Home improvements - time the house had some TLC!

[JhnBssll]

I've made the pipework up ready to do the connections in the airing cupboard now too 😊

The pipe going away from the photo goes up the wall and into the boiler - this is the cold supply for the hot water and the filling loop. The pipe going off to the left serves the bath, toilet and sink in the bathroom 😊 I think I might clean the debris out before I spark the blow torch up in there

Just need to sort the new hot water pipework out now - another hole to be drilled through the kitchen ceiling

 

[JhnBssll]

I changed the supply over this morning to the new pipework - everything seems fine so thats a great relief

Heres the new pipework connected under the sink in the kitchen:

And the old pipework cut and capped:

And heres the connection upstairs...

The flow to the bath tap is much improved but the flow to the sink tap has reduced, no doubt there's some horrible bodgery of pipework under the bath to discover next I'll be leaving that for another day though

Next job now that's done is to connect up the new hot water pipework to the kitchen

 

[JhnBssll]

I've had a productive afternoon I've connected up the new hot water pipework, the shiny 15mm pipe at the back of the photo tee's in to the existing hot water pipework as it exits the boiler then runs across and down in to the kitchen to serve the kitchen sink and new downstairs loo.

I've also disconnected the old sink and redundant pipework then ripped out the last of the worktops, all of which are now at the local tip The kitchen is looking quite empty now I still have to reconnect the outside tap pipework but that shouldn't take long.

I've just spent a few minutes popping some cheap foam insulation over the cold water pipework where it will be next to the heating and boxed in...

So next job will be to finish stripping the tiles. I started before I went to the tip but didnt get them all down before i had to leave to make my appointment. It didnt help that the glass splash back exploded on removal, showering me with thousands of glass spears and leaving my arm looking like I'd ridden through a bramble bush I had to clean it up as best i could then have a quick shower to get the glass off me Next time I have to do that job I'll be stick something on the glass first

Once the tiles are off I'll strip and rewire the electrics 😊 I'm pretty comfortable with electrics so that's an easy if time consuming job

 

[newts]

I've had a productive afternoon I've connected up the new hot water pipework, the shiny 15mm pipe at the back of the photo tee's in to the existing hot water pipework as it exits the boiler then runs across and down in to the kitchen to serve the kitchen sink and new downstairs loo.

View attachment 614066

I've also disconnected the old sink and redundant pipework then ripped out the last of the worktops, all of which are now at the local tip The kitchen is looking quite empty now I still have to reconnect the outside tap pipework but that shouldn't take long.

View attachment 614067

View attachment 614068

I've just spent a few minutes popping some cheap foam insulation over the cold water pipework where it will be next to the heating and boxed in...

View attachment 614070

So next job will be to finish stripping the tiles. I started before I went to the tip but didnt get them all down before i had to leave to make my appointment. It didnt help that the glass splash back exploded on removal, showering me with thousands of glass spears and leaving my arm looking like I'd ridden through a bramble bush I had to clean it up as best i could then have a quick shower to get the glass off me Next time I have to do that job I'll be stick something on the glass first

Once the tiles are off I'll strip and rewire the electrics 😊 I'm pretty comfortable with electrics so that's an easy if time consuming job

You'll need to check your household insurance still covers you after DIY electrics. Rewiring circuits is notifiable under part P regulations to local building control (especially kitchens & bathrooms), would need to be fully tested to get a certificate of compliance.

 

[JhnBssll]

You'll need to check your household insurance still covers you after DIY electrics. Rewiring circuits is notifiable under part P regulations to local building control (especially kitchens & bathrooms), would need to be fully tested to get a certificate of compliance.

Yup, we're having the consumer unit replaced by a qualified electrician after it's all done which will require testing of all circuits so we'll be fully compliant Very good point though.

 

[CXRAndy]

Yup, we're having the consumer unit replaced by a qualified electrician after it's all done which will require testing of all circuits so we'll be fully compliant Very good point though.

Go with RCBO breakers. Each circuit then can have 25mAmps earth leakage.

We had random tripping of our RCD on our 15 yr old consumer with one RCD. I checked each circuit and found no excessive leakage, but the total for the house leakage was 25mA, just enough to randomly trip the RCD and take out the whole house.

 

[cyberknight]

on our local facefluff page is someones extension that they didnt even get planning permission for and by the sound of it they were trying to pull a fast one with the materials used so they didnt have to class it as a permanent fixture

 

[Broadside]

With a decent breeze they will be proved right that it is not a permanent structure!!

