ProDave

It is amazing how councils vary. I dealt with all my pre commencement conditions by email with the planning officer, at no cost whatsoever. When they were all satisfed I got an email, followed up by a letter, stating all the pre commencement conditions had been satisfied.

I opened a credit account with Jewson, for the one reason that they were introducing a delivery charge for orders under £150, but not to account holders. Some say you get a better price with the cash account, but in reality the way to get the best price is haggle (play one BM off against the other)

Oddly enough I don't have trouble with my knees. I guess being an electrician I am immune, or they have no feeling left!!!! I just find it a messy and tedious job, especially mixing adhesive from powder, which is why after just a few hours have had enough for that day.

Perhaps a planning guidance leaflet dropped through the letterbox with some parts highlighted? A bit like when I got wind of my neighbour intending to culvert the entire length of the burn through his garden. I made sure he got a copy of the SEPA guidance note, which basically said oh no you can't.

Surely if they have started work without first gaining PP,. you should be notifying the council of your concerns?

At out last house I "broke all the rules in the book" Floor tiles (mixture of slate and ceramic) glued directly to P5 chipboard with a "flexible tile adhesive" and UFH. 14 years on, all is still perfect. Present bathrooms that I am tiling are tanked with the Impey Water guard membrane which is a decoupler.

In Scotland I think PD is eaves height max 3 metres within 1 metre of the boundary. So a 2 storey extension would NOT be PD What are the concerns the OP has about this extension? As I see it the real issues are ensuring there is no eaves overhang, dealing with foundations that may or may not go under his land, dealing with fencing and boundary marking after the build, access during the build etc. All of which will be dealt with by a party wall surveyor. The only planning issue is I would not want a window from that extension looking onto my garden, and the planning process would be the time to object to that if they propose one. At least with it not being permitted development you will have the planning process to ensure it does not cause you issues.

Not quite the answer you want (as I am doing my own tiling) but I have just bought 7 square metres of porcelain tiles, adhesive and grout. Total cost of materials £222 The scary thing being the adhesive cost more than the tiles!!!!! I will have spent 4 half days doing the tiling, so lets say 2 man days, the labour would cost more than the materials if I had to pay for it.

We settled for top hung openings that swing outwards, and you can swing them right out and back to present the outside face of the glass to the room for easy cleaning. Ones that tilt, or turn, always strike me as a mechanical nightmare and seal compromise, plus as already noted they open inwards, not good if you have left a window open and it rains.....

I will add my experience for a complete contrast. I could not find a TF company that offered the insulation level we wanted, and one even refused to talk to us when I suggested I may take a standard TF design and add extra insulation to it also for various reasons we were using strip foundations and a suspended timber floor downstairs. So we ended up getting the frame detailed by a local arhitectural technician and then built by a local builder who have done many low energy houses. We contracted that same builder to lay the foundations then build and erect the frame, so any issues of the frame not fitting the foundations were theirs and theirs alone. As it happens I dug the trenches. The first thing the builders did was set up the profiles and the guy doing it was surprised to find I had actually dug the trenches in the right place. They were very particular to get the walls mm perfect, straight, level and square. But even so, the frame team did not build the frame to the drawings, instead they came and measured the footings as built and built to match that. The frame was built by hand off site in their workshop and brought to site and erected as complete panels as any other TF. The roof was different, a vaulted roof cut on site supported by big ridge beams. We had an open ended contract with the builders, basically "you carry on until I tell you to stop" That was because of limited finances. We actually got further than I thought we would and when I told them to stop they were happy to do so and we parted amicably. (I still see one of them regularly) Since then I have been doing all the work myself. There was one issue (similar to one noted above) that the rafters that made up the cut roof were not quite all straight. By then the roof was tiled so way to late to alter anything so I corrected it by packing the battens that make up the roof service void, and the finished, plastered ceiling is now perfect. I should add we had a very good working relationship with the builder. They were always happy to discuss details, in particular air tightness detail as the frame went up, and offer suggestions. They were also happy to make minor amendments, like the position of a couple of doors was altered very slightly,. and ensuring the stair opening size matched the stair design we were using (slightly different to shown on the plans)

That would do. But I would not pay that much. Some timber from a builders merchant and those concrete pads look awfully like garden wall pier toppings, again from a builders merchant for a lot less no doubt.

My static caravan sits on a base of 300mm compacted MOT1 topped with a layer of gravel to make it look nicer. It sits on 12 piers of concrete blocks on their sides. There are 4 lengths of steel angle driven into the ground and it is strapped down to those at each corner to ensure it stays where it is when the wind blows.

