Jackie

Many thanks for the responses. I have looked at the Money Supermarket with interest and am also looking at Nationwide. I assume that the tax paid can be claimed back from the I.R. as we used to do with the C&G account. I think that you would have to do this as the French I.R. would tax the gross interest anyway, they did last year with us. Was the account you had in mind Graham called "e-savings" linked to a Flexi-account, an instant access account via the internet because their blurb now says UK residents only!...................................John  

We had a letter from Cheltenham & Gloucester today which says that they are now restricting their savings accounts to UK residents only. This is because of the above directive and which sounds as if they find reporting interest earned on a savings account to the UK Inland Revenue too much trouble! The UK Inland Revenue would then pass on information to the saver's country of residence. So such accounts will be closed by the 15th of April and all they are offering is a Lloyds TSB Overseas Club Account at a charge of £50 a year but this subscription to be waived for the first year. OK the Edit facility is back, I was going to add that the letter from C&G implied that other providers might be doing the same thing! So what do you recommend folks, anyone know of a good UK building society that will let you have an overseas address?..........Jackie and John feeling unloved!    

[quote]Many thanks to all who passed on their experiences - for anyone else interested, I've been told by another Forum member that they had a 5000l tank installed for nearly 4000 Euros less than my 8,500 eu...[/quote] On the subject of size we were told that a minimum size was now 3000  litres and that the capacity should be sufficient to give a retention of three days house output. I found this formula looking back through the posts on TF. Water usage is calculated at 150 litres per person each day. They count the number of bedrooms plus half a bedroom and assume  2 people per room. For example 3 bedrooms equates to 7 people x 150 l/day x 3 days retention = 3,150 litres. Don't know if this is of any help...........John not Jackie    

[quote]Blimey, I had ours emptied recently and was told it was 10,000 litres, glad I dont need it replacing.How often do they need emptying?[/quote] We were told at least every four years with an inspection every three years here in Deux Sevres.....................John not Jackie

[quote]Not an answer to your question, Jackie, but a true story. We asked our nephew's grandmother what he might like for Christmas (he's 7). She told us that he was very interested in Sandtex.We puzzled abo...[/quote] Thanks for that Dick, a bit like The Vicar of Dibley and the little boy in the Father, Son and Oily Goat episode. The things that they say! On the decoration front I have found some interior white crepi so will give it a try. Happy New Year to you.................John not Jackie

Can anyone suggest a masonry paint like Snowcem that I can brush on to a wall recently rendered in concrete.  I would like a white finish if possible. The wall is internal but in a salle d’eau so the humidity will be high at times.  There are branches of Bricomarche, Leclerc, Castorama and Point P near me so a brand name would be very helpful…..Thanks in anticipation……………John not Jackie

[quote]You'll not get Sky in Deux Sevres with a mini dish, you will need a 65cm dish to get all channels. In heavy downpours you'll probably lose all reception even with a 65 cm. However, it will be fine f...[/quote] Well we do but as the poster says a heavy downpour may affect it but it is ok here for 99.99% of the time. Worth saying that we have a Panasonic box and they may be a bit more sensitive than some of the others...........John not Jackie in 79

We buy our pétrole from Bricomarche and/or E Leclerc. They often reduce the price at the start of winter, paying about 14 euros for 20 litres this year. The poêle à pétrole we use is a Zibro Kamin and works very well. We decided not to have the electric fan version as there would be little or no heat during a power cut. We don't buy the expensive no smell pétrole as the standard stuff works well enough and only gives a brief smell on turning the heater off. This type of heating works very well as a secondary source of heat and is very economic to run. Refills are not any cheaper than the special price at the start of the season so it pays to stock up. Only one problem is what to do with all the empty 20 litre containers that accumulate in the barn!.............John not Jackie PS These heaters do increase the humidity in the house and the risk of condensation so some ventilation is needed. They may not be good for asthma sufferers.

