External Wall Insulation- Suitable ?
- Thread starter TeeDee
- Start date
Have to agree there. I strongly suspect that caves were used only when large predators were around. So far I have not seen a comfortable cave but that is not surprising here
No, my house is timber under slate with a combination of wool, rock wool and kingspan insulation in the voids. Totally unsuitable for this product.
We’ve been here a year and her room is a struggle to heat so we had been looking to install IWI.
In all the prep, have discovered the ~1.5m wide window has no foam around it. It’ll be rectified tomorrow and will see how that affects the heat!!
I’ve also added checking the rest of the windows to my large list!!
Up in Borrowdale a guy from London lived for decades in a cave. Made it nice by all accounts.
In m another part of the lakes cave has been transformed with a concealed trapdoor with a handle mechanism and counterbalance to open. The secret cave. The theory is someone from Barrow shipyards built it. About 15 years ago a magazine gave hints to find it and it was trashed within weeks.
Anyway that cave had several sleeping platforms and you could easily live in it.
Interesting, how warm can one get a cave? If warm enough and dry then why not, that is just a combination that cannot be found here.
Now you that you mention I think I watched a series on houses in UK where somebody carved himself a home in a chalk cliff. Not so easy to do into granite ...
I’m not diy naive but I was quite shocked when I discovered this today in my daughters bedroom.
We’ve been here a year and her room is a struggle to heat so we had been looking to install IWI.
In all the prep, have discovered the ~1.5m wide window has no foam around it. It’ll be rectified tomorrow and will see how that affects the heat!!
I’ve also added checking the rest of the windows to my large list!!
Fitters that do that kinda **** need to have a foam cartridge release into their behind!
So frustrating as there could be so many houses out there like this that people are blissfully unaware.
OK, so chalk is surprisingly lousy at conducting heat. Closest chalk formation might be in the Baltic States.
Not exactly true, I've visited that secret cave a number of times over the years and either it wasn't trashed or it got repared a bit after it was.
The metal framed door with cemented in stones eventually came apart like it was always going to. Close it a bit hard and it would have come to bits.
The sleeping platforms were bits of chipboard flooring and there was one (more or less over the doorway in) I would have never wanted to sleep on in the first place cos when I'm putting a floor in its on 400 mm centres, that wasnt close and just on unistrut.
Back to the external insulation, I've worked on quite a few homes that were renovated with it over in Whitehaven.
I generally like it, yes it can look a bit odd if one house has it and next door doesn't but rest assured, lower bills make that look a lot better and a house is just a box you live in. If you're prepared to put up with higher bills just so yer house looks nicer from across the road yer an idiot.
The homes I worked on had deep soffits and reasonable overhangs on the roof so there was no issue there.
If you have rising damp of knackered gutters external insulation wont repair it but it can help in some ways, read HERE.
Adequate ventilation is key and I would assume that using moisture resistant plasterboards (with impermeable backing to lessen vapour getting into the walls might help.
I've lived in some cold damp country houses in my life and theyre an absolute millstone to peoples finances, the sooner they get over the idea of paying too much for inefficient homes the better.
A mate went up the week before the article and two weeks after, it was broken in that time period. He also took a lot of rubbish out and there was other mess he didn't touch. He went back months later and decided he'd carry on and bivvy elsewhere. He said the secret cave was trashed as far b as he was concerned.
It might have been repaired since I kind of left that scene and the previously tight group of friends moved on in life as things happen. I doubt a resource like that would be left in a mess for ever. I believe it's been around for a long time before we found it. BTW we found out the old way, locals word of mouth.
It might not look solid but I've known enough mates who found it sturdy enough, some were big lads too. Certainly not to building code that's for sure. Main thing, dry and out of the weather.
I've been to relatives with old cottage and back boiler on wood burning kitchen oven. They had no gas supply nor oil. It was that ancient range. As a result they kept the kitchen warm and the living room with dining room corner. The rest felt like ice cold even in summer! That was strange. Gave me the creeps as a kid. I would even go to the toilet on my own. Without heating and old stone walls it was a damp and cold home downstairs away from the kitchen and living room. I'd hate living there. Add in the corridor to the toilet was where they hung the pheasants and rabbits too. Not great for someone not fully country brought up.
It might have been repaired since I kind of left that scene and the previously tight group of friends moved on in life as things happen. I doubt a resource like that would be left in a mess for ever. I believe it's been around for a long time before we found it. BTW we found out the old way, locals word of mouth.
It might not look solid but I've known enough mates who found it sturdy enough, some were big lads too. Certainly not to building code that's for sure. Main thing, dry and out of the weather.
I've been to relatives with old cottage and back boiler on wood burning kitchen oven. They had no gas supply nor oil. It was that ancient range. As a result they kept the kitchen warm and the living room with dining room corner. The rest felt like ice cold even in summer! That was strange. Gave me the creeps as a kid. I would even go to the toilet on my own. Without heating and old stone walls it was a damp and cold home downstairs away from the kitchen and living room. I'd hate living there. Add in the corridor to the toilet was where they hung the pheasants and rabbits too. Not great for someone not fully country brought up.
We looked at what we could do for our end terrace last year. There were interest free loans with cash-back incentive if our EPC suggested an upgrade and we went to an approved installer. We looked at cavity, under floor and loft top up. It turned out we had cavity wall already, but the others were no bother. We were all booked in when Ukraine started, so missed the mad rush when energy prices started rocketing.
We also looked at refreshing our render, pebble dash. Interestingly one supplier sent us their proforma quote for external wall insulation, which detailed some of the requirements. It would be panels installed under a new coat of render. Their quote would have included the building warrant. There was no planning requirement, but yes a building warrant. I would expect planning might be required in a conservation area or for a listed building.
I don’t think I would be massively concerned about how it would look compared to the rest of the terrace, everyone has a different render finish anyway. Someone the next street over had it done and I don’t think I would have noticed if I hadn’t seen the panels going on.
It isn’t particularly cost effective if you have cavity wall insulation already though, but as far as the funding goes (Scotland), you have to have the insulation sorted before you can look at assistance for any form of renewable heat. In some cases though, even with the best retrofit of energy efficiency measures, the heat pumps wouldn’t be able to keep up and aren’t worth it.
There’s good factual advice available from the Energy Saving Trust and Home Energy Scotland.
We also looked at refreshing our render, pebble dash. Interestingly one supplier sent us their proforma quote for external wall insulation, which detailed some of the requirements. It would be panels installed under a new coat of render. Their quote would have included the building warrant. There was no planning requirement, but yes a building warrant. I would expect planning might be required in a conservation area or for a listed building.
I don’t think I would be massively concerned about how it would look compared to the rest of the terrace, everyone has a different render finish anyway. Someone the next street over had it done and I don’t think I would have noticed if I hadn’t seen the panels going on.
It isn’t particularly cost effective if you have cavity wall insulation already though, but as far as the funding goes (Scotland), you have to have the insulation sorted before you can look at assistance for any form of renewable heat. In some cases though, even with the best retrofit of energy efficiency measures, the heat pumps wouldn’t be able to keep up and aren’t worth it.
There’s good factual advice available from the Energy Saving Trust and Home Energy Scotland.
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