Yes. Instead, make a free standing base say of 6 by 2 timbers that just sits on the slab, and fix the SIPS panels to that, making a rigid self contained building that is demonstrably portable by picking the whole thing up as one lump. You can insulate between the joists of that base so it is instantly better than just sitting on a cold uninsulated concrete slab as your floor.

In England and Wales, the electrics will be notifiable under Part P. Just use an electrician signed up with one of the self certification schemes and they will notify it for you. No need to contact building control. I would have thought a simple foundation slav is all you need with this building sitting (not fixed) on top of that.

Our stairs also came from Stairbox. They did get 2 of the newel posts wrong so they re made them. Of the replacements only one was correct, so they re made one of them a second time before it was finally all correct. But they never quibbled and sent the replacements promptly.

This is Highland Council's definition of a "caravan" https://www.highland.gov.uk/downloads/file/1346/bst_018_caravans_and_mobile_homes Note that in England and Wales a "caravan" can be larger than we are allowed in Scotland because at some pint the Caravans act was updated there, but not in Scotland. As long as the building is capable of being moved in 1 or 2 pieces it can be classed as a "caravan" it does not have to be on wheels. @Crofter is building his holiday home under this ruling and the Highland Council confirmed that being able to be picked up by a crane and put onto a low loader is sufficient to make it qualify as a "caravan" as far as BC are concerned. The only practical difference in your case would be make the frame it sits on strong enough that it won't disintegrate if you put a couple of scaffold tubes under it an picked it up with a crane. It would typically sit on pads or on a slab. There was a Grand Designs house a few years ago that built a 100 square metre portable house building right to the limits of the definition of a caravan. If you have a drainage connection, that will be subject to building control but nothing else will be.

Exactly what size of office are you building? Why are building control even involved? You can build a building up to about 100 square metres and my making it "portable" it becomes exempt from building regulations (it is treated for BC as a "caravan" and does not need to be on wheels for that) I have wired many such portable buildings, real sturdy well insulated houses but built with a few rules in mind that makes them "portable" even though they are intended as a permanent home. I certainly would not be involving building control for a garden office.

The plant has to be 10 metres from a watercourse (In Scotland) Though a neighbour has installed one a lot closer, waiting to see if BC sign it off or not.

Yes you have to peel just enough of the backing to stick the start of the strip down, then peel the backing as you smooth it out. I've started the tiling today, just done the tricky bit the actual shower former which went okay.

You can pay a LOT for a heat pump. My plumber friend paid in the order of £10K to have a system installed. He was swayed by the rhi payment and the need for installation by an MCS company to claim that. Given that he is a plumber I am willing to bet he would have done better to just buy one and install it and forget the rhi. I get the feeling the only people that actually benefit from that scheme are the installers.....

I bought mine from ebay. I started looking long before I really needed it, but was mindful of needing to find one reasonably close so transport cost was not too high. One came up on auction on ebay about 50 mles away. I was going out that day, so I put in a cheeky bid of £2500 and went out. When I got home I found I had won it. It cost just under £300 to get it transported to my site. I then spent about £100 servicing the engine. There was no service history and I didn't want the timing belt snapping and trashing the engine etc. When I had finished I sold it on Gumtree and got back my £2500. Buying an old machine like this is obviously a gamble and things could break that render it as an unrepairable heap of scrap, but it did what I wanted, even if it was old and basic.

I chose air source. I just about had enough room for ground loops, and had my own digger at the time so installation costs would have just been time and some diesel, but then I found the pipe for the gtound loops and the antifreeze to go in them would have cost way more than the actual GSHP. Then there is the cost of changing (and disposing of the old) antifreeze every 10 years. So I decided for the much cheaper and easier install I would go air source. It is arguably slightly less eficcient, but that is more than offset by the simplicity and lower cost.

Who's bathroom furniture did you use? and who's toilet and basin?

The devil will be in the detail of the exact wording of the right of access. Is there no other access possible?

I think this thread highlights the advantages of buying your own plant. I bought my own digger, I bought a very old very cheap 3 ton steel tracked machine for £2500 and after 2 years use sold it for £2500 I would call that a bargain. It was SO handy just having it there for even a small job. I also bought a whacker plate for about £150, not as good as a roller, but damned handy. I still have that. This would be a perfect first job to get used to your new toy piece of specialist machinery.