ProDave

I am not sure I agree with that. Our last house was built to normal standards for 2003. Actually I suppose it was cutting edge then as it was built with a 150mm timber frame. Just a year or 2 earlier the normal was a 100mm frame. It had good under floor and loft insulation but no attention placed on air tightness, pretty standard basic timber double glazed windows and no mvhr. It was a very comfortable house. Never a spot of condenstion or mould, even when hanging wet washingon the airer in the utility room to dry. Annual heating cost was about £800 for heating oil (perhaps peaked at £1200 when the price of oil was higher) Of course I hope the new house will cost less to run than that. BUT the old house had solar PV at the original higher FIT rate, that was paying us about £750 per year, almost paying for the annual heating costs. The irony of the whole downsize to a smaller, lower energy house plan we had, is that in the time it has taken, the FIT has dwindled to almost nothing, and for political reasons it was impossible to get the FIT until the house is complete so we were unable to install the solar PV while the FIT rate was worthwhile. So the sad reality is, with no FIT then with, or without solar PV fitted, our new house will not in fact cost us anything less to live in than the previous one did. There are some rather sore issues with this that are like an itch that just keeps itching. Sometimes I do wonder if we should have just accepted the old house was good, and our new "better" one may not actually in practice be any cheaper.

We also didn't move out of the old house until the basic shell of the new one was complete. So the loft of the new house is already full. We have the washing machine and tumble dryer set up in the house (you really don't want that shaking the caravan) and I have my office set up in the new house, where I am typing this.

Back to the original topic. I have just watched it now. What a complete shambles with the first basement contractor. I wonder how it works when you have a tiny site and you are building on the entire site. Do you rent the adjoining space from the respective owners to work from? How does connecting services to a house like that work, again never any details. If I read it right, he added an extra 100mm of external insulation that was never planned. If he was right up to the boundary to start with, the building is now trespassing on adjoining land by 100mm all round. I did see the sun amp, but no mention other than high tech energy saving heating system. There were lots of rolls of white ducting so assume some form of mvhr? Agreed non compliant stairs. The brief preview of next weeks episode appeared to show another staircase with no banisters.

I don't think architects are "tossers" I did however have an issue with the business model that some architects use. My example is our previous house. I had designed the house. What I wanted was someone to take the design, suggest perhaps some improvements, then detail the design and produce a set of drawings for planning, building control and ultimately for the builders to work from to build it. I did not want the architect to project manage it or put the build out to tender. What I got was 2 of the architects didn't bother to turn up to the site meeting, and the 2 that did, seemed to ignore the scope of the work package that I wanted, and instead quoted quite ridiculous fees that seem to be based on a percentage of the build cost, and not related to the man hours of work they would need to put into the project. To add insult to injury, their estimate of the build cost was not far off double what it actually cost me to build in the end (and therefore their fee was nearly double), and if it really had cost what they said it would, then the project would not have been viable and I certainly would not have afforded to build it. It was a very disappointing exercise. For that build, in the end I employed a local firm of builders to build the shell, and they charged £2500 for the planning and building regs drawings. There was no "architect" input at all. With my present build I just could not face that again, so this time it was all detailed and drawn by an architectural technician, with input from a structural engineer.

It is also worth mentioning do you have a use for the 'van after the build? We do. I want it to remain as a studio and workshop. The planners were not initially happy with that. But then I pointed out that on the day of completion, I could remove the 'van from site, then immediately replace it in an identical position, then it would qualify as a permitted development garden building. they then changed the condition to "habitational use of the caravan will cease upon occupation of the house" meaning we can keep it as a studio, but can't use it for accommodation after the house is occupied.

I am very pleased with my Euro top hung outward opening triple glazed windows. I am on the side of wood burners, as long as you have free wood. I would not entertain the thought of having one and paying someone to deliver chopped firewood to your door.

In storage in our old house (rented out but loft space and garage not included in rental)

There was another one where they used stainless steel yacht rigging wire stretched across at seemingly random angles. It clearly fell foul of the "will not pass a 100mm diameter sphere" and in a final sequence, a polycarbonate sheet had been added to make it pass, with the clear implication it would later be removed.

It's normal to include temporary permission for a residential caravan as part of the planning application for the house. I suspect you would be okay even if you didn't as there is some law that allows temporary buildings related to the build. You pay band A council tax. We had the council tax valuer sniffing about very early on, I met him on site twice. When we did finally move in and I contacted him, he said "let me get your file...... Ah I see I have been to your site 17 times" I recon he must have been visiting monthly so see if there was any sign we had moved into the caravan. Re post. In our case there is not even a street name, so all houses just have a house name, the village name and postcode. We chose a new name for the house and started using it, first on the utility bills. We have no problem getting post delivered. when the council tax man came, he put it on the valuation list as "caravan, house name, village....." he said that was so that when we occupy the house they can delete the caravan from the valuation list and add the house name on it's own to the list. This is the only post we receive addressed to the caravan. You can get a used static for as little as £1000 but you will probably want to pay more for a better one. We paid £4000 for ours but that was because it has a very unusual layout that suits us better and suits future use of it better, so it was buy it at that price while it was available. It was probably a fair price, it is in good condition. They will be very cold and damp in the winter (we are hoping to start sleeping in the house before Christmas to avoid the worst of the cold) You can mitigate that with lots of heating and accept your heating bills will be high, but offset by road fuel savings. I have just put a wood burning stove in ours so at least some of the heating is free. What I found here is buying from a dealer is easiest (there are two within 10 miles of us) as they will deliver a 'van they sell for free. Neither of the 2 dealers are very interested in delivering 'vans they do not sell. When we sold the last one from our previous build. the buyer had to get a haulage firm from 50 miles away to transport it as neither of the 2 local dealer would move it for him.

