cavity wall insulation

d900

Good day all,

I have a 1960's ex council home (its nice honest) and going from the hole repair marks in the outside walls its had cavity wall insulation put in at one time or another.

Im not sure who ever did it did a good job as my walls are freezing and i have some mold right at the top of 2 bedrooms with external walls so im thinking the insulation hasnt reached all the way to the top of the house.

Any ideas how to check its had insulation and to where? perhaps i can get an expert out but unsure who to ask.

any harm in getting more insulation pumped in? if it can find a gap i assume it will fill it.

thanks in advance

Airwolf1

Are the gutters full of grass, do they want cleaning? If you have mould, have you tried claiming on the house insurance, if it's suddenly appeared? They may at least give you an idea as to what the problem is even if its not a valid claim, assuming they'll send someone out.

27col

If a building is not being heated then the insulation will have virtually no effect. It is intended to reduce the rate of flow of heat through the wall or ceiling. No amount of insulation can contribute to warming a building. It can only reduce the loss of heat after it has been introduced to the inside of the building.
I suspect that a lot of people are not fully aware of this obvious fact. You say that the rooms are cold. But even if there is no insulation the room should warm up, if enough heat is applied. If there is insulation, then, at that stage, the insulation does its job and reduces the rate at which the walls and ceiling transfer heat to the outside. Thus reducing the amount of heat the needs to be subsequently applied.
If you get into the loft you should be able to see the top if the insulation is in the walls over the windows.
If the filling is expanding foam I am not at all sure that you could add more. It is very flimsy in structure, at least mine is. But it does not have to be strong, it just has to support it's own weight, which is not very much. I am not sure what an expert could do without cutting out bricks. Unless you get a firm to carry out an infra red survey, with a heat sensitive camera. I don't know how expensive that would be, but it would be very informative.

Lally

I have booked in to get this done soon, I have never heard of the firm but they put a flyer through the door and having been ignored by Scottish Gas for a week, I gave them a call.

Is this somehting which could go wrong? I don't like the idea of possible mould. If it does go wrong, how do they get the stuff out again?

Their letter said it has a 25 year guarantee. But would I be better to wait for a reply from a more reputable company?

Ladybird20

funnily enough and further to my other posting about the heaters not giving out enough heat on another thread,, i have wandered if my rooms have been insulated,,can i get someone to drill out a core into the plaster board to check this or will it be in the cavity????as my neighbour found out she had no insulation at all when some of her plaster board has to come off.The difference in my bedrooms and hers is that mine was built from scatch with breeze block ect and hers was part of a the old porch and was converted that way.....sorry to seem i am hijacking ur post,,,but i am intrested in the answers for the same reasons

littlesos

Ladybird20 wrote: »

funnily enough and further to my other posting about the heaters not giving out enough heat on another thread,, i have wandered if my rooms have been insulated,,can i get someone to drill out a core into the plaster board to check this or will it be in the cavity????as my neighbour found out she had no insulation at all when some of her plaster board has to come off.The difference in my bedrooms and hers is that mine was built from scatch with breeze block ect and hers was part of a the old porch and was converted that way.....sorry to seem i am hijacking ur post,,,but i am intrested in the answers for the same reasons

Cavity wall insulation is fitted into the cavity between the inner wall and outer wall of a double skin building. Some older building have single brick walls and no cavity, but a large number of houses do have a double wall construction. Removing plasterboard won't tell you anything about whether you have cavity wall insulation!

I don't understand why your neighbour expected insulation behind the plasterboard, unless it was a loft conversion.

To check if your house has cavity wall insulation you would have to drill into the cavity. There may be visible small, mortar filled, holes in a line around you house, indicating that cavity wall insulation has been retro-fitted.