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BIG MAC

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Everything posted by BIG MAC

  1. Hi all, They dont manage to send a bill they do manage to take money from our bank though? Wondering whether they have some equivalent to Direct debit that we have inherited fro previous owners maybe, it's not a huge amount but irritating. I shall pop in and see them when I am next over but even having informed my bank not to pay them its seemingly to no avail. Must learn to speak better French I wasn't expecting Urdu or Aboriginal simply asking doesanyone know if the have a service for their English speaking contingent, if they don't then arguably it's a good idea? after all microsoft gave them French windows (Deliberate pun) All for speaking French, mega frustrated when I can't get my point across though. Was making a simple point, wasn't expecting the guillotine lol    
  2. I don't live in France. EDF a la' London power, Dalkia etc have many British employees. In my experience UK utilility companies (London Power Included) do not make fast and loose with my hard earned. I have tried communicating in pidgin French. None of my neighbours are Bilingual as far as I am aware. Of course we have the option of using a French speaking friend and as soon as we find one we may well do.... Of course if EDF had an English speaking contact to deal with their many English speaking customers well that would be right handy....It couldn't work could it? just like the immobiliers have twigged it's good for business...nah.....far too logical.....  
  3. And it is EDF shaped How do you stop these people from ram raiding your bank account for electricity you have never used? I have looked on their web site to try to find a way of communicating in English as My French just isn't up to it. Its bad enough getting charged for the pleasure of having a Bank Account. Not happy
  4. Hi Cooperlola,   I have mailed you back, Ta "Do you have long straggly hair, ginger whiskers and wear a cape and deerstalker btw" Errrrr nope, not the last time I checked anyhooooo, is that not the preseve of the Morgan Aero owners club or something like that? Oh to have straggly hair....oh to have any hair! I digress...... Thanks for your help thus far    
  5. Hi Cooperlola,   Are you taking cars or bikes for Le-mans? we like to take a bimble down for the bikes, it would be great to see you there if you are a kindred two wheeled spirit. Look forward to your PM Cheers,   TM
  6. Hi Angelweb, We very much subscribe to the idea that we don't want the French experience to be a chore, hopefully we come across as fairly rational and worthwhile people (We dont feel at all patronised, we were the ones asking for advice and very glad of it) We believe that while the whole project is a bit of fun we do have responsibilities to our French neighbours some of whom we hope to call friends in the future. We hope once are up and running to have many of our friends across and put some money in the local tills. We have some adjoining outbuildings that we would like to convert into another house, our main house is on mains water drains and electric (French electrics a la agricole are a hoot!) has anyone any experience of making connections to mans services as Ideally we would like the out buildings to have their own water, power and drainage this would entail digging up a section of our tarmac lane to get the drains in I suspect the power and water we could connect withing the curtelage of the property. We haven't pointed out yet but hope it goes without saying if we can help someone out let us know we are backwards and forwards with our tranny van a few times through the year. Oh and on the learning French from I have the Michel Thomas CD set but it just doesn't seem to be working still give it time, didn't claim to be the sharpest tool in the box did I?  
  7. Hi Cooperlola, We may well take you up on your very kind offer It would be nice to see an example of a tradesmans work. One of our favourite spots is by the River in Les Alpes Mancelles? is that near you? We are in France hopefully in Aprl for Le-mans bike race however this may be dependent upon our pregnant daughter who could be producing offspring about the same time! Thanks once again, TM
  8. Hi Cooperlola, We are in Charchigne so very close to Alencon nearest village to us is Javron Les Chappelles I f you have someone you can recommend so much the better, what goes around etc. Incidentally we are back and forth a fair bit cw Tranny van so if  you are local and need something delivered do let us know.    
