Blog

Safe as houses (or schools?)

school building closures

The partial collapse of a school wall in Scotland has led to the closure of 17 other schools in Scotland while urgent checks are carried out.  Thankfully nobody was killed or injured in this incident but it does raise some interesting points; first about the design of these 10 year old buildings and also about the inspection during the build. A …

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To Google or not to Google? That is the Question

Electrical checks

Some years ago I was working at a house and I discovered that a boiler flue that passed through a floor void had become detached and was leaking into the floor void. I told the householder and she said that both her daughters had once used that bedroom and had become ill. They went to the doctor and he started …

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Welcome to Skill Builder

Skill Builder logo

Welcome to Skill Builder, the resource for everyone involved in a building or renovation project. We provide practical guidance for all aspects of building renovation. We aim to give you plenty of hard information, as well as a good deal of inspiration. We recognise that the learning curve in building can be steep and relentless. As regular viewers of programmes …

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Busman’s Holiday – A Plumber in Cyprus

Cyprus

I have just returned from a one week holiday in Cyprus. It was a cheap break and we weren’t expecting fantastic weather at that time of year but we stayed in a 5-star hotel with plenty of facilities and a good sea view. We would both have been quite happy to sit and read a few books but as it …

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The renewable heat incentive that’s anything but

Renewable Heat Incentive

Regulars will know I'm underwhelmed by government’s Green Deal and the way the RHI favours companies willing to cut the red tape required to become an approved contractor.

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Oxley Woods

blog oxley

My heart goes out to the people who bought homes in Oxley Woods. These modern style houses on the outskirt of Milton Keynes started life with such promise. For a start they were designed by a partnership that included Richard Rogers. They were bold, bright and beautiful, built from prefabricated panels with sleek lines and maintenance free exteriors. No more …

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Printing 3D Concrete

3D visualisation

If I had a pound for every time I have seen an invention that promised to revolutionise house building I would have at least £32.50 by now. This latest one is a 3D printer for concrete, simply load up the shape and dimensions of what you want to build and watch it chug away building up layer upon layer of …

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Dealing with floods

Flooding house

Well we can’t say they didn’t warn us about climate change, more rain, rising seas, extreme weather. The television is full of images of flooded homes and the miserable aftermath. People being interviewed say that they have never known it this bad. Houses that were once considered above the flood plain are now being deluged and everyone is looking for …

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A curious incident

Gold masks

The recent incident of The Apollo Theatre ceiling collapsing on the audience thankfully resulted in no deaths, though it appears there are some very serious injuries. No doubt even many of those lucky enough to have escaped unscathed will have nightmares and may hesitate to enter old buildings for a while. At the very least they will become habitual ceiling …

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Holding your ground

holding your ground

It’s raining again and it looks set to carry on for days. My daughter phoned to say that the problem of damp around one of her windows has returned. She lives on top of a hill and the gable end of her house catches everything that nature can chuck at it. We have had all summer to fix the problem …

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The damp conundrum

Keep dry

I have always been a sucker for a challenge. If someone tells me that they have a problem that nobody has been able to fix, I am there. Rising damp is not usually baffling but rising damp in a third floor flat is. Yes I do mean rising damp and not penetrating damp, the proof being that some of it …

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Why Your Shower Tray Leaks

Leaking shower tray

I went to look at a shower tray leak today. It was the usual story, a leak around the tray. The water was pouring out. The householder had been trying to solve the problem for months. He had even renewed the grout and silicone on the bottom three courses of tiles and still the water poured out onto his lovely …

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Missing the point

Re-pointing

I have been re-pointing some brickwork this week. Despite having a shed full of various pointing guns I was doing it the old fashioned way with a hawk and a Marshalltown tuck pointer. The reason for using hand tools as opposed to the compressed air gun was simply to reduce noise. The customer has a one week old baby and …

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Why help to buy?

Help to buy

It never ceases to amaze me how many politicians never seem to see beyond their next move. They certainly aren’t chess players. Yet again we see another politician blundering into a trap as obvious as any fools mate. His eye is firmly fixed on the immediate prize and he seems to be blind to the dangers. If only he could …

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The Not so Beautiful Game

Qatar World Cup

Qatar, host nation of the 2022 World Cup, (that is soccer for our American followers) is busy building the infrastructure for the games. An expected 500,000 migrant construction workers will make their way across the Indian Ocean to provide the labour and for many it will be a one-way ticket. Put bluntly the Health and Safety record on construction projects …

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Deal or no deal

Green Homes Grant Installer

The British government has been working on ‘The Green Deal’ for several years now. It was originally the brainchild of the previous Labour government but the coalition took the idea on and brought it to fruition. I say ‘fruition’ but that is hardly an accurate description because it has failed to even blossom let alone bear fruit. There are currently …

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Lost in Construction

Loft construction

It might seem like a busman’s holiday but whenever I’m out enjoying myself, I still can’t stop looking at buildings. Now comes the bit where I inflict my holiday snaps on you and if you are well brought up you say “nice” but anyway feel free to comment. The first is someone’s ingenious attempt to protect a gable end wall …

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Indecent Exposure

Washing machine

I had a call-back on a job today. The kitchen unit doors were knocking together. I assumed it would just be a simple matter of adjusting the self-closing Blum hinges and I would be on my way. It turned out that the hinges causing the problem were not Blums but the hinges attached to the washing machine. For those of …

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Under-floor Timebomb

Underfloor heating

As the popularity of under-floor heating increases we are inevitably seeing a larger number of faulty installations. This is the way of the building industry but it needn’t be so. Plumbers are often called in to pipe up under floor heating manifolds to the heating systems after the floor loops have been laid by others. Because it is trapped, the …

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Halls of Smoke and Mirrors

10 Downing Street

I don’t know how the outcome of the Leveson Inquiry will affect the behaviour of the British media, but it needs to get a move on before the High Court building falls into rack and ruin. There’s also the possibility that the door is now a computer generated image and the reporter is just standing in front of a green …

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