ProDave

I am assuming the battens will run vertically fixed to the timber studs. You (or your electrician) might want to do some of the wiring by going horizontally from socket to socket for instance, which will be in a safe zone for wiring. So it's a lot easier to preempt that and drill a horizontal hole through the battens at switch and socket height before you fix them to the wall.

A screw through the air tight layer is okay. If by chance it misses the stud, do bot remove it, leave it there filling the hole and just fit another one. Pre drill the studs at 450mm and 1150mm above finished floor level to allow for cables, or leave small gaps in the studs at that height.

Yes Leasehold is rare in Scotland. When we owned a flat, we jointly owned the land it stood on with the flat above. We were both jointly responsible for "common parts" i.e foundations and roof. We owned a 1/8 share of the entrance area in front of the flats, we owned the whole of our garden and a parking space. But the issue is not about ownership, it's a covenant issue and who / if can enforce it or how to get permission. Very often if the covenant was put there by the builder, it was to protect them from you doing something stupid while the development was being built that might hinder sales of the other units. Quite often when they have finished and gone, they have no interest in enforcing the covenant, but it is still there, and "unlikely to enforce it" is not the same as saying you can ignore it. On a much more trivial level, I kept a caravan against a covenant for 3 years with nobody bothering me, but it would have been simple to move it if there had been an issue. The annoying thing about this situation is it demonstrate developers total lack of interest in providing a window where it might enhance the property with a nice view. Instead it's probably one of their standard designs and they could not be bothered to tailor it to better suit the location.

The only way to be sure is lift some floor boards in the small bedroom immediately above the wall you want to remove to see what it's doing. Chances are it is only built of block because "that's what they did" or are there other walls in the house built of stud and plasterboard? It was common in the past to have load bearing walls upstairs that are not immediately below the load bearing walls downstairs so there will be some bending forces on the joists, but hopefully they will be sized for that, if not there may sometimes be some sag in the joists.

This time insulating my ground floor. Blog at the usual place http://www.willowburn.net look for the entry "insulating the floor"

Our SE visted the site and I dug 3 test pits for him with the digger, down to 2 metres. What this showed was once we got through the organic top soil, we were into a sandy clay with a lot of rocks and boulders, but didn't hit bedrock even at 2 metres. So he was happy to specify strip foundations, the only depth stipulation being we were down into the sandy clay, and he specified the concrete mix and reinforcing mesh to be used. I never questioned the reason for the mesh as the present house, build 2 doors away on much the same ground has strip foundations without any mesh.

My thought is to build in such a duct and a fan costs very little at build stage. So I will almost certainly fit it. If it ends up not working or not getting used, you have not wasted much. By comparison, if you decided to fit it later, it would be a lot more work and a lot more disruption to the building, that's if it's possible at all.

I would like to see that in court, how you did unauthorised work on their network.

Now shoot me down on this one, but I have a "cunning plan". On the assumption that a WBS in one room may overheat that room, and mvhr won't re distribute the heat very well or very quickly. What about an extract vent in the ceiling above the stove, ducted to another room in the opposite corner of the house, with an in line fan that you can turn on, to move head from the room with the stove to other room(s) A sort of blown warm air heat distribution system?

Another issue. Who owns the land you are going to have to stand some scaffold on, to get up to fit this window?

These days it's normally a structural engineer that specifies the foundations, type, depth, type of concrete, reinforcing mesh etc.

What's that about, non habitable buildings only?

So I was working in the house this afternoon and an Open Reach van pulls up. Out got the same chap I saw nearly 2 years ago when he gave me a drum of cable. He had a look at the end of the cable in the house ready for a socket, and the other end coiled up on the grass verge right above their trunk cable. That's what I like, he said, a nice easy straightforward job. He assured me someone will be here on the 22nd to dig the hole, connect the end under the verge and connect the socket in the house. It's all going too well so far. P.S I forgot to say, I had to pay a £65 connection charge for the new line. I have not paid anything to OR. The BT operative I dealt with said it's normally £130 connection charge and his system has let him discount that. Apparently some days it lets them discount it to £0 but not on the day I phoned. Compared to the cost of getting water and electricity connected I am not grumbling at £65

I thought there was an almost universal alternative name for them, the first word begins with S.....