  9. I am fascinated by the various different approaches taken here. We own a house in the Mayenne / Loire region and are about to convert what was our cave into our new kitchen. The cave earth floor is approximately 1metre below ground level out side and we intend to lower it by another 100mm to allow for the make up of the new slab. We are going to excavate some trial pits first to see where we are in relation to the footings of the walls but ideally we want to excavate  400mm to formation then place about 100mm of 20 mm sieve river wash pebbles to the entire floor surface (self compacting and free draining) we will then affix egg box type rigid material (Don't know the French word for it but its brilliant and cheap In England we would call it Delta membrane I think?) all around the internal walls so allowing moisture to transmit freely behind the membrane, we will place just 40mm of Jablite or similar material on top of the pebbles and include a 100mm upstand to the periphery, we will place a layer of 1200 gauge polythene with all joints and overlaps taped and the excess taped to the egg box, one layer of steel fabric reinforcement on 50 mm concrete stools then cast a 125mm thick slab in readymix c40 or equivalent. The egg box material shall extend to approximately 200mm above the outside Ground level we will ultimately cover it with thermalite block the top of which will be closed out using hyload dpc and hardwood capping scribed to the existing stonework. The blockwork will be rendered to receive ceramic tiles the natural stone above will be cleaned repointed as necessary then sealed with a breathable sealer to prevent it shedding dust / drying out. The above may seem long and drawn out but we think its a good way to provide a dry and well insulated room without losing too much of the original character. Mac
  10. Hi Trevor,   Another Trevor here (Heaven help us!) I have a similar plan for conversion of my Cave to a kitchen. Plan is to excavate to reduced level (Headroom is a problem we have 2.2 metres want 2.5) we intend to rake out and repair stone walls as required (Looks like lime mortar eeek!) then install egg box type damp proofing which stands off the wall but allows the passage of moisture (very important to do this as old stone walls allowed to dry out to much and crumble away) we will then place and compact hardcore about 250mm will be all we can get in because we don't want to undermine the footings, this will be blinded with about 50mm of soft sand prior to recieving heavy guage DPM which will be taped to the eggbox, we will then install steel fabric set on support chairs to allow us to cast a 150mm concrete slab (The slab will have a small gutter formed all the way around to a small sump which will eventually have a sump pump installed) we will then install a breather membrane (Tyvek or similar) prior to installing MF studwork ready to recieve insulation and moisture resistant plasterboard, this we hope will give us the best solution to our problem using low tech methods but hopefully achieving the right result at minimal cost (Bit concerned at the 750mm excavation though and that due to this we may have to forego installing Polystyrene insulation (unless we can use it instead of sand not sure if that is allowed)...anyways enough for now just sharing some thoughts...good luck!
  11. It's great that you guys have taken the time and trouble to produce this quality of information, I reckon two hours reading over the past couple of days are going to save me a fortune in the long run. Cheers Mac
  12. Hi, I am a wee bit engrossed with my own combustion appliance problems at the moment nevertheless a thought occured that may have some validity to your backpuffing chimney. is there any potential for dropping another liner through the stack terminating in transfer grilles top and bottom (Suggest the bottom one on the side of the chimney) and the top as low on the stack as is possible to prevent drawing combustion fumes into the room) this Heath Robinson affair would  give almost a "Balanced flue" effect with the possible bonus of intake air being preheated using the chimney as a primitive heat exchanger, just a thought but relatively cheap to have a go...   Kind regards, Trev Mac
  13. Hi all, Have just joined and would like to say I have found the site very interesting and informative so far. I have read Opel Fruit's thread re oil fired heating and was impressed, my problem is that my chosen method of heating is solid fuel....a logburner with backboiler to be precise. Back in Britain we would tend to install these systems as "vented" using an open vent combined Fand E arrangement on primary and domestic HW cicuits. lLooking at the make up units etc which are stipulated for oil fired does anyone know whether the same rules apply for solid fuel? I have purchase an elderly but hooge Quebb Master Multifuel stove and was intending to have a pumped primary heating circuit for space heat plus a gravity circulating circuit serving both domestic HW cylinder heating coil and towel rail as a heatsink for when fire is damped or there is a pump failure. Any guidance anyone can provide re French Building Codes etc gratefully recieved.   Thanks.    
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