Ferdinand

Ouch. My comments. I feel focused slightly on possible regulatory action. 1 - We had some of these moved, but may have been 33kV, when we did our big PP. We were faced with having a swathe through the middle which was pretty much house width. Fortunately we had a Wayleave with the right to make them move it all. There is a thread somewhere which explains the stuff, but this is oversailing so different. 2 - The process to switch it off is IMO a nonstarter. There may well be 500 or more people supplied by that, and to do such work *must* have a long process. Lots of notices, consultation, applications etc. Takes months to plan if not emergency. unless something is happening already. 3 - You have practical alternatives which is good, if you are allowed to use them. the jack up option is like putting your first floor on acroprops to repair the downstairs wall. Parents did that to a listed building and rebuilt a whole facade. Perfectly normal technique, but you may need a bit of redesign on the roof as it will need to be self-supporting. 4 - You need some more piccies showing where the thing is in reality, taken along the line of the wire to see the actual distance from the house. If you have a known dimension in the pics it would help so the distance can be estimated. Could be something very simple such as a known 2 or 4m piece of wood on trestles level with the closest point. it may be beneficial to put a time lapse camera on it along the line if you have them around, so you can see how far it moves in any wind that comes along. 5 - I think at some point you are going to need to talk to the LPA, and there is a risk that someone may just try and say no (though I think they will be sympathetic). It might be beneficial talking to your been-round-the-block wise owl just for their feel for the situation; it will have happened before though only occasionally. Since you have an architect it might be worth asking them if they have had one, or to call in a favour or ask their oldest local architect friend. An alternative might be a quiet chat with an old hand at building control, or even someone in the electricity company, but personally I would want an informal idea first from someone not links. 6 - I would perhaps avoid spending money on the garage bits for now until you have a better idea which direction this is going. Sure you have done that anyway. The rub is that some stuff is interdependent of course, and you cannot do eg the slab in 2 bites. 7 - If it is a comfort, I do not think that the LPA will stop you In your tracks as long as you are not doing something in specific violation of THEIR requirements. IMO the ones with the big spanner will be the utility, but they will want a workable solution too. As this must happen sometimes, I am sure there are ways .. just takes a bit of work to find them. Ferdinand

If it is not to passive house levels experience says you need a lot more cats ?. Will try and digest and comment a little later, since the forum helped me readjust my similar setup earlier this year.

I like the feel of option 2. Sorry - did not have time to read the whole thread except for Zen Jack and his moderately cold feet. But there is an option 3 below. My comments are: 1 - This is a high risk time, with Brexit and so on, and unpredictable markets, and in your area taxes recently changed to slant against you should you sell. In my view that means bigger contingency up front and leave some of your final spec items a little less defined, then you can have lollipops if you haven't spent the lollipop money on known or unknown unknowns. I would suggest perhaps a 20% contingency, and be aware of possible compromises that you can make should it be necessary. 2 - The one thing to include a lot of in your budget is time, whether elapsed or spent. You sound to be doing your due diligence, which is good. The thing is the old insight that things become an order of magnitude to fix each time you go one stage further into your project. So make your mistakes on paper, by learning enough up front to have a good enough idea of what you want. Then you don't need to keep changing it. 3 - On the finances I might try and avoid a self-build mortgage altogether. 5.5% for 3 years on 200k is an extra 15-20k interest over a normal mortgage. I would max out your current one to buy the plot if you are happy, because the trend in interest rates is a slow up, then see if you can get to habitable stage in the new one out of savings to get a normal mortgage on *that*, then work from that. There are tradeoffs there vs what to include in VAT reclaim, costs-benefits of staying renting or selling your current one, cost of the new one, and so on. Run the numbers for you. 4 - WRT to the plot, you need to work out the things you don't know about the plot that could impact you later - eg ground conditions, expensive services (if there are still some to get), planning conditions that will be imposed, ologists, and so on. That is about risk management, but it is also about the way you may need to negotiate your deal. Given that you have planning but will want to change it, make sure eg that your seller will not object to the kind of thing you want if they live close by. I assume you have had a chat about your ideas with the Planner. Ferdinand

You can also get flexible paints designed to fill tiny cracks .... Wickes have one for “walls and ceilings”, for example. I think the6 are intended for plaster as it ages, but could be useful..

You could also do anything else ... tile, cork noticeboard, checker plate is one I have seen up to dado eve above a worktop. The sky is the l8mit. But a beer fridge is essential for the Buildhub en masse inspection visit . It s nearly september, so if you wanted the new skill you could do a plastering or DIY evening course. F

I’d say you more like Archie from Balamory with all this creative experimentation. I trust that Archie has a Waste Transfer License to be accepting yoghurt pots from third parties and taking them down the road in a carrier bag.

