MikeGrahamT21

Let me fill in the gaps... This is for an extension which is already built, cavity wall construction using masonry blocks (2.9N), wanting to give an extra 50mm load bearing for the lintel to sit on either side, and also line the reveals at the same time, so going to use 6x2 timber, C24.

Yeah, but steel on the inside rather than timber for the actual lintel

Yeah

OK, what filler would you suggest? Thought sand/cement in 4:1 would have offered enough movement capabilities. The ends of the timber need to be in contact somehow to transfer the load. Cheers

Hi, Quick question. If you were putting up vertical structural timber (C24 grade), which interfaced with steel (lintel) and concrete, would you: Have the timber in direct contact with the steel and concrete Leave a 10mm gap on either end and point up with sand/cement to allow to movement/expansion etc? Regards Mike

I can take a picture from the outside using the thermal camera when it's next really cold, but the utility is only heated to around 16c so you may not get the full effect. I've just put another Centra in our bathroom, to replace one which came on via a PIR everytime we walked in the room and also everytime it was windy, as they sent me the none sealed version of the bloody PIR, so now we are humidity controlled or pullcord with permanent trickle, though you can turn the trickle off if you want via the DIP switches which is quite handy. Even on the slowest trickle, which is almost totally silent, it still shifts a fair bit of air, but is almost totally inaudible.

Found the leakage points, it's coming in via the composite door, where the latch and locking mechanisms go in to the frame, crazy how badly some products are made, even more annoying as I've got 3 of the same type door.

dMEV did the trick, no need for an inlet vent either so there must be some leakage somewhere despite my great efforts, got a bit of smoking cardboard and with all the doors shut the smoke went where it should. Humidity is 67% this morning, the lowest its been since i put the monitor in there, so all good.

Cool, thanks

Couldn't remember the Part letter, this one is cheaper than the one i saw yesterday, looks good and also pretty much the same as the one i saw. Would you use two, or just one on the return so the boiler doesn't fill with rubbish?

Also what about the magnetic filters on the 22mm pipes? I saw some yesterday which allow the filters to be taken off for replacement without draining the system which seemed a good idea, it suggested one for flow and one for return which seemed a bit OTT, would a single one on the return suffice? Or would you not bother at all?

Yeah I did see those smaller cheap manifolds. Any reason why you wouldn't want it under the floor? It would be accessible at all times via an access panel in the floor. I've scaled the rad back in the extension from a double to a single, giving around 5000 BTU, still 3 times the requirement suggested by the BRE tool. Living Room Radiator (bypass) is where the stat is located so that should be spot on.

Whilst on the subject of heating, I'm specifying a radiator for our new extension which we hope to knock through into next year, which has a vaulted ceiling, only 3m x 3.3m. I've tapped all the u-values and dimensions into the BRE Heating Load calculator which has come out with a design heat loss of 353W, and recommends an emitter of 567W minimum. I'm not too sure just how much to believe this, and was going to go overkill on the radiator (nearly 3000W), would this cause any issues bar costing my more money up front? Presuming with a TRV it would turn off anyway once it got to temp. Boiler is a 24kw, but system is only small, and thought a large radiator may give me more scope for dropping the return temperature to allow the boiler to condense, or would this hinder, since it would be turned off via the TRV quicker than a smaller rad? Given the max BTU and W output on the boiler, this included in our system won't be anywhere near it. This one is a double radiator (vertical column), if you think its really too big, I could drop back to a single radiator, obviously half the output. Regards Mike

Hi, I'm planning on re plumbing all of our radiators, with brand new insulated pipework (currently uninsulated) as I re-do the floor in each room. At present something is definitely not right, as the return temperature on the boiler is almost the same as the flow temp, so figure starting from scratch is likely the best option. Because of this stage by stage process, I was thinking of using an Emmeti T1 (if I remember right) manifold installed under the floor in the hall, with brand new 22mm flow and return back to the boiler (tee off the existing pipes) and then 10mm back to the radiators using plastic plumbing so I can do continuous runs with no joints to each room, with the only joints being at the manifold, boiler and rad. Would get either push fit TRVs (if i can find them at a decent price), or the push fit adapters if not. Does this sound sensible? Radiator in the main living room will be our bypass, with no TRV. Is this right? Do we need any other form of bypass in case for whatever reason someone does turn both lockshields off? Would radiators in this scenario need balancing, or not so much since the pipe run to each will be almost identical in length. Currently we get around 10C drop on the rads, despite the boiler return temp being pretty much the same (think there must be a bypass somewhere, which shouldn't be there). We have 5 radiators, and 1 towel heater with no plans for wet underfloor heating in the future, boiler is a condensing with built in pump. Is 10mm to the rads sufficient, or would 15mm be better? Also with regards radiators, which type are the most efficient, traditional or flat panel? Can you still buy aluminium?? or mild steel ones? Am I right in thinking it would have to be either ally or steel, seem to remember something from GCSE science about a reaction if you mix 2 types in one system. Thanks for any input. Regards Mike

Agreed. I've had a thought, rather than drilling a whopping hole through the wall, I'm going to install fan in ceiling and take it out through a tile vent. If I have any issues with lack of airflow, I'll put another vent in ceiling down other end of room, and either take it to another tile, or just allow air from the loft area into the room. Think I'll go with the continuous dMEV for £44, sounds a sensible option to me

Yeah, she burns stuff all winter long, which is the most important time for MVHR. I've not totally discounted it, going to pay more attention to where it smells this year for possible intake locations. Yeah, I can pick up a dMEV for £44 (Vent Axia Centra) off ebay, which seems reasonble. Would you say there is little point going for something like a Vent Axia Tempra P (Single Room MVHR) which I can get for £146, but it'll look rather ugly on the outside of the building which isn't great.

