bit out.

I'm in the middle of drawing my plans for an extension for building control, which I will post on here in my blog when they are done, but may not be done until November time. Not for a full house, but will give you some ideas of whats required. Its masonry cavity wall too.

Cheers mate. This has definitely been the hardest room so far, i always knew it was going to be though! Glad its done now. Few weeks off, and then the master bedroom floor is getting ripped up! But that should be a straight forward, everything out and everything in job...he says lol

no your right it is a narrow one, it used to be a cupboard there, so its a 610 wide door. In an ideal world i would have put a normal size door in, but its a supporting wall, and I couldn't be doing with ripping out the lintel and putting a new one in for the sake of a few cm's ? its fine to walk through, it'll have to do anyway.

Well finally got another room done, or at least phase 1 before the extension... Cupboard boarded... Plastered... Coved and undercoated... All decorated and the airtight membrane taped to the wall. Just the radiator to go, which gets delivered Friday, will stick a photo up when its done. Been a huge job this one, not helped by lockdown, but got there in the end!

IG do a free design service if you send them specs of your building, they'll run calculations and specify a lintel for the job, i've used it before, and it was pretty quick