Ferdinand

What is stopping you adding your new sheds now under the PD rights for the existing dwelling, and then just not demolishing them when you remove the old ones? I am not sure when the removal of PD rights takes effect, but it cannot be before development starts. I guess it will be at the point you demolish. One problem might be if you have something like 'all existing sheds to be demolished' in your PP? What does it say?

A further comment would not be appropriate. Had 150 blue bricks in the Corsa this morning, mind, and at present I do not have a 4m sized trailer secure storage facility.

Personally I would not in theory be that sympathetic to the owners of such a horse . Not sure if I could follow through in practise. Thanks for all the help on this thread. In the end I went for 8 bulk bags at about £30 each delivered, so I can control exactly where they go and avoid paying anyone to shovel 8 tons around. Still need the Audi Allroad and the big trailer. Ferdinand

The larder in my previous Cottage was about 8ft by 4ft, and had three steps inside the room to be a semi-cellar. Or put a big rockery or one of those sheet waterfalls on the outside. F

I used .7 with a coating for a sun lounge roof for a Tenant which seems extremely good several years later. For cladding I would probably go for the same in expectation of a 20 year life to match the building, unless it was going to be at least half cheaper than the .7 to have the .5 . Even that might be a false economy. It would also need some thought to make it dismantle-able and remantle-able.

I am inclined to think that they have a big machine they need to run at 100%. Spoke to the chap this morning while doing the post, and they have not yet put up prices due to recent rises. Approx. 10% rise coming. What orientation would your cladding be? H or V?

OK. A SIPs version. A basic structure to be practical and inexpensive. Obviously there are elephant traps in some places, and other suppliers. 1 - Basic building. A SiPs kit from Simply SIPS, which gives an insulated 8x12' kiosk faced with OSB3, with a 5ft wide doorway for £1199. 97mm SiPs with U value of 0.3, 2 - Doorway. I will pay between about £600 and £900 for a custom made and fitted PVCu door and glass side panel to a pair of French doors for that gap, including locks and fitting, with a U-value of 1,5 or so. Call it £700. 3 - Base. Possibly slabs or fence posts or a concrete slab, Cost not very much unless serious groundworks required. Allow £10-250. 4 - Cladding. What does it need? I know that I will pay around £7 per sqm for plastic shiplap-style cladding in white. It comes in 5m x 300mm lengths for £10 which are tricky to carry in a small car. The cabin will look very white from the outside, but be easy to clean. Call it £200 for the cladding, £40 for the laths, £60 for the membrane. Plastisol coated corrugated may be an alternative for cladding. 5 - Roof. It comes with a 1:40 fall towards the back. They recommend EDPM. Say £150 including adhesive etc. 6 - Summary Adding up I make that just over £2500 before work starts on the interior and services, if the base is concrete. A different approach to @Crofter for something reasonably insulated, with new materials, and which could relatively easily be dismantled. Ferdinand

I am wanting to explore ideas.

Inspired by this thread from @mrfish, Can we have a thought experiment as to just what it costs to build an insulated garden office with reasonable facilites? (Also because I still need something like this). I wamt to think through cost-effective options and see if I have not though about any aspects. My £3k number is because more-or-less this is what it costs to buy a secondhand insulated, wired, site office of this size and spend £400 shipping it in. My specification is for: 1 - 8 x 12 ft insulated garden room, capable of being practically used all year round. 2 - 2 x double electrical socket, water, lighting and drainage. 3 - Building base. 4 - I want to be able to dismantle it and rebuild (eg every few years). This is perhaps a personal requiremnt for me. I am excluding items difficult to compare: 1 - Labour to build and fit out, because most of us could do this ourselves. 2 - Supply connections, as they could all be different depending on the circumstances. Ferdinand

Welcome. My strong view on this would be to put a walk-in fixed screen shower on the former bath footprint, to future-proof the house. It will only cost a few hundred.

That has not been my usual experience here. Perhaps I get big ones from quarries. F

I am looking for about 7 tons of gravel for paths and a front and back garden, base for a loose-paved seating area etc in the next day or so. I would be grateful if anyone could give me a price check. I have looked at Decorative aggregates (eg "Golden Gravel" and normal gravel) think I can use a basic 20mm quartz gravel rather than decorative since much of it will be hidden and I am going for architectural planting etc and have an interesting boundary treatment. Prices are delivered. From the local BM, Decorative gravels (Golden, Slate chippings etc) are between about £100 and £130 for a bulk bag (=~800kg), plus VAT. Normal gravel = £50 per bag. Non starter. From Wickes Decorative Gravels are about £140 per bulk bag for eg Golden or Plum Slate. 3 for 2 makes that £94. Minus the usual 20% for Trade Card and using a Reloadable Gift Card makes it about £75 per bulk bag, plus £30 delivery equals £78 each for 10 bags. Normal Driveway Gravel is £43 per bulk bag or £40 each for more than 3. Minus 20% = £32 each. Or £35-6 each including delivery. Good reviews. From a local quarry: Golden gravel or Yorkshire Flint gravel comes in at about £400-450 plus VAT for 8 tons delivered. Quartz Gravel (ie normal basic driveway gravel) comes in at £200 plus VAT for 8 tons delivered. But I really do not want to inflict a 6 wheeler on this small cul-de-sac and make half a dozen people rearrange their cars - will use up too much goodwill. Conclusion Therefore I think I am inclined to go for a slighlty smaller quantity and get 8 bulk bags from Wickes, and swallow the extra £50 or so it will cost. Have I missed out any keenly priced options? Cheers Ferdinand

