Unsupported chimney breast!

[Ed Sirett]

Nicely put!

BTW I was hearing on the radio the other morning about how a panel of three people (a solicitor, a surveyor, and an estate agent) all thought that the new scheme is doomed.

I know there is a certain mount of hype and the radio station probably trawled around to find extreme view. This has to be tempered by the fact that these views were not any old tom dick or FRICS. But representatives from the Law Society, The RICS and the NAEA.

The gist of the beef was

1) The HIP goes against the basis of all other transactions (caveat emptor). 2) The delays are usually a) The lender - they need to get an independant estimation to cover themselves b) Chains. The latter is absolute and some people choose to take the cash and rent temporarily to help break a chain. 3) With protracted sales the HIP may go out of date in several ways:

[norwegionblue]

Yes there is opposition to the scheme but there's no going back. The law has been approved by parliament The main problem initially will be insufficient trained inspectors and dare I say the quality of the peoplefundertaking the surveys. The freason for its introduction is to make selling and buying easier. There is no going back to the way it is at the moment. The doomsayers will need to propose a viable alternative. Anyone for the Scottish system? The other issue is that Europe issued a directive that all buildings should have a energy rating. As the Home Inspector will carry out a energy rating assessment of the property as part of the condition survey this will satisfy this requirement

[Weatherlawyer]

I wonder why?

[Weatherlawyer]

I take it that all this is to bring into line with sensible countries where you have to tell the truth and stick to an agreement and all that crap?

It will never catch on.

[norwegionblue]

Because the work is a material alteration which is defined in the building regulations. Trust me(joke) im an ex BC Surveyor better still ring your local authority building control dept

[Mary Fisher]

But the govinment insists that's it's The Way Forward.

Mary

[Andy Burns]

You do appear to have the required sense of humour :-P

[Owain]

Sorry, we're getting the blasted things too :-(

Owain

[Chris Bacon]

How is Joe Bloggs supposed to know all this? It's easily within the realms of D-I-Y, as is re-jigging bathrooms, doing drains, and a host of other things.

[Tim S]

I hate beaurocracy but I would hope most people would consider talking to building control when removing bits of masonry holding up X-tons of masonry above (partial removal) or holding up floor joists (total removal).

At least those people who know that you should talk to BC when knocking out load bearing walls :)

I wonder why people are so keen to remove chimney breasts - one of my criteria of house hunting of late is that it should have a chimney - at least one that can be opened, relined and reinstated. I like open fires from time to time and I still remember being grateful in the early 70's that we were still toasty warm in one room at least when all around was black for 6 hours at a time ;-) Even this year, a lot of houses in my village were without electricity for a day or two thanks to April snow bringing down trees across the power lines. If that had affected us in our rented modern house, we would have been turning into the family Frosty.

Cheers

Tim

[Frank Erskine]

On Sat, 22 Apr 2006 22:21:23 +0100, Chris Bacon had this to say:

The guvmint doesn't want people to do it themselves, does it?

Any fule noes that all d-i-yers are totally incompetent, in the eyes of Prescott and Co.

[T i m]

" two wall mounted gas fires downstairs", a storage rad in the bedroom and in cupboard of bathroom, wall mounted balanced flue mini heater in the daughters room.

Can't see the point trying to (efficiently) centrally heat a huge solid brick flank wall ;-(

And we are motorcyclists, campers and cyclists .. being at a constant

22 deg C isn't that important to us .. ;-)

All the best ...

T i m

[Weatherlawyer]

They come down on you like a ton of bricks, you fool. How'd you expect?

Some people are as dense as bricks. It's bloody frightening that somene can pull the arse out of a chimney or undermine his foundations or some other foolishness just because his mum or satanclaws bought him an SDS for crimebo.

So is getting an official nod:

1. Find the local town hall telephone switchboard.

1. Ask for technical services.

2. Ask for building advice or an appointment to see someone about whatever.

1. Get it sorted.

How hard is that?

[Donwill]

But Tim did it 30 years ago if I'm not mistaken, long enough time to show movement I think. Would it have been notifiable 30 years ago? Donwill

[Weatherlawyer]

It may or may not give way as long as the house stands. It's only got to fall once.

It doesn't have to do damage to the gable. If it were made with engineering brick for example or the flue reinforced with concrete instead of infill.

Now for heaven's sake lets caustic soda this damned thread. It is full of people who just want to yap at their tales.

[Ed Sirett]

It's not really diyers they want to stop (diy is unstoppable and even penalties have little effect). It is clear that the main effect of the legislation is to make self-employment a difficult and unattractive business model.

[T i m]

Ok, last try, it's down, gone, missing, removed. Nothing to fall as nothing is there. Try an imagine a house that doesn't have a chimney breast or stack .. it's just like that and has been like that for 30 years now.

On top of that the room that once housed the breast is now bonded to a new extension where the footings are about 3 (if not 4) times deeper that the existing ones.

The 4 1/2" 'cavity' that was once the back of the breast was also

*bricked* (not s**te soft blocks notice) back up using the recovered bricks and a matching (as near as I could) strength motar mix. The concrete slab that once formed the first floor hearth was fully removed. All cut / missing joists were replaced and floorboards lifted and 'joggled' so as to reduce any weakness in the area of the old breast. If I building inspector was to look at any of the area today (kitchen, beedroom, loft or roof) there would be no obvious signs that a chimney ever existed.

To answer 'your' other question Donwill (I note our expert didn't), it was part of a general house improvement process I was doing at the time (it had gas lighting, butler sink and outside loo etc) and much of it was assisted with the aid of some small grants they were offering. The BCO's (of the time) and others were in and out regularly (especially as it was partly their money) so I would have assumed would have said something if they were concerned / interested?

All the best ..

T i m

[DJC]

But that is probably about as unstoppable as DIY. Making it difficult will just cause it to be more invisible.

[Mary Fisher]

"(that are rarely on)" :-)

No.

Same here, in fact 22C sounds like the first stage of hell.

Mary

[Mary Fisher]

Or as Spouse always says, "It can't fall, there's nothing to stop it."

Mary