h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I had a sort of conservatory built several years ago. It's always had problems when it rains. The builder came back several times and did various thing to try to alleviate the problem - covering to the wall, enlarged the downpipe, fitted a larger collecting hopper so it didn't overflow, but still the rain poured in - not all the time, but definitely in heavy weather. So I brought in a roofing company to look at it. The chap took one look at my box gutter and said it was the wrong type. When they came back to fix it, I was told that there was an end cap missing and the gutter hadn't been sealed together properly at a join. It was a big job and meant that the roof had to come off. Hey ho, I thought - bingo, job done!

But no! Next time we had heavy weather, I still had leaks, although not the amount of water that had previously come in, but still enough to need a basin. So the roofing company came back and put more sealant on the roof. So - what happened the next time it rained heavily? Still some seepage. So - back came the roofers to inspect, looked at the guttering at rooftop level on the main house. Oh my, the guttering was hanging off, which explained why lots of water was coming down and why the walls couldn't cope. So - today, back came the two men who did the second lot of work and fitted some new gutters, and it's really strongly held together. Lots of fixing points.

Wish me luck when it rains heavily next time!

Surely that must work! I mean.... guttering is hardly the most complicated aspect to house design, building or repair in teh world - we had a leak here, in the house, for years, sort of through the wall avove a window in the front room... wrecked a ton of plaster on the inside, looked like it was the window, but really it was a odd thing on the outside, avove the window; like a stone err, ledge, above the window (they do hae a name I think, but can't recall), anyhow, over the years, rain had just worn the stone plinth down, and the water then went onto the wall, and I think seaped in through the top of the old windwo frame and thence into the wall and came through there... replaced the plinth when the windows got replaced, then just ignored the crummbling plaster work on the inside of the wall there, until we had the front room redecorated; at which time we had two main walls replastered, adn so they touche dup that bit at the same time - oh, and got the ceiling replastered too, to take off the dredful artex finish still need a ltot of the house restored/redecorated though... starting with the bathroom.... then kitchen, utility room; then we can finish off upstairs, and think about finishing the front room; needs new flooring, the walls are now all done, and once the flooring is done, we can have new skirting put in there (been replacing the skirting upstairs as we do each room; have done main bedroom, tiniest bedroom, but not middle bedroom or landings yet) after that, it just leaves the hallways, staircases, and downstairs hallway, and the final job will be a new front door and window avove it - kinda put off doin any more work this year, as its so disruptive asides anything else... must make an effort though to try see if we could get eh bathroom done before the end of the year, then at least my new kitchen woudl be in sight! so need a new kitchen, it really is falling to pieces now

I hadn't really noticed the guttering - and certainly hadn't seen that it was hanging down. It was in a place where I don't normally see - I have to go to a bedroom window and crane out. There are other pieces of work needing to be done. There's a patch down one corner that needs replastering and some of the bricks outside need repointing - and there's a wall joining with my neighbours that needs completely repointing.

I can remember the time when Artex ceilings were all the rage. Do you mean a lintel (the ledge above the window)?

My list of things to do is almost as large as yours. I'd like to put a proper fireplace in the front room, which had had one, but it was blocked up. I had my bathroom replaced a few years after my bath started to leak a while ago (the bit round the plug had corroded, so I got rid of the awful avocado suite that was there when I moved in . A couple of days ago, I replaced the loo seat, as it broke, so now I have a very nice soft closing one, which was surprisingly easy to install.

are loo seat is barely holding on.... I refuse to repalce it now, if we're going to repalce the entire bathroom soon! - simularly the oven doesn't really work... I refuse to fix it, or replace, as we'll do that when the new kitchen goes in!

yep... lintle I think... above window, and on outside of house...