[Closed] Grand Designs new series next Weds

We get up to some "interesting" stuff at times but that lift of the roof was simply stupid with no scaffold/edge protection/fall arrest or basically **** all apart from a pink coat and a pair of trainers!

I'd be surprised if the HSE didn't take a keen interest in that dropped lift no matter how short staffed they are. He may well be an amateur but the crane operator isn't. Lift Plan anyone?

It can't have any building regs. Surely two illegal staircases in the first shot.

[quote=wrightyson ]It can't have any building regs. Surely two illegal staircases in the first shot.

My thoughts as well.

I don't get what Kevin is so gushing about, I don't like it!

50% over budget... standard Grand Designs after all then.

Here you go kids, here's your new bedroom, careful when you brush against the walls or your bed tho, you might get a splinter!

what was the point of smashing all the slates?? that was never explained and just looked like a load of vandalism

Missed the middle bit as on the phone.

Saw the piece getting dropped and then a few minutes later they were moving panels into place by crane and not wearing safety shoes.

Why have they got OSB on show downstairs? Doesnt it out gas?

Well I thought it was great project. Innovative, artistic and affordable.

The top half looked great, if a little dubious safety wise, but hey! that's a bit of fun. The downstairs looked like they'd forgotten about it and it was a bit of an afterthought. It was also beyond tiny - what happens when those children grow a few inches?

Didn't get how he went from never having built anything, and owning no tools, to producing that interior?

And those slates; what was that about? Two guys come over from America or wherever to pointlessly smash stuff up.

I also didn't get the money. Struck me that two professionals earning good money should have had more than £80k to splash.

Overall thought it was one of the better GD's and I'd like to see more of this guys stuff.

Did anyone notice the joiners name?
Dick Mashiter!

Good project that one, still bemused by the 2 bedrooms so the children have to share.
Really liked the selfsupporting upper structure, food for though for our next place if it needs extending 😉

I also didn't get the money. Struck me that two professionals earning good money should have had more than £80k to splash.

I thought they were doing it out of savings, the usual rubbish talk of budget of £XXX'000 whilst completely failing to mention the enourmous cost of the land/building for their site.

yeah how much did the cottage cost or was it the parents annex in the first place, still wouldn't have been silly expensive for a tiny bungalow in N.Cornwall. total cost 250K ish maybe

Perhaps when the kids are older they’ll move the master bedroom up to the mezzanine.

I liked the space and the black weatherboarding. I think that Kev was maybe overplaying the whole “danger” aspect of it in the voice over. Perhaps that was put in after the unfortunate incident with the dropped panel.

Next week looks bonkers. The teaser showed some sort of wooden framed Millennium Falcon like structure complete with space port.

Was their parents bungalow and a proper shitty little thing at that. Even if they paid markets rates it can't have cost much.

It was a lovely house although I coulnd't live with all that wood and the crappy downstairs. But I also noticed that there is no way they could have got building regs approval.

So what is the consequence of not having building regs? Condemded so they can't live it in? Fine to live in but not able to sell it? Nothing?

Most of my thoughts have been covered. I liked some of it but the girls' bedroom looked tragically unfriendly. And there was simply way too much of that wood – it looked like an outsized sauna especially with the bench seating.

And as said above, two professionals with that tiny budget – seemed very odd.

But next weeks will take is into the absurd for budget – £1.5M+ ?

If it was the parent's 'outbuilding' i.e. free, then they were funding it out of savings in order to be mortgage free I guess - that makes plenty of vs. borrowing a metric sh1Ttonne of money for a vanity project.

I think they said that they bought it (£40k rings a bell) after the parents had originally offered it as a temporary home whilst they sorted themselves out.

180k for that house is a bargin then 😀

It is, but if they can't sell it (cos of building regs) then it is still only worth £40k surely?

You don't need building regs to sell it. There are enough vw transporter drivers in that there London who'd pay cash for their own slice of cornish surfer wannabe ness.

No building regs would mean no way to get mortgage. Not sure about house insurance either. Still assuming they dont plan to sell it and they bought it out of their selling of another house then they are mortgage free and will be living very comfortably. Assuming nothing falls down or catches fire that is!

just trying to work out why some of you reckon they fall foul of building regs.

The only thing I can see is no bannister on the main staircase (v. easy to sort out). The ladder to the mezzanine may be an issue if thats counted as a separate room but not sure it would be. Again easy to fix with a "proper" staircase and only an issue if you need a mortgage...they didnt use a mortgage to finance the build. Im not an expert but I guess house insurance is more concerned with whether its structurally sound, house is also a rebuild not a new build so that might get round a few issues too.

actually quite nice to see a house on Grand Designs done for only 120k as opposed to usual barmy stockbrokers spending a couple of million on an underground bunker in Putney that includes the mandatory equine jacuzzi and indoor 5 a side football room in a art-deco/nihilist glam rock fusion style.

