Ferdinand

Get a flock of sheep for lawn tidy and freezer next year. Or talk to @newhome about the Racing Simulator she may still have gathering dust.

Welcome. Personally, were I doing a renovation with a new slab in the floor, I would not bury pipes or wires in the screed or slab simply for maintainability reasons, studding out the wall where necessary. It sounds, as has been remarked, that the Planning / Supervision may have been insufficient. If they are wall mounted I would not see a need to conduit the electrics, or in extremis perhaps even insulate the water pipes. I would aim to minimise plumbing runs, but elec would need to go everywhere as I fit a *lot* of sockets. Ferdinand

You may have trouble arguing that over a 20 year period. Policy changes and tightens. Though pointing out that a busy Antiques Business would generate many times more traffic might help ? .

Also why you want a shower accessible from the utility room as well as study perhaps. Muddy doggoes and children, perhaps.

If you want a longish read with lots of great ideas on robust design and fitout, try this old thread of mine on Landlordzone from 2011. "The Tenantproof House" About 200 posts but quite dense content, but forthright thoughts from lots of LLs. My favourite I think from this thread was someone who dealt with the Student Wear and Tear challenge by procuring a secondhand commercial kitchen from a restaurant made entirely of stainless steel. Obvs students would love that. https://forums.landlordzone.co.uk/forum/energy-efficiency-epc-design-repair-improve/35896-the-tenantproof-house F

This thread seems to be a duplicate.

(Seem to be 2 versions of the thread) Ouch. Make it smaller for GIA purposes. I think the first need here is thinking time, as CIL takes a bit of getting to grips with and varies by area. But the easy way is if the GIA calc is less than 100 when you correct the Council, if they accept the basis of your calculation. What is the actual GIA? Start with that. If your PP is still in process, in which case I think you can "withdraw" it then resubmit within the next 12 months without having to pay another fee. If it is not yet determined, I would check that you can do that, then withdraw and go into the regs etc. Can you make eg your logstore or your sitting area open to the outside etc. to shrink the GIA ? Walls can take up a lot of space :-); can you make some walls a bit thicker with insulation, or use other tweaks? Make it accurate, 'cos if I were the Council I would come and measure it having been subjected to that sort of claim. Ferdinand

Replied to this but my reply has evanished. Will see if it reappears then try again if not.

Ouch. Make it smaller for GIA purposes. I think the first need here is thinking time, as CIL takes a bit of getting to grips with and varies by area. The easy way is if the GIA calc is less than 100 when you correct the Council, if they accept the basis of your calculation. What is the actual GIA? Start with that. If it is GIA can you make your logstore open to the outside etc. to shrink the GIA ? Walls can take up a lot of space :-); can you make some walls a bit thicker with insulation, or use other tweaks? Make it accurate, 'cos if I were the Council I would come and measure it having been subjected to that sort of claim. If your PP is still in process, in which case I think you can "withdraw" it then resubmit within the next 12 months without having to pay another fee. If it is not yet determined, I would check that you can do that, then withdraw and go into the regs etc. Ferdinand

Don't forget to focus on risk and time as well as money. I cam commenting from a Midlands perspective, but with family in Surrey and I live in a bungalow +1 storey, which was reduced to a hole in the ground and 3 walls then rebuilt. I am not absolutely clear about whether you are happy project managing at a level of Administrating it, or the more demanding feel willing to instruct your trades / subbies on some things. iii) I think that to get an "extra storey on your roof" company to do that could easily cost nearly your entire budget for a nice new storey and a staircase. It may not, but it could. That could put you in the "all the money on 2/3 of the project - bugger what do we do now?" category. It happens. That is a risk you need to manage. ii) I can't really comment on - turns heavily on the local market and what prices you are given. i) I would suggest this one, unless you have clear ways to manage the risks you identify on the others. I would then suggest identifying a possible "Phase 2", which would be a ground floor extension in the future if you feel you need it. That could also be doable under Permitted Development. I would also say: 1 - Given the roof complexity, buy your own scaffolding. 2 - There are certain elements not in your list of costs, as you know. A full list (incl. for example fabric improvement) would be a good next step. 3 - Explore options such as reduced rate VAT as it has been empty. 4 - Do not forget the Council Tax you save by getting in early. 5 - Is there a risk of losing your 3% Stamp Duty if you take time selling the other one off? 6 - Serious consider whether you need a PM or Advisor to help you manage the technical side. Ferdinand

I mean that normal laminate will curl up like brown paper if it floods. So you need a moisture resistant one. I had been planning vinyl or vinyl tile for my bathroom to be extra safe, but got 20 packs of Quick-Step flooring at an excellent discount from B&Q so used that for the bathroom. I was pointing out that it is worth thinking about what happens in the more humid environment, and also where a flood will go. I have a personal penchant for overengineering, though. One of my thumbrules is that I like a waterproof floor in the room with the washing machine to be able to contain a washing machine full of water. Probably meaningless, but makes me feel comfortable and is probably a useful habit of thought. Ferdinand

