Sunamp

[Pete]

For those interested apparently tonight's episode on grand designs has a Sunamp system in the project

[Nickfromwales]

What channel / time please ? I'll get the ball and chain to record it  

[Barney12]

Channel 4. 9pm.

[Barney12]

5 hours ago, Nickfromwales said:

What channel / time please ? I'll get the ball and chain to record it  

 

Blink and you will miss the 5 second camera shot of the Sunamp.  

[PeterW]

2 minutes ago, Barney12 said:

 

Blink and you will miss the 5 second camera shot of the Sunamp.  

 

But you can play guess the budget overrun at every turn.....

 

and how did the front door and stairs pass building regs ...??

[Barney12]

Just now, PeterW said:

 

But you can play guess the budget overrun at every turn.....

 

and how did the front door and stairs pass building regs ...??

 

I said exactly the same thing to myself about the entrance. Mind you not much point in a Part M entrance as you wouldn’t get much further in a wheel chair! 

 

The internal stairs open risers looked wider than 100mm to my eyes!

[PeterW]

2 minutes ago, Barney12 said:

 

I said exactly the same thing to myself about the entrance. Mind you not much point in a Part M entrance as you wouldn’t get much further in a wheel chair! 

 

The internal stairs open risers looked wider than 100mm to my eyes!

 

Unless that's the argument ..!! No access as no real space !

 

No rail or banister !

[AliG]

I'm watching now. How bad a job can someone do before you don't have to pay them? The first effort at the basement was a joke.

[Barney12]

10 hours ago, PeterW said:

 

Unless that's the argument ..!! No access as no real space !

 

No rail or banister !

 

Actually, I'd say they were bloody lethal. You could fall a full two stories with ease and straight onto a metal steel angle! Death would be HIGHLY probable if you hit your head.

 

How the feck can that have been achieved? Perhaps the reality is that they don't even have sign off from building control? It really naff's me off, the rest us spend our life jumping through god knows how many hoops to keep the right side of the BCO and then the likes of Grand Designs just produces a load of tabloid tat. Rant over

 

 

Edited October 26, 2017 by Barney12

[PeterW]

I agree ..! Falling is highly probably and most likely lethal ...

 

intrigued by his “design” for his insulated brackets too ... basically it was an L bracket with a fillet, difference was his load was back off the wall so he could get insulation in. Seemed to have a passion for Kooltherm too - bet I know where his budget went ..!

 

I would have gone for a piled foundation too on that for the basement using an auger rig and pouring alternate piles - quick and cheap and he had the access as he was only going down 4m. 

[jack]

The "no rails" thing has happened several times on Grand Designs. I've always assumed they installed something for sign-off and then removed it.

 

I particularly remember this one by Kathryn Tyler in Cornwall. We stole a few ideas from that house, but not the rail-less stairs!

[Dudda]

It did has a lot of questionable parts in terms of regulations but it was a very nice house. I really did like it and his finishes. It was high spec everywhere. Top range internorm, quadrouple glazed sloped glass, sunamp, top range mist sprinkler, 150mm external insulation and 75mm internal insulation on top of the SIP’s. Would love to know the u-value of the wall. A quick calc by me has it around 0.06 - 0.07 W/m2K. Polished plaster kitchen splashback, polished plaster to both WC’s, Polished concrete floor, the external cladding looked lovely and I really liked how he did the joints and every stainless steel nail was measured and marked before hammering home. What was it? 650w heating demand in winter? It must really suffer from over heating in summer. It would have to in a house that small?

I’d love to have the time and money he had. Able to quit my job and go 60% over budjet and still technically not owe the bank a penny as it was from friends and family.

Edited October 26, 2017 by Dudda

[Jeremy Harris]

The recurring theme of obvious non-compliance with building regs on Grand Designs needs to be addressed, I think, especially as we seem to regularly get breaches that aren't just minor stuff, but really significant safety-related issues, like staircases without rails or any protection from falling.