Take a 100 mm sphere and play with it. That's what you've got to achieve on all those stairs. He clearly had some engineered design in the ring beam as he totally underestimated his steel.

Tonights 😯

16 grand for a carbon hammock bath.........inside 4 shipping containers.

Chapeau for the effort

Love the container idea!!

This ones gonna be good.

Mildly annoying bloke? Check.
Crap sounding idea? Check
Hope that he fails? Check
Edit:
Hope his carbon fibre bath breaks the container the first time he fills it? Check

So much hate you had to write it twice, eh.

I think you're lying about the [url= http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/last-nights-grand-designs#post-6338283 ]EDIT[/url], though...

It‘‘s coming together......

I like it. Now lets see the bath.

Pff.... Typed once. Copied and pasted once. Phone/stw did the formatting

I quite like it. Not for me, but better than so many houses out there by a long, long way.

Looks great.

Don't like the bath though.

I was thinking this is 'my big fat gypsy wedding' mash-up with 'grand designs'....my big fat messed up house.
Now its finished...there are a few little details that seem OTT, too quirky, for me that is, but generally I applaud. Good job.

scandalous - Member
Love the container idea!!

Yup, interesting build; very futuristic. To my surprise it sits well with the surrounding landscape.

Can't help but see the site office thing from some angles, though...

I think it's fantastic. Fits brilliantly in the site, quick build and cheap. Winner all round

Do a google image search for shipping container homes and look at the huge range of styles that have been created.
I'd love to put together a home out of shipping containers, being modular it wouldn't be to difficult to extend later on.

Doubted it as an idea
Loved it when complete.
We need more interesting buildings.

Amazing location, lovely textures and colours but **** all to do with containers really.

Best Grand Designs I can remember. Stunning and cheap. Want one.

Great result. Should have had the naked carbon weave bath though.

...but could have been cheaper had he just stacked them as they were designed to be. Adding all that steel changed their essential character surely? Great looking in the end I agree.

I loved the episode. But for the basic price of the shell, I wonder if it would be cheap to build that in wood? Looked great at the end though.

Given that he already had the land was the build cheap really? How is it secured to the ground - doesn't need foundations does it?

How is it secured to the ground - doesn't need foundations does it?

No I missed the first half

That'll be why then 🙂 He dug out some really tough stone (which he later used for the drystone wall) and put 6 or 8 pads in I think.

Liked the finished design although it wasn't really such a bargain considering they had the land already and it was hardly a family home.

I think the shipping containers were just for a headline - by the time they had been altered I can't help but think he could have made a bespoke structure (with for dimensional freedom) that used the same type of framework that made the containers strong. I'm sure it was a good investment for his architects practise though!

I think it was essentially a cheap build but really would be if you removed 50k of bath and kitchen and replaced them with normal examples

Maybe the use of containers got around some rule on a technicality - perhaps it classes it as an agricultural building and allowed the development?

I missed it last night, anyone know when its repeated?

Teetosugars - watch it on 4OD

Containers are great, they give you a nice strong(ish) structure and you can do all the awkward bits off site and it's quickly watertight. Granted that in this case he made life a bit awkward for himself with the 90 degree stack but a bit of steel soon sorts that out. I think £20k for most of the structure was a pretty good deal.

Loved the finished building, especially the external finishes and his work ethic was incredible. I'd need a bit more space myself but thought the look was fantastic.

Questions I asked were:
It's onto rock so why all the excavation? Was it leveling the site rather than putting the pads in as Kevin seemed to suggest?

How long until he gets bored of that bath? (a decent shower would be a much better idea IMHO)

£30k on a kitchen??!!!!!!! Did look nice though.

Does he ever just wear jeans and a T-shirt? Best dressed farmer I've ever seen.

Going to watch it tonight. Sounds good but I'm very dubious about his costs. I've just finished a container office building and if you discount luxury £30,000 kitchens and baths etc. the square metre rate wasn't close to that.

I think cheers_drive has probably hit the nail on the head though. There are probably cheaper and more efficient ways of doing it, but where's the fun in that. There is a certain amount of weight to the recycling argument too I guess.

Looking forward to watching it intermitently tonight as 4OD crashes at every ad break on the PS3 🙄

Well I was right about 2 things - there is no way it cost 130k and it took about 2 hours to watch due to the ps3 crashing. 🙂

I thought what he did was really nice in the end though. How I wish my family had an idylic site that I could build my house on for free.

Yea, agree about the cost. I'm sure Kevin made a comment about hard work and "good will", I read that as free labour/work/etc.

I quite liked it. I makes my idea seem credible, of making starter homes from containers. I reckon you could do them cheap, would be quick, much of the work done off site, and with a limited set of required skills. Whats not to like. Just need to find the right plot...

I think Irish building regs being slightly more lenient in terms of thermal efficiency, DDA compliance and a few other things in comparison to Scotland probably helped in keeping the costs down slightly too.

I'd be pretty skeptical about containers being the answer to low cost housing. The only way to keep costs down is to do as little altering of the containers as possible and that would mean meeting space standards for low cost housing would be a problem. I do think creating modules off site is a good idea though.

