Ferdinand

One issue there is that you need to think about time factors in heating up and cooling down, and balance the amount of heat the house can hold with the rate at which it can get in or out. If you have a lot more thermal storage in the extra concrete inside your superinsulated airtight house, then the larger amount of stored heat will escape very slowly once it has built up - and you could have a high swing that eg stays high for a number of days 'cos your insulation is keeping it in. The total amount of heat moved by air is relatively small. So things like the "decrement delay" (which is a measure of how long heat takes to soak through your walls) become more important. If it takes (say) 12 or 16 hours, that means that it will be a long hot day before the inside starts heating up, and much of the heat can go back out of the walls outwards overnight, plus you can cross ventilate, stack ventilate or purge ventilate. Mine is *not* superinsulated, and in hots circs it can get uncomfortable by early to mid afternoon, so in a real heatwave (outside temp say 30C or more for several days) I need to have my skylights and a downstairs window or two open overnight, and have it all shut it all up before the sun comes out. One slightly unintuitive thing some here have found is that overheating through windows in highly insulated houses is that overheating can be more of a problem in spring / autumn than in summer. That is because we are used to doing things like brise soleil and similar things now, but even though the slanted sun in the spring / autumn is less intense, it circumvents the measures we think to put in for the summer sun by being lower. Ferdinand

Here are the guidelines from my water company. https://www.stwater.co.uk/content/dam/stw/stw_buildinganddeveloping/domestic-and-residential-fire-sprinklers-design-policy-and-guidance-final-v5.pdf

Most domestic systems just use mains pressures; you have a separate and larger pipe and the mains pressure does the job. I think you have 0.5bar and a big pipe. 90% of domestic fires only activate a single sprinkler. http://www.ultrasafe.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Water-Protocal-Doc-V2.pdf Talk to a respected local company for15 minutes, and they will give you the gen. It’s really not as exotic as it may sound. Some places (Wales) fit them by law in all new builds. F

And perhaps also a plan of your bathroom. I have had more success with compact basins than wcs, but there is a huge range available if you look hard. F

Welcome, @Mako. I'll sit this one out in my deckchair.

I would think it should but you would need to check the policy. But a sprinkler system will do about 95% less damage than the fire brigade, and accidental setting off is very rare. One of their main selling points is that fires get restricted to a single room, and they use relatively little water. Briefly, they have a separate mains supply and sometimes a tank in eg the loft, the sprinkler heads are concealed in the ceiling, and they detect a fire by having a link which melts when the air temperature reaches 60 degrees C or so and it drops down and turns on. Normally there would be a sprinkler head for every 3m x 3m area (ish). There is a separate water pipe system, and they do not need electricity. They do not use the same mechanism as smoke detectors, which usually use an optical sensor to see smoke, so are toast proof and should be woodburner proof unless it has started a fire and triggered the heat detector. There are also systems which use a water mist rather than a spray. You need very few of these, but they tend to cost a lot of money for each one. They are not normally linked (ie Hollywood is lying about the hero setting a fire in a waste basket to flood the entire building and kill all the zombies with 784 sprinklers going off at once). Hollywood, lying. My faith is shattered - it even happens in Spongebob Squarepants.

A Ha-ha would help there...

Aha - the one with the services going through the eye of a needle. ? Had not twigged to your other question. F

Yes - that can be done. The quality of the pointing will be poorer, but it is possible if there are a few inches of space. I'm not wanting to open a debate, but if your neighbour's structures are well away from your new side wall might it be worth offering to buy a strip of land - say 1.2m or 2m? It would cost a fair amount, but would make it easier to build more neatly and more maintainable, and may even gain support if he is going to get a few thousand out of it. Just a thought. Ferdinand

On your last post have you considered trimming the sides of the end with a bit of skirting a bit of windowboard? You could have the bullnose at the front or top, and it would neatly flll your 2 inches of extra length, and finish it off visually. If you don't want to do that you could use a couple of pieces of 1 x 1 with quadrant or another trim on top. It's very Ferdinand to have a thing to fill that is 2 inches longer than the standard timber size ?.

You can build it without any access to next door and anyone or anything touching their fence, can’t you? Or you will need to negotiate access.

I think any architect tends to have a house style, which is why it is so important to look at previous work.

Never apologise to a cat. It will bank the apology and expect compensation as well. A friend has just got rid of the last sproglet to University, and is replacing it with a doglet . Has gone for a cross between a Shitsu and a Poodle, which is apparently called a Shihpoo. I am so going to put the extra T in at the wrong moment by mistake. “Shitpoo” is as inevitable as rain in The Lake District.

You sell tm at a bargain price with buyer collects condition.

i’m moving to Kent... There was an interesting snippet on a recent Beechgrove Garden I caught up on this week, where the presenter was talking about Gardeners’ Delight tomatoes, and said her dad had got double her harvest per plant by growing them as a bush tomato ie no pruning, rather than her growing them as a tall and pruned.thing whatever it is called.

Should this be on the docs from the Land Registry? (I don’t know]

It is just a note that the London market is going to be very difficult to predict. There was a piece in the FT this week claiming that it was booming, which I think very irresponsible. F

Don’t tell me .. you’ve got a brand new combine harvester, and you’ll give me the key...

You also need ventilation to remove the moist air. So slow cooker will not dehydrate imo. Another way is apple rings for 4 or 5 days on a bamboo pole in your wash-drying arrangement. F

An oven is less controllable in the narrow temperature range and I suspect use much more power. Also ovens tend to have fewer shelves, so fewer apples at once. My oven is hard wired so tricky to measure. Though In autumn it probably all helps heat the house. There is a thread over on the Gardeners’ World forum where I have been running experiments with a warming drawer, and we have been working out what to do with the apple glut. https://forum.gardenersworld.com/discussion/1046577/ideas-for-eater-apples

Playing with my new half price allegedly cosmetically challenged food dehydrator. Applechips here we come. Watch out .. can use a lot of power by BH standards as it needs 10-15 hour runs at 300 or so watts.

Apologies for my couple of typos. I think the meaning is clear.

Interesting story. The source seems respectable. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54326178 F

Being slightly contrarian, can I recommend that as a foil you also do a "needs" analysis from the other end - a list of spaces and facilities that you need. Particularly in the London, house values are currently questionable having gone down for each of the last 3 years. Suspect that you may do this anyway, given your approach on the forum. It's good to know what you can afford, but there is no reason why you need to spend to the max. Having some headroom is a good thing to do. Whenever I go to Town I love window shopping all the expensive boutiques for the things I don't need to buy any more than I need to buy a polka dot hippopotamus.

If I wasn't sure I would spend a couple of hundred taking advice on this - rough cost of his alternative, but idea of the potential risk / cost profile to you. That would give your ballpark. Half a day for a local surveyor to do an ballpark assessment and write a letter? I think you are realistically talking about 20k or 50 or 80k numbers here, not 5k or 10k. Your really need to think carefully about your options, and the cost landscape one each one. And how much you need the money - one option is that if he offers a sufficient sum you should actually be comparing it with the added value you would generate on your second house, not the overall cost. What is better - 50k and walkaway plus a bigger garden for your existing, or 100k added value and the hassle / satisfaction of another build? What you actually *want* is also a key factor here. Assuming this is Holywood, Belfast, I suspect the plots are worth a little less than @AliG's £1m - perhaps more like 750k? Assuming more like £2000-2500 per sqm on 1200 sqm for prices of 600-750k each? Very very guestimating. Just thoughts. Ferdinand