Wisigoth

Our house is in the Midi-Pyrenees and as the boiler needs replacing, we are considering going solar for water and central heating.  We have a good south facing roof for the panels and our plumber has recommended a system combined with condensing boiler to back up on dull days and cold nights. I'd love to be green but the cost is frightening - even with the reimbursements. We've been quoted about 6,000 euros more than if we just had a conventional condensing boiler on its own. This is to run four bathrooms as we hope to do Chambres d'Hote.  Has anyone tried it and is it worth the money? 

The whole ground floor of our French house has beautiful, porous terracotta tiles, most of which have a lovely glaze.  Unfortunately, in the five years we've owned the house we've suffered damp on the surface of the tiles in one end of the lounge (it’s not a good idea to leave wet washing in a closed up house). We also had a minor leak in the bathroom - drips from a faulty washer, (we normally turn the water off but were expecting a builder to begin work) and now the beautiful tiles aren't so beautiful in places. The lovely glaze has worn away in patches of the lounge where attacked by saltpetre and the ones affected by the leak are limed (white in patches) and dark stained in the worst places where they went mouldy. I've tried all sorts of stuff for terracotta from Weldom (Starwax stain remover for terracotta etc.) but nothing to show for my huge effort.   Does anyone know if there are companies that will restore the shine to your floors or are there any products that will work where Weldom's have failed?  Should I use one of those hand held sanding machines or would that ruin them altogether?   Advice appreciated

We always leave it on standby (red button, not green) when not in France. The engineer who fitted it for us said this would be enough to prevent us losing the card for CH4 & 5.  Perhaps we ought to leave it on the green button to get updates. We're going over to France in a couple of weeks.  If we leave it on green perhaps they will send us the update then. (If, of course, that was the problem and it wasn't caused by a technical fault.)   It's an old Amstrad.

Our trusty old Skybox (reconditioned when we got it in 2003) has started freezing up.  It was fine at Christmas but on our Easter visit to France, we had to keep unplugging it every couple of hours.  Sometimes when the picture freezes, we still get the sound.  Having searched the net, I’m guessing its something to do with a software update which we don’t receive as the box isn’t connected to the phone line.   Do we scrap it and get a new one?  We’re moving to France permanently soon and thinking of investing in a large flat screen (possibly HD) telly.  We don’t have Sky in England so I don’t know much about what’s available. Should we be looking for an HD Sky box?

We bought a house with pool already installed and there are two things I wouldn't choose if I were starting again.  Firstly, our pool is an "L" shape to incorporate the steps.  This has proved problematic as we've just had an abri fitted and were restricted on type and it cost a lot more.  Secondly, we have a diatomic filter.  We've been replacing parts over the last few years which has proved costly, and it's still not working fantastically well. Also the diatomic earth costs about 40€ a bag.  The guy who fitted the abri also builds pools and he told us that diatomic filters cost more than sand filters. They regularly need replacement parts and work out much more expensive.  We're thinking of giving up with it and replacing it with a sand filter.  I also enquired about changing from standard chlorine to a salt pool and our abri guy said that if you are thinking of chambres d'hotes (which we are), then by law it must be a chlorine filter. Hope that helps.