Extension thread 2021 - countdown to Christmas

[Callmejudith]

New thread for continued celebrating, moaning and commiserating

@Callmejudith I could live in that fridge 😂

@PoshWatchShitShoes do you separate the heating and hot water?

@StrongArm the 2 boilers are next to each other on one wall and then the water tank is on a different wall... and that's the end of my knowledge of plumbing 😆

@StrongArm we have a 3 storey house, rambling old Victorian house. We have a shower on each floor, bath in the middle.
We have a system boiler on the ground floor, cold water tank in the loft, hot water cylinder in the middle floor. The middle floor bathroom and shower and ground floor shower and all hot water taps on all floors run off the hot water cylinder.
The top floor shower is electric and we ran the mains up there for it. The mains pressure in our area is fine for this. We can't run this shower off the hot water cylinder because the drop between the cold water tank in our loft and the shower head was not big enough for gravity to kick in and give enough pressure for a decent shower on the top floor. The hot water tap in that bathroom is fine as you don't need as much pressure for that.
The other floors are fine pressure wise and have we have thermostatic showers on the middle and ground floors running from the system hot and cold supplies.
The advantages of a system like this are we can run hot water all over the house and there is no drop in pressure for any point.

It really depends on your water pressure as to your options.for each floor.
The massive downside of a system boiler of course is it's complicated and takes so much space with all the tanks and components. However I've managed to get.my head around it all so it can't be impossible!

I have resisted all suggestions that a megaflow or combi boiler can cope with the size system we need for this house. Our neighbour did go for a megaflow and it still struggles to heat his top floor. He had to add extra pump power in practice. He couldn't put a bathroom in on the 3rd floor because the pressure wasn't good enough to get up there and he would have to look at switching to a system like ours for usability.
I'm grateful a heating engineer once lived here and put this system it in as I would find it very off putting to actually install this kind of complex system if I had the choice between a boiler, pipes and rads, OR a boiler, tank, cylinder, pressure gauge, pipes, rads. But it does work really well!

@Callmejudith

Just look at the beauty

Oo, which ff is this as looks really similar to what dh just ordered for here?! I was out and he got trigger happy!

I'm completely new to extensions but have been keeping an eye on this thread!
Can I ask how much roughly a 4x10m single storey extension is? I realise it's likely to vary a lot!
Excited to read your extension journeys

@Callmejudith, that FF looks lovely. Our AEG one is arriving on Monday, my very first massive FF but with 2 drawers like yours. We will be keeping our old built in FF in the utility so will never run out of fridge space again!
DH and DS have struggled all week to hang the massive new vertical radiators. They are having trouble drilling in to the reinforced concrete to hang the brackets. One is up now and fingers crossed for the second this morning.

The electrician is also coming on Monday to carry on with the wiring and hopefully fit some of the sockets and lights. Spent £300 on them at the weekend 🙄
Does anyone know who fits the sink when you are having an undermount one fitted to quartz? Is it the worktop installer or the builder?

Great to see some progress on all your projects 👏

Morning all we are still heating less but we do have hot water in the bathroom unfortunately not the kitchen. We do have a log burner in the sitting room but unfortunately can't light it due to the kitchen boxes piled up in front of it!
I'm at that "how many bottles of wine had we drunk to think this was a good idea" stage!!

Depends on alot of factors but 60k to 100k would be a ball park.

It’s a [[https://ao.com/product/hb18fgsaaa-haier-american-fridge-freezer-glass-64462-27.aspx?gclid=CjwKCAjwzaSLBhBJEiwAJSRokhnRfkpnGiO2LOVatiePINUqi5NxjbMAsUagnIChnx3NV1kInNL4jhoCFzYQAvD_BwE&&ef_id=CjwKCAjwzaSLBhBJEiwAJSRokhnRfkpnGiO2LOVatiePINUqi5NxjbMAsUagnIChnx3NV1kInNL4jhoCFzYQAvD_BwE:G:s&s_kwcid=AL!8149!3!485219328717!e!!g!!hb18fgsaaa&gclsrc=aw.ds&&&WT.srch=1&WT.z_MT=Search&WT.z_RTM=Google%20PPC&WT.z_DT=m&WT.z_KT=Product%20Code&WT.z_PT=MDA-Cooling&WT.z_CN=Codes%20-%20American%20Fridge%20Freezers%20-%20API&WT.z_AG=Haier%20-%20HB18FGSAAA_TS&WT.z_KW=hb18fgsaaa&WT.z_AT=American%20Fridge%20Freezer&WT.z_MAT=e&utm_medium=search&utm_source=google&utm_campaign=codes%20-%20american%20fridge%20freezers%20-%20api%7Chaier%20-%20hb18fgsaaa_ts&utm_term=sku%7Cexact&utm_content=kwd-326916082055]]

We looked at so many but loved the fact on this one you can open just one door (loads auto open both) and the freezer drawers are brilliant as you can see everything.

