Ferdinand

Mine has been running at higher humidity than normal. I have been runnning my PIV a couple of settings higher. I think it is too soon to conclude that you have a problem. It may just be a combination of the extra sealing (even on an old house new ceilings throughout are significant - with the floor you may have lost 30% of your "leak ventilation"), plus all that grout etc under the new flooring will need time to dry out, and it can't go down 'cos you sealed that with Celotex. Suspect patience required for a couple more months as it aclimitises again. Plus new plaster is a good sealant. 3 suggestions that could help getting the background trend moving in a better direction. 1 - Set your trickle fans to the higher trickle setting if they have two (like my Vent-Axia ones do - 6 l/s and 9 l/s). The boost may also be adjustable with eg a rheostat on the PCB. 2 - Do the usual ventilation things when at home etc. 3 - If you need you could try a dehumidifier. Domestic ones may help, but the one I swear by for leaks and rapid results is the Broughton CR40: https://www.broughtoneap.co.uk/products/dehumidifiers/ Something to buy and sell, not rent except as a trial. Should get for ~£400 if you decide you need one. Small and needs a separate bucket, weighs about 26kg. Worth having the counter so your next purchaser can see it is mint. If dehumidifying, important to run the temp high in that area. Should have an impact on a normal sized whole house. Or get a decent domestic one and try it for a few days - will not hold its value as well. Had I done that much to an old house, I would have a PIV as well as the trickle fans (normally do that in rentals) as a matter of routine, just for resilience and to keep air moving. Remember that a newbuild takes about a year or two to dry out, so 4-6 months might be reasonable for all of that stuff you have done. I say do reasonable stuff to control it, watch, and wait until next spring/summer to take a check. If you are measuring, a few of these min/max themometer-hygrometers might help see your swings. About £10 each. https://www.amazon.co.uk/ETI-Ltd-thermometer-hygrometer-indication/dp/B017KNQNZA/ Ferdinand

It looks as if I will be doing something like the above. Gravel raked flat over membrane. Requested play area is 8x8 or 8x6 feet. Fence post frame. Bolted or timberscrewed together. 50mm 600 x 600 mm slabs probably inside frame. 20-25mm rubber mats on slabs. Fake grass attached to fence posts frame. That gives a soft area which should last a few years without needing to be reconstructed (due to possible movement of base), and where a kiddie fence can be attached easily if require later. But which can be dismantled later. Cost will be about £250 (ish), but I have some of the bits already. Any comments are welcome - especially if I have missed anything. Ferdinand

Not sure that it is wise to have plans on the thread with the architect's name on them, or why they are needed here at all. If there are real issues and a split, then it will need goodwill or at least cooperation on both sides. Identifying them here will not achieve that. Suggest splitting the build query from the architect query, removing plans from this thread and posting an anonymised excerpt on the other query. (Quick action - well done.) F

I think you need to have a conversation with your potential TF companies about what they provide, and what input they provide. There maybe an overlap you can exploit. You may find your architect will be willing to pass the plans on to another professional such as the design dept of your chosen supplier. There are potential contract issues here - eg did your contract run to getting planning, or is it for the full build process. That could muddy the waters. If it was to PP only, then you need to clarify with the A. what mechanism they are providing for the build to continue; If you are trying to walk out of a contract, then what happens depends on the contract and professional practise. Could all be quite delicate. How is the relationship with your A? >1. Architect costing around 20K from building regs and detailed design I do not understand this. From BR and DD to what, and for doing what? Ferdinand

AIUI they put the thick edge at the bottom when installing. Indeed, you sometimes (I am told ?) get ones that are thinner at the bottom that have flowed upwards. Or could perhaps been installed upside down. Lived in a house that was still in possession of many original Georgian panes, but I admit I never went round checking any. I am sure Jeremy has a way of measuring the thickness of a Georgian window with a few cornflakes and some bits from a Standard Vanguard, but I was not in possession of a micrometer that would reach round the adjacent window frame. F

I would say it shows that where there are 2 options - studio or 1 bed - at the same price, they go for the one bed. To me that is market setting the price. F

Nice job.

Agree with Adrian on that. Remember all the people stranded in Studio flats in London in the last recession but one when the prices of one-beds went below what they had paid, so all the first timers went for one-beds? Ferdinand

I had something like that with a Brook at the bottom of a field. Every few years the bottom of the field would be flooded. I was glad it was at the bottom of the field :-). Best of luck.

