Home DIY

Just put a valve on it iside when its coming out and a drain cock and turn it off in winter and open the drain.

Both days?

I do like the idea, just doesn’t feel worth it.

Tbf, summers are cracking nowadays. I know it signifies eventual doom, but it’s genuinely hot in London for weeks at a time.

Main valve will be the tap, but yeh I need to be able to drain it.

Looks out window…

Is this mounted onto drywall with this as a bookshelf asking for trouble? There are a lot of books so am imagining two rows of two of these side by side.. I think the studs in my flat are metal (at least, I've run into something I seem to not be able to drill through) and I'm not 100% sure how to drill through them, or whether it's advisable to do so - I think metal studs are pretty thin?

Also taking suggestions for any sort of book storage that will go on top of some Ikea hip-height cabinets, thinking of something like the Billy to just sit on top of them, but not really feeling the Ikea veneers..

Can I build a brick wall against a rendered wall? How does it join so as not to encourage damp inside the house? I'm imagining big bolts through the first bricks with a generous application of some kind of damp proofing gluey stuff in the hole?

Might be best to cut through the render and into a mortar joint then put lead in that joint that covers the top of your wall (I guess onto a roof if that's what the wall is holding then mortar the lead in.

Thanks. We're hoping to re-render this year so will factor in. But in principle there's nothing wrong with adding a solid object adjacent to an external wall from a damp perspective?

Plan is to cover over the 'roof' with prefab concrete bar and infill blocks then build the wall on top of that in place of the fence. That height up to the roof line is probably over the permitted 2m where we'd like to cap it so not sure what that means for lead/roofs and such.

Plus new soffit/fascia etc.

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how splishy-splashy should a lawn be in the rain, before there are concerns that the soakaway underneath isn't working properly?

We did have a guttering downpipe that was packed full of moss, so although that seemed to stop at the elbow underground I do worry about the routes into the soakaway

Anyone have the best priced source of Valchromat as sheet material, delivered? Ideally with all the colours available

SL Hardwoods or Atlantic Timber, but I’ve not ordered a single board in a long time.

If you can get a ~£1k order together Latham are by far the cheapest, everyone gets it from them anyway.

Should be fine. If I were you I'd weigh the books, add an extra 25% on top to be safe, and then work out how many of your chosen fixings are rated for that load.

Personally I prefer wall anchors to the toggle fixings you linked to. Main reason is the toggles need huge holes drilled, which are then harder to fill later if needed. Also more chance you'll hit some metalwork behind the plasterboard that you hadn't realised was there.

There isn't too much detail on the listing for the shelf, but it does say max of 15kg and mount on solid walls, so do double check on the shelf itself. 15kg isn't that many books, I don't think.

how splishy-splashy should a lawn be in the rain, before there are concerns that the soakaway underneath isn't working properly?

Depends on how heavy the rain was. There's nothing wrong with the soakaway in our downstairs neighbour's lawn but Thursday evening had such a downpour that it there were large puddles on the lawn from just 10 minutes of rain, it cleared quickly though once it had calmed down.

Prepping and re-painting our external tiled windowsils..
So far we have used a wire brush to remove the peeling/flaking paint.

My plans are to clear out old cracked filler between tiles, sand, fill (with toupret exterior filler? or a recommended alternative?), mask, then paint with Sandtex Microseal exterior masonry paint, then seal the join with UPVC with a clear sealant.

I saw that Geocel 201 was recommended by Airhead previously for sealing a patio door, but I can't find it in clear so was planning to use: https://www.screwfix.com/p/geocel-the-works-pro-sealant-and-adhesive-clear-290ml/250JJ?

Does anyone have any advice or recommendations?

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Why not support Soudal who sponsor a WT team in your favourite sport?

Just going with what’s been recommended previously really.
It seems Sandtex also do a masonry filler that gets good reviews, so might give that a try.

'masonry filler'?
You have a joint between very dissimilar materials. The window frames will expand much more quickly than the window cills, so you need a low modulus, and high MAF, (movement accomodation factor) sealant, with good unprimed adhesion.

High MAF sealants are happier in compression than tension, so try to seal the joints on cool days when the joint is at maximum extent.

https://www.sandtexpaints.com/ie/ready-mixed-masonry-filler/
Doesn't suggest any elastic recovery.
I'm surmising this product is fine sands/other fillers in the minimum of waterborne acrylic resins to hold it together.

This is the equivalent of cotter pins, when Soudal elastomeric sealants are readily available.

From the H&S data for the above:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylisothiazolinone

The masonry filler is to fill the highlighted joint between the tiles once I’ve cleared out whatever has been used before (and has subsequently cracked).

I was going to use the Geocel product for the join between the frame and the tiles. I’ll have a look to see if it meets the low modulus, high MAF criteria. Thank you for the help.

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That looks like an angled stress crack.
If you can clean it out, an elastomeric sealant will absorb the compressive stresses much better than the 'solid' masonry filler. The better elastomeric sealants, ('MS'), are also overpaintable.

Decorative sockets.

Need some kind of twin fused spur. Had been looking at dowsing and Reynolds or whatever but they don't have a twin, just singles.

I could do two singles but might not have space as there is a double socket to the left and a single fused spur for the cooker on the right. It'll need to come out a bit anyway as we're soon to be tiling and it feels like there's barely enough cable length as it is. I have no desire to get the electrician back to add length after he nearly caused a fire by not tightening a cable into the consumer unit.

I see D&R sell custom plates but the options are only things like usb/ethernet/satellite etc.

I suspect I could get someone cleverer than I to fit the sockets I need onto it but in lieu of that, other brands to look at? Google isn't doing a lot for me.

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There are several modular systems which can be configured the way you need, one of which is Soho Lighting: https://www.elesi.com/sockets-switches/by-finish/white-metal/grid-plates-switches

Just pick the 4-gang modular plate, 2x switches and 2x fuse holders.

I’ve just bought and started fitting this range. Seems really high quality so far.

Suspect the old cracked filler is a mortar of some kind. You'd need to rake it out and re-point it to have a chance of it lasting I would have thought.