Ferdinand

As an intermediate, why not close them but use a bead of silicone around the edge of the shutter first, then wipe off the excess. Then if you find it works OK with the MCHR and decide to foam it up in 1 or 2 years, you can reopen it with a modelling or Stanley knife and do the thing more thoroughly. F

thanks. That is a classic BRE document ?. 230 pages including 21 Appendices. Including ‘Appendix O (not used)’ on a whole page. An army artillery man, there. Should have had a picture of a hat and “This is not an Appendix”.

Thanks for tecpomments, all. It looks like provision for the future and watch this space, for now, then. Ferdinand

In a 1960s Comic, this would be under "Droopy's Drippy Questions", but are they? I was just reflecting on big bifolds, and whether they would actually be necessary, bearing in mind that lift'n'slide windows only half open, anyway? I might be more inclined to have a 3-ply bifold, and a big window. That must be worth £1200-1500 off the cost (or could be spent on slide and turn). But is anything lost by so doing?

I have seen comment on BH that an EPC of 100 is nominally a Zero Energy house. Can anyone give me a source I can reference for this? (Needed for blog post). Cheers Ferdinand

If you leave the 1.5mm² 'protected' by the larger fuse, then it can lead for example to your smaller wire burning out before the fuse itself - which (in addition to allowing a bigger current through, fire hazard etc) is a far more complex thing to mend afterwards. Apols if adding eggs to your aniseed balls to suck. F

Height above stairs will be bound by Building Regulations' requirements, anyway. If he is an architect he will have complied with those. It was more about asking for more detail of the plans so we can see how it all fits together - a 3d angled view from above (technically called an "axonometric" by architects) would be good too ?. The more info we have, the better feedback you get. The one thing that I think immediately is to go for side-by-side parking not tandem (unless they won't allow that, in which case I would make the drop kerb very generous in width and do it in a couple of years anyway). Where are you with the plot purchase - have you bought it yet, or have you got a lock-in agreement with next door, such that he can't back out? F

Note: Previous conversation about this project here:

It would be useful to see how the 2 floors (and especially the walls) register, and perhaps the elevations. Looks good that you are not being constrained by the box you were given when you started. That staircase looks a bit head-bumpy afaics, and there may be (perhaps) complications with flat-roof to wall joints if that is what it is. Are those your spaces or next doors spaces at the front? If next-doors, what did you get in return? Ferdinand

I have up to about 25mm - maybe 26mm, and up to 1m long. Usually come in cheap kits from Aldi etc once in a blue moon, and a typical use would be to thread pipes or cables through a thick wall or ceiling, also not needing to be very often. I have one which is a long 16mm one which generates a small standing wave in the drill bit as it wobbles. Ferdinand.

According to my diary, 21st June is the first day of summer. Crossed wires in custom and practice, methinks.

??? Warm spring in Escocia?

That looks partly like a summer/winter imbalance, and that they are trying to claw back on the basis of 6 months of difference. it looks like a bit of a jump. You may have done all of this next but. I would cross check your actual usage against what they are charging, and decide how long you want to take for it to come back into line. In my experience these payments are negotiable with evidence. You could try for 125 or 130. My payment with a different supplier has just hoicked from 87 to 117, but I owe them £250 after a heavy winter so I cannot really complain, and I only changed last year. I am in the MSE Energy Club to monitor for cheaper tariffs, but I tend to go for large suppliers and fixed 2-3 year tariffs. Others will know more about Bulb. Ferdinand

Welcome Sam. I put a Ten things To Do on my blog in the blog area recently, that may be useful but addresses energy rather than aesthetics, heavy renovation, and redesign. If you were able at some stage to blog here about some of the principles of lighting design, I think that would be really helpful. Ferdinand

I think that demolish and replace is a good option. I think that like cable systems being unreliable at the connections, there are loads of complications at the joint between the old and new in all the different spheres .. electric, leakage etc. And new build has huge tax and simplicity advantages. Ferdinand

there is a lot of value in having a very secure store early on, as it lets you get a lot of things in advance that people might just be giving away. You also have somewhere to store your gibbons (*) and maybe digger, and eg scaffold etc. It could save you from moving some stuff twice. Pros and cons based on whether you save more by having the store or economy of scale. There are often opportunities to get things free. Ferdinand * £&5)=*#*)7 iPad. = gubbins.