Our connection came down to just a shade over £1000 for them to pull a cable through the duct I had installed, connect into the meter cabinet I had installed and make the connection in the connection pit I had dug. Believe it or not £750 of that was for "wayleaves" A figure I think they just pluck from the air. Sure it would have needed some form of wayleave to cross 12" of grass verge and pass under the road, but £750?

I would be surprised if just letting 30mL of water out would drop the pressure that much. I strongly suspect your expansion vessel either does not have enough air charge, or it has failed altogether.

That Hotun looks interesting. Fit one now? or wait until after BC sign off and swap it?

I presume Orkney have their own council? Just checked and in fact it's £150 for Highland Council http://www.highland.gov.uk/info/180/planning_-_applications_warrants_and_certificates/172/street_names_and_house_numbers/2

On the subject of who follows the rules...... I found this home made "tundish" on a job today the D2 pipe went down to the ground then along the floor with no discernible fall before exiting at garage floor level. Part way along the discharge from the boiler expansion vessel joined it with no tundish. Re my vent pipe being a chimney. I have long thought it should be possible to encase the tundish in something transparent and sealed to both inlet and outlet pipe. That would not impede the flow of water and it would still be visible, but would stop air leakage up the vent pipe. Plastic bottle or similar perhaps?

I take it this is for electricity? and is it permanent or temporary? For temporary I have seen an old kitchen cabinet with a bit of roofing felt tacked on. It lasted the year that was required without falling apart. And for permanent, I just set two standard flush mount meter boxes into a substantial short bit of "fence" along my boundary. I would ask them to quote what regulation says it has to be brick built. you can buy floor mounting fibreglass electricity kiosk's that just need a concrete base to stand on.

Like I say I am actively trying to avoid that. A fee of £145 was mentioned once up here ant that's extortion to add a house name to an existing list. I will carry on without paying that as long as I can as a matter of protest. If I succeed in getting the phone line installed with the address manually entered that's one step closer. I already managed that some time ago with the electricity.

Thanks. I have "reported" it in that first link. I ticked "no" to has it been built within the last 12 months. I well see if anything happens as a result of that. I also added the note that we have been receiving post for 2 years and the postman has no trouble delivering to the house.

Today's job was to try and organise getting the phone line connected at the new house. Previously Open Reach had visited, given us the cable and duct which is all installed so it just needs connecting under the grass verge, and a socket connecting in the house. First phone call to BT new connections did not go well. He could not find the address of the new house on the address data base *. He stated he cannot process the order until the house appears on the address data base. I argued that my next door neighbour managed to get his phone line connected without being on the database, so it must be possible. No it is not. Can I speak to your manager please. I gave up after 10 minutes of canned music, that was never going to be answered. So I call back, expecting this time to have to get irate at the call to the manager not being answered. Instead I got a different operative, this time much more helpful, who finding it not on the database simply said I will have to put it through manually and proceeded to take all the details and place the order. I have an activation date of 23rd March, so watch this space to see if it happens. * as a point of principle, I am at the moment refusing to pay to get the new address listed on the address database. I didn't pay for the last house, and I have been receiving post to the new house with its new address for well over a year (electricity bill) so I personally have nothing to gain by paying for that. So I am holding out on the basis if someone else wants it they can pay for it (a whole different topic of course) I suspect that will come to a head when we start getting charged for council tax?

I wonder if this will finally change buyers behavior? i.e. when choosing a home will people actually start to look at only houses with a decent EPC or will they carry on as now not bothering to take note? Surely it is about time the market price of poorly insulated homes was lower to reflect the work they need to bring them up to standard. An awful lot of the old cottages up here get an EPC of E or F, which is now too low to be used as a rental property for instance. Look forward to the "government scheme to insulate your home...." junk phone calls any time soon. It makes me very glad indeed that our new house will be do well insulated. Like all good journalism (sic) it gives no hint as to what the target EPC (or some other measure) of these "refurbished" homes will be. If they are aiming for all hiomes to have an EPC of A then best of luck with a Victorian or earlier property.

That's definitely true of ionisation smoke alarms where the actual sensor has a shelf life. Burt what about heat alarms where the sensor is just a thermistor. I can see no reason for those having a shelf life? Also (a bit of a rant) why are heat alarms more expensive? the thermistor must cost a lot less than the ionisation detector module, yet heat alarms always seem to cost more.