ProDave

I am one hoping to come in at a finished price of £1000 per square metre. Just to warn you, I am into year 5 of the build as I have been doing so much of it myself.

That roof is seriously out of square, what's going on?

I didn't realise your panels were so new, I thought they were on the house when you bought it? So no FIT for you then?

A quick search finds this one https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Solar-iBoost-Free-Hot-water-from-your-PV-Solar-Array-Immersion-controller/123863648409?_trkparms=aid%3D1110001%26algo%3DSPLICE.SIM%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D225114%26meid%3D29b39850189049778a4f90ca1f0dc22f%26pid%3D100005%26rk%3D10%26rkt%3D12%26mehot%3Dpf%26sd%3D282178038088%26itm%3D123863648409%26pmt%3D0%26noa%3D1%26pg%3D2047675&_trksid=p2047675.c100005.m1851 It has a wireless sensor. It would be worth digging into the specs to see what it's range is. that might save having to run a cable to the meter box. It says "The distance between the water tank and utility meter is less than 30m." so it might work for you with no extra wiring.

Find out what solar PV diverter you will be using first. I am out of touch with what is available.

I am staggered that your electrician can't or won't do this. It is just a radial circuit from the consumer unit to the inverter, with an ac isolator switch and a generation meter. And a DC isolator switch between the inverter and the panels. If your remote meter is in a decent cubicle it could remain there, mine is about 20 metres from the house. As for the PV diverter. That will have a current clamp on one of the meter tails. Even if the meter is still in the remote cabinet, that can be fitted in the house, as long as the external meter box does not feed off to other places, just the house. If like us, the external meter box feeds to other places, then the current clamp would have to go in the outside meter box. I provisioned for that by laying a length of spare SWA telephone cable to the meter box. Before you go any further I would choose which PV diverter you are going to use. Others will have to recommend one as I made my own. You will need to register the PV with your DNO and they will need a bit of paperwork, including a schematic of the instalation.

I once saw what looked like a pretty standard small dumper with a back hoe on it. At first I thought what a neat idea, until I realised there was no way it could self load.

Is there anywhere on the site to use the excavated soil? I used all ours to raise the ground level of the lower parts of the site, no muck away at all.

£55 for an 84 page book actually makes the wiring regs book sound like good value. When I needed is similarly expensive but even shorter BRE book, I went to our local library and borrowed it on an inter library loan, it cost me just over £1 in postage costs to do so. That would be my advice for something you only want once.

I do agree it was probably the wrong place to build a house, but was just pointing out it has not "flooded" i.e. the water level is not above even the garden level (what is left of the garden) let alone the floor level. Had the river bank held, there would have been no story. I also agree the local planners and appeal both made the right decision. Do buyers of new builds never look at the planning history? If I saw it had twice been rejected due to flood risk, I would not have bought it. It reminds me of this one https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/aberdeenshire/795497/abergeldie-castle-brink-fearsome-river-dee-closes/ Abergeldie Castle nearly suffered the same fate in 2016, but it did not collapse, the bank did not erode quite that far, and I believe they rebuilt and shored up the riverbank and it still stands today. I suspect this house won't be as lucky. In that case 60ft of riverbank and several mature trees were swept away. They probably thought 60ft from the river was safe.

I chose the all GU10 LED option. And in 2 years have not had a singe failure. I like the ability just by choosing what lamp, to have different brightness and colour. I have fitted (for others) many of the LED flat panel fittings. They do seem to work very well indeed and give a nice light. But my concern would be, are they still going to be available in the same size and style in 10 years time? I would pretty much guarantee the humble GU10 or MR16 lamps will be. So if I were fitting flat panel fittings, I think I would want a good number of spares just in case.

To be fair, this house has not flooded. It is in danger of being swept away as the river bank has eroded, so was it built too close to the river or was the failure of the bank unforeseen?

I would extend the pipe up above the WC and fit the AAV there. There is a risk of sucking the water out of the basin trap when you flush the WC.

