A very useful tool for builders, painters and decorators, tilers, landscapers and other trades. You can calculate how many bricks, blocks, sand, cement, tiles, paint,flooring,decking, floor boards, concrete and other materials you need for your building or refurbishment project. You can measure the area, length,volume, weight for any materials you might need to know before you buy. Then you can easily calculate how much the building materials will cost for you project. Don’t forget to add the V.A.T, as most building merchants don’t display the price with the V.A.T included.

The VAT can be calculated using a simple formula.

Example at 20% – working out how much standard rate VAT to charge

Item	Amount
Price excluding VAT	£100
VAT rate 20%
VAT (20% x £100)	£20
Price including VAT	£120

For a rate of 20 per cent, you can also work out the VAT-inclusive figure by multiplying by 1.2.

If you have the price EX Vat then you multiply by the VAT rate and divide by 100.

e.g. if the VAT rate is 17.5% then the VAT on £200 would be:

£200 *17.5 / 100 = £35.00

Removing walls

Open plan layout is very popular in London homes and flats. Solid though they look, walls don’t have to be forever; you can knock two small rooms into one big one. It is hard work, messy, noisy, though not for amateur builders.

But before reaching for the demolition hammer, the homeowner or the builders, must check if the walls are load bearing walls. Which walls are safe to knock down without Building Regulation and without major complications ? Not the outer walls which carry most of the load of roof and upper floors; they’re a job for expert builders.

Not the party wall between semis or terrace houses they mustn’t be touched at all. Internal partition walls which hold up nothing but merely divide the internal space can be demolished with no more additional work than making good the plaster, painting and decorating and sometimes plumbing and electrical work if a switch, socket or radiator needs to be relocated. But there are some internal walls which carry part of the weight of roof or upper floors.

These can be knocked down but only after you have, in effect, built a bridge to carry the load. You can get an idea of
which is which by looking in the loft. If roof timbers rest on a wall then that’s load-bearing. Walls under or near water-tanks are probably load-bearing. And where joists are divided and join just above a wall, that’s load-bearing
too.

A Structural Engineer is needed, Metal Beams,RSJs, lintels, Pad Stones and Building Regulation approval before the load bearing walls are demolished.

Any major building job like knocking down a wall – any wall-must be approved first by the Building Inspector (in inner London) or the Building Control Officer. Speak to your local council enclosing drawings of what you propose
to do. These need not be perfect, architect-style, but must be clear and give measurements. The Building Control then will ask for Structural Calculations in writing if they are happy with the purposed demolition works.

Removing the external load bearing wall for a kitchen extension