advice needed on heating new (not yet built) Conservatory

flea72

Phil_L wrote: »

I seem to remember that a conservatory is an unheated (and uncooled) space. If you want to heat it you are required to get building regulations approval and you must comply with Part L.

to avoid the need to comply with building regs (which states for an extension to be classed as a conservatory is must not have a permanent heat source), then you only need to fit thermastatic valves to any radiator. this way, the radiators can be turned off, and therefore, the heat source isnt permanent

Flea

EliteHeat

flea72 wrote: »

to avoid the need to comply with building regs (which states for an extension to be classed as a conservatory is must not have a permanent heat source), then you only need to fit thermastatic valves to any radiator. this way, the radiators can be turned off, and therefore, the heat source isnt permanent

Flea

How exactly does this differ from a normal radiator valve or can't these be turned off anymore?

molerat

My council building inspector's view was .... "you are going to put radiators in after it is signed off anyway, everyone round here does, so there is no point me worrying about it" ..... how things work in the real world The only thing he really wanted to check was that the outside step was to regs :rolleyes:

27col

Steph998. You are talking out of the top of your head.. It would appear that you know nothing about the principles of heat flow.
1) A conservatory is not classified as a habitable room purely because it does not have the insulation figures that habitable rooms must have in order to be approved and built.. I did not say that it was not habitable. I said that it was not classified as a habitable room.
2) Under what law of thermodynamics do you think that the heat only passes in one direction.
3) If you think that your conservatory will maintain its heat then all you need to do is to close it off from the house on a cold night and see just how fast its temperature drops..
4) If you think that using propane is an economic way to heat a room the you must have more money than sense.
5) The fact that you seem to think that your conservatory is maintaining its heat shows that you do not understand. The temperature of the room is only being maintained by the amount of heat you are pumping in. The measure of the effectiveness of insulation is how long it takes the room temperature to drop if no more heat is being applied.
It is apparent that, what any of us say, you think that you know better.
Incidentally, I do not have a conservatory, but I have built a couple. If I did have one, I certainly would not be prepared to pay to heat it on a cold night.
All conservatories will heat up significantly on a nice day, and the amount is is direct proportion to their lack of insulation. By the same logic they will cool as rapidly at night. Obviously they can be made habitable, but only at considerable cost. You may have fancy K glass and good luck to you, I hope it makes a difference. But I would imagine that most people do not. In fact, a good proportion of older ones do not even have the double walled ceiling material.

Steph998

27col wrote: »

Steph998. You are talking out of the top of your head.. It would appear that you know nothing about the principles of heat flow.
1) A conservatory is not classified as a habitable room purely because it does not have the insulation figures that habitable rooms must have in order to be approved and built.. I did not say that it was not habitable. I said that it was not classified as a habitable room.
2) Under what law of thermodynamics do you think that the heat only passes in one direction.
3) If you think that your conservatory will maintain its heat then all you need to do is to close it off from the house on a cold night and see just how fast its temperature drops..
4) If you think that using propane is an economic way to heat a room the you must have more money than sense.
5) The fact that you seem to think that your conservatory is maintaining its heat shows that you do not understand. The temperature of the room is only being maintained by the amount of heat you are pumping in. The measure of the effectiveness of insulation is how long it takes the room temperature to drop if no more heat is being applied.
It is apparent that, what any of us say, you think that you know better.
Incidentally, I do not have a conservatory, but I have built a couple. If I did have one, I certainly would not be prepared to pay to heat it on a cold night.
All conservatories will heat up significantly on a nice day, and the amount is is direct proportion to their lack of insulation. By the same logic they will cool as rapidly at night. Obviously they can be made habitable, but only at considerable cost. You may have fancy K glass and good luck to you, I hope it makes a difference. But I would imagine that most people do not. In fact, a good proportion of older ones do not even have the double walled ceiling material.

Whew. I hope you got all of that off your chest Col, gee whizz, this is not an exam room you know, it's a forum. Chill out. :rolleyes:

As for me talking out of the top of my head....from some of your posts, I reckon you are talking out of the other end.

I have never stated that I know anything about the principles of heat flow, so you are correct...I know nothing about the principles of heat flow. Am I supposed to have some sort of degree in quantum physics before I advise another poster on my own experience with my conservatory?