There will only be the one central adjustable foot. The rest of it is supported by screwing to the wall. That one foot is made up from bits in one of the various "useful items" hoards I have, Just a foot from something, screwing into an aluminium spacer, and a handy bracket to attach that spacer to the underside of the timber.

Be careful the cost of the battery and periodic replacement of it does not end up making your "free" electricity cost more than from the grid. Look at NiFe cells. Very long life and very forgiving. I might experiment with a small battery system based on those eventually.

Getting further. That's the main framework for the base unit built. There will be a slatted shelf along the bottom and the wood will be painted. Worktop all across the top. the bit behind the WC will be boxed in with Multipanel to match the walls. An access hatch will be provided at the right to access the WC cistern and at the rear left to access the UFH manifold. It is being built to look a bit like a free standing bit of furniture but it will be very much fixed in place. Latest CAD model for the next "design review"

So the architect cocked up. The steel beam that is the cause of the issues can't be shown on the drawing or is shown in the wrong place. This is way beyond a few mm drawing tolerance. I would be saying "you designed it to fit that window, you make whatever aerations are required to fit that window, at your expense. As it is, you have a house built that does not match the drawings by a long way. Are you happy with that?

I had a call today. The plumber tried to start up the heating today but it kept tripping. when i wired it I connected it to a B32 mcb as that was all I had, but every time the compressor tried to start the mcb tripped. so I went over there this afternoon and swapped it for a C32 and all is well. The operation as I suspected is very basic. By default it has a target temperature of 55 degrees for the buffer tank and it runs the HP continuously until that is reached. It then turns off until the buffer tank temperature drops to 50 degrees when it re starts. The highest running current I measured was 19 amps, which is a power input of about 4.3kW but more typically it was running at about 14 amps or 3.2kW input power.

Personally I have never seen the need for a dimmer in a bathroom. I would just put it back to being a normal switch, particularly as we now know the fan is on the dimmer.

Why is that the case with SIPS when it is not the case with Timber frame? I personally would not accept that. If they are saying there must be something as the frame does not have enough racking strength with just bare joists, then would not a sheet of 11mm OSB do that, onto which the OP could put his floor make up? Any resolution has to be resolved and agreed with the SIPS company and their engineer,.

A case of the tail wagging the dog here. You need to tell the SIPP company the floor make up that YOU want including your UFH and THEY should design it for that, including any extra allowance for extra dead loading. i.e. they should NOT fit the floor boards at frame erection stage, or if they must fit something, then a cheap layer of thin OSB onto which you can put your UFH panels then your chosen finished floor. They also need to make allowances for the floor make up to add extra height if needed.

I strongly suspect your problem is the same as mine, a spurious and very short pulse detected by the HP thinking it has a heat demand and turning the pump on for a fraction of a second but not long enough for the flow meter to operate hence it trips with the CH14 error. I "fixed" mine by filtering the thermostat input with a 100K wire wound resistor from input to N and in parallel with that a snubber consisting of a capacitor and resistor in series. Is that something you would feel confident fitting yourself? or do you know someone that would fit it for you? I am sending you the service manual. Don't get too excited there is not much in it,.

Tip No 1. Throw away the piece of junk that is the current version of the NTE5 master socket and buy the far superior older version. You won't actually achieve anything by "moving" the master socket. Just splicing on an extra bit of cable and moving the master socket will result in exactly the same length and route of cable, as leaving the master socket where it is, and just running a length of cable and fitting a slave socket where you want it. Then plug the router into the slave socket. You only need to "move" it if there is some reason why an unused socket cannot remain in it's present place. You just need 2 pair telephone cable, or 3 pair will do, and you can buy it in short lengths from most DIY shops, screwfix etc.

Definitely a good plan. It will have a toilet as well which satisfies your obligation to provide a site toilet for the workers, though you will have to empty it.

No but have you tried Rationel?