Kelvin

I’ve never had a bathroom vanity unit or cabinet fail like that. The only kitchen unit I’ve had fail was a particularly cheap one in my first flat. I have sealed any cuts we’ve made to the island cabinets. Our bathroom furniture is from the Roca Ona range. It seems solid and well enough made. To some extent you do get what you pay for. Our utility room is from DiY kitchens online and while it’s good, especially given the price, it’s nowhere near as good as the main kitchen.

One of the first things I did after making our offer was carry out a land survey which included a percolation test and soil analysis in the rough area the house was likely to go. The farmer provided the tractor and an IBC. You can do the percolation test yourself but I lived in England at the time so was easier to get a proper survey. Part of the survey report included an outline design and location for the soakaway that took all the bylaws into account that you list above.

Exactly. The field that adjoins our land has livestock rotated through it. Cows with calves a few months ago and now sheep. This keeps the grass down and the weeds in control while not damaging the ground. The livestock here is sent to a local abattoir and ends up at the local butcher. Same with the fruit as we buy that direct from the farmer. Where we used to live our paddock backed onto a farm that provided eggs for The Happy Egg company. The chickens had free range of 15 acres of land and while there were thousands of chickens in the field you’d never really guess that just by looking as they were so spread out. Sadly I’m not entirely convinced we can fix the problems we’ve created. We can mitigate some of the effects of the changing climate. However this argument that the UK is so small that anything we do is negligible compared to the much larger polluters is specious. It’s about intent and everyone doing something to reduce their footprint both at a macro scale and a micro scale. An example of this is the rainwater attenuation we put in. We didn’t strictly have to but we did anyway because the town below us is prone to flooding and we didn’t want to add to the problem.

No. The design of both types of soakaways is different. Certainly mine are. Graf have some information on their website. https://www.graf.info/en-gb/knowledge-hub/blog/does-a-sewage-treatment-plant-need-a-soakaway.html#:~:text=Even though they can be,would have a larger surface

The only thing dearer is the duo insulated pipe and the stuff I got wasn’t too bad. It’s not much more work going under the slab. It does need to go quite deep due to the bend radius of the pipe though. My only options were under the slab or up the wall and through the ceiling. I opted for under the slab as the ceiling at that location was already very busy with water pipes, electrical/data cables and MVHR ducts. In hindsight I should have moved the plant room to the West elevation where the ASHP was which would have made my plant room a bit more square and made all the MVHR ducting easier to route.

When consider the huge economies of scale in farming in some other countries and cheaper labour costs it’s easy enough to see why it’s cheaper. However on principle we only buy meat that is reared local to us consequently it’s dearer but we also cut down on the meat we eat so our spend on meat is less than it used to be. But the quality is better and the money is supporting local farmers.

It’s not that hard to do. I built a RPi based DAC to compare against a dear Chord DAC I borrowed. Nae difference.

I mostly agree with Roger and Dave. We aren’t saving the planet we’re trying to save ourselves. The planet probably doesn’t really need saving in reality. It’ll be here long after we’re gone. I didn’t buy an EV to save the planet nor have we built this house to save the planet either. The fact that both are likely a little better for the environment over their lifetime is bonus. But we aren’t building anywhere near enough houses like it. The typical buildhub house and full renovation is leagues ahead of any other big builder built house. The car is a nice thing to drive. The house is (or will be) a nice thing to live in. I can directly compare it to the old farmhouse we rent which is nice enough with great views and on a working farm. But it’s a cold damp and dark house and not a pleasant place to live in.

I’ve just fitted the last speaker which was a Focal 300 ICW8. The Focal mounting system is much better than the Bowers & Wilkins system. Far easier to install and secure the speaker especially if you are using a speaker hood (which you should be doing) On the speaker hoods. I used the Firetopper Pro hoods in two different sizes. The bigger hood is red and the dye transfers to your hands then onto your white painted ceiling. The smaller hood is white and not dyed.

We’re still at the early adopter stage for EVs. Also the legacy car makers are struggling to adapt to a changing market. The car market is awash with luxury cars whether they are EVs or ICE and most new EVs have been at the luxury end of the market so far. The other challenge is younger people are becoming less interested in driving generally for a variety of reasons not least of all cost.

Yes the damage inflicted on our home during the build has been soul destroying at times. Most recently the plasterer slid open the sliding door and the handle hit the opposite post damaging the wood. Just a shrug of the shoulders when I pointed it out to him. My other half is a bit more sanguine than me so it bothers her less than it bothers me.

Conversely it was jointed look that drew us to clear coating them. We were in a hotel in Are in Sweden several years ago and they had very similar looking windows and my wife was smitten with that look so was an easy decision for us (well her)

Nordan

I’m being honest. They are no less convenient for us. In fact it powered my site before we had power and during power cuts.

Sure I’ve done it too but it’s tiring driving for 8 hours non-stop. HGV drivers aren’t allowed to drive for more than 4.5 hours before stopping for a break (of 45 minutes I think)

Moving heavy loads is perfectly doable towing something a long way is marginal at best not least of all because the charging stations aren’t well designed to cope with anything towed. But the constant myth of you can’t go long distances in them is nonsense. We regularly do Scotland to England in ours which, door to door, is 450 miles. Takes two quickish charging stops and we can do it in roughly the same time as we did it in the ICE car. Sure you can drive your diesel car 500 miles without stopping but few people do that in reality nor is it particularly safe.

I agree in principle and self-sufficiency is my primary goal. However as we generate more of our electricity using renewables there are periods where we have over capacity so storing that somewhere is a desirable thing to do. Using the batteries in EVs that spend most of their time parked at home seems a reasonable to me.

You could do that yes. The E-GMP based cars can charge other EVs for example.

It’s the ICCU (Integrated Charge Control Unit) in the E-GMP platform (that your EV9 is built on) that allows bi-directional charging. This is the article I referenced above about the pilot in The Netherlands. Elsewhere it said the I5s were slightly modified to support V2G. Therefore it’s reasonable to assume the E-GMP platform cars have the underlying technology to do it. It’s worth noting that Hyundai (and Kia) have had some problems with the ICCU requiring replacement in many cases. Ours was replaced for example. https://www.hyundai.news/eu/articles/stories/how-bidirectional-charging-can-power-your-world.html

The Hyundai E-GMP platform has the capability to do V2G as there is/was a project to use a fleet of Ioniq 5s in The Netherlands to provide power to homes. However I’m sure I read these had been adapted to be able to do this. The V2L feature it does have is very handy and I’m surprised more EVs don’t offer it. Our Ioniq 5 has provided power at our plot before we had a mains supply and during power cuts.

I contacted them to get a quote for my build but decided against it for two reasons. Firstly I ought to be able to get a decent result by careful detailing given it’s a new build. Secondly there was a lack of technical detail and I had some concerns about the longevity of the product. Great for refurbs or possibly where builders can’t be bothered to do the air tightness detail manually.

I have the same wifi dongle. Happy to share pictures of how mine is installed if you get stuck.

I bought some German rust removal stuff and it worked a treat on our tiles (same issue) at our previous house. I shall try and find it.

While you don’t need to inform the land registry you really ought to then set up an alert for the registered land so that if there any changes you get notified beforehand. There are examples of people being scammed out of their property vis the land registry. https://www.gov.uk/protect-land-property-from-fraud

Also in Scotland you need the building warrant approved before you can apply for the address. Some DNOs won’t provide an electricity supply unless you have a proper address apparently. SSEN were happy that it was literally just a field with full planning approval but no warrant.