Ferdinand

Welcome @Nigel59. It's useful to know roughly where you are. If you are commencing in Jan, does that mean you have planning permission in place? Ferdinand

Howdens sales are very good if they are close enough to what you need / want. It's an annual October thing and they stick to the dates. I have had about 3 in the last few years but none very recently. As kitchens they have been fine, but I tend to follow the "go part way up the range" guideline. I have one with their own brand appliances, and that has been alright for 3 years but I don't expect them to last a decade (though they might do). I don't think you get much option to upgrade the "package" if they are offering particular combinations (as was my experience). If there were items I would spend a bit more money at, it would be a posher tap, a better sink (0.9mm not 0.7mm thick), and a thicker worktop if going laminate (38 not 28mm). And I would check that the cupboards are the 18mm board variety not the 16mm. They are the things that are touched most often and give perceived quality, and make sure it is very solid. But you can touch stuff in the showroom. Their branches can quote independently so it may be worth talking to 2 if you have 2. I have got an extra 1-2% off (by asking say for 2030 to be rounded down to 2000), but they don't really do that. ATB. Here their coffee and biscuits is good, and they do (did?) free bacon butties on Friday morning. F

I think you promised it to someone as an inheritance. And I think it was @Thorfun. (Is Thorfun a Timmy Mallett version of Thor's Hammer?)

Make sure you know how you will work with these. eg How will you cut the compound foam + alu sheet sandwich without the thin alu folding up at the slot. Used a version of this on an s/s extension back in 2000, and it was a sod. May be doable, just make sure you know how.

The level of insulation helps, but the problem is when it eventually heats up and toasts you the heat stays. This when we think about how long the heat pulse takes to get through - and for that we look at the "decrement delay" number for the material to be suitable. For that the stuff in SIPS, or PIT if you are using it, are not that suitable. In a shed garden room it is more difficult than in a house as it is smaller space (surface area:volume ration etc), so it all works more quickly. My house is bricks, mortar, and PIR, and it tends to get uncomfortable for me by mid afternoon in a real heatwave. With a different insulation material and more of it it may have taken longer, but it is built as a good quality conversion only 10-11 years ago, so I am not about to sort that out. A split aircon is really just the currently cheapest and most flexible elastoplast to manage the issue using the least energy.

Amazon have a "Prime Day" coming up Oct 13-14. I am not really clear what this is or does, but it seems that money spent on other things first gives £10 of Credit, and I think there is 2% off or extra Amazon points. https://www.amazon.co.uk/primeday/ Some benefit especially if you have purchases planned.

Correct. My bad. Should be times 0.05 not 0.002.

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Hmm. Do you have any local allotment areas? Can you walk in and ask a few people for recommendations? If you are out this way I can point to a couple of places I have used - some distance away but not too far if you were out for a day doing something else as well in the Peaks if the rules permit.

Excellent idea. Everybody building 4 sided Ha-Has. Ha-has : the new walk on glazing. (Not that I’m claiming any credit...)

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Isn't one of those Runway 3 at Heathrow? Why isn't it finished?

Welcome. Sounds like an effective tactic to get it built.

Tenant reported today that all her fire alarms were "low battery bleeping" and driving the dogs nutty. (Suspect that it has happened over the lockdown period, as it is the first time I have seen her for a few months). It is correct, and they are 10 year alarms with 6 years to run. Fire Angel have instantly agreed to replace them all by post. Probably not my favourite product, but few 10 year batteries were available then. It should not have happened, but they have handled it as well as can be expected. F

Install it above a shelf?

I can't get the Wicked Witch of the East out of my head now. I think a pair of these should be installed in the bathroom.

Has a balloon to protect his Nads ... tray would bounce off and damage the ceiling. (The last time I put out a hostage to fortune like that was when I made a Big Bad Wolf joke about @ToughButterCup's piggery. A bit later the wind blew his house down.)

Specialist fruit tree nurseries. These would be long term features of your garden so it will cost a lot of time if they pop their clogs. I have bought about 8 fruit trees and bushes this year. I went to: - The two or three local (within 20 miles) nurseries that mum went to for decades and was keen on throughout. - Primrose.co.uk (and them with James McIntyre as actual supplier). I have heard good and bad things about Primrose, especially reliabilty issues with prompt delivery, and I went with them for special offers. I have been happy, but part of one order took about 6 weeks to be delivered (presumably a switch to next year's stock). The plants were well packaged and fine, but at the smaller end (£7-12 each), so not a total disaster if lost. This is a thread from Gardeners World Forum with recommendations for online nurseries. Try Fruit in the thread search. https://forum.gardenersworld.com/discussion/1043094/favourite-online-nurseries/

Seems to be a well-intentioned development with a few not-too-sensible Green dogmas attached (the lead councillor is Green Party). The banishing of cars from near houses mean that people will have to eg unload shopping then make a separate journey to park the car. Not good - never mind the impact on frail and disabled. The anti car stuff being locked in for the lifetime of the estate is peculiar at a time when Zero Emission cars are just beginning to boom. They will end up with cars in front of houses in 15 years time by not thinking carefully now. Don't understand the stuff about "e-bike charging points" - is that not just a normal socket? And some very funny politics. 'Slide back to business as usual under the current govt', when in reality we are in the the middle of the first sustained period of emissions reduction ever - notwithstanding that the Green Deal was a further complicated cockup after the previous Code for Sustainable Homes giimmick-ridden cockup. Does anyone have an idea what it will cost to do PassivHaus Certification for 600 houses on 8 separate estates, with several types of house on each estate? If it is just 5 types, I make that something like enough spent on certificates to pay for a house or two. Nowt so queer as folk. F

Ah. Memories of drinking drambuie. On ebay that looks like £350-£500 worth.

I am not sure where your requirements on budget vs performance, but if want to consider the Economy 7 route one inexpensive option is secondhand storage heaters. Invite your friends who claim to be home-exercising in Covid to help get them in subject to the Guidance, and you get to see if they have been lying to you or not ?. I think I would suggest building a heat model of your house - that link is to the Jeremy Harris spreadsheet thread, and also to remember that there is a current scheme which may give you part of the cost. If you are going to make it more airtight you may need to think about ventilation too. Ferdinand

Away with all the waffle and the wibble and the circumlocutions and the justifications and the smokescreens and the babble and the blether.. They are all just men who want to learn to multitask, and haven't quite made it yet.

Eating render does not give you cholesterol problems; different ishoo. And you are saying he put them on wrong side out , since the sticky stuff goes between the wall and the tiles. Will you tell him?

That will be interesting as there's quite a movement in favour of artisan, inefficient, extensive, expensive farming. I still don't know how they will square all these extra woodlands and nature reserves, less efficient farming and improving food security by reducing imports. It's not very long since I heard a baker on Farming Today explaining that the £4 loaves they sell were far healthier and they did some at cheap prices for poor people, but needed lots of subsidy so everyone could have some.

If you are happy that it meets both your structural and both ways drainage needs *, I can’t se why not. F * Does not make your soil behind the walls sodden, nor your sunken garden flood.