Well, I don't know if you've seen my other post, but yeah...thats an interesting one. I REALLY wanted MVHR, but it seems our lovely neighbour with her wood burning stove may have put an end to that one, so really not sure what to do about it, at the moment its not a major issue as the house is leaky enough to sort itself out, but hopefully in the future it won't be quite as much.

Is this part of a whole house system? In this particular room, the only MVHR possible would be single room, just not sure its worth the extra cost. Would you pay the extra £150 for an MVHR unit over dMEV?

Hi, Trying to decide what to do in the utility for ventilation, after spending many hours airtighting the building. We plan to heat the utility to around 16C (which we are doing already), i've put a humidity monitor in there which is showing 15.4C average, and between 73% and 84% humidty, which seems quite high, though I ran it through an online tool, and found that only equated to 60% at 21C, so maybe not too bad. We plan to have a condenser dryer in there, and also a heated airer, so could do with some way of getting rid of excess moisture. Do i get: a dMEV fan such as Vent Axia Lo-Carbon Centra for extract only ventilation (how will this act if the room is airtight?) a Single Room MVHR (Nearest fit is the Vent Axia Tempra P, but the vent pipe will stick out of the wall around 20cm, which could look quite naff) a standard intermittent extractor fan controlled with humidistat Do nothing, though i'm not sure thats an option with Building Control A dMEV or standard intermittent extractor would certainly be the cheaper of the options, but I have no idea where the air would come from, as we have no trickle vents on the doors or windows, and theres no openers on the window. I suppose there will be gaps somewhere for it to come from. Any input greatly received. Regards Mike

ah right, the profile will take 44mm according to the profile manufacturers website, must be a squeeze though! 4-12-4-12-4 are the same as our current 'new' windows, which we are quite happy with, but wondered if the gas gap was a little on the slim side to be truly efficient.

Also, what type of spacers do they use, no mention of that on the website? Our current 'new' ones are the black thermal spacers EDIT: Found it: Inner pane – Pilkington KS Outer pane – Pilkington Optiwhite Gas filling – Argon Gas Spacer bar – SuperSpacer Thickness - 28mm or 36mm for triple glazing How did you manage to get 44mm for triple from these, they don't seem to offer it?? Do you have to speak to them direct?

Yeah i'll definitely look into these. If you wouldn't mind sending some pictures, especially of the internal beading. The eurocell modus is definitely better than this, but its whether it warrants the extra £, and at the moment I don't know how much extra £ that would be.

Yeah the 7016 on upvc does have a slight blueish tint i agree, we have some already, but I don't mind it, looks nice when installed. What are the u value on those windows? I'll take a look at that company, and also the profile.

Yeah absolutely, less frame and more glass will always be better. Both products boast about slim sightlines for maximum glass area, so there may not be much in it. Yes the Liniar frames are indeed marketed for improved acoustics, however we don't really require that as the area where we live is very quiet, most of the time you could hear a pin drop! I know for a fact our current windows suffer from chunky frames, and are indeed designed badly (on our part when i didn't know any better) to have too much frame. The new windows I'll be designing with as little frame as humanly possible, so we get the most glass area.

Hi, Before you comment on this, please bear in mind I don't want to spend thousands and thousands on Alu Clad Timber windows, but rather are more modest uPVC in 7016 grey to the outside. I've narrowed my choice down to two profiles, both would be triple glazed with the following spec: Liniar's brand new EnergyPlus90, 90mm profile which I would furnish with 48mm Triple glazing (4-18-4-18-4) which I believe would give a u-value somewhere in the region of 0.7-0.8U for the whole window. This profile is very new and very hard to get hold of at the moment, but i'd be willing to wait for it, its a 9 chamber product, which has ph-B status. We have other Liniar profile already (energyplus70), which i quite like, and they use q-lon gaskets on their windows which I also like. Eurocell's Modus, which is a 75mm profile, which can take a maximum of 44mm triple glazing (4-16-4-16-4) which gives a certified u-value of 0.8U for the whole window. This product is a 6 chamber, non-passivehouse certified profile, which is easy to get hold of, and can be ordered from the many retail outlets which Eurocell have. Not sure what gaskets they use, website talks about triple seals and airtightness which is a good indication, but I have had eurocell (eurologik) products in the past, and haven't been massively impressed, this however is a very different product. Does anyone have any experience of these products? Not expecting it for the Liniar one as its only just been launched, but the eurocell one has been out for a while. Because the Liniar one is so new, getting a quote for comparison is quite difficult. I did email a company in Nottingham, however they have gone quiet on me. I saw a post by Jeremy talking about the gas spacing in the triple, and from that I reckon the Liniar one would be more suitable, nearer the 20mm spacing, but if both hold the sameish u-value, would there be much difference? Any comments greatly received. Regards Mike