As your proposed basement is on the end of a terrace in London, I think you do want some planning advice on the local attitudes and policies. that probably wants to come from a local Planning Consultant or Architect who has been involved in similar. Or perhaps from pre-planning advice from the Council (££). It will not bind them. But may tell you their attitude. I would take probably split it into paid for advice up front on a time basis as orientation, consider whether I needed a pro for the design and planning stages - I would treat those together with a bonus payment for getting planning, and then consider the build. In London I would not want to be left without access to an immediate expert, depending slightly on whether I was paying for expensive infrastructure like scaffold on pavement licenses etc. Ferdinand

Fit whatever was going to be your Plan B for when the boiler breaks (even electric panels or fan heaters(?) ), and get completed with that, then do it afterwards. F

Welcome. We all have opinions. Your job (echoing Mr Bosch above) is to learn enough in your situation that you can me a decision in which you have confidence. On that one, read the contract to see what your rights are. When I talked about removing some of those, essentially I would have had to buy out the next 15 years' cashflow to put them in the same position as if the contract had continued. Hopefully there may be an "out" if you are demolishing. That is one to sort out in advance if you can, as any changes you want to implement may well take months to agree then months to implement (Land Registty and Deeds will be involved). I would lay odds that you will end up either buying it out, or keeping it on. My call would be to build a materials store / workshop as large as you can under Permitted Development in a position where you will be able to keep it as a long term feature of your house, and move them to that roof. Ferdinand

I would say either can work. In a range cooker you may get more bang for the buck if it does what you want. F

Final notes: If you want to play around with this footprint more it will need to be things like moving your central corridor off-centre .. even right against a wall, thinking about a single flight staircase against one outside wall, perhaps move the door to the end etc. Personally, I would strongly recommend getting some input from an architect .. perhaps only one or two days, to give you a different angle. This footprint seems to me to be ‘fragile’, in the sense that the division between “excellent” and “difficult to live in” is quite narrow. As it is a 250k build, 500-1000 on getting it to be as good as you can will be a good investment. Best of luck. F

OK. Try these for size. The best I can do without impinging on client time this week. Here is your original. Here the one with what I said above. In particular: - The lounge is now 6m x 6m, with the dining bit bitten out of one corner. Enough space to play with. - Kitchen turned into a C plan. Plenty of storage with an island the same size as a normal kitchen table = 1200 x 900. I would make the island suitable for 4 or 6 x bar stools for more formal dining ( @jackdoes this kind of thing). I have used the "sit in the 'corridor'" trick; if you are sitting on the stool you do not need the circulation space. There is still 600mm to walk past anyway when the stools are out. I would also make it a surface suitable for major cooking sessions. - Hob on peninsula unit for social cooking. Peninsula 900 wide so space for 4x breakfast bar should you need. under 300mm overhang. Keep 4 stools there, and 2 under island. Sink round corner for fridge -> worktop -> sink -> worktop -> cookers layout. - Store has gone. I cannot see the point of having secure paper files in the same space as a huge water tank and umpteen water pipes. The water gubbins can be in the utility, the secure cabinet is under the stairs in the middle of the house. - All the other spaces are functionally the same size, so no losses there. - Put the utility room and hall door where you like. - The angled wall with the full height mirror is important for making the entrance interesting - so you get a glance out of the big window. - I have flipped the stairs so that the understairs can be in the porch for bikes and gubbins. Also improves space in lounge. Secure store is under stairs - I would make it 750 deep with bifolds, to fit a filing cab or custom unit inside. - The layout around the porch and hall is still a little clunky - needs some playing with. - Windows need reorganising. And a blank for anyone else to play with. Just a few more things to say later. Ferdinand

