The House Projects Thread

[240PP]

Cheers!

I’ve heard good things about the Daffodil but never went. One of the gf’s friends had her wedding reception there. Plenty of other options to go at though!

[Mito Man]

Ok stupid question time

I want to fit an outdoor tap to the side of the goat house. The nearest accessible water supply is another outdoor tap on the side of the workshop.

The goat house is 200 metres away from the workshop and 30 metres up a hill - is this at all possible with just a run of 25mm pipe or is it much more complicated with pumps etc required?

[DeskJockey]

Guess it depends on how much pressure there's available, but I'm sure @jamcg will know.

[jamcg]

Ok stupid question time

I want to fit an outdoor tap to the side of the goat house. The nearest accessible water supply is another outdoor tap on the side of the workshop.

The goat house is 200 metres away from the workshop and 30 metres up a hill - is this at all possible with just a run of 25mm pipe or is it much more complicated with pumps etc required?

You’d have to bury the mdpe Pipe which is a lot of work to find out it doesn’t work- why not tee in a pipe, run it to the rough location and try it above surface? If it works happy days, get it buried. If not you’ll have to look at pumps and possibly storage vessels depending on flow rates, so my advise is to try it and see

Don’t forget your back flow protection, double check valves definitely required in this situation

[Mito Man]

I thought there would be some formula where I could measure flow rate and then work it out
I'll give it a try above ground first as you say. If it even gets half of the way up hill I'll be happy!

[jamcg]

I thought there would be some formula where I could measure flow rate and then work it out
I'll give it a try above ground first as you say. If it even gets half of the way up hill I'll be happy!

There is, but if you’re prepared to sort it if it doesn’t work sometimes it’s easier to just try

[Jobbo]

Do you have 200m of hosepipe? Just try that to see what the pressure is like.

[Mito Man]

I don’t, have 100 metres and it’s not very good at the end of that but I’m hoping wider pipe, less frictional losses and if I can get it the whole way up it will just be feeding a small water trough so it’s not like I’m planning to run a pressure washer up there

[Jobbo]

Pressure is pressure - wider pipe will just improve flow rate.

[jamcg]

Pressure is pressure - wider pipe will just improve flow rate.

But along the length a narrower pipe will create more resistance and rob you of the pressure- it will build up over time but might release to zero flow if it’s undersized.

Whilst volume and pressure appear separate in household plumbing they are linked, especially when you ask it to go through a restriction such as a tap.

Some water companies use this principle with a low flow bung into water meter housings on new builds. You can pressure test from it to a certain degree but if you open a tap you get the tiniest trickle

[Jobbo]

Pressure is pressure - wider pipe will just improve flow rate.

But along the length a narrower pipe will create more resistance and rob you of the pressure- it will build up over time but might release to zero flow if it’s undersized.

Whilst volume and pressure appear separate in household plumbing they are linked, especially when you ask it to go through a restriction such as a tap.

Some water companies use this principle with a low flow bung into water meter housings on new builds. You can pressure test from it to a certain degree but if you open a tap you get the tiniest trickle

For testing purposes, all he needs to do is use a hose though. If there’s no water coming out because he’s gone 30m up from the tap he’ll know it’s pointless trying to sort it out by using a larger diameter pipe. Static head isn’t going to be inhibited by a narrow hose. If there is pressure, he can start to think about making sure there’s a decent flow rate.

[Ascender]

Looks like we need to relent and get a gas supply and gas boiler. The oil tank needs replaced with something modern which is on a legal base and has standard fittings - the cost of that will be more than a new gas boiler.

We could do that, but given the oil boiler is circa 20 years old, sods law means it will fail at some point, probably within a week of getting a new oil tank.

If we were planning on staying here, we'd probably look at an air source heat pump, but not sure the upfront costs of one of those would be worth it given we hope to move out within 12-18 months. They seem to be 6-12K to get a decent one and have it installed. But then maybe that is worth considering given the cost of gas...

Looks like the boiler upgrade scheme to subsidise the cost of moving to a heat pump is only available to residents of England and Wales.

[DeskJockey]

Who needs heating in tropical Scotland? Seems odd that the incentives aren't union-wide.

[Swervin_Mervin]

Looks like we need to relent and get a gas supply and gas boiler. The oil tank needs replaced with something modern which is on a legal base and has standard fittings - the cost of that will be more than a new gas boiler.

We could do that, but given the oil boiler is circa 20 years old, sods law means it will fail at some point, probably within a week of getting a new oil tank.

If we were planning on staying here, we'd probably look at an air source heat pump, but not sure the upfront costs of one of those would be worth it given we hope to move out within 12-18 months. They seem to be 6-12K to get a decent one and have it installed. But then maybe that is worth considering given the cost of gas...

Looks like the boiler upgrade scheme to subsidise the cost of moving to a heat pump is only available to residents of England and Wales.

Gas is cheaper than electricity generally (I think longer term costs they start to balance up due to longevity of boilers etc).

I'm yet to be sold that ASHP are the panacea to all our problems. A bit like the push to inculate, en masse. It's got future PPI-equivalent scandal written all over it.

[Carlos]

There's some interesting stuff on Bobby Llewelyn's youtube channel about Sunamp Heat stores combined with solar/ashp etc for non gas properties.

It was a new one for me and I'd expect an uplift in value for a low energy home come sale time ?

[Mito Man]

I take it you’re pretty close to an existing gas line because the connections can otherwise be pretty costly?

[Ascender]

Yes, there were connections put-in a few years back to all 12 houses in the square, so that's nice and easy.

We've been looking at ASHP for the new build and the latest models seem to be very good all year round in our climate assuming the house is well insulated to the latest standards. From looking at some of the online home efficiency reports done on similar properties round here, we'd have to do a fair bit of insulation work to get this place up to scratch. And then I'd still need to make the figures work assuming we're leaving soon - albeit we may get a better sale price.

I was going to say its weird that some of the incentives for these aren't country-wide, but actually, its very normal for Scotland to do something different for "reasons".

[Jobbo]

Might get a good deal on a gas boiler - I doubt many people are rushing to buy them.

We have a Grant oil boiler which must be 10-15 years old and should easily last 20+ years; there’s not much to go wrong and parts are readily available. I’d be quite inclined to stick with oil even if gas were available to us; having a large tank means you can buy when it’s cheap and not be held to ransom on pricing.

[MikeHunt]

We moved into a house with a very unloved garden earlier this year. Im not green fingered but these people had done nothing for a quarter of a century. You can see from the placement of the steps that a 1/3 of the garden was taken over by overgrown bushes. It has taken 2 months of weekends, but the ground work is finally completed and the basis of the patio is ready. I haven't posted here before, but this feels like a milestone.

edit: Yes, the tractor is fun to drive.

[dinny_g]

Jesus a lot of work Mike - but that space is lovely...

Keep posting updates as you go"!