All I know is that my electricity bills have not gone up since we built our conservatory, and we use it all year round. You (or a fellow poster ) declared that our bills must be huge..they are not, and I fail to see how you could know that without personal experience. There is something to be said for living with a conservatory, instead of just speculating on the pros and cons. I put the propane fire on low when we sit in it in the evening, and we change the cannister once every three months in the winter. Hardly excessive costs.

I am not stupid enough (despite what you think) to think a conservatory generates its own heat, which is what you are inferring. My point was, that once heated, our conservatory maintains the level of temperature for quite a long time.

Where did I say a conservatory was 'classed as a habitable room'? All I said was why could it not be used as a habitable room?

As for me thinking I know better than everyone else.....well Col, pot, kettle, spring to mind.....again.

Anyway...thanks for your comments, and let me know if you ever have your sense of humour bypass reversed, and you manage to get your head removed from your ar*se.....maybe we could PM each other on the principles of thermodynamics.

travellady

Hahahaha.. u certainly rattled Col's cage Steph!! lmao.. I must admid we used our conny an awful lot- infact every day/night over 2006/07 and since moving back into the front living room ourbills have rose!!!! explain that 1!! Well actually I can- I love it being hot and before I would have the heat on low in the house as we were in the conny- the heating was on in there and so was the elestric blower!! but since moving back in the living room all the heating is on low durin gthe day and 25-30 degrees from tea time and has been that wway since Sept!! eek!!

11thcommandment

How you heat is depends on how you are going to use it. All year round use means it needs to be at a comfortable temperature (the floor too if you use tiles and don't wear shoes in the house!)

We had a conservatory built and very quickly wished we had installed underfloor heating, the temp in the conservatory the morning after the coldest nights was as low as -5degC. We had installed a fan heater and then added an IR heater (5kW in total) which were completely inadequate on the cold days (mainly in Jan/Feb).

So, when summer had gone and left us with memories of +40degC !!! in the conseervatory (and that was with only 1 side having exposure to the south) I installed an 18000btu aircon unit with heat recovery (it also worked in reverse to heat in the winter).
It provided best of both - cooling in summer & heating in winter at reasonable cost. £400 for the equipment (DIY fit) and running costs of 0.4kW per 1kW output e.g. in winter it used 2.3 kW of electricity to produce 5.8kW of heat and the same ratio to provide cooling.

Conclusion :- get it right FIRST time, plumbed in UFH keeps the air and floor warm and you don't have to compromise your space with rads. Get a couple of roof vents installed for use in summer.

Note, If you do decide to go with rads then you will need to fit a big fan in the ceiling to blow the heat down.

Hope this helps!

sunshinetours

I hope most people now understand that most conservatories unless very highy specced will not provide an equivalent all-year-round-useable room like a proper insulated roofed extension. When our conservatory reaches the end of its useful life we will almost certainly replace with a proper extension with plenty of windows (a garden room I guess) which is fully useable like the rest of the house. Anything else is a compromise i am afraid, especially if you a have a south facing back of the house

We heat our conservatory which we use as a playroom with an thermostatic oil filled radiator during cooler months which makes the room bearable and Ok for kids running around in. i wouldn't want to sit out there fior any great period of time though

robv_3

To make a conservatory habitual all year round you need to throw money at it at the build stage or afterwards using energy for heating cooling.

Spend more on the build and reduce the running costs.

Wish list:-

Pilkington Activ Blue with Optitherm and Argon filled roof.
Optitherm/Argon Windows (Activ to expensive for walls)
100mm Insulating under screen
Wet UFH
80mm Cavity
Automatic roof vents
etc

11thcommandment

sunshinetours wrote: »

I hope most people now understand that most conservatories unless very highy specced will not provide an equivalent all-year-round-useable room like a proper insulated roofed extension. When our conservatory reaches the end of its useful life we will almost certainly replace with a proper extension with plenty of windows (a garden room I guess) which is fully useable like the rest of the house. Anything else is a compromise i am afraid, especially if you a have a south facing back of the house

We heat our conservatory which we use as a playroom with an thermostatic oil filled radiator during cooler months which makes the room bearable and Ok for kids running around in. i wouldn't want to sit out there fior any great period of time though

With hindsight and our issues with heating/cooling we should have had a proper extension like sunshinetours suggests, we checked the cost afterwards and it would have cost about the same.