UFH you need significant insulation underneath plus the layer with the pipes. So it would be about 150mm deep at least. Plus it buggers up your doors, which may or may not be a problem,

You need to run the numbers well enough so that YOU have confidence in YOUR decision. We all have views that are best considered as a supplementary checklist for the purposes of checking your assumption ... which was the request. Buy lunch for a neighbour who has restored one in the style you would likely do ; we all love talking about our projects over a donated lunch. My last one I ended up paying 3k extra for half a new roof that I judged wrongly. Assumed that a 1970 roof would still have 20 years in it. Wrongggg ! I was OK in money terms because I had saved more than that elsewhere and bought for less than expected. Still a shock when a leak appeared in my pristine lounge ceiling just a couple of months in. You could eg deliberately phase, or be ready to as Plan B, phase your budget and accept that you need an ultra-duvet for a few years.

Part agree. Cold roof should be free. Room in roof not so. Walls Would be 10-20+ per sqm if say 50mm celotex and pb then skim etc, or similar. Eg Celotex PL4050 is 40-50 a sheet, plus delivery to timbuctoo. 10m x 5.5m footprint x 2 x 2 x 2.4 = 150 sqm = 2-5k. Depending who fits. Assuming 2 floors, which may or may not be true.

I am considering "back to plaster", not "back to brick". The other question for an older property is "unknown unknowns". If you suddenly find you need a new roof, or have a bit of rotten wall, or some joists with dry rot, or need a new septic tank which now has to be a poo-plant, that can each add anything from £500 to £8000 on its own, and it might be prudent to assume that you may have 1-5 such events happen. Or not and you get a holiday. ==> big, big contingency. To me eye, the central heating, rewiring, reglazing, and possibly bathroom costs look ambitious, whilst the kitchen may be generous (but I am a bloke and some people spend that x2 on a range.) And you do not have anything in for replumbing, or renovating the fabric to a higher insulation standard, or ventilation. Or external works eg any wall built from stone or brick will be about £100-200+ per sqm if you pay for it. So consider the possibility of 80-100k by the time you have done it, and added shiny bits. Vs what it will be worth also. Also @ProDave has done a number of similar things, and is in Scotland. And a well built old property is very different from a poorly built old property. Ferdinand

Welcome to the club. Can't really comment without loads more detail, but try another way - £500-£600 per square metre, assuming there is nothing big and structural (eg roof, reconfiguring walls etc), Those prices look to me to be perhaps doable for someone experienced who is networked in with good suppliers on a small house (= 2 bed or 2 up 2 down), or some for a self-restorer doing the labour. For a newbie or a 3 bed + house - too optimistic, especially if it is for you; we always overspend on things we love. Also crofts tend to be in the back of beyond, so trades have to travel. Also I usually do brick semis and b7ngalows not crofts. Ferdinand

That would see to argue for a new slab infill to make sure there is no such space. If it is a croft, I will defer to those in Scotland of course. It is genuinely difficult to see what one does with 3ft thick (rubble fill, or solid?) walls, other than seal plus ventilate the inside, and allowing the damp to move outwards. I'm being coy because they are all different. I have a number of places from this period as rentals, and I like them because they are often well-built and predictable, and eg asbestos had not yet been used in buildings. I'd take care eg with Georgian buildings in London because so many of them were thrown-together speculative builds by titled money-grubbers. Quite a few here have restored, and regretted not rebuilding. Now off to ...er .. clear my gutters to make sure it does not leak next winter. F

Sorry - this may not seem helpful. There are quite a wide range of things to know - to do with fabric and structure and preserving them, and where water comes in and out and how it does it. A lot is basics - even as simple as are the airbricks blocked and is the ground level too high. But there is a lot of different things which may or may not apply. It's all the traditional maintenance and renovation stuff, about which there is a library of 840603 books written, then insulate and ventilate in balance - especially if you make it more airtight, and keep it maintained. I think if you look around you will find some renovation blogs which will covers some of the questions each, or perhaps find a 'renovation' book. Or even a course. There may sometimes be something hiding in the detail of Exhibitions. I am not aware of help organisations, unless something like the Historic Houses Association for their smaller house members. If I were buying one (or a big one), and I had questions, I would want a Full Structural at the point I was getting really serious. We actually did that when we *sold* hours, because it was Listed and a right bruiser of a place, to avoid scaring off the customers. Ferdinand

@lizziesunflower fly-trap seems to work. Slightly too many hoverflies for my comfort, mind. £1 not bad for 3 months. Whilst the fruit fly trap seems to suggest either that it is ineffective, or we have no fruit flies. Complete Nellie the Elephant For here.

