Shoestring

So late to the party here, you probably already have your stairs! Just in case it's helpful; we went oak handrail and treads and softwood painted risers and spindles. We used Pear Stairs and they were really good, love the quality, our carpenter is a god too, so that helps! We had a non standard height too & needed the staircase in in order to start upstairs so we wrapped all the handrails in bubblewrap (from all our various packages) covered that with cardboard and put strips of vinyl flooring cut and stuck together with duck tap for each tread. My only regret is I would like to have painted the spindles and newells before they were fitted as it's mighty fiddly and time-consuming. The stairs were preserved really well under all the protection (from adhesive, plaster, paint & tea) and I have used Fiddes hardwax oil in clear for the handrails and treads.

ProDave sounds like you had a nightmare, thank goodness for your Defender! Unfortunately this won't work for us because the caravan is too long to go through the gates and clear the bank opposite the driveway as the gateway is too narrow to angle it up the lane, so needs the height of being on the lorry so it clear the top of the bank. 😬

Hi all, We have had our much loved but now redundant static caravan for 9 years, it has been a home office, spare bedrooms & even our home for a time, while we were extending our house. We had I delivered by the man who we bought it from, on a flatbed rigid lorry of roughly 20ft (probably a little over) with three axels, (and I can't remember but I think must have been fitted with a winch). The caravan is 30ft long & 10ft wide, it over hung the back of the lorry & this enabled it to be angled accordingly while on the lorry. It was a relatively simple process, despite our stone gate posts being narrow and our country lane being tight. It seems that 9 years on caravans have grown, as have the associated transport options. We have found the caravan a new home, but we haven't found anyone who can get through our gates to collect it from us & deliver it there. We are based Dawlish, Devon new home is near Axminster. Has anyone had similar issues and did you find a solution? Or does anyone drive a lorry, that fits the description of the one that delivered it, who could help (or know someone who does)? I apologise if I missed anybody asking the same question, (I had a look through the older threads but I couldn't find one matching). Many thanks in advance.

Goodness, I am no expert but that cannot be right! It looks like if you leaned on that, it would fall straight over! Either there is a fault in the channel, the glass is too narrow for the channel or it's not been installed correctly. I hope you can get this sorted out 🤞

.Hi all, As per title I really need some help in understanding what I need to do/materials needed to comply with Building regs on fire escape routes (namely a staircase coming down from the attic onto a landing area) and 30min protection materials between floors. We are mid build, with first fix elecs complete, but essentially the house is a shell. What we have built is technically an extension, although really it is a house in its own right. Our planning permission was for a two storey extension, & we didn't have our permitted development rights removed, so during the build we decided to install attic trusses for potential future conversion to attic, given the additional cost of attic trusses wasn't huge. I would like to make sure all the materials we use now (on ceilings, stairwells, etc), comply with fire regs for future conversion of the loft, so it's done once and done properly. I also want to make sure to plan the staircase to the attic has a secondary escape route because (we have an open area - play/reading areas, off the landing & directly below in the hall) and our BC officer says it would be considered "open plan" and could pose a risk in the event of a fire. I am hoping this, will avoid us having to install a misting/sprinkler system but I have been looking into this. I am a bit confused over the type of plasterboard required on ceilings, our architect has said we need two layers of Fireline board but I can't find reference to this in any building regs docs. My dad has also just had the all clear from the same BC officer for 12.5mm plasterboard and skim (with chicken wire above holding up 100mm of rock/glass wool and finished with 22mm t&g flooring) on a loft conversation in his house. Can anyone clarify? I made provision for a staircase to the attic when we had the attic trusses designed, but didn't know at the time about the need for additional escape route. BC officer flagged this up to us on his last visit, but did say a secondary door out into a bedroom may be acceptable. A turn in the bottom of the proposed attic stairs makes a conventional door into a bedroom a little tricky. Does it need to be a proper door or can it be an escape hatch? Can there be a big step (400mm ish) down from staircase to bedroom? Do I need to redesign the proposed attic staircase - (which could be done, but isn't ideal, & would involve a fair bit of compromise elsewhere)? I am going to ask if we can add the attic conversation onto our Building regs plans, as it's not currently included. Meantime we are very tight on cash and I dread doing work/ordering materials that then aren't right so any help or advice on this would be very gratefully received.

Many thanks for this info Nick, I shall look into this.

Nick, I am interested in a misting system. Can I ask you how much you charged to set them up for your two customers in England? I understand that I am not allowed to install one on a DIY basis? We are currently at a first fix stage in our house.

