Post and beam

Having just about finished a build in North Herts i can say that my ignorance of the building industry and not being on site all day every day has caused me grief. Trusting that a tradesman will do exactly what has been agreed has been my biggest source of grief. No excuses, my fault but annoying all the same. I can state that not one tradesman has done exactly what they were expected to. Apart from the tiling of the Kitchen floor. Little things mostly. Being on site is crucial. I rejected the Potton recommended Project manager option when i realised that the £40k fee actually only got me a one day a week site presence. For a little more than a 54 week build thats nearly £1k/day. I can recommend a good brickie and a good roofer though.

Who can do this please? Scraping the crush off of our drive is enough of a job to be honest. Going down half a metre would be a nightmare. My plan now is to scrape the crush away, lay a membrane, perhaps a French drain away towards the rear garden,200mm of type 3, compact. Then worry about what the top dressing will be.

Is this a particular company as i cannot find them online or just a generic concept of a fabrication company can do this. Thanks

I intend to use steel posts for our 2 drive way gates. I would like to use some of our spare facing bricks to provide a decorative pier around them. Question is... the hinge hangers do not appear to protrude far enough to allow this. Have i misunderstood the thing or is there a special post for this application? Thanks in advance as always keith

I thought there was only one SUDs requirement. You are either required to meet it or you are not. One of our many planning conditions was that the front hard landscaping had to be SUD's compliant. The crushed concrete that we had poured to support heavy traffic during the build contains sand. It does not drain water when i perform the following test...... Run a hose onto a test area for 1 to 2 minutes, water should not pool more than 300mm . We do not get visible run off towards the house when it rains however, its finding its way underground somehow, just not in the way, or time, that the test requires.

It depends, is the only answer right now. If i can get away with grading it to fall towards soil then it will stay as it is. If it were not a planning condition to be SUD's compliant i would leave it as it is. Worst case, if i have to dig up what is there today then all bets are off.

Possibly true, i just need to learn what & how this might be achieved.

I suppose this very useful piece of 'theoretical' advice depends entirely on whether it is my choice where the test is filmed. no idea what kind of evidence is expected. But thank you.

Must be SUD's compliant. Otherwise i would not give this a moments thought. This is not my area, i have no idea. The frontage of the property is 18 metres wide, most of which was covered with the previously mentioned rubble. I did wonder whether channels could be cut across it to bury french drains and take the water to the side where there is soil. Otherwise i am back to ' i have no idea'.

When our house was first under construction a large amount of crushed rubble was poured to form a drive way, mainly to support the 35t Crane but also all the vehicles that visited. It currently performs as a perfectly serviceable driveway. But it fails the SUD's permeability test. As far as i can see then only option is to have it removed ! and then to lay a compliant type 3 base. Does this sound correct?

I would spell out exactly who it is that will pay this figure. For the avoidance of doubt.

I may not be explaining this very well. One last comment and then i'll leave this subject. My contention is that it should be me that decides what i build and why. And it is me that judges what is of value to me. There are many things that could be built into the total package of a new home. That i pay for dont forget. Some would potentially be of benefit to a later resident. I dont care, if they want it they can provide it. Simple really.

No that's an inaccurate assumption. I knew from the outset that an EV charger was required. My sparky did indeed run a suitable cable from the consumer unit out to an outside wall. This was part of his overall fee of course. This also happens to be the part of the EV installation requirement that i believe is reasonable to be mandated for the potential benefit of whoever may come after me. It still leaves almost £600 for the unit itself which i maintain is not reasonable as a gift to someone else.

You must be minted. £600 for the charger on a supply only basis is not 'very small'. Neither is the £300 plus installation fee.

Doing some research on what i need to provide for both my drive way and the paths i was directed towards this site....www.tobermore.co.uk Within i read this....'In England, SuDS can be recommended by planners but not enforced by law. Section 3 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 is designed to help with surface water management in urban areas.' Does anyone have practical experience of the implications of this. I dont want or intend to circumvent the planning rules. But it would be comforting to know that if i screw up on the effectiveness of what i do it will not have dire consequences for my bank balance. I started today looking for a recognised test of whether my drive currently meets the permeability requirements. Would hate to dig it out if its not necessary.

And if we carried this logic over to the EV charger point, a cable and connection point ready for a charger would appear to be enough. That is reasonable.

We keep coming back to this without resolving why. What is this 'should' nonsense? Because the 'rules say so' is not what i mean by an answer. The 'rule' is an unfair and ridiculous burden on the house builder.

These EV chargers have a display panel. If your BCO was awake ( and cared) they might notice if its not working.

'To comply with the rules' is an answer but its not THE answer. Why is it a rule? I think it is reasonable to require installation of the cabling to a point on an outside wall. In contrast it is nonsense to mandate that i spend a grand of my hard earned for the potential benefit of someone else.

A future owner of my house might want a pool, should i install one now just in case. FFS! Solar panels are very popular, green and likely to become mandatory soon. Should i also install some

East herts are my local authority. I had to spend a grand on a full EV charger install. I dont have an EV car.

This is from just now. I can forgive the infrequent couple of seconds buffering we get in the evenings sometimes. Fair trade off as far as i am concerned.

As an ex Submariner i can say that quite a few visitors do ask where the portholes are. We did have a fish tank built into the junior rates dining space wall which made people do a double take.

Disagree. If the supply/demand equation were better balanced the upward price pressure would evaporate. Homes( not just new homes) are in short supply thus the price.

One obvious reason is the huge imbalance between supply & demand i think. As long as the amount of people wanting a house outstrip the supply of them then the price/quality thing will suffer.