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Our VELFAC windows are being delivered next Wednesday and our VELFAC approved installer, E R Aluform, has just advised they're ceasing trading as of today. We paid them a 50% deposit. Please no abuse on why we agreed to pay them a 50% deposit for the installation; I'm feeling rather fragile and would be grateful if anyone can offer any advice on what to do— whether we can recoup the money? and / or who can fit VELFAC windows at such short notice. Thanks in advance

Soon after our windows were fitted last September we noticed two defects in one of the large panes. We were told this was part of the manufacturing process and one of the risks of getting a large pane of glass. The pane in question is about 3 m x 2 m. We have 12 such panes of glass in our house and none of the others have any defects. Other than this window, we are absolutely delighted. At the time we raised it with the UK distributor of the windows. They agreed it was unacceptable. They raised it with the European supplier who noted it was part of the acceptable defects that may appear in a pane of glass this size. Now that the walls of the room are plastered and painted, the sun reflects through the defect and puts a rather hideous shadow onto the wall. Does anyone else have any defects on large panes of glass? Are such defects normal? Windows are aluminium clad, triple glazed. Supplier and distributor shall remain nameless, currently, as I dearly want to get this resolved. The only resolution for me is a replacement pane of glass, fully paid for by the supplier, including transport and fitting. That would be honouring our original contract in my opinion. We have been offered a compensation sum of about a 10th of the cost of the entire window. The windows were very expensive. I don’t want to wake up to that shadow every morning. Photos show the shadow on the wall and also the view out of the window when the scaffolding was in place showing the distortion in the view. Any thoughts welcome please.

Quick question ref a glazing quote I received. ALL of the glazing within the quote is specified as 'tough and 'laminated. This confuses me. I was under the impression that they are two sides of the same coin - I.e. safety glass. Toughened will shatter in 'safe' fragments whilst laminated will hold together - just reducing any risk posed to person involved in the breaking of said glazing. Having read the approved document k, safety glazing is only required in certain areas - as I thought. When I suggested this to the person issuing the quote (I included diagram 5.1 from Part K) I was informed that building regs part Q requires enhanced security for all of the windows in a new build - hence specifying tough/lam for all my windows/doors. I just checked part Q....I must be missing something as that is not what I interpret the document as stating. My instincts say that tough/lam is significantly bumping the price up, unnecessarily. Also why would you use toughened and laminated? Surely one or the other ticks the box? A sanity check from my fellow self builders would be much appreciated. TIA Jamie

Any help out there please? We have 2 corners with glazing meeting at the corner vertical SHS. We have an MBC timber frame but there is no timber frame at these junctions, just the glazing units and the steel corner post. We are worried about thermal bridging. Still at the design stage so could design in some insulation. What would you do?

Hi All. For those of you I haven't had the pleasure of speaking to yet, I'm planning a self build but during the day I'm chief technical at a fairly large manufacturer of windows/doors/glazing based in London/Herts. A few of you have PM'ed me with glazing questions so I thought it best to make a separate thread for sharing any info. If anyone needs help with technical details, specification, getting trade prices, e.t.c. fire away. My way of giving back for all the great construction advice I've already received here.