Mine is grey. All of them are grey. And anybody who disagrees gets concrete boots and a deep garden pond.

This is a slightly exaggerated but amusing cautionary tale. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/wildlife/9827052/Holy-bat-protection-Thats-cost-me-10000.html There was a wonderful comments thread on it which has vanished, F

Ask your optician, or take your glasses in and ask them to test them. Of they can probably read it out over the phone, or ask by email. One of the things I like about high street opticians is that they will still unbend my glasses without charge when I bend them into a strange shape. F

The option for docs is a 27” monitor and an iPad to take the photo. F

Or get your prescription from the optician, and buy some prescription online glasses from somewhere direct for a tenner. Depending on what closeup means, and whether you need to be hands free, you can get a monocle (from £25) or an eyeloup (set of 3 2x to 10x for £10). Or something that sits on a table. Ferdinand

I think for something that crisp you want a Contorted Hazel or similar as a contrast. F

That's about right.

I find that with my Range Cooker, even in my 2010 regs house. I think my cooker hood us something like 250-300 cbm per hour. So OK, but not stonking.

Indeedy-doody. I was thinking precisely of you. Lettuce proceed. I do not have the hirsuteness to grow a hipster, which is probably required. My beard limit is bumfluff. 8-{o>

Depends on what they are doing. I combined nature with plants/trees, and I knew what to expect before the Surveyor arrived. Out of date with costs, but it should be a few hundred I would think. The Phase 2, now .... ?. Get thyself over to http://www.ecologistdating.com/, and bag an affair and a bus-non-gender-specific-person’s holiday. F

Presumably they are being shafted by iirc the Dartford Warblers if it is Farnham? There is probably more on a canary than a swift.

Obviously the whole system is a confused, confusing, bureaucratic mess, which could be designed to extracted as many paperwork fees as possible while incentivising flytipping, and making it all so difficult that fines can be picked off people like gooseberries from a bush, but... 1 - What is "waste"? Where is it defined? eg The 2011 Waste Regulations seem to be missing a definition. eg to pick something on the edge. If I as a self-employed individual take some broken paving slabs from Location A to Location B to be used as hardcore, is that waste? To my eye it obviously is not, but what does the Law say? If I have organised for location B to have paid Location A a tenner for it, with a receipt, is that waste? What about eg wood from a tree-trim to be used for as firewood? 2 - What is defined as "waste you produce yourself."? Cited from here. "Registration is usually free if you only transport waste you produce yourself. Otherwise, registration costs £154." 3 - Who needs to register for a license? Is transporting material between 2 of my own locations described as my 'own' waste? What happens if the person transporting material is a self-employed tradesman working for me? Any answers are most welcome. Cheers Ferdinand

The EU Water Stats page linked does include some residential vs industry comparisons, but I am not *that* convinced by the quality of the data as there seem to be some peculiar numbers that defy explanation. On the investment, the comparison we need is real terms numbers with what went before - we need data from the war until 1990. My view - which I do not have the data to prove - is that there may well have been relatively heavy investment up to the 1960s, then less in the 1970s because the economy etc, and either not very much or moderately more in the 1980s (idealogical reasons and policy), followed by a boom in investment after privatisation. I think that is more or less the pattern on the railways, for example. Point 2: Fair enough. Point 3: I haven't seen or got any information that would allow that determination. Be interested to see it if it turns up. F

Found some more Zoot Music. Apparently this 60s band is called Zoot, playing a cover of Eleanor Rigby. I think the vocalist may have escaped from the first Shatner version of the Star Trek title sequence.

The figures are updated weekly. Agree that fish seem to be involved, as the amount left in the reservoirs seems to have continued going down albeit more slowly (except for West Cumbria). Pity the Burghers of Carlisle, where the ban stands. Suspect there may be a PR Calypso played on a violin all summer about this. Latest Previous

This is presumably a different neighbour than the one with the free retaining wall ? ? F

You can get your screws on good centres by using the ‘Method Of Halves’, if you do not want to measure and mark, or are not happy with eg a handspan as a measurement. On a 6-8ft plasterboard, it will give you a good approximation to 125-150mm since you will need 8 equal gaps between your screws. Put a screws at top bottom and middle to hold it, then put the next one in the middle of each gap. Do it again and then once more, and you should have evenly spaced screws. Ferdinand

“They looked like scissors so I put them with the scissors”.

Cushions. One of the undoubted plagues of life. Exodus should have had them between Plague of Frogs and Plague of Boils. F