That's a good, question, @Ralph. And it is a good time to ask it. But in the end you have to define "reasonable" yourselves. My suggestion to answer it would be to consider: 1 - What have you done in the past month that will take place in your new lounge? Write a list. The variety of activity is important here, not the frequency. What, for example, will happen if one of you wants a 5000 piece jigsaw out for a fortnight, or somewhere to work from home? 2 - Especially consider when you have done several things at the same time. 3 - Then do the "cut out cardboard furniture and arrange" thing, considering the things on your list, or ideally take it to lots of friends' places with different sized lounges, AirBnBs, or whatever, and play house. 4 - Then sit down with a bottle and think. (Or you can get Sarah Beeny and her magic LCD floor, but they are expensive - both Sarah Beeny and the floor). Sticking my neck out, IMO it is especially important that spaces exist within the house where a couple can be separate when required, without feeling pushed out. Ferdinand

I've been playing with this plan, and it could imo be greatly improved by questioning a couple of the more fundamental design decisions. How constrained are you to 6m on width? Is that a genuine hard constraint (eg is your plot 7m wide?)? Let me try and explain. I know what I mean, but we think in different styles. Your plan is 6m x 12m inside, and that is a sod of a slightly awkward shape to work with for a modern design without getting quirky. That is the classic proportions for a small play-school house - a door and 4 windows, entered from the middle of the long side, with a hall in the middle and room each side, with a kitchen and staircase and other bits where they fit round that. But, you are trying to get a modern "wide at the back" style layout into it sideways. So you have ended up with service rooms that feel relatively large, and a lounge-diner that you are concerned may be cramped. And the symptom is that it feels too tight for a island, and you are here for a reassurance check. (It is good to be checking.) It is all made more difficult because you have divided your plan into 2 even narrower spaces by having a de facto corridor 1.2m wide all the way down the middle - so *all* of your spaces, except for one, are automatically limited to being 2.4m (8 feet) deep. And that is a heck of a limitation, and imposes a grid feel, from the start. That is why, I suggest, your utility feels long and narrow, rather than square. The long and narrow feel of the whole plan is exasperated by the lengthways island. Not, I think, the impression it needs in the current layout. Classically in garden design, for example, you would divide a long, thin garden into garden-rooms across the plot - not put a straight path down the middle. Same issue. You feel as if you can't fit an island in, because it won't fit without heavily compromising everything else ! But the underlying issue is not the size of the island or lounge; imo it is the limitations imposed on those by the basic size and layout of the floorplan. Essentially as I see you are trying to get a Oliver Hardy into Stan Laurel’s trousers, and the best solution is either to change the trousers, or change the person. Or something will chafe. For a specific example, 6m (lounge) is not wide enough for 2 equal activity zones; it is one space. And if there are 2 people you will always need the possibility (otherwise you will end up with a repurposed spare bedroom or a garden room or lose your upstairs snug to an office/hobby). eg If you have a TV end or a study end, that will need at least 2m (eg small Ikea 2 seat sofa), and your other half of the room then becomes cramped as a relaxing area. How to get around it? If it is a genuine hard constraint, then it can be worked with, but I think the easiest way to improve the liveability of the plan would be to make it say 7m or 8m x 10m, rather than 6m x 12m , or perhaps wider in part. Everything would then become a bit more relaxed to plan. And you would have more space for an island and a more generous (and flexible) lounge. Can you, for example, make it wider (if only in part) by building up to a boundary? Otherwise we are imo into playing with disrupting that central corridor to give you more practical spaces, and thinking carefully about the lounge. Which can all be done, but I needed to ask the fundamental questions first. And finding ways to create spaces deeper than 2.4m. hat is normal for a refurbed house, but new ones are better with the constraint designed out. Sorry. Around here questions often turn into cans of worms . They sometimes even turn out to be useful cans of worms. (If you confirm that 6m x 12m is a hard constraint, I will add a few notes later). Ferdinand

Welcome.