 

I understand that the programme is primarily about the aesthetics of design, and so they take the view that the look is more important than the function is some cases, but they are creating an expectation with some viewers that it's perfectly OK to have potentially dangerous features, as long as they match the aesthetic of the building.

 

In terms of heating demand, last nights house was pretty much the same as ours.  We had minor over heating at first, caused primarily because we created a very sheltered spot by digging back into a South-facing slope, which increases the outside air temperature a couple of degrees above that we used to model the thermal performance.  I learned pretty quickly that a well-insulated house is far more susceptible to relatively small changes in incidental heat gain, including solar gain, than I'd anticipated.  Nothing that couldn't be managed, but I fell into the trap of worrying far more about the heating system, rather spring and autumn overheating (spring and autumn are by far the worst times, because of the lower sun angle and deeper penetration into the house, we've found).

[Dudda]

13 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

 In terms of heating demand, last nights house was pretty much the same as ours.  We had minor over heating at first, caused primarily because we created a very sheltered spot by digging back into a South-facing slope, which increases the outside air temperature a couple of degrees above that we used to model the thermal performance.  I learned pretty quickly that a well-insulated house is far more susceptible to relatively small changes in incidental heat gain, including solar gain, than I'd anticipated.  Nothing that couldn't be managed, but I fell into the trap of worrying far more about the heating system, rather spring and autumn overheating (spring and autumn are by far the worst times, because of the lower sun angle and deeper penetration into the house, we've found).

You've cellulose though which would help regulate it more. He had Kingspan drylining everywhere. He did have some polished concrete at the entrance and lower level which would help but not up where the heat rises to the living accommodation.

[ToughButterCup]

16 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

The recurring theme of obvious non-compliance with building regs on Grand Designs needs to be addressed, I think, especially as we seem to regularly get breaches that aren't just minor stuff, but really significant safety-related issues, like staircases without rails or any protection from falling.

[...]

 

I thought it was just me. I've stopped commenting because Debbie rolled her eyes once too often. "Stop shouting at the telly dear, they can't hear you"

[SteamyTea]

Write to Kevin McCloud, I did.

https://www.granddesignsmagazine.com/kevin-mccloud/271-kevin-mccloud-on-how-he-welcomes-spring

 

Fabric First

At Grand Designs Towers, we recently received apolite email from someone called Steamy Tea complaining that I was very, very wrong to use the term thermal mass when talking about how buildings perform: ‘There is no such thing in science. There is thermal energy and mass; they are not connected.’

Unscientific it may be, but it’s an accepted term in the building world, like ‘coolth’ and ‘flying buttress’, neither of which are scientific words. Moreover, a quick trawl across the internet will reveal that thermal mass is a common term and used by, for example, the Passivhaus Institut.

So what do I do? Steamy Tea’s email is not brilliantly helpful: ‘There is also the matter of thermal inertia, this is a difficult concept to understand as it is a six-dimensional problem – three physical dimensions, one of time and one each for heat capacity and thermal conductivity.’ Ijust about understand this, but know I'll have difficulty explaining it on television, unless I make a programme for the Open University that should have been broadcast on a Tuesday afternoon in 1973. This is an important point, because a ‘fabric first’ approach to building that employs stacks of insulation arranged around materials with high thermal mass (I mean six-dimensional inertia, I think) is the future for building in climates like ours. The idea needs communicating. So thank you to Steamy Tea for being the annoying physics teacher that I strongly suspect they are. If any readers can be helpful and elucidate as to what I should say, please write to me here at the magazine (info@granddesignsmagazine.com). I’d like to clear the terminology up, before taking on the Passivhaus Institut and the entire construction science world.

 

 

Here is the reply I got from Tom from the production team.

Dear SteamyTea,

Thanks for your comment. We will will do our best to ensure correct terminology is used.

Many thanks,

Tom

 

And

 

Thanks for your email SteamyTea. I will bear this in mind for one  of our productions.