 

[CXRAndy]

on our local facefluff page is someones extension that they didnt even get planning permission for and by the sound of it they were trying to pull a fast one with the materials used so they didnt have to class it as a permanent fixture
View attachment 614213

That looks like its been built on the rear yard wall. I bet it doesn't have more than a few inches of concrete under the original wall

 

[JhnBssll]

The new Kitchen units finally arrived on Monday evening, unfortunately several bits have been damaged in transit Two of the base units are damaged, one of which isn't salvageable. The other is the corner unit that needs to go in first so I'll try and make do with it, it won't be visible once it's fitted and should be well away from any moisture. The unsalvageable one is the sink unit where there's a big chunk split out around a screw head, very disappointing. One length of plinth also needs replacing because the paint has rubbed off and both lengths of cornice are completely missing The company get great reviews and I know several people that have used them without any problems so looks like we've just been unlucky but it's extremely frustrating - it'll likely delay having a working kitchen by at least another few weeks as they'll have to make the replacement units and ship them

 

[JhnBssll]

So after a super busy week at work I managed to do some more in the kitchen today. Plumbing and electrics are all sorted, the only thing left to do now is start moving units in

I didn't have to do anything too drastic to the electrics, just move a few sockets, although yet again I have had to fix multiple 'surprises' left by the previous owner. In no particular order we have...

Diagonal oven cable routing

In the photo above you can also see the wall is chased out for 2 double backboxes next to each other - at some point they had moved the oven isolator switch to the left and extended the cables with chocblock connectors, then buried the original right hand box behind the splashback - chocblocks and all I'm pretty pleased I found that particular treat and made it safe

Next is another example of fine workmanship - this is apparently how you convert a single socket to a double

They'd also daisychained sockets so rather than a single spur off the ring in some cases there were two or three spurs off spurs I've sorted that too

So not only is the kitchen ready to receive its units, but it's also less likely to spontaneously combust

 

[Colin Grigson]

So after a super busy week at work I managed to do some more in the kitchen today. Plumbing and electrics are all sorted, the only thing left to do now is start moving units in

View attachment 614838

View attachment 614839

I didn't have to do anything too drastic to the electrics, just move a few sockets, although yet again I have had to fix multiple 'surprises' left by the previous owner. In no particular order we have...

Diagonal oven cable routing

View attachment 614840

In the photo above you can also see the wall is chased out for 2 double backboxes next to each other - at some point they had moved the oven isolator switch to the left and extended the cables with chocblock connectors, then buried the original right hand box behind the splashback - chocblocks and all I'm pretty pleased I found that particular treat and made it safe

Next is another example of fine workmanship - this is apparently how you convert a single socket to a double

View attachment 614841

They'd also daisychained sockets so rather than a single spur off the ring in some cases there were two or three spurs off spurs I've sorted that too

So not only is the kitchen ready to receive its units, but it's also less likely to spontaneously combust

I hope the bodges were confined to the kitchen … I’d wonder about the rest of the house too if they’ve ‘improved’ that as well - cracking work you’re doing … as usual

 

[JhnBssll]

I hope the bodges were confined to the kitchen … I’d wonder about the rest of the house too if they’ve ‘improved’ that as well - cracking work you’re doing … as usual

They have 'improved' things throughout the whole house I'm afraid I'm slowly working my way through them, there are a few other areas of concern but by the time I finish this project I should have tackled the majority of them

 

[JhnBssll]

It's amazing how quickly the room transforms once you start putting the units back in! This is todays progress...

I stopped for the day midway through fitting the plinth heater. Its connected but theres a small drip from one of the threaded joints so I've isolated the valves and will investigate again when I've got a bit more energy I find these problems are generally much easier to solve at the start of a day than at the end Once the leak is sorted I'll wire it to the flex outlet behind the double oven opening and when thats done I'll fit the double oven 😊 There's a single oven/microwave/grill combi job going above the double oven but that hasn't arrived yet. The induction hob will be above the drawers on the left, its a 13A 3-pin plug jobby so will be pretty straightforward to fit - I've hidden a single socket in the back of the drawer unit for the job

I have found more damaged items today but fortunately I've been able to work around them fairly succesfully so far

Anyway, I'm pleased with how its coming together. Plenty more still to do though

 

[JhnBssll]

I wasn't feeling top drawer yesterday so had an evening off This evening I was back at it, taking the tall unit out and sorting the plinth heater connections. Predictably it was the threaded connections that were dripping so I reassembled them with a bit if jointing compound and they're no longer dripping 😋

I slid the tall unit back in to place and screwed it back to the wall and then connected the plinth heater cable to the flex outlet. It works rather well - once the heating gets over a certain temperature the internal thermostat clicks and turns the fan on, blowing nice warm air at your feet 😊

I'll cut the plinths to fit later once the other units are in, when they arrive

With the heater in and no leaks I wired the oven in and slid it in to place. It's only held in with a couple of screws but seems solid 😊

There's a single oven/microwave going above that one, should be reet posh when it's done I'm aiming for maximum brownie points with this one...