Selfsufficientish.com

Quote - "Or small ads in shop windows. Might want to make sure they are proper ones, not cowboys. But I think Boboff's idea is better"

Tried all that and on local Facebook, sales and Freecycle groups its surely like the secret service here abouts, in a country that is in ressession, that has millions out of work offering cash in hand employment, one would of thought it would be relatively simple apparentely the Highlands doesnt come into these stastistics they have to much work, they wont travel to work, and dont advertise that they do, all very cloak and dagger indeed, we are beginning to wonder if its really more down to the old "incomers syndrome" that is causing us most of our problems or a mixture of that plus the lady we swapped with to get this cottage, i think upset everyone locally, had not one nice word to say about anyone and mucked most about in one way or another, so whether when the address details are given this is what stops trades coming i dont know but im starting to think this house is cursed .......


Slanj

I don't really know why I am replying but I will try and give you a more possitive view.

You live 40 miles from "city" thats an 80 mile round trip, so thats £25 in fuel and say 90 minutes travelling or for a workman £30 of his time, so thats £55.

It's not personal, but would you come a running, after doing this 20 or so times and being "messed" around, with absolutely no work to show for it, moans and groans all the way through, and people generally treating them like they are "cowboys" and out to rip you off.

There is another side to all these Watchdog / Rip Off britain style "entertainment" programs you know.

I used to deliver logs and stopped because for £50 a load people wanted them cut at 6 inches, could not understand that the lanes were frozen and I could not move them for 2 weeks, and then phoned me on bloody Boxing day giving me grief, I really am lucky that I don't need the money that bad.

We live in Cornwall, and Kelts are very insular I know, but it is funny that what sets apart people who are accepted and those who are not, is those people's attitudes, if you continually see the slight's being made, and the "syndromes" and the unfairness of everything you seem to, then honestly I can understand why people might shy away a bit............ I am trying to be nice, I know it might not seem so, but I just have this vision of you going into the Pub, and, well, you know, being an Uber Manic Noob, and then when you don't get anywhere after spending £30 on crap food in a freezing cold Bar, with smelly blokes who swear, or worse the place is empty, you leave with no telephone numbers and blame me!!!

So anyway, I have said it now, and I am HONESTLY just trying to say, please calm down, breath, remember the Emperor probably thought about building Rome for 5 years or so, whilst he went to the Pub, and lived his life, travelled, read books, researched travelled, waited for the Rental boom in Bethlehem to die down, then found his workers and built Rome!

Anyway, enjoy your soup in a basket! ( Do they still chain up the swings on a Sunday where you live?)

Boboff
I feel i have to take offence at your comments above, first off i/we are nowhere close to how you describe us, you are basing your very singular views my friend on odd comments i have made throughout my time here-in a rather onesided way taking most it would seem out of context, given that you dont know either myself or my partner or the problems we have or are in the process of experiencing.

I will accept that yeah were looking for trades, mentioning in passing why we think/know we are having difficulties getting such persons i am entitled to my view/opinion rightly or wrongly this is what it appears like, we have after all lived in another Loch Lomondside village for close on 10 yrs so do not for one second either think/beleive we didnt know what we were coming too, as we did but beleive me the anti-social behaviour and disabled hate that forced us out of our previous home we loved is well documented, we came here to get away from all that, we came here to live as we wanted to, doing nobody any harm, we came here for the peace, quite and the rest, however since day one absolute fact everything from minor questions to major things have been a struggle for what actual reason i dont know, when challenged the locals laugh when you mention its hard getting anything done here?? as if making it worse we are running out of ideas tombe honest but will somehow manage to get this house the way we want, fully aware it will not happen overnight having had many properties we are fully aware of this however its perfectly natural to want to once having moved to get that new property as you would want it or is it just you possibly that wouldnt i know particularily know women my own included who wouldnt want their house to their standard both internally and externally.

Admittedly some of it will be an adjustment period being required but i cant help feeling an already hard, troublesome time has been unessesarily made difficult for us, we have without doubt decided that if the trades we require can not be sourced by early next year however i will simply it has to be said bring in a workforce from elsewhere, i dont bode with your ideal about quoting for work however as if they dont try they wont ever get work, advertising as covering Lochaber but as soon as you mention where we are all of a sudden they no longer go that far, maybe thats whats wrong with the UK workforce right enough and why the Polish and others are taking all their work it requires in your instance an extra hr or so travelling anf fuel big deal we are fully aware of this and did anyone say we were not willing to pay that premium.

I conclude by noting that you appear to have gotten us completely all wrong but duly thank you for on this occassion your totally pointless post, that has done nothing but upset me further in an already hard situation non the less we are here to stay, we are here for the duration and one way or another will succeed.

Many thanks however for your contrubition, i would thank you however for not trying to second guess us and keeping it on topic, i have all the way through only produced absolute facts and would profer you do likewise.

Slanj

I note that you say you are nothing like I describe, then write to prove you are.

It's not a democracy where you can tell me what to do you know.