Loved it, the bit where they made a big thing about 'oooh are the containers going to collapse when stacked at 90 degrees' was stupid though as it's just a steel frame cube & beams and some pretty basic calcs. to provide support. Guess they needed a 'jeopardy' section to each programme 😉

So was the roof timbers falling from the crane in last week's episode added for jeopardy too? 😀

Yeah Kevin had sawn halfway through the lifting pins 😉
and had told the other lot to build on fast erroding soil 😀

I'd be pretty skeptical about containers being the answer to low cost housing.

Agreed. They are a niche solution that can be used to create a cheap one off solution.

But if you are building a load of low cost housing the benefits of containers such as prefab and cheap materials can be accessed without the downsides of containers.

I do think the housing industy can learn a lot from the way containers are built though. Mechanisation and automation of contruction has got to be the answer with a better use of prefab modules made in a factory.

The German, Huff (sp?) house modular concept is a good one that has been used on a number of the previous builds.

I think automation and factory forming houses in modules is a good idea but the level of investment required is so huge that there isn't a method that is particularly cheap at the moment. Whereas with cars generally everyone wants a similar thing ie. something with 4 wheels that'll fit around 4 people and a dog in, with houses the variation can be much more significant and costly. Equally all cars are designed for standard roads whereas there is a huge variation in site locations and conditions. Our willingness to pay for good design and construction is completely different here also. Many people are willing to pay £50k for an Audi/BMW because it's supposedly better designed/value than the equivalent Ford but then buy a poorly constructed Barratt noddy house with no design input whatsoever.

I'm sure we'll get there in the end but by that time we'll be 3D printing houses rather than constructing them manually. 🙂

The German, Huff (sp?) house modular concept is a good one that has been used on a number of the previous builds.

I think automation and factory forming houses in modules is a good idea but the level of investment required is so huge that there isn't a method that is particularly cheap at the moment. Whereas with cars generally everyone wants a similar thing ie. something with 4 wheels that'll fit around 4 people and a dog in, with houses the variation can be much more significant and costly

This is very true.

Building houses is much more akin to rapid prototyping than actual manufacturing. However this ispartly because this type of manufacturing technique is currently the preserve of the type of people who want one off bespoke design since it is easier to be "funky" than with traditional on site building methods.

Meanwhile Barrat and the like churn out identikit houses and people lap them up. If one of these large scale house builders was to invest in prefab they could utilise their comonallity to reduce costs.

OK, so maybe shipping containers aren't the solution to cheap housing. But, what I don't understand, is why someone hasn't come up with a cheap pre-fab solution. Things like Huff are great, but cater for the opposite end of the market, with options to suit every desire. Surely there is a market for a basic house, no options, just a standard design. Doesn't seem like rocket science to me, but guess I'm missing something.

Surely there is a market for a basic house, no options, just a standard design.

Better?

[img] [/img]

Hah - just seen this!

COPYCAT!!!!

[img] [/img]

Looked great to me though of course not original.

Budget was hugely suspect even without the bath and kitchen. Windows and cladding didn't look cheap and 35 people on site at once? That's a lot of cost even if just for a few days.

Likewise building regs - staircase, open window, insulation all looked suspect

End result looked great on the surface though

Yeah, if I ever get the chance to do a self-build I will be looking to one of those.

Doesn't getting some German company to manufacture it, ship across from the continent and install it for you kinda defeat the idea of a self-build? 😛

Doesn't getting some German company to manufacture it, ship across from the continent and install it for you kinda defeat the idea of a self-build?

Probably, but I am sure you know what I mean...

I do, to be fair the Huf haus would be pretty high up on our list once the lottery win comes in. Plus dabbling in the dream car link on here too 😆

"I think automation and factory forming houses in modules is a good idea but the level of investment required is so huge that there isn't a method that is particularly cheap at the moment."

Not trying to be difficult but look here

http://www.envirohomes.co.uk/

Mildly interested in that link. Any idea how much they cost?

Always a bit skeptical about claims of vacuum insulation. I used to think it was the holy grail. I now think it is the holy grail, and not yet discovered. I think all the panels leak over time, so not as environmentally friendly long term. Great for certain applications though.

Also, they are still offering individual bespoke buildings. Why don't they do a standard one for a fixed price excluding ground works etc.

Kevin Watleys character in the last series of Auf Wiedsein Pet sold prefab' homes from Scandanavia

I drove past a homes shop in Sweden Once

Kingspan are offering vacuum panel insulation [url= http://www.kingspaninsulation.co.uk/Products/Optim-R/Optim-R/Overview.aspx ]now[/url] - "If installed correctly and protected from damage and penetration, can provide reliable long-term thermal performance over the lifetime of the building."

They suggested it to me for use in a floor under concrete. Might just work there - would the concrete itself would be enough that even if the sealing on the panel itself failed it would still maintain the vacuum?