I haven't watched this one yet (don't watch commercial tv live) But just last week on George Clarke's "ugly house" they created a first floor balcony that only had posts and a top rail, not even sheets of glass to fill in the gaps. I wish they would concentrate more on the technicalities like heating system, insulation levels, ventilation system and as build SAP value, but I guess that would be too boring? Running out of money, nowhere to live and (a recurring theme) new baby on the way are much better entertainment value.

If it's a one off, ebay. I bought my 20 way Hager and 10 rcbo's for about £80. Not all from the same seller.

I used the frametherm rolls. Cut the rolls with a panel saw while they are still rolls. Dead easy and not very messy. The small offcuts are perfect for floor insulation or odd gaps.

This brings us onto site insurance. I HOPE you all have a self build site insurance policy in place? If so that will include your employers liability insurance. So far only one person has asked to see mine, and that was the builder who built and erected the frame.

I was originally having blown in insulation in my 190mm frame, until I found out the cost, and you need a man with the machine to do it. I changed for the frametherm instead, it gave the same U value and was half the cost, and was a DIY job to fit it. 190mm frame with Frametherm 35, 100mm wood fibre external insulation then render, OSB, service void then plasterboard inside gives a U value of 0.14

For my ground work, and then the construction and erection of the frame, I paid in stages in arrears. When I got the same builder to supply and fit the windows, I paid 50% of the window cost up front to them, and the remaining 50% and the labour for fitting once they were in. But by that time there was a lot of mutual trust between us.

Did you go "full plans approval" with building control? If so your "non standard" build will have been detailed in the plans, which they have agreed. Therefore ALL you have to do is build according to the approved plans and they will have to pass it. They only have cause to complain if you deviate from the approved plans.

I think that is a condition imposed on all the Graven hill plots. Not so much a planning issue but a condition of sale.

The PME earth and caravan thing is to do with failure of the cable. With a PME, it comes into the house, usually in a concentric cable with the outer being a combined neutral and earth. It is not unknown for that CNE conductor to fail. If it does and a caravan is connected, then the metal caravan skin (which should be bonded to earth) can raise to L potential. This can be VERY bad news for someone entering or leaving the 'van with one foot on the ground and reaching up to grab the door handle. A TT earth avoids that issue, and while Neutral might rise to L potential, the caravan skin will remain at local earth potential. Same issue for site tools (if not 110V via a transformer) This I believe is also the reason for the change to the regs to fit an additional rod, as usual we the electricians are having to take on the responsibilty of sorting someone elses shortcomings.

I was going to mention sheds. And that car port that covers half the car (Aesthetics has trumped over practicality?) If you are having a car port it needs to cover both cars completely. Sheds can be dealt with under permitted development, UNLESS PD rights have been suspended, in which case your planning needs to cover a lot of sheds, you can never have too many. That bunk room, I would not call it that or include the bunks. It will impact your drainage requirements (I assume it's mains drainage) Just call it a multi function space and by all means put the bunks in later after completion sign off.

All relays will be able to switch AC or DC. Their current rating for DC switching will be lower than for AC switching.

There is nothing wrong with you connecting your own earth rod to the main earth terminal to supliment a PME earth. After all, the ethos of a protective MULTIPLE earth system is there will be an earth rod, or pigtail at every connection point. Indeed the draft of the 18th edition of the wiring regs looks like it will become a requirement to add a local earth rod to a PME install. In my own case I have the supply head and meter remote from the house, and a local earth rod by the house to supliment it. A static (indeed any) caravan should not be connected to a PME earth.

CPC do lots of relay boards http://cpc.farnell.com/search?st=relay board

Hi and welcome to the forum. Looks like you have secured a nice plot there. We will be watching with interest how this proceeds. Some of us are a little skeptical about the limitations on how and when you build, so will be interested how you find it first hand. I am intrigued by the layout, particularly the "bunk room" and the thinking behind that.

Check the current requirement of the LED's. Cat6 cables are tiny CSA and won't carry much current.

Ah lofts. You get to see all sorts in my line of work. The ones where you can't get 6" beyond the hatch due to all the junk carefully stored treasured possessions that are the most "fun" And the ones that have 3ft of loft insulation added so you have no chance of finding the joists to stand on.