ProDave

Don't be looking to the council for emptying services. A private contractor or your water company are where I look. I use a company up here called Sure clean, but I know Scottish Water offer the pumpout service. I think @joe90 has a Vortex so he will answer any details about it if that is the one you choose. I am near certain you won't be able to discharge into the canal. Unlike rivers most canals have no flow so nothing to dilute what you put in there. They are dirty enough as it is.

We pay about £150 each time we have a 2500L septic tank pumped out every 24 months. It's just 2 years now so will be getting the treatment plant pumped out for the first time soon, and then take guidance from the tanker driver if it was over due or could go longer next time.

So if it's unregistered, does it not just need a surveyor with the appropriate qualifications to re register it then?

Yes mine is the Conder that uses an air blower.

This time one couple split up and he then could not afford to finish so is living in a barely habitable house, but with a lovely garden. Next door a floating staircase that is completely devoid of any handrails. And the treads bend when you step on them. Both over budget.

I thought you were not allowed to use a pump to suck water out of the water main?

Without a doubt I would fit a small treatment plant, and without a doubt I would choose one that works on the air blower principle like Graff, Vortex, Biopure or Conder (I chose the Conder) You will get a much cleaner effluent, you can manage with a 20% smaller drainage field, and there is very much less chance of the drainage field blocking. Septic tanks are likely to come under more stringent rules and a lot of people are going to be forced to upgrade very soon.

What does your solicitor say? Is the disputed bit of land still unregistered? if not who claims ownership? I must admit when we bought our plot the solicitor and land registry seemed much more helpful and there was a procedure to match unregistered land with what the map shows.

Really the only need for 3 phase is if the DNO refuse your request for 8KW of PV (or any upgrade costs they want to palm off onto you are more than the cost of a 3 phase supply)

The problem with any rigid batt type material is getting a snug fit. Leave gaps and air can get past making the insulation very much less effective. That is where wool or blown in types win.

Mobile phones are astonishingly good value now. I have a £5 per month SIM only contract on a not very old smart phone I was given by someone upgrading to the latest thing. It is not unlimited, but has enough minutes for all my needs. It would not be possible to get a landline call package for that little, and even if I paid per call to use the landline it would cost more than £5 per month. So our landline is for incoming calls, and a necessary part of getting broadband. That is open to continuous review..........

It's what someone thought was a trendy name for an executable.

My daughter was showing me on her latest app, I think it was snap chat or something similar, where she could go to a page that showed on a map exactly where all her friends were at that instant in time, some you could see them moving as they walked down the street. If she zoomed out it even showed the one who was on holiday in Turkey. MI5 etc must be loving all this. I keep "location" turned off on my phone, unless I actually want to use it for navigation. And I have no desire to install a listening device in my home.

Never seen one. A very fine 19 core cable and very fine pitch connector would not be easy even if someone sold one.

I haven't watched this yet, but is the first program on the new BBC Scotland channel that has looked remotely worth watching. For Sky and freesat viewers you can get BBC Scotland even if you do not live in Scotland.

Ours is a wood fibre house. 100mm thick wood fibre board on all external walls and 100mm thick wood fibre board on the roof as a sarking board. Originally we planned blown in wood fibre chips as the frame insulation until I discovered you get the same U value and nearly as good decrement delay using Earthwool Frametherm 35 for half the cost. And it was a DIY job to fit it not needing a gang of men with a blower machine. The only "drawback" is what finish are you planning? Ours is rendered direct onto the wood fibre board. the first winter we had a problem with the bottom edge along the garage wall blew, we have had that bit re done. We now think there is a blister on the gable end wall. Still need to get that looked at, but if the render is going to give trouble then that is obviously a big disappointment. Don't know if it is "the system" or poor application, and expect everyone to blame everyone else.

The Kingspan / Mitsubishi Lossnay units like mine don't have a condensate drain. Just a core similar to that made of waxed paper, and some fans. The case is mostly lined inside with polystyrene mouldings to give a smooth airflow path around the various components. I don't know how it manages when just about every other mvhr does have a condensate drain but it doesn't fill up with condensation.

I hope later this year to apply for a temporary habitation certificate. I wonder if they will need to actually visit for that?

Are these silo's the finished item, or just temporary accommodation while building another house?

Well that's basically all that is at the heart of my Mitsubishi unit.

I think I have had 3 visits, trenches pre concrete pour, external drain inspection and pressure test and timber frame complete. They were not interested in inspecting the treatment plant. Recently when I was set up for the internal drain pressure test they could not attend so just ticked that off. when asked what next inspection they want, they said "completion"

Such an arrangement is common in larger buildings. It's called a Sub Main to feed the second layer consumer units. You could avoid the use of rcd's at the distribution board by using something like SWA for the sumbains and then have conventional CU's at the second layer. In theory there would not be much need to ever visit the distribution board.

As above. We are on a single phase 11KV overhead line and the nearest 3 phase line is over half a mile away so the cost of getting 3 phase here would be astronomical. The only way you know is if you get a quote both for the move, and for a new 3 phase supply. If you get the new supply, that is not oficially the end of it, you would still have to pay something to get the old supply removed or disconnected. (I know someone who converted 2 houses into one. He refused to pay the £1000 to have the road dug up to disconnect the redundant feed, so it has been sat there for years, with noting but the electricity meter connected to the supply head on a zero standing charge tariff) If you do get your 3 phase then you can connect 8KW of PV between 2 phases without needing prior permission.

There is a long known about issue of PVC in contact with polystyrene, but that article seems to suggest some forms of PVC don't like being on contact with other forms of PVC. I have never come accross that. I have seen cables passed through a wall with some form of polystyrene insulation for a long period and you can see physical "melting" or flowing of the PVC jacket, but I have never actually seen a cable that has failed because of this. If your brand of ICF is one based on some form of polystyrene then it would be a pretty good idea to put something behind the cables so they are not touching the polystyrene. PVC conduit does not "solve" the problem as that is still PVC but being thicker it would take longer for any effect to manifest itself. For that matter I would be wanting PVC pipes to avoid touching the polystyrene.

Can you use say two 15 degree bends and make the offset over a longer distance, but with less "obstruction" to flow?