Umm. Stamp duty? Iirc we move half as much as 25 years ago.

I think one issue here with your new plan is that the central entrance to the en-suite turns your bedrooms into corridors now. Not clear on the utility of making it now have 2 single bedrooms. Wit( the existing circ. space is all in the middle not the edges.

Not sure if thread is going anywhere in particular, but Parker-Morris standards allowed studio flats of 29-32 sqm (depending on whether 1961 /1967 version). For a pied a terre or singleton that may well be fine. Some of the "lets be like Parker-Morris and avoid modern shoeboxes" brigade come unstuck on that one. The London Spac standards (which iirc are going national) entirely seem to duck studios. There is also a problem with trying to adjust standards too quickly. Back when Landlord Licensing came in in 2011 in Southwark the pillocks who run the Council thought ... abracadabra lets make all renting rooms in HMOs at least 10 sqm to solve overcrowding .... which would immediately have outlawed a huge number of rooms in their Borough and have made thousands homeless. It took some concerted interventions by LLs before they backed down. (*) Also this, which had survived from the 1990 version when they had never heard of fixed shower screens or plastic coated shower panels. The document is quite funny. http://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/documents/s55660/Background document Existing HMO STANDARDS.pdf There are plenty of examples of similar stupidities still happening. Most recently that I know Nottingham tried to impose a requirement to serve an EPC on tenants for a type of property where an EPC does not even exist under EPC law - tossers ?. So as I remarked above there needs to be a lot more detail here. When they trip over their own feet they land on you. The problem is that they write stupid regulations, then enforce to the letter of the regs, and local councils are in some things unchallengeable in practice. Ferdinand * Don't get the Southwark pillocks muddled up with the Lambeth pillocks who gave a whole street to squatters because they forgot what the Council owned, or the various multifarious other pillocks running Local Councils. Or indeed the Coventry pillocks who have just argued that Landlord Licences do not increase rents by comparing with a single year in Nottingham when licensing charges did not significantly apply. Or the Newham pillocks who argued that Private Rentals increase ASB, then discovered after the fact that the number was higher mainly because they had underestimated the numbers of Private Rentals by 20% - never mind, by then the untrue stats had achieved the desired outcome. HL Mencken: "H.L. Mencken — 'The older I get the more I admire and crave competence, just simple competence, in any field from adultery to zoology.'"

This idea occurred in a novel from 1961 called A Fall of Moonduat by Clarke, on a moon base. He used the whole wall and 6 switchable pictures. I think it works well, though variation needed as you way ... unless the gimmick takes over. Ferdinand

No. Not currently viable - even at optimal prices. Jeremy is in a far better position to use batteries and benefit from them, so I will not be looking at it seriously until after he has done the hard work ?. I also do not have his dodgy power supply. Civilisation starts in the Midlands. For me, viability is one of the keys guiding sustainability. I recall some very stupid green campaigners demanding that 40p per unit solar pv subsidies be maintained "to support solar", when in reality the same amount of money could support twice as much eco-benefit by halving the subsidy as technology has improved. All it would have achieved would be more 100m fortunes held by rent-a-roof solar types. But then many green politicos always were spectacularly gormless imo. (I should point out that there are also many whirring away in the eco-engine room, doing brilliant stuff.) I cannot use an electric car yet, which would be part of the benefit, as I need to tow a couple of tons from time to time. No electric cars are serious tow-wagons yet in sensible price-ranges. Next step would be to build a car-port on the S side and move some of my panels to there, and then perhaps an ASHP when the current boiler dies. Currently accessibility has the priority.

In general that may be a good thing for many. Then after working out the financial and personal cost, they will have looked the monster in the eye and they can decide sensibly whether to run the gauntlet.

They seem to also be in 2m and 3m, but potentially extra could be used in my design to soften the fence post frame ... maybe. or I could find some 3.6m fenceposts. This is the current general idea I am ruminating about.

Where is the room for the 24 hour on call dog-butler? (Update. Got it ... that’s the Master Bedroom)