[quote]Don't tell him Pike![/quote] Silly boy!      (They don't write them like that anymore!)..................................J

[quote]Oh I don't know Alexis, at least here, one is spared the speech by her madge. Does she still start with "My husband and I...... " ?[/quote] Zo, your name vill also go on zer list, vot iss it?...........J

Why is everyone sooo concerned about health if I was a visitor from another planet I would reach the conclusion that everyone here is a raving hypochondriac. Chill out it may never happen. Well said Di. To many of us it already has! Aaah what it is to be young!.......................John  

Well thanks to Dave and BAF as from that file it looks as if the answer to my question is "Yes it is allowed" as the gaine shown is just below the surface of the plaster and no sign of a protective metal cover. Thanks again and this is what I will do..........another problem solved by the good folk on Living France.................John

[quote]this any help http://www.mr-bricolage.fr/fichesTheme.asp?cat=Electricit%E9&type=magazine[/quote] Thanks for the information Dave and yes there are some interesting files there. Sorry to say I did not see one that answers my question. Have you noticed one about installation of gaine as I describe, maybe I missed it..............John

I want to bury a 20mm ICTA grey gaine in the concrete surface being applied to an internal wall. Is this allowed as it will be just below the surface and my concern would be that some poor soul might drill through it at some time in the future? Mind you that could apply just about anywhere in the house. As an alternative I could put on the concrete and then place the wiring on top in a white rectangular surface mounted conduit. This would be less pleasing to the eye but if needs must.........John Jackie's other half.

[quote]dc - I haven't experience of your condition but I have Crohn's disease, have been in remission for sometime, but had a bit of a flare up a couple of months back. My experience of the health service ...[/quote] "I receive 100%reimboursement for Crohn's related treatment with my carte vitale - there are 30 or so illnesses which qualify for this but you must get registered if you aren't already." Hi Helen. I wonder if you could give more information about this as it might be of interest to others. As you know I have Crohn's and whilst between the CPAM and the top-up insurance I get back all the money paid out for medication this is not the case for consultant's fees. Do you get all the money back for seeing surgeons etc and when you registered did you have to have the diagnosis confirmed by a French gastroenterologist or did they accept your UK diagnosis? What evidence did they require and how and where was the registration carried out?.......all the best..............John, Jackie's other half.

Has anyone downloaded AVG 7 and had problems with it. I refer to the free version which I have installed only to find it crashes the computer during a scan. Deleting and reloading has had no benefit...............John in Dept 79

Well thanks for all the suggestions folks. I have decided to try casting the surface of the shortest wall. I have added one modification and that is to screw a rusty iron grid, as used for reinforcing concrete, had some left over from another job, to the wall first. I will see how this goes and consider other options suggested for the other, larger walls. Again many thanks and all the best.............John in Dept 79

Thanks for the replies. Well I guess there is no real reason why I should not use plasterboard other than losing several cms of space in front of each wall. I have used plasterboard on both metallic rail and wooden frame in the past and then tiled with success. I just thought it would make a change to do it this way and would give a stronger job. As I would do this in sections I would not need that many boards, I already have a collection from a previous job, and would only cast about a third of the wall height each day. Plenty of other jobs to do whilst waiting for the concrete to harden. I gather concrete is a good surface on which to lay tiles. These are mostly internal walls and not damp but I would use an exterior grade adhesive anyway. I can see that the rail and plaster board method would protect the tiles against slight wall movement but I don't think that it is going to move as the only weight on it is the metal and plastic veranda roof. I guess I was just curious to know if there was any good reason why I should not do it this way. I would have thought hydrofuge plaster board and metallic rail would be actually more expensive than concrete. Any further thoughts folks?.........................John in Dept 79

I have got a real rough old wall that I want to tile. The basic wall is stone blocks but someone has in the past thrown concrete at it and this has resulted in a wall which is lumpy bumpy. The surface seems quite sound however. I want to have a smooth surface and I had thought to fix vertical battens at just over one metre intervals and then fix boards across one at a time and starting at the bottom. After fitting each board ramming in a 3 to 1 mix of sand/cement. In this way casting a new surface for the wall working upwards. The wall is not really bearing much of a load and other walls in this area are breeze block again with lumps of concrete thrown at them which are on tight. I would wet the wall down before casting. The thickness of the coating will vary between one and five centimetres. This seems to be a quicker idea than rendering in layers. The boards would be thick enough to prevent bowing. Any comments folks or is this a no no? ..........................John in Dept 79

