Home DIY

carp pond

Having something soft under the pond liner to stop it from puncturing on sharp stones (or in my garden, the endless broken glass we keep digging up) is the correct way to make a pond so maybe they over-bought when digging the pond?

Honestly id have sat without gas till I could get another quote, it just seems ludicrously high to renew a gas pipe interally or externally but they sound like they kinda had you over a barrel and no one is stilling doing nothing at this time of the year but yeah its defo a rip off price.

How many meters was it out of interest?

How many meters was it out of interest?

Turned out to be longer than I thought - 4m. From what I can tell, it's about £200 a meter Down Here so it's not a million miles off average, but it still feels expensive.

Im really struggling to get to the point where they have charge £1600 for it and how if the average is £200 a meter that they got that price.

4m of 22mm copper is about 30 ish quid plus say with mark up we'll say £50 in material but how can it be £1550 labour. Just sounds like you've been ripped off.

I'm after some advice on what to fill this hectic hole in the new flat with - will normal polyfiller be enough or should I stick on some of that mesh tape on first to keep it all together?

1930s flat with plaster that is keen to keep on crumbling, as shown by repair attempt number 1 on the left hand side by previous owner

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Yeah, powder (Polly filler) is fine, I'm guessing it's chasing to some TV type thing, work on the left just hasn't been sanded back flat. It's just a shame the quantities needed are so small

Cheers, nice to have confirmation - plan is to get rid of the AV setup. Stage one is remove cables, fix wall, stick mirror in front of cable outlet

Sure you want to pull down those stud walls?
Presumably they are supporting your rafters, tiles etc… they are far from ideal as they are (also presumably) transferring the load of your roof to the middle (weakest point) of your 1st floor ceiling joists.
But if your roof is still vaguely triangular then they are getting away with it.
If you take them out and there are no other visible means of support for your roof then it may well stop being triangular quite soon.

I don’t believe they’re holding any load - there’s a purlin on each side which supports the rafters, and a diagonal strut which runs from the centre wall in the middle of the house up to each of the purlins. Those struts had been removed at some point (presumably to open up the space for use as a room) but have been added back in by my builder when we got some other work done.

That’s good, you’ve got the purlin supports in - they’ll be doing more work than the stud walls.
What you want to achieve in your attic is essentially an insulated box with air flow all around it, except underneath. So it may be pertinent to leave the stud in and use them for that purpose, leaving the space beyond uninsulated (but for the floor) so it can ventilate correctly.

As on the left portion of TW’s picture on the last page.

Not in London, but we we paid 4.5k for a new combi boiler that involved removal of a gas fire, an old back boiler, and installing a new external gas pipe round the house to the cooker (and the boiler in the loft). So it does sound pricey....

Sorry that was a reply to you! Got all messed up on the app.

Anyone know about low profile threshold strips? I don't want to trim the bottom of the door to clear the aluminium one we bought that's too high. None of them seem to specify a height/thickness measurement though

ie.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/296050733464

If there's no change in height you could glue a 1mm strip of stainless / brass etc down over the gap for a very thin threshold. Metals4u cut to size

I saw some alu strips on ebay too that might work. Will need to measure the gap. Ta

Has anyone wired up an outdoor socket off an amoured cable before?

How long are we talking start to finish, and any pitfalls?

I'm guessing cutting and trimming the wires will be a fucker. Especially in the cold.

I know

@HatBeard did - a bit here

I dug a trench and paid an electrician

Sorry just to clarify the cable is already in situ and it'll be plugged/unplugged to a socket, so it's only the adding an outdoor socket on the end of the cable, not the whole shabang.

My memory of the process is that there are a load of particular grommets and ferrals that make it more of a faff than normal.

Saved for later because it's fucking impossible to find something confirming the fucking order
https://youtu.be/jH5LcjqPr7A?si=ZP_F8Ta-xqIFSEje

Doing electrical work in your home is nothing to be scared of right? Just got a place with Robus spotlights in tracks in the kitchen. All fine apart from one where the bulb didn't work and they snapped the plastic housing that goes into the track, presumably while trying to replace the bulb.

It's not too expensive to buy a new unit (https://www.toolstation.com/acorn-50w-ip20-track-spotlight/p43255), so I am I right in thinking I could easily fix this myself?

Turn off consumer unit, disconnect wires from old light unit, connect to new unit the right way round, and then turn consumer unit back on and test?

There's no good reason to pay an electrician to do this, right?

You're 100% able to do this yourself.

There’s a nonzero chance you’ll find something fucky that the previous owner has done, even with a like for like replacement. This happened with me for a bathroom light where they had butchered the fitting so I had to butcher the new one in the same way.

Take photos throughout so you can revert easily if needed, otherwise it’s straightforward!

@hugo7 appreciate the confidence!

@Pantsmaster great tip, I will do that.

I'd be a bit circumspect about my ability to correctly ground the cable, and maintain IP integrity.

I aslo just dug a trench, and let the spark do the connecting.

IIRC, it would be notifiable work in any case.

It's not that bad but it is lots of trying to work out the best tool (I think I ended up using a combination of hacksaw and snips) and making sure you've got all the bits that fit together.

Assuming you have all the correct bits and access is fine then an hour should be ok

Is there a way to sharpen this saw or is getting a new one the only viable option?

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