If you are taking up the floors and relaying them you could look at something like this for an option for UFH. We are using a similar product in the upstairs of our house which is timber joists & caberdeck boards. Although I am not sure how you would insulate below it for the downstairs in your house, I am sure you could make something work. https://www.nu-heat.co.uk/blog/a-closer-look-at-clippaplate/ You can also get pre routed board to take UFH pipes. Our situation is a little different to yours as we are doing a big extension, rather than a renovation. We are on mains gas, so have decided to go with a system boiler (which is hydrogen ready) & a hot water cylinder over ASHP or GSHP. A Combi boiler is not suitable for us, because of the number of bathrooms/size of house. Despite the £5k government help towards ASHP & GSHP we found the initial outlay for them to be prohibitively expensive, compared to a gas boiler. We have spared no expense when it comes to insulation though. The hope is with a well insulated house, we won't need to run the heating all that much anyway! Like everyone I would strongly recommend insulating as much as you can and get quality windows and make sure they are well fitted. A note in windows; Don't assume triple glazed is better than double, not all products are created equal and coatings on the glass/types of glass/quality of the frames can make a huge difference to the overall performance. Hope all that is helpful to you.

Hi, we have just done this job on our house. The screed man & underfloor heating company specified we needed the blue foam (comes on a roll) for the internal walls and 25mm PIR for the external walls, the blue foam helps provide an expansion gap for the screed and the PIR is to stop thermal bridging. We cut our 25mm PIR to 100mm "skirting boards" on the external walls (for our 65mm of screed) and then cut them down to size after the screed was down and hard enough. Hopefully that makes sense and is of help to you!

I have also been in a position where a lady was kind enough to show me round her house. I knocked on her door to ask her about her larch cladding and aluminium guttering, things I was considering. There were quite a few similarities in aspects of her design to ours, and her tour was so invaluable, it really helped us with some of our detailing. Above all though, it hugely influenced my buying decisions, so I know first hand how powerful a visit can be (and not everyone is so bold to go door knocking!) so I can see what a great 'ace up the sleeve' of the window company showing our house to customers might be.

I am sorry if this isn't the right place for this topic but I really hope to gain some opinions here. We bought our windows back in October/November, they were fitted in December & our house, though far from finished, is now starting to look really nice (at least from the outside!). I am really, really pleased with our windows and have remained in contact with the sales guy who is lovely & was very good to us. Last week our sales guy came to see the windows in situ, & as a favour to him, I allowed him to bring a perspective customer. Our sales guy took a few photos & has since shown them to his team, there is now wider interest in bringing more perspective customers to the house, I have no real objections to this, apart from perhaps questions around insurance (and possibly security), if anything were to happen, and I don't want the window company to take the micky and use our home like a sales office. I also feel if our house is being used as a marketing tool, that maybe we should get something in return, but I don't know what is fair to ask, as even their sales people don't get commission. Has anyone been in a similar position? If I agree to more people coming to look at the house should I get a contract/disclaimer or anything legal in place? Do you think I should ask the company for anything in return and if so what is fair? Or should I just say no to anymore people coming here?

We just had two identical sets of double sliders installed. One on first floor on a steel one on ground floor sat on blocks, the difference in operation is huge, the slider on the steel works so smoothly you can do it with a finger. Amazing how such things can make such a massive difference. Littlevoice, a consideration when deciding on french/bi-folds/sliders, do consider how windy it is where you are - sliders don't bang around like other doors can.

A lot will depend on the look you want to achieve. I loathe uPVC and wanted timber, my husband didn't want the maintenance of timber so we went with aluclad (best of both worlds). We looked at aluminium as a cost comparison, and it seemed that good efficient alu products are pretty compatible to aluclad timber price wise and I didn't like the look of aluminium internally. I looked at loads and loads of options and chose Nordan. A big factor for us was the cost, Nordan came out ahead of competitors there. I really liked the profile externally - it wasn't just plain and boxy. They do not have in house fitters so you'll need to do the leg work there, although they have a list of recommended installers (but do your own due diligence on them). We wanted to celebrate the timber internally and Nordan offer a clear lacquered timber (other stains etc available too), the timber is engineered to make it stronger and take out the knots so looks a bit like a solid wooden counter top, with lots of small rectangular pieces finger jointed together. If natural/stained timber look appeals to you, don't go with Rational as it's not done well. We went for a classic profile inside, which again stopped it from looking square and boxy & gave more of a traditional feel. We had double glazing but they do triple glazing and loads of different opening options and products with varying u-values I think they offer PH products too but don't quote me on that. Their website lacked information as did their brochure and we struggled a bit with logistics, they weren't faultless by any means. We have a showroom local to us which was really helpful & well worth a visit. We're really, happy now everything is fitted, it looks great, and it was good value compared to many other companies. Also, when there were issues, they were pretty good at sorting things out. I will also mention Norrsken who came a close second to Nordan but were more expensive, they do however offer an in-house installation. Hope that is helpful to you in making a decision!