Yep. Good point to raise. That is a crucial aspect, as Wallbarn explored with me. In my case, the main use will be mum (<50kg) in a manual wheelchair, and we do not often have visitors in the big buggies. I will be embedding the last slab into a 2" deep recess in the drive (or building a 2" concrete wedge), held in by mortar, and where the corner outside the front door is there will be a dwarf wall round both exposed sides to one to two courses above the level of the path. So horizontal movement will be difficult as the requirement will be to shunt hundreds of kg of slab along, and the 2" thickness will reduce the tendency to lift them by a force applied along the plane of the surface. The side between the path and the house will be filled with river pebbles (ie 3-5 inch size stones). There is a potential issue with the big (Type 3 8mph 200kg approx iirc) buggies if someone decides to try and attempt wheelies or the reaction to fast starts, but that will stop the slabs simply moving horizontally. And they are the mothers of all slabs at about 65kg each. So my judgement is that in my circs it is sufficient risk management for the few years it will be there. But all comments are most welcome, as in some respects this is experimental, and I am keen for debate. Ferdinand

Welcome, Angel. Will comment on the length of your piece of string on the other thread .

If the third party company will give you a guarantee on the result, then I would attach a high value to that, as getting it wrong can have a big downside. Sound insulation is pretty basic, and expensive to improve afterwards I think as it is buried deeply. So if you DIY it, then have a plan B for improvement for when the test engineer sucks his teeth and goes "sorry, Guv". Plan B might be, if permissible, to not cosmetically fit out the next one until you have sound tested the last one, so you can beef it up on the other side in Unit 2 without having to half-demolish the interior of Unit 1 to get it back to a point where you can do the work. I think you could *maybe* get some decent advice from Building Control on this, because they always want houses that work. Ferdinand

Boy Scouts are always...

No complaints so far.

Price War amongst Big 6 suppliers I heard Martyn Lewis on Monday on R5 pointing out that currently there are very competitive prices on offer from bigger suppliers, so good for anyone who is quite conservative. Programme attached or link here. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07vbnzz Ferdinand 5LiveConsumerTeamWithMartinLewis-20191118-SwitchingEnergySuppliers.mp3

For info that would usually I think be the change of status on the Council Website, or a notice appearing on a lamp post outside the location. Ferdinand

Hopefully these are useful questions. Is that screed that we are looking that was under the ply? What is under the screed? Is it sound? What about the joists? Is it a slab or suspended floor underneath - looks suspended? (Relevant perhaps in considering what happens to the water when a water leak floods it). If it is suspended and downstairs does it need insulating underneath ? (or on top) ! How is it insulated in the floor is a good question if downstairs, how is it sound insulated in the floor if upstairs. Has it got ufh? Assuming not but let's be explicit. (In my upstairs bathroom (not posted yet and not directly relevant) I had to go all the way back basically to the lounge ceiling as the subfloor was not well sound insulated and had been made of butted-up chipboard by the previous self-renovator.) What will you do if it floods? I might argue for a small step up at the doorway - say a non-perceptible few mm, such that the first chunk of water stays in the bathroom rather than the rest of the house, but that then requires some form of tanking. But that then says to make the floor in some way waterproof - but if it is on the Gnd Flr you will need to make it airtight anyway. Click-Fit is a good decision to avoid floor-flexing-tile-cracking problems, but you need to consider it as a bathroom floor. For Click Fit the only one that I ever use is QuickStep (which I did use for a bathroom in 2017), as that is the only one that I have seen to be practically take-uppable and put-downable again, with their own underlay (which is cheap and has adhesive strips at the joints). I would seriously consider the click-fit vinyl as it is a warm finish - and also relatively thin if that matters. I would buy enough do to what repairs I may consider necessary over say a decade - in my case this is usually 20-30% and enough that I can do a loo or cupboard floor and still have a bit over if it turns out to be perfect). Just my thoughts to help stew the brew. Best of luck Ferdinand

Jerry Pournelle used to recommend taking keyboards into the shower for cleaning. Can”t see why it would not work for a laptop, as long as it is dried properly afterwards (and backup up first - but then we all have full backups anyway *). Ferdinand * /lie

Fortunately no milk spilt...

Well my car had a very damp proof boot cos a bucket of the Wickes dam proof membrane fell over and the top came off...

Build one and find out ?

Trust that it doesn’t have a wooden beam going through the middle of it like our Jacobean Chimney did :-). Yes it did catch fire eventually.

To complete this mini thread, t we are the ramp supports I used. This Version of WallBarn ASPs has self-levelling heads which can tilt to about 3 degrees to compensate for minimal fall or irregularities on a roof, or here generate a smooth slope. These are the standard version which take about 600kg each, and adjust up and down by a couple of inches. Costs are about £3.20 for a 40mm ish small one to about £5 and a bit for a 260mm ish big one, with others in between to give a range of sizes.