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Hi, When we moved into the house the mains water pressure was so high it would splash out of the sinks when opening a tap fully and pop the hoselock fitting off my hose pipe so we got a plumber out and they fitted a Caleffi 553 pressure reducing valve. This is all good, water pressure in the...

We’ve got a 1940s detached house, the living room has been knocked through into what I imagine was the old dining room to create one big room. We starting to remove the carpet with the hope of exposing the underlying floorboards and found this in the middle of the room where the original...

Hi, Our 1940s detached house doesn't have cavity wall insulation (which I found out recently while having some windows replaced). The ground floor of our external walls are exposed brick but the first floor has been rendered, does anyone know if it’s possible to install cavity wall insulation...

Hi, Moved into a 40s/50s house with some interesting phone wiring I'm trying to unpick. The main phone wire comes in through the front door into an old PTO labelled junction box (screw-down terminals with metal bars connecting them together) above the door. From this one cable runs down the...

I am looking to wire in USB power supplies for both my Nest Thermostat and Netatmo indoor weather station unit, both currently take power from their respective supplied micro-usb to usb cables which plug into wall power adapters. For cosmetic reasons I have limited space so would like to replace...

Hi, Our wall lights are controlled by a double switch, a switch for each side of the room (no other switches control these lights): We're redecorating at the moment and would rather all of the lights are controlled by a single switch. As you can see in the picture, a single wire from...

Hi, Bought a house mid last year which has a wired alarm fitted (Paragon Plus control box, bunch of PIRs and door sensors, see pic). It works fine but we're in the process of doing up the house and I'd like to add some more sensors and if possible a remote keypad. I must confess to...

Hi, I've just moved house and all three toilets have really useless flushes (they seem to still use a load of water but take two of three flushes to completely clear). They all have "ecobeta" dual flush retrofit kits installed on them. Does anyone know anything about these (are they any...

Hi, I've read quite a few threads on this forum about this, so I think I know what I need to do, but can someone just confirm. I am replacing my toilet with a new one, the plastic soil pipe comes out of the concrete floor a few cm too far from the wall, so the existing 90 deg bend causes...

Apologies if this should be in a different forum, but I am ultimately going to be tiling this area. I have ripped out our downstairs cloakroom to decorate, tile the floor and put in a new suite. Unfortunately as I was trying to remove the toilet, the screws fixing it to the floor had been...

Hi, I'm trying to replace the ceiling lights in my lounge but on removing the first one I was shocked to find that on removal of the final screw it was still stuck to the ceiling. After a gentle pull I found out why; the light had been plastered to the ceiling and came off with a large chunk...

Hi, I am trying to replace an old rotary dimmer with a new touch dimmer but the wiring in the old dimmer doesn't seem to match that suggested on the new instructions. The dimmer is controlling two lights. Into the back box I can see two three-core cables coming in (Red, Black and...

Hi All, The light in my kitchen takes these bulbs Markings read: KANDOlite 230V 40W G9 FR L05 Two have gone and so I'm looking for replacements but seem to be having trouble finding them anywhere. I've found loads of 40W G9 bulbs but they don't appear to have the white part...

Hi, All this recent boiler scrappage talk made me start thinking about my draconian Thorn Olympic boiler and open vent system. I'm guessing it's only a matter of time before it give up the ghost completely after more than a handful of close calls. I don't want to start a debate on the...

Hi, I was up in the loft the other day and noticed that the extractor fan in my bathroom is actually connected to the lighting ring. Further investigation shows it going via a fuse outlet unit in the bathroom, is it ok to run this off the lighting ring? This leads to my next question. The...

Hi, Please excuse my vagueness, I'm a bit of a newbie with central heating. We have a Vaillant TURBOmax VUW combi boiler mounted on the wall in the kitchen. Under our kitchen sink there is a feed off the cold tap with an in-line valve (the type you turn on and off with a screw driver)...