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My Contactum consumer unit has two RCCB's fitted, one has seven MCB's off it and the other five MCB's off it. The RCCB with the five MCB's keeps intermittently tripping out, it can go for weeks without tripping, then perhaps goes twice in a week. As the fridge and freezer are on this RCCB one...

The valve has gone faulty in my Pegler Terrier TRV, it doesn't turn the radiator off even on Frost. I've swapped the Termal head, still the same. Can I replace the TRV without a system drain by freezing it? I'm a bit concerned about the radiator outlet from the TRV, with it being a short...

I currently have a gas Y Plan system fitted in my three bedroom detached house. The system is working ok but the boiler is rather old and getting noisy so I'm thinking of replacing it. Should I just replace the boiler with a new condensing boiler to get better efficency (my understanding of...

I want to install a power shower in a shower room I'm building. I've already got mains pressure cold water to the room, and tank fed hot water. For a number of reasons I can't get tank fed cold water to the room. If I fit a single impeller shower pump to the hot supply it would give about 1.5...

I want to move a door in my utility room which involves building a small new wall in 100mm Bradstone blocks (about 1000mm wide). For various reasons I can't build a cavity wall, it will have to be two Bradstone blocks thick, 200mm. As there will be no cavity should I insert a vertical...

I'm just fitting Alarm PIR Detectors and there is a jumper inside them which can be set for 'Digital Pulse Count', with settings of 1, 2AP & 3 available. I guess 1 & 3 are the number of detections before it triggers, but what is 2AP? Also what's the best setting to use for normal household...

I've just replaced the bathroom radiator with a vertical towel rail. The top of the towel rail (and bleed screw) is now higher than the Bottle Air Vent on my Y plan system. Will this cause a problem, should I raise the Bottle Air Vent to get it above the top of the towel rail? Thanks for...

I'm refitting my kitchen and want to change the sink waste pipework, a 40mm pipe goes from the sink through the wall and into an outside drain at present. I want to remove the outside drain (I've checked and the underground pipe only feeds this drain) then use a pipe boss on the 110mm pipe to...

I want to repair a couple of cracks in the rendering on the rear wall of my house. I've removed the rendering around the cracks to a width of about 30mm and a depth of about 10mm. The wall is sound behind the cracks which appear to have been there a long time. The removed material appears to be...

My house was built in the late 1960’s, it has cavity walls of Cotswold stone outside and breeze block inside. One lounge wall has a fireplace built of Cotswold stone bricks, they are of irregular sizes but nominally 8” x 5” x 3”, the actual chimney stack is built outside the house. The...

I've recently fitting 230V outside lights down my drive, they are plastic globes on one metre high poles off the ground. In this cold weather the plastic globes are continually filling up with condensation. I've fitted the suppliers 'optional' rubber gaskets to seal the plastic globe to the...

I'm just replacing the window boards in my conservatory and have found the cavity dwarf wall under the windows is empty. I would like to insulate it whilst I've got the window boards off, but with what? I can't slide insulation boards in because of the wall ties and the cavity varies in size...

My conservatory is roofed with triple layer polycarbonate sheets, and is to hot in the summer. I want to paint the inside of the roof with textured emulsion paint to reduce the glare from the sun. Will the paint damage the polycarbonate sheeting in any way? Thanks for any advice. Rod

The previous owner of my house painted the rendering white on the front of the house, then continued on and painted the Cotswold stone edging white as well! (He named it the 'White House') I want to restore the Cotswold stone by removing the paint, which I think was masonry paint. I've tried...

My Zanussi Turbodry 1200 washer/dryer has started sounding like a 747 landing on the spin cycle. I've put my hand in the drum and it can be lifted up and down at the back. Could this be the drum bearing requires replacement? If so, can someone please give me an idea of the complexity involved...

I need to add an additional radiator in a ground floor extension to my house, the rest of the two story house is plumbed in 15mm copper pipe with the boiler on the first floor. Can I add the extra radiator using small bore piping? Will doing this possibly upset the balance of the system? Any...