help insulating my sandstone home?solid walls-suggestions needed please
The burd and I have been in this house for just over a year and the heating/insulation could do with some work.
I'm looking for any experiences/advice/suggestions you may have as to how to improve the heat retention in the house House Description Walls Mid Terrace (brick wall in hall between us and 1 neighbour, sandstone wall in front room/kitchen between us and other neighbour) Front/Rear walls solid Sandstone, approx 20-24" thick All Walls lined with Plaster Windows House is fully Double Glazed Floors Front Room- solid wood Floor Hall- Tiled Bathroom- Tiled Kitchen- Tiled Downstairs has a "crawl space" of approx 3ft underneath it with access Master Bedroom- Carpeted on floorboards 2nd Bedroom- Carpeted on floorboards Upstairs has space under of approx 350mm to ceilings of downstairs Loft No access apparent-think it's been sealed over-unknown if insulated 2x storage cupboards in the eaves in master bedroom- potential access point Current Heating system 18yr Old Combi Boiler (holds pressure ok) timer system separate NO remote/room Thermostat Front room and Hall have "neo-classic" radiators (like old church Rads) Bathroom/kitchen and both bedrooms have double panel Radiators with thermostats on each one Current heating is set to run for 2hrs in the morning and 2hrs late afternoon. house starts to get chilly approx 60-90mins after the heating switches off. We also have big discrepancies in heat throughout the house- Warmest to coldest.. Small Bedroom Kitchen Living Room Master Bedroom Hall Bathroom over to you for suggestions/ideas/ingenious solutions:) thanks |
Rockwool outside wall insulations batts. Dont know the looks of the house, but best would be to insulete all wall from the outside to awoid problems with damp etc. 100 - 150 mm should ot it.
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Main question : do you plan on staying there for a long while ?
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Good starting point - neighbours are good insulators ;-) Quote:
Sandstone doesn't insulate well. Depending on composition, it has 2 to 5 times the heat loss compared to brick. The harder / heavier it is, the worst it is -lighter, softer sandstone traps lots of air. The only saving grace is its thickness. It gets worse when it gets wet - but just about everything does. If you can / are allowed to , have it insulated from the outside. It also changes the external appearance of the house. You can do that on the inside, but it eats away at the useful space, and gets expensive quickly as you'd need to redo lots of the interior. Quote:
It's also the most expensive to replace. Quote:
Wood. Cork. Even plaster. I've never understood tiles in bathrooms. They're ice cold. Quote:
Still leaves 2' - plenty to crawl through. Some companies are even filling the whole lot with PUR / PIR these days Quote:
Cork chips or paper could be blown in through a hole rather than ripping out the entire floor or ceiling. Quote:
Check it out, get it insulated. Even if it was insulated years ago, it may well be a good idea to add another layer of better insulation. Quote:
Rule of thumb used around here is that when it's about 20 years old, you'll benefit from replacing the heater - the new one pays itself in reduced heating cost. Quote:
Insulate all visible pipes. Pipes are inefficient as radiators. A reflective liner on the wall behind the radiator helps too. Quote:
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Built circa 1895, last re modelled about 1994 (after being flooded!- We now have a bund built to 8ft round the street now) Quote:
Front sandstone wall has large windows, and rear sandstone wall has French Doors- so not only do we have Sandstone, we have coldpoints also Insulating on the outside would not be possible- A large part of the appeal of the place is the look of it- I believe you can do internal insulation, and TBH would give us an excuse to get rid of all the magnolia, and get some colour underway:) Quote:
Floor and all walls are tiled- I think getting rid of them would be good from both an aesthetic and insulation point of view. Again, however its solid walls all round, but no space that we can afford to lose re the double glazing- replacement would be good, but I think there's lower hanging fruit to be picked first (and the savings can bolster the coffers for new windows:)) Quote:
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Cant have too much insulation upstairs Quote:
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Plus any left over pipe insulation=grill block! Rad reflecters are worth investigation also! Thanks everyone:) |
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Might well be worth the effort. The latest window/door sills have no thermal bridges in them. Getting it done while insulating the inside walls saves on work and remodelling-hassle ... at a high initial cost though. Quote:
I'd get that insulated even before you insulate the crawl space itself. A box of styrofoam plates or the like around it will do a lot of good. Quote:
Cork is really undervalued, but you can get some really nice finishes these days that don't even look like cork anymore. It need not have the flattened bottle cork - look anymore :rolleyes: Quote:
Surely there must be some easier way to get in ? There ought to be if the houses were built as separate houses back in the day ... if it was one big house divided in 3 later on, well, anything's possible then. Quote:
Especially when you're not using the space. Any heat going up there is wasted. Quote:
Give it a try over a more or less stable week or so and compare the amount of gas used / comfort. Last year I've reduced the water temperature from over 60 C to around 45C, and burned less gas despite a longer harsher winter. No timers here , no heat storage, just rads with thermostats, late-1980s set-up so it'd be about time to replace the heater even if it's just from an efficiency point of view. But I don't own the place, so ... |
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