When you make statements, expecting them to be commented upon, and someones beliefs may be different to yours, the fact you don't agree with them does not make your beliefs or the others persons right.

I see little point in being specific, but seriously Slanj, take a good hard look at what you have posted over the last few days and then tell me again everything you have posted is absolute fact, seriously, just try it.

Anyway, hope it all goes ok for you.

Hey Slanj,

Please try not to take offense at Boboff, he's giving you good advice - calm down and don't take it personally when you don't get the service you expect from tradesmen. I do believe that your expectations may need a little adjustment. To give an example, you complained several times that you hadn't heard back from the sweep, within barely 24 hours of saying "As for getting the chimney checked/swept i intend arranging that asap". Give the man a chance! I wouldn't start complaining until I'd been waiting three or four days, at least!

It's easy to take things personally, but better for future relations with your neighbours if you try not to. As an English person living in the heart of Wales, I could easily think it's the incomer syndrome when it takes four months to get a quote out of a competent plumber (yes, really!) or when a load of logs is delivered a lot wetter than we'd been led to believe it would be (most recent irritation). It's not because we're incomers, though, that's just the way people do business round here. We can either jump up and down complaining and feeling very upset about it all, or we can just accept that things happen rather slowly and the locals drive a very hard bargain (the Scots have nothing on the Cardis - and they wouldn't be offended by me saying that, they're proud of it!) It's frustrating, but accepting the way things are is a lot better for our blood pressure, and people tend to be much friendlier if you don't complain a lot.

Anyway, back to details of central heating systems. I learnt a bit about thermosyphon systems on the Green building forum (http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/for ... 675&page=1). Mainly, I learnt that it is possible to have a thermosyphon system with the heat source (stove with back boiler) on the same level as the heat store (thermal store/big water tank) if the pipework makes a loop. In our house, the pipe goes out of the back of the stove's boiler, up through the ceiling, along to where the store is, then slightly down and into the top of the thermal store. The return pipe comes out near the bottom of the thermal store, down a bit to go under the floor, along and back up through the floor to return into the stove boiler.

The more normal way of doing it would be to have the store above the stove, upstairs or in the loft, depending on the arrangement of your house. You do have to bear in mind that they're very heavy, though, and you might need to reinforce the joists to support it.

Having gone on about thermal store systems (because that's what I've got), it's not absolutely necessary to have a store. You can take the hot water straight out of the back boiler and into the radiators. I'm not sure whether you'd need to mix in some cold so the radiators don't get too hot (you certainly would for underfloor heating, but that works at lower temperatures than radiators) or whether you'd just have to be careful of scalding hot radiators. Either way, I don't think including a mixer's very complicated. Of course, if the hot water goes straight into the radiators, you have to have the stove lit all the time you want heat.

An even simpler system is to just have a stove in one room and let the warm air waft around your house. This only works if you have the right shape house! Ours is a bungalow, so no change of heat rising up to the bedrooms, and fairly long and thin, so heat doesn't really drift along the length of the house. If your fireplace is in the middle of a square-ish sort of a house, this might be worth considering.

You asked about collecting wood - there was a thread on here about that a while back: http://www.selfsufficientish.com/forum/ ... t=firewood Oh, I've just seen you've asked about this on another thread!

You're right about the hearth - building regulations specify how thick it has to be (depends whether it's sitting on stuff that will burn or not) and how big it needs to be all round the stove.

All i can say is i take it nobody noticed my sig that says just learning then??

Anyway meaning no offence to anyone i shall agree to disagree i truly beleive from your comments that you have a preconception of who/what i am therefore so as to keep the peace i am going to bow out of this conversation before it gets messy, the point of a forum is to discuss topics, debate topics, to share information and ones views which is clearly not what is happening here, come live here then lecture me on what i am doing right or wrong, ask anyone that lives about my area if anything i have quoted is not fact, i am in a bit of a hurry as stated many times i live daily fighting MS (and other deseases and require to be kept warm, so yeah it actually is a big deal for me when this last week we were without power for three days, and heat for five) so obviously maybe more than most require some things done a bit sharpish, i am willing to pay for that privelage and can see nothing wrong in anything i have said or suggested to that end) shall leave you with that one thought, as this thread clearly is not big enough for us all! i am simply not willing for certain people to make assumptions (very wrong assumptions, i may add) about what or who i am i came here asking advice as thats the point not to be ridiculed.

And btw the reference to the sweep who still hasnt appeared was a joke? as was my reference to am i looking for a pub carpark with a lot of vans in it? as khowing just how long it takes to get things done about here it was poking fun at a possible reason why. apparently some dont have a sense of humour!

And Slanj, which is short for Slanjivar Gaelic for cheers

I give in thanks to all who supplied valuable information it has been noted, and in the fullness of time where appriate will be acted upon .... i shall glean information either elsewhere or in my own threads from now on.


Slanj

You don't own the threads.

The fact that you put Slanj at the end of all posts and I called you it, was a joke.........

I bet you really enjoy the Daily Mail?