Two heaters, since one would only give 34C according to the thread.

Without doing all the sums, can you use 2 in series for the shower?

Is there a possibility here using walk in freezers with no power used, or even small refrigerated containers upcycled inside a stud wall? They are strong things with a lot of insulation - dismantled a 40ft one once. The issue would be managing humidity. Outside the thermal envelope? Does the efficiency change if you are at say Transit or Bedford van size, and use the other half for something that needs to be warm such as a drying room . Said he somewhat speculatively. Ferdinand

That diagram does not seem to involve bending at the knees (?) F

That is near Grantham, but the bloke basically provides a pile of SIPs and some timber, so you get a thing like a bus stop with insulation and a floor. Could be cost eff give, depending on the ability of then the buyer to source the rest and build it. Guessing that best coat will be 2-3x his price ignoring time. Which could be OK. I still need an 8x12 detached utility, and it is close enough to go and have a look. Hmmm. Their website is here: http://www.simplysips.co.uk/ The biggest issue for me would be appropriate doors (roller shutter might be an idea) and how to handle finishing the flat roof.

@JSHarris published a simplified cost spreadsheet for his project here, from which you could generalise a skeleton of items, @Russell griffiths http://www.mayfly.eu/2014/04/part-twenty-nine-some-details-that-may-be-of-interest/ That list contains approx 100 items so could be part to a good basis and a checklist from a different angle to your own to fill in some gaps. I expect there will also be something printed in eg House Builders' Bible somewhere. If you end up with something that is comprehensive it would be a good structured checklist to put on BH. Ferdinand

We are not as well specced as many here, but these are our experiences. Our internal temperature has been up around 24C measured this morning, which is a couple too high for my ideal comfort. Creating a through draft via a couple of open windows or doors seems to work to keep it a little cooler. Two questions: 1 - Is it feasible to run the ufh as a temperature equaliser in a conventional ufh system? I.e. Gas boiler only and pipes ? 2 - How robust are solar films to window cleaning using a pole and clean water? Just interested not planning this as our better solution would be a south facing veranda. Cheers Ferdinand

That is presumably big installations that normally run on cheap overnight electricity. Charging milk floats? Ferdinand

I think that this kind of slightly more elaborate brickwork is basically straightforward but different, and not *that* more difficult once you are used to it - do 50,000 bricks like that and you will be quicker. We think it is difficult because we do not do it enough ourselves. I think the implication we sometimes see (not here) that only Artisans can do things that look complex is a bit of a smokescreen. I am reminded of all sorts of skills I saw from 25-year experienced engineers when doing site training in Telecomms - in my case particularly cable management and tying in - that looked as though I would never learn in my wildest dreams. IMO walls faithful to a local style for walls are perhaps more important for the 'feel' of an area than blanket cladding everything in the correct type of stone from the correct quarry. F

Thanks @JSHarris. Useful.

Diaper work is nice though. http://www.building.co.uk/bond-patterns-in-brickwork/3046522.article

The Brickie who is building it for me went "Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!" (roughly) when I suggested the dog. My concern for neighbours would be if it became a feature, and had people coming to gawk. I love the idea of making it slightly more fun for the kids from the local Primary School in the morning, or people out for a walk on the footpath that runs close by into the country park .. but it would be easy to disturb a quiet lovely road eg if we had a few Tonka-Tanks visiting during the day to gawp after a Facebook feature.

Is there any wisdom on attaching fence panels to the top of a small wall for extra privacy? I have seem this done by people drilling down through those concrete copers that are everywhere, or by buying (or making) a bracket which is screwed down to the copers, Highly bodgy or somehwat bodgy - asking for ingress of water down the middle of the wall, and require repair in under a decade. In my case it is a 3ft wall with coping bricks which are 45 degrees each side. I think I am inclined to use 3x3 tanalised posts attached to the back of the wall for perhaps the top 18" to 2' attached using concrete screws or concrete screwbolts, using 3 per post section, then attach the 2ft high or whatever panel to the front of the posts. If I can find any I will add brackets to let the panel rest on the wall with no mechanical attachment. Can anyone see any issues or suggest better methods? (I am OK wrt fencing facing the highway and height regulations, because it doesn't). Cheers Ferdinand