Well thanks folks, I did not intend to start a war. AVG 6 is soon to be replaced I gather and therefore AVG 7 is a bit of an unknown quantity. Has any one got AVG that you pay for and is it any better than the free one? What other anti-virus software are some of you folks using and what do you think of it?.........................John.....(Tin hat on) in Dept 79 

Tried to renew my subscription to Norton (Symantec) and have had no luck. As far as I can see the version I have, Norton Anti-virus 2000, is no longer supported and an upgrade, despite the year's free subscription on offer, is quite a hike in price. Could not find anyone to email on their various sites and ringing the telephone number given just gives you a robot telling you how to find stuff on the net. I also run the free AVG anti-virus and it seems to work ok but it has missed one or two that Norton has found. I also run free versions of Adware and Spyware detector programmes so do I really want to upgrade the Norton Anti-virus. What would you do folks, have trapped more than half a dozen viruses this year, some in emails and some on quite innocuous web sites, the last one on the subject of concrete mixing would you believe! I am aware that AVG have version 7 nearly available but is this likely to be good enough? What do you swear by?.....................John in Dept 79 

I think the question you have to ask yourself is what is the worst that can happen if I get it wrong. For stuff like laying floor screeds and non-structural concrete work there are tutorials available on the net. If you want to start knocking holes in walls for new doors etc then I should be very wary of doing this without professional advice. Lots of tips on this site and others like Total France. Plumbing is not difficult but you need to be able to make good soldered joints and use a gas blowtorch safely or better still learn to braze. Lots of DIY booklets in the Brico stores or B&Q in the UK. Wiring is another matter and you need to get this right first time and it must be to French standards. On balance I would agree with the previous poster but do lots of research before starting work and get a good personal insurance policy or at least a strong safety line! It is a long way down from the roof........Good luck......John in Dept 79

[quote]Can members tell me if it is ok to use UK type shampoo, soap, shower gells, toothpaste without upsetting the Fosse. Sorry if its a stupid question, but if you dont ask .....Mike[/quote] I would have thought these items are quite mild and you are not going to be putting that much into the fosse if at all. You see the same brands of toothpaste and soap in the French supermarkets as in the UK though not all. In some places only the loo goes to the fosse and grey water from sinks and showers goes to a soakaway though I suspect that is not technically allowed now but existing installations may be like this. Of greater concern is large quantities of stuff like Javel (bleach) going into the fosse, that would upset the bugs! You can find alternatives like WC Net for cleaning the loo. There is usually a label saying Sans danger pour les fosses septiques on the bottle if it is ok to use. Include dishwashers and washing machines as maybe not very fosse friendly..................John in Dept 79 (Everything goes into ours as it is a fosse toutes eaux......honest!)

If both types of fosse, septique and toutes eaux, have to be emptied at least every four years is there any point in feeding the bugs at all. With our fosse toutes eaux we were told that feeding it was a waste of time as the washing machine, dishwasher etc would kill the bugs anyway. A fosse septique is another matter and as has been said only products passed by people should go down it. Has anyone with a fosse septique had an inspection where the inspector made it clear about the emptying frequency and what was said? I also thought a fosse septique, if working properly, never needed emptying!...........................John in Dept 79 

Hi again. Re loir and smells. Despite the 'orrible smells they make the way to frighten them off may be linked to nasty smells. It has been suggested by the notable academic Dr Pat Morris that they may be deterred by strong smelling oily substances. Moth balls don't work really, I did try pushing these down the mole holes in our lawn as well as in the wall spaces of the house but the little b*****s just pushed them back up again! Coming back to the loir, it was suggested that I try creosote and if you are doing up the roof timbers of your barn I guess you could slap some around on the beams before cladding them. Trouble is that creosote is very hard to get here as I believe it may have been banned in Europe, have not seen any in the Brico places of late.  The loir when they die of old age or whatever in your wall or ceiling spaces, attract thousands of little flies, something else to get rid of. A bit like the seven plagues of Egypt! The comment about peeing on the ceilings is based on the experiences of some friends of mine who live nearby and who had all their upstairs ceilings replaced as the pong was really bad. It is a good idea to block up any holes, they can get in through very small holes for an animal the size of a squirrel, as you go about your restoration. Anyway good luck and if you find a better way of getting rid of the blighters do let us all know, the jury is still out on ultrasonics but many think that does not work either!...............John in Dept 79