ProDave

Assuming as you name suggests, you are in Scotland, section 3.12.3 here gives all the details https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-standards-2017-domestic/3-environment/312-sanitary-facilities/

Is this a wise conversion? Doing so, if the neighbour then did the same, would turn both houses into "semi detached" and devalue both of them. A rear extension might make more sense?

I still have the barn tool box I made as an apprentice, including making the hinges.

^^ I am sure I saw a version of that that said it "will hurt like f**k all the time you are dying"

Our cold main comes up in the utility room at the corner of the house closest to the mains. To get to the kitchen the cold runs up the wall, along in the void between downstairs ceiling and upstairs floor, then down into the kitchen. There is no issue. At worst the "cold" water will be 20 degrees if it has been standing in the pipe for a long time. In winter that is a bonus as the raw water coming into the house is very cold. Just keep the cold pipe well away from any hot pipes and lag it well.

He wasn't wearing a high viz vest. It would never have happened if he was.

I moved a lot further than you to achieve that. But even so I was down there this year, but only as a passenger on the M25 /M23

I would not give that the satisfaction of being described as a "roof window" It look like some DIY bodge job. What's the roof material? it looks like box profile sheets cut into strips? The lead flashing above the window needs to be longer and tuck under the roof cladding strip above it, not end just below it with half a tube of some sealant hoping to seal it. And the same with the side flashings, they need to be longer so they tuck under the roof sheet above.

I loved the bit about no more power points, just stick a pad on the wall and it will get power anywhere. And the bit about only heating the rooms you use misses the point about a well insulated house completely.

Hi and welcome. It sounds like your expectations of what is needed to do it right are correct so you should be well prepared to make a good job of it.

I bought a packet of standard hacksaw blades from a "hardware shop" they were just so weak and brittle you could hardly use it for a minute before the blade just snapped.

There are other benefits, lack of draughts for instance. Our previous house I don't think was "bad" from an air tightness perspective, at least I can't think of where there might have been big accidental leaks. However to comply with building regs, all 4 bathrooms, the kitchen and the utility all had extract fans, that we all know are not air tight when not in use. Then it had a stove connected to a chimney. the stove drew it's air from the room so there had to be a vent near the stove to let air back into the room. then there was a letterbox, and a cat flap. And of course every window had trickle ventilators. This all adds up to a LOT of holes in the building. The result was on a windy day, if you opened one door, somewhere in the house, an internal door would slam shut as a gale blew in (or out) through all the multiple paths. The new house has mvhr, so just two vents for all the air, and a room sealed stove. No cat flap and no letter box. If you open 1 door on a windy day now, nothing, no draught at all.

Our kitchen island is like this. Actually 5 units strapped together. Howdens sell a large one piece back panel for this. It simply screws through from the inside of 2 of the units. in this case the 2 end units, the curved ones, the back does not have a cavity so simply screwing through from the inside is all that is needed. Simple to remove should I need to.

You are entitled to your opinion. I paid a lot less than you for my kit, I got the mvhr unit from ebay and the ducting from BPC, self designed. From measurements I know I am running mine at about half the BR recommended rates and it is fine. The air is always fresh inside the house. The trouble with trickle ventilation, is a lot of the time it will be under ventilating, on a still day, but on a windy day, will be grossly over ventilating. MVHR really comes into it's own when you are building a really well insulated, and sealed, air tight house. But fitting mvhr might not always be optional. One self builder near me did a good job on sealing his house, so much so that when he had an air test done, the result was so good, building control insisted he fit mvhr.

Real downlights are quite deep. But flat panel LED lights fit in the thickness of a bit of plasterboard, you just need about 25mm for the driver to tuck into.

Nothing too posh, Howdens Clerkenwell.

BuildHub membership is free.

Here is our kitchen, Oak floor, light grey gloss handleless units, green granite worktops. Oak worktop on the island.

I think it all hinges on how long ago the poor work was done. Most survey reports are littered with get out clauses like only examined from ground level with binoculars etc so they will no doubt say the defects were not visible. I had to quickly write a report last week on faulty / dangerous electrics in a house that had just been bought. Up here is you buy a house, you have just 7 days to report any defects that the seller omitted to tell you. It will be interesting to see if the seller is made to pay for putting the defects right or not.

I haven't been able to see out of our north facing triple glazed windows for days. The condensation on them is frozen. This is good news, it means there is not enough heat escaping through the windows to melt the ice, let alone evaporate the condensed water. The south facing ones are clear. Even a little bit of weak winter sunshine will heat the outside enough to clear them.

Though I spent my childhood cleaning my teeth with such water, oblivious to the issues, and got away with it,.

I managed to phone them yesterday. Having gone through a load of checks with them on the phone to confirm it was installed properly, they agreed it was wrong and have ordered a replacement drain valve thing. But they can't say when I will get it as it's presently out of stock. It works okay as it is, but being a poor self builder, I don't like the thought of roughly 25% of my boiled water just going straight down the drain.

The usual fault with PME is a break in the PEN conductor, allowing the PME earth to rise almost to L potential. A better check would seem to be use a rod, just as a reference, and trip if the PME earth differs from local earth by a set amount (a bit like the old voltage operated earth leakage devices) I guess it might be doing a loop impedance test, which should also detect that condition?

I doubt mould on the walls is being caused by the choice of flooring. I take it, this is an old house? Care to describe it? and what EPC rating did it get from the selling agent? Sadly a huge amount of the UK housing stock is very poorly built and in particular very poorly insulated. The only solutions are to improve the insulation, or to just pump lots of heat into them and keep them very well ventilated.

But Screweys and toolstation both have shops. The only trouble is, they are 24 miles from me. TP is only 7 miles, and I was going that way for something else anyway. It is no wonder though that those that can't compete, die.