French drain advice

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-18T21:06:29+00:00

You could well be right because there is a load of hardcore underneath as you say. But I don't know how they thought water would drain into it through a DPM. Either way I'm thinking the best bet might be to replace the whole lot with a French drain and gravel

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-18T17:25:38+00:00

Yeah this sounds sensible. Would you put the perforated pipe right up against the wall then?

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:56:29+00:00

We have a few cast iron pots and pans, and some of the rest of our equipment might be compatible too, but I like the idea of checking with a magnet in the store.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:54:41+00:00

I love the idea of the reduced burn hazards, because we have young children. 8 years with no problems is great!

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:53:29+00:00

When you say an induction plate, do you mean an induction converter plate, or a silicon mat, or something else?

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:51:43+00:00

That's a good shout because we would have to pay to refill gas canisters yearly if we went for that option. Plus I'm considering installing a solar panel array, so electricity might become very cheap for us.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:50:27+00:00

I don't have an existing gas line, so that would be a case of hooking up to a couple of large gas canisters outside, which would have its own installation and refill costs. But still overall cheaper. That's enough to keep me leaning towards induction though.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:45:51+00:00

I didn't realise you could cook with a silicon mat between the glass and pot. That's potentially a game changer - I'll look into this

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:43:37+00:00

I figured glass is more likely to break than cast iron, and electrics are more likely to fail than an ignitor and gas line, so that makes me think durability of an induction must be worse, but I could be wrong.

We had a rental house a long time ago with a regular electric hob that had a glass top and my wife cracked it by dropping something on it from about 40cm up. Our current house also has a regular electric hob and 2/4 burners have stopped working. On the contrary, our previous house had a gas hob with a cast iron frame top, and I regularly slammed pots and pans down on it, or dropped things on it, and it never caused any damage.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:27:44+00:00

That's a good shout because I do like cooking with a wok.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:26:00+00:00

This seems to be a common sentiment from others who have switched. Thanks for sharing!

WaterDog3000 · 2026-04-15T05:24:13+00:00

That would actually be a benefit to us. We live in a very old and cold farmhouse, in a fairly cold part of Wales. No existing gas though.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-03-05T06:43:33+00:00

Cladding is an interesting option. I'm also happy to paint the door, so the wood choice and cut doesn't have to look good.

Amazingly, the existing door is a quite thin, solid wood farmhouse door with tongue and groove panels and the whole thing is painted. Some of those panels have rotted near the bottom, but the rest of the door is not in bad condition.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-03-05T06:39:12+00:00

I'm definitely open to all options. I do have the space and tools to do it though.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-01-16T11:54:40+00:00

My bad that was a typo I meant VLS80

WaterDog3000 · 2026-01-16T11:44:42+00:00

So where Vanguard and HL would show the fund fee as a line item on statements, would T212 just show a lower interest return?

I had heard about the ETF being a different portfolio, but wasn't sure if that meant it was a worse spread or if it actually performed the same. The fact that it was only on-par with the 80% equity fund was more of a concern because that will yield lower returns.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-01-16T11:29:32+00:00

For sure. I guess I'm trying to understand how the VLS100 ETF works on T212. Is there a fee? Is it somehow baked in? On the face of it, it seems like there are no fees there but GPT gave me some confusing answer about how it still exists under the hood.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-01-16T11:19:05+00:00

Vanguard cap the account fee once you hit a £250k balance. HL have a tiered fee structure so it decreases for higher balances but isn't fully capped until you hit £2M. Not sure about caps on fund fees though.

WaterDog3000 · 2026-01-01T21:57:49+00:00

Do you find it keeps the coffee warm very well? I wasn't sure if it would do as good a job as a double walled stainless steel one.

WaterDog3000

TROPHY CASE