Many thanks

Tom


GrandDesigns

Boundless

 

And people often wonder why I think Architects and house designers are tossers.

Edited October 26, 2017 by SteamyTea

[daiking]

You’re not the only one.

[Nickfromwales]

I stepped out of the way of the last architect and bowed to his infinite wisdom. 

Then he had a bill from the customer that I generated to put the correct fire escape ( means of ) windows in and bin the ones he'd arranged and I subsequently fitted, like a good boy . 

[Ferdinand]

4 hours ago, Dudda said:

It did has a lot of questionable parts in terms of regulations but it was a very nice house. I really did like it and his finishes. It was high spec everywhere. Top range internorm, quadrouple glazed sloped glass, sunamp, top range mist sprinkler, 150mm external insulation and 75mm internal insulation on top of the SIP’s. Would love to know the u-value of the wall. A quick calc by me has it around 0.06 - 0.07 W/m2K. Polished plaster kitchen splashback, polished plaster to both WC’s, Polished concrete floor, the external cladding looked lovely and I really liked how he did the joints and every stainless steel nail was measured and marked before hammering home. What was it? 650w heating demand in winter? It must really suffer from over heating in summer. It would have to in a house that small?

I’d love to have the time and money he had. Able to quit my job and go 60% over budjet and still technically not owe the bank a penny as it was from friends and family.

 

Do you happen to like polished things?  

 

They are not going "over budget"; they are building to the necessary specification but the materials were too overpriced. For self-builders, until the point of destitution suely money is a dependent variable?

 

 

 

 

 

Edited October 26, 2017 by Ferdinand

[ProDave]

I haven't watched this one yet (don't watch commercial tv live)

 

But just last week on George Clarke's "ugly house" they created a first floor balcony that only had posts and a top rail, not even sheets of glass to fill in the gaps.

 

I wish they would concentrate more on the technicalities like heating system, insulation levels, ventilation system and as build SAP value, but I guess that would be too boring?  Running out of money, nowhere to live and (a recurring theme) new baby on the way are much better entertainment value.

[Barney12]

13 minutes ago, ProDave said:

I haven't watched this one yet (don't watch commercial tv live)

 

But just last week on George Clarke's "ugly house" they created a first floor balcony that only had posts and a top rail, not even sheets of glass to fill in the gaps.

 

I wish they would concentrate more on the technicalities like heating system, insulation levels, ventilation system and as build SAP value, but I guess that would be too boring?  Running out of money, nowhere to live and (a recurring theme) new baby on the way are much better entertainment value.

 

This weeks was a little better and they didn't do a bad job of making something reasonable from a pile of sh*t

BUT, the black render was awful. Patchy, uneven and looked terrible.

PLUS, you do left wondering how "real world" some of the costings are. Discounts and freebies galore I suspect!

[AliG]

It was a nice house that they built, but I really did think he was being obsessive about the insulation. Just because you can get the U-Value down to 0.07 doesn't mean it is worthwhile to do so. I'm not convinced the quadruple glazing would pay for itself either.

 

Considering the size of the house, 100mm extra width in all directions and a U-vlaue of 0.14 would perhaps have been a better compromise.

 

I'm a lot more compromising now than I was at his age to be fair.

 

As for the stairs this is a recurring Grand Designs mystery. Even if you could get away with it why would you want to take the risk.

 

 

[Barney12]

Are building control documents available through "public information requests"?

I guess not if they used a private firm.

I'm almost tempted to ask for a copy of the completion cert

[daiking]

13 minutes ago, Barney12 said:

Are building control documents available through "public information requests"?

I guess not if they used a private firm.

I'm almost tempted to ask for a copy of the completion cert

 

When it inevitably goes on the market in a couple of months, you could ask.

[ProDave]

There was another one where they used stainless steel yacht rigging wire stretched across at seemingly random angles.  It clearly fell foul of the "will not pass a 100mm diameter sphere" and in a final sequence, a polycarbonate sheet had been added to make it pass, with the clear implication it would later be removed.