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hi, I have just bought a rather expensive Swedish bathroom cabinet with a built in 240v light. The cabinet goes above the sink and has a bog standard unrated rocker switch on the underside and within the zone 2 perimeter of the sink. Is this actually legal as far as UK regs are concerned? Not...

Hi I need to plumb in a freestanding bath that is on a raised step in a bathroom. Is it ok to use a P trap under the raised floor or should I be using something else? The trap needs to have a long inlet tube to drop from the bath waste outlet through the raised floor with the trap under the...

Thanks flameport, appreciate the response. I did search for this type of thing (honest!) but drew a blank for some reason.

Hi, I had an old out-house converted to a utility room at the end of last year. The waste pipe from the washing machine and sink runs out of the side wall, along the wall for about 2 meter then has an elbow down in to the external grid. I also had a new central heating boiler installed and the...

Thanks Tony, resigned myself to having to call the engineer out. Just have to be cold for a few more days.

Hi, having problems with the central heating - all the rads in the house are lukewarm (nearest bolier) to cold (farthest from boiler). I have got a Vaillant ecotec 937 combi. The thermostat is demanding heating and the boiler fires up and heats up to the temp set on the heating dial on the...

I have an odd problem in so much as it seems to contradict with what I have read in various threads that suggest a diluted PVA wash prior to emulsioning a newly plastered wall. We have had a number of rooms replastered in our victorian property though by all accounts the plasterer went about...

Hi, I have a garage that has asbestos walls and roof. The roof is in reasonable condition but some of the walls have cracks in them to the extent that the asbestos has been completed separated. Some of the wooden beams supporting the walls have also rotten. A friend of mine who is a chippy...

Just had a window replaced in the bathroom with a smaller one so the inner and outer walls have been bricked up by 3 courses. I am now left with a cavity gap between inner wall (new bricked up courses) and the outer wall. I want to bridge this to create a level surface for tiling on to. Any...

Hi I am replacing an old (Victorian) concrete floor in the kitchen with a new one due to break up and heave. I have been advised (by a builder mate) that new revisions to regs now require a layer of DPM both above and below the inusulation layer, so now goes like: Screed Concrete DPM...

Thanks for that. Is there any specific kind/manufacture of lagging I should be using or is the rubber insulation from the diy store sufficient?

Going to replace the lead supply pipe in my property as far as I can go without digging up the garden. Current lead pipe runs to front of property (Victorian era) and then down under suspended floor (I will probably join MDPE to the lead pipe at some point under the floor) along the length of...

Hi. I have taken on a pretty challenging renovation project of a victorian end terrace. The ceiling if flexing in the 2nd bedroom (approx size 12'x9'). The flexing is definitely the ceiling joists and they are very small, I would say they are less than 3"x2". I think I will ultimately need...

Hi, I am having a bay window replaced - was originally stone and brick built but was replaced in the 80s with a single full height UPVC bay! The house is 1900-1920 so the house brickwork has aged considerably. The builder wants to use new (St.Annes Red) brick which will obviously standout...

Does that still apply even though I am leaving the original timber beam in which had been there for decades and just filling in underneath it with stud work?

Hi all. I have rather a challenging renovation task on my hands at the moment. The property is a 1930s end terrace, last touched in the 70/80s. The previous owner had a fetish for taking walls out and has knocked out the wall between lounge and hallway and a knock through between lounge...

Thanks all, the boiler is a Vaillant Ecotec 837 condensing and is about 18 months old. How do I calculate the rad sizes based on the flow/return temps you mentioned? BTW: "If he or she has a condensing boiler" - it's a he.

Hi, I am embarking on a bit of a modernisation project and want to replace all rads in my house with newer more efficient models. Some of this will involve replacing long singles with shorter doubles and/or relocating some of them to different walls. To do this do I have to have a buildings...

I've just spent weeks tiling and fitting a new WC/Basin suite in a downstairs cloakroom. The original soil pipe exit is vertical through the floor, the new WC had to be offset slightly from the original so I have had to use one of those flexible connection pipes to give me the offset I...