ProDave

Well done, i forgot about those. https://www.screwfix.com/p/flomasta-self-cutting-tap-15mm-x-3-4-/21250

I proved that years ago working in an office at a constant 20 degrees. Sometimes you were in shirt sleeves and loosening your tie as you felt too hot, other times you put your pullover on as you felt cold. Same at home, we always feel warmer after a meal.

The fan motor in most ASHP's is considered a non servicable item and the only option from the manufacturer is a new fan motor, list price about £400 they are a variable speed motor with the control electronics built in. In my case, I found it was possible to remove the front plate, pull the armature out and gain access to the 2 bearings, so it cost £5 to fix mine. A neighbour had a fan failure, his was an electronic failure and in these fan motors the electronics are potted into the plastic housing. I did not even manage to get the front plate off his to get to the bearings even. We found a "new old stock" replacement motor for his on ebay for £200

One thing never discussed in a "heat low and continuous" strategy is the ancillery items. For instance, when my heating is on, I have four circulation pumps and 2 zone valves on. At a rough estimate say 200W. That is power not contributing to heating but used to push water around the system. I can't help feeling that is a significant proportion of the heating power a lot of the time so perhaps an argument for heating harder for a shorter time?

It sounds like the downpipe was leaking. Fix that and the damp will go away. If the wall was getting regularly splashed above the DPC level then the best DPC in the world will not stop the damp entering.

I did a bearing replacement on my ASHP fan. I did not want it to be out of action long, so I took the motor apart, measured the bearing and put it back again while I ordered one. In my case it was impossible to measure the shaft diameter without pulling the old bearing so I made the best measurement I could and ordered two, and one of them was right. I might suggest if you can't get one locally, you wait until summer when you can shut it down, leave a few windows slightly open then dismantle the motor, measure and order the bearings, and then order one with no hurry to re fit it until the new bearing arrives.

The earth bond should be above the stopcock before the first branch so it is correct to leave the earth where it is and insert your tee above it. Your problem will be I bet there will be no slack in the pipe to insert the tee, so you may have to cut a bigger section of pipe out, fit your tee and then a slip coupling above it. Unless anyone knows of a slip tee fitting? Most fridges have a very thin plastic pipe for there water feed so it should be easy to feed that round the back of the cupboard and have the isolating valve near the front just off your tee.

A TP does need a real vent at both ends of the drain run. I thought I had covered that by incorporating an outside vent stack on the static caravan at the far end of the run. But BC argued what if the 'van is removed? I argued that would be the responsibility of whoever disconnected it to make arrangements. They did not accept that. The only alternative they offered me was run an external vent pipe up the outside of the gable end of the house. The problem with that the drive had been concreted by then and there was no way I was digging it up. So reluctantly I took the internal stack pipe up through the roof to a vent.

I still have a bag of brass 4BA screws, previously used in all sorts of electrical stuff.

Depends how old, probably M3.5 if recent or 4BA if old, BA threads used to be the standard for electrical things a long time ago.

This is what bugs me with this whole battery storage and DNO restrictions nonsense. It would be simple to design a system that just used a CT on the mains feed to ensure it never exported more than 3.68kW but could deliver a lot more than that from the batteries when the house was using it.

Sory i don't have a picture. But those piles in the picture above support a rectangular building. The wall in the foreground supports the end of the building at ground level and the rest of the building is supported on the widely spaced piles. The point of the post is rather than try and get a piling rig on soft sloping ground they did it all with a digger. Removed a lot of top soil and then for each pile dug down to something solid then cast a 1 metre square of concrete then formed a poured in place concrete pier onto that concrete pad. Then put most of the soil back then membrane and gravel to top it all off. All the tops of the piers are at exactly the same height and gives you an idea of the slope.

That design is so similar to what my neighbour did.

A picture of the plot might help? A neighbour here on a tricky plot built on piles, but not with a piling rig, but with a very skilled digger driver excavating a square hole at each pile position pouring a 1M square concrete pad, then forming a concrete pile on top of that, then put the soil back. A bit like the post above, not many piles, widely spaced and the house was then built on a substantial timber base formed over the pile tops making it an above ground house with clear space under it. Nothing more heavy on site than a 6t tracked digger. Here is the resulting piles he built up from

Yes ours is. Only one mouse in the house in 6 years, and that was through a partly open velux window. The last house, they always got into the loft. The ridiculous practice of a cold ventilated roof with the mandatory vents large enough for a mouse means that is inevitable. And why I am a huge fan of a warm roof design with all insulation and air tightness following the roof line.

Surely it would be better to get mutual agreement now, and build it as a party wall straddling the boundary with you contributing some of the cost and an agreement that when the time comes you build up to it for your extension. that would probably involve agreeing roof profile and you joining onto they roof when you build yours. Anything else is a compromise and extra cost for you both.

Interesting topic. A short term rental (i.e. holiday) now needs and EPC so I assume letting caravans is still allowed as they are EPC exempt? The only person that could answer that is the council who should be able to confirm a caravan is EPC exempt?

If they were damp when fitted they would be a lot weaker and the screws would pop easier. I have never known good dry new boards failing from the moisture in the plaster.

And he started with a nice flat site with ground that already looked hard and stable (what pre preparation was done?) Now try that on our sloping site with an over thick layer of soft top soil containing vegitation? One good thing on there, he glues some sort of cement board to the upstand outer edges. that solves the often asked question on here how to protect them after a whole house has been built but still nothing covering the EPS upstands. What was that buried flat metal strip around the perimiter for?

It was not many years ago I replaced the fan in an Electricaire unit, spares are still available, and even more recently I installed a new one, now being marketed for heating large industrial spaces.

Well one of the thermostats is dud. I would say boiler thermostat. The water exiting the boiler should never be near boiling, so even a failed cylinder stat should not cause that. I bet the radiators are scalding hot to touch. Until you get it sorted, do not leave the boiler on at all over night, or while out of the house, and watch it like a hawk when in, first sign of boiling or banging turn boiler off.

A well written description of why I would never have "smart" heating controls. My hard wired programmer and thermostats never go off line.

I really don't think it would be the boiler heating the hot tank that hot, much more likely the immersion heater is turned on and the thermostat has failed. Immediately find and turn off the immersion heater switch. Boiling water venting to a plastic header tank has been the cause of more than one very unpleasant death and why the law was changed for a secondary thermostat in immersion heaters. Don't ignore it, act NOW before even replying to this thread. I would add, turn off the boiler as well, and run a hot tap to run off some of the boiling water out of the tank.

This sandwich SIP panel you are describing is exactly what caravan manufacturers have been doing for decades to produce lightweight, thin and strong floor wall and roof panels with foam insulated cores. It would be worth a search to see if you can buy for instance caravan floor panels ready made? Here is one such product https://www.panelsystems.co.uk/news/2019/04/lightweight-panels-for-a-variety-of-applications I think the challenge will be finding something for sale in a small quantity at an affordable price?

No, it would mean the cables being in a hot duct and probably insulated so they would have to be de rated.