Closing out a self build house

[Eileen Green]

Hello. My first post here. I wish I’d found Buildhub a lot sooner!

 

Myself and my partner bought a semi derelict house almost two years ago. We got planning permission in April last year and today we have a beautiful two storey home of which I’m incredibly proud. 
 

We have had our builder friend (still a friend) support us on a day work basis along with a chippy also on a day work basis, but he has spent less time with us. We had a fab electrician and two wonderful plasterers. The building is Sips panel construction and we have put in a rainwater harvesting system as well as MVHR and solar panels, battery and Mixergy hot water tank. We passed our airtightness test earlier in the week and we are waiting for confirmation of the SAP rating tho we have been led to believe we will at least be ok on this. The reason I stumbled across Buildhub was because we were struggling to fathom the airflow meter we have borrowed as we need to commission the MVHR. We bought the system from BPC who supply and support for self installation- our Building Inspector wants “sign off” and we can’t find anyone who will do this. Has anyone successfully commissioned their own system and obtained Building Control sign off? I feel we are very close to achieving this. I used to work in the property world and I remember one sage comment - “Anyone can start a building but the difficult bit is actually finishing it”. 

Edited July 27, 2023 by Eileen Green

[Blooda]

Welcome.  

If you have got this far, commissioning the MVHR will not be a problem. It will take a couple of people a couple a day or so to do it properly. 

We were going to install ours our self but we were in the middle of lock down, so the ducting was installed by the plumbers step dad, who happened to work for a H&V company. 

We [me and my lad] set ours up with a Testi 405i we bought of amazon, with a home made hood/tube [similar to that that can be found in some of the forums here].

We completed all the forms [which were on the back of part F]. We got the plumbers step dad to "sign it off" and he used his Gas Safe Number in the box for "Registration number (if applicable)".  We also managed to borrow a UKAS calibrated Anemometer for a bit, so we could use the cert number.

 

Building inspector probably never even looked at the form. And would definitely not check UKAS calibration certificates.  

 

Have a look through the threads in the MVHR section, lots of useful information here. 

 

First question to you what's the airflow meter model?

[joe90]

This subject has come up before, and if I remember correctly there is no such thing as a “qualified person” to sign off an MVHR installation, most here (me included) did our own. Again from memory a previous member asked their BCO what qualification was required to be “qualified “ and he failed to answer. Just crack on (with lots of help here) and present the BCO with a filled In form/spreadsheet with all the data.

[Blooda]

The was by the time we got to that stage, BCO and warranty had the confidence we were doing thing properly. 

4 hours ago, Eileen Green said:

 “Anyone can start a building but the difficult bit is actually finishing it”. 

 

We had "about 2 weeks" work to do for about 14 months. And still have, having moved in just a year ago. 

When asked about completion we used to say it's more complete than a [insert well known developer] house.

[Eileen Green]

Thanks all.
 

Blooda - it’s a Testo Vent 417. Your info is a massive help - especially noting the calibration certificate number as we were just about to return the gizmo to the guy who lent it to us. 
 

Especially grateful for the “confidence” to diy.  I will report back.

[Blooda]

Take a photo of you using the meter, and keep, just in the remote chance BCO questions, and a photo of the cert.

 

Has the Testo Vent got a Hood / Funnel ?

 

 

[Eileen Green]

Yes it has a hood. We’ve taken a number of pics of the meter in action. Also BPC have helpfully sent us the “Form F” and confirmation of the values we are looking for (which we had already found elsewhere but it’s good to get confirmation). 
Looking at Form F I think we could well be ready for sign off. We still need to fit an internal door on the under stairs cupboard which we might as well do before we invite BC.