As for everything else, as I said, crack on!

scotsmart wrote:And Slanj, which is short for Slanjivar Gaelic for cheers

Haha, me calling you slanj wasn't a joke, just ignorance!

scotsmart wrote:And btw the reference to the sweep who still hasnt appeared was a joke? as was my reference to am i looking for a pub carpark with a lot of vans in it? as khowing just how long it takes to get things done about here it was poking fun at a possible reason why. apparently some dont have a sense of humour!

It's not always obvious when something in writing is a joke - this is the bane of forums and email. Since I don't know you, how am I to know when you're joking or not? Whatever impression I may or may not have formed of you, it's entirely based on what you've written on this forum, not a 'preconception'.

I offered my comments with the best of intentions. I'm sorry you found them offensive.

Racheal
Be sure it wasnt your comments that i was refering to im sorry if you felt i was, i had tried, bit my tounge on several occasions and finally decided for the better good of all that i was better saying nothing else.. (i had attempted to make use of the smileys to show where i was joking, but your dead right it is hard often to know, a forum, typed word anywhere has no emotion or feeling it is so often taken out of context, and kilter but thats life, hence why i took the desision not to upset further as i obviously was, leaving others to say, and do as they wish, i am perfectly active elsewhere gaining the information i required, i will if i may converse elsewhere to this particular thread, that i feel was just by some becoming to personal) i operate the second largest UK VW van forum so beleive me when i say, its water off a ducks back, thats forums you will never get 100% agreement or compliance ever but be sure once again nothing was/is directed at yourself other thank due thanks and appriciation for your assistance

If i could i would remove all my content here-in but i will not let it ruin my enjoyment with-in SS

this has been an amusing read


not meaning to offend anyone, love and kisses to all!

Sorry, I just have to butt in on one point...

scotsmart wrote:And Slanj, which is short for Slanjivar Gaelic for cheers

It's spelt "slàinte mhath".

...And you are doing this to a COUNCIL HOUSE??

scotsmart wrote: if so whats the rough cost of such a system and is there any special permissions required to fit one (we are in a rented housing association property) and lastly the rough running costs per month of such a system?

We currently use around £25 a week in electricity and our cottage is never warm so we need to change this and rapidly any suggestions of course welcomed ..


Slanj

AND YOU ARE DOING ALL THIS IS A HA PROPERTY?? Down here in England you would need permission and it would be turned down unless you agreed in writing to reinstate the property to the standard when you moved in. I think you need to stop reading and posting here to save everyones blood preasure and look for a cheaper leccy supplier. If you use a cashback site you can get around £100 a swap. Choose the right tarrif, swap suppliers every 4 month, save a couple of £100 on your leccy bills.

SusieGee wrote:

Big Al wrote:...And you are doing this to a COUNCIL HOUSE??

Al behave! Housing Association actually. It's nearly Christmas be nice to each other

Sorry SG,

I didn't mean to post that before i checked the facts. As for christmas i try to follow a buddhist path.....

I had said i wouldnt post here again but im very interested in what makes you think i wouldn't either want to or in fact be allowed to make such alterations as previously mentioned just because its a HA owned property? it still to all intents comes under the same building/planning regs as any other property.

In previous HA/Council owned properties we have tenanted we have put up a conservatory, a brick garage, massive sundeck and redesigned and installed kitchens, gardens, a loft conversion to make a playroom and several other similar things so why you think we wouldnt or couldnt get permission is a mystery to me completly.

You are right of course in stating that the requirement for said permission is that should we decide to leave it all be reinstated, however what you fail to mention is that this "condition" only applies to if we gave the property back or were rehoused by the same authority (in this case the HA concerned) however in the case as was and always has been via a transfer we have moved in total 5 times in 30+ yrs each and evertime via the mutual exchange scheme operating nationally where you will find i am totally correct in stating that so long as the incoming tenant accepts the applied adaptions irrespective of what they are it is absolutely no problem nor issue, it has to be noted that ALL have been very happy to get our previous homes, (as so they should no other property in the neighbourhood had its own garage, nor conservatory etc??) its a very common means of
exchanging to gain interest in a property as its illegal to offer cash incentives so you make the property more attractive to would be exchangers (not at any point why we did so, we can see no
reason why just because we dont own the property why we wouldnt/shouldnt upgrade it to better it looking after it as if it were our own).

I have yet to have any of my suggestions for adaptions rejected in all that time? as landlords under
the national tenancy agreements have no power to stop such adaptions so long as they are carried out correctly up to current standards and do not affect the actual structure/fabric of the property
? its actually quite rare and usually and rarely rejecting as it goes, only once out of probably 25 of the major adaptions i have requested was i ever refused and that was for a driveway due to one neighbours unjust complaint, about fumes from the car parked there-in annoying her, which
at appeal was thrown out anyway.

I do so remain amazed at some of the comments, but hey its a free world Merry Chrimbo

p.s. Appoligies for spelling the phrase wrong i was attempting to make it readable so it might be recognised by those who would be none the wiser otherwise