We also had our very heavy handed ds8 go round the showroom testing opening the doors and “closing” them while walking off and I was amazed how many of the expensive ones didn’t close properly!

Oh wow link fail

fridge

Ah ha, so ours is the same but a bit smaller! It's coming in a few weeks, after the floor is down.

Feels if our whole house is a fridge at the moment!

Then we will all be faced with the conundrum of trying to minimalise the amount of fridge that sticks out beyond the units. I was wondering whether or not moving the units forward but also leaving a bigger gap all round the fridge ( to allow the doors to open) might do the job??

@Hothammock thanks for such a comprehensive reply. I went into the 1st floor loft today and found all the old water tanks (now disconnected). Your set up sounds perfect. Having had the largest megaflo possible in the last house, I can well believe it wouldn't work here! There's just simply too far to climb for the water! The whole house will need replumbing as all the pipes are exposed so it's a chance for us to get it right but I can't see too many options.

@moveblues I agree with bumtum126
You won't see much change from 100k. You can economise on fixtures and fittings and door styles. Also you need to be aware of knock on costs. If you want underfloor heating you might need a new boiler... If you want a kitchen in there you might have to reconfigure drains... Etc

We've also got no heating in the whole of our downstairs, until maybe mid Nov. We've got a wood burner in the living room luckily. It's not been very cold yet but have put the plug in oil filled radiator on a couple of times.

Our fridge is in a corner and will stick out a bit but not too badly I hope.

We also have no heating but we do have hot water. I need to get the guys back actually to try and investigate what's going on.

OK I've managed 2 months, but today I am over it. My house is a full on state.

Sorry to hear about the heating issues. We didn't have any in our living room and master bedroom for a few years, so sympathies, as it's miserable being cold!!

I'm reusing the integrated Neff fridges from our old kitchen, as they're 4/5 years old and in great condition. I had a beautiful Fisher & Paykel on my wish list, but as we're spending £7k on our Airbnb, the dream fridge didn't materialise lol.

Builders are cracking on. Every time I visit they've made big progress which is great. Here are my pantries being created, I've got one for food and another for something else (maybe dishes and glasses) and a walk in larder in the utility room (maybe for cleaning products and toilet rolls). No idea what I'll be storing, but I've bought some fancy jar labels for spices and stuff on Etsy 😂 #priorities

@Indecisivelurcher I feel your pain! I tried doing some cleaning yesterday and gave up as it's futile. My mood wasn't helped when I said to the electrician that we hoped to be finished for Christmas and he burst out laughing!!

Looking good @PoshWatchShitShoes. DH wanted a fisher fridge but actually I have to say in real life I wasn’t blown away by them.

Just popped over to neighbour to look at our wall which has been revealed now they’ve chopped away all the ivy. It’s in a terrible state. Luckily we have loads of bricks from a wall they took away to build the extension wall so hopefully it’ll not be extortionate to rebuild.

@Indecisivelurcher can you get away for a night or two somewhere that isn't a building site? Just for a break and some heating x

Not really, got a 6yo and 4yo here, and dog and diabetic cat who needs injecting at the crack of dawn, so that's too much to ask someone really. I'm trying to keep the living room decent but we've got no heating, there is too much stuff in one room now, the dust from lifting old tiles has come under the door and covered everything, it's hard to feed everyone decent meals now as the kitchen is just trashed. My daughter is 7 on Wednesday, my mum and mil are hosting and cake baking, but she really wants pancakes for breakfast 😬 I'm just complaining, probably tired!

I'm also struggling to work from home here now due to noise and dust. Friday was just a write off.

@Indecisivelurcher that sounds really really tough. It all just seems too much doesn’t it.