Recent content by RedTomato

I don't really understand the list of works, but I think CSM might be a painted-on fibreglass roof cover.

I have a 1930s semi-detached with a 5-section bay window at the front. At the top front bedroom we noticed a damp patch in the ceiling of the bay window. Ah, water leak. Had a guy in to inspect it, which we paid £300 for. Went up on a ladder, had a look at it inside and also poked around in our...

How old is your house? Any idea when it was built? Brick or stone or breeze block? Is part of your house built onto another, older structure? Is there any chance that this room is actually an extension or a conversion of some type? I've seen supports like that but only on the exterior of really...

I feel a bit of an idiot posting this, hence the title. Bath plug (standard round plug on a chain) seems to fit, but bath slowly drains which is annoying when relaxing with a nice book. On investigation, the bit the plug fits into, the receptacle, is slightly out of round. There's about a...

Energy prices are going to be sky-high for the foreseeable future. Absolutely insulate that house as much as possible. Underfloor, external walls, windows, roof and loft. Now is the perfect time. I bought & renovated my 1930s house 15 years ago and the biggest thing I regret is not enough...

Updating with success story. I see a few other people have the same problem as me, so have added more detail about how I fixed it. Ordered a side pull cord action switch, looks a bit like this: Side_fix_pull_cord_switch.500 by RedTomato posted 14 Dec 2020 at 12:04 PMS-l500 by RedTomato...

Hi @KenGMac thanks for replying. I've been through all that, had a plumber in who said its the shower hand-control valve needs replacing to fix the leak. He did that, then messed about with replacing the tiles & gave up on that & buggered off so I had to get someone else in to fix the tiles...

I have no idea if it's ventilated. Probably not. Kitchen fireplace was removed decades ago when electric cookers came in, before my time. I had top chimney stack removed a few years ago. The damp started a few months ago so unlikely to be related.

Hi, I have damp coming through an upper wall. It could be from a shower or from an exterior chimney stack. Pics attached. House is a 1930s London semi, brick walls with no cavity. First pic is the kitchen wall. The bathroom shower is directly above this. Second & third pic is the upper...

Hi, I have damp coming through an upper wall. It could be from a shower or from an exterior chimney stack. Pics attached. House is a 1930s London semi, brick walls with no cavity. First pic is the kitchen wall. The bathroom shower is directly above this. Second & third pic is the upper...

It's more about the dampness. The bathroom is on the outside corner of a 1930s semi, so two walls are cold and have black mould problems. I've set some constant background heating for the bathroom which has helped, but when the fan comes on, it dumps all the warm air outside. Fine when it's...

Which one would you recommend? Not sure a PIR switch is right here, don't want fan coming on every time someone goes into bathroom to wash hands, check their makeup, or any of the 101 other things that teenagers use bathrooms for - fan would never get a rest.

Thanks, I'll do exactly that next time the fan humidistat breaks down, they seem to have a life of 2-3 years. Meanwhile, I need to do something to avoid 2-3 years of a stinky house.

So the old bathroom fan was connected to the lights. Didn't like drafty baths, so I changed it to a semi-decent envirovent 125 with timer & humidity sensor. All's good, till my family started using the bathroom for other purposes. Oh dear - family need a way to turn the fan on after dropping a...

Thanks that'll help keep it upright. @JohnD yup half-height gate, only comes up to waist level. 2 foot wall on one side, weak 3.5foot wooden panelled fence on the other side. Adding a pair of 7ft tall gate posts & a lintel would look rather odd :)