Insulation

Lawman99

My gas bills where rather large last winter- I have (with the help of MSE) got onto the best deal, but I now want to prevent heatloss as much as possible. I have double glazing, fitted draft exluders and have insulated the loft last weekend (8 inches) but the house is 1900s and has no cavity to fill in the wall. Any ideas on how to insulate the walls?







[threadbanner]box[/threadbanner]

Waffle_On

As far as I know, there isn't an easy way to insulate walls without a cavity. Your only options would be applying something to the inside or outside of the house, which would be pretty costly and change its appearance. The only time I've seen it done was on DIY SOS where they applied sheets of insulation to the outside of the house, then rendered it. It looked good then, but it wouldn't suit all houses.

27col

If you insulate the outside it changes the appearance. If you insulate the inside it makes the rooms smaller. You pay your money and take your choice. They insulated some large concrete blocks of flats near us recently and the result looks great. I shudder to think how much it all cost.

Cash-Cow_3

Lawman99 wrote: »

My gas bills where rather large last winter- I have (with the help of MSE) got onto the best deal, but I now want to prevent heatloss as much as possible. I have double glazing, fitted draft exluders and have insulated the loft last weekend (8 inches) but the house is 1900s and has no cavity to fill in the wall. Any ideas on how to insulate the walls?

8 inches is a bit thin. You should have at least 11 and don't forget to do the hatch as well.

phill99

Internal wall insulation is really only ideal if you are having major renovation works doene at the same time. It will require redecoration of the affected rooms, works to the electrics as all of the plugs / switches on the affected walls have to be brought forward, new skirting boards etc etc. In terms of trying to recover the costs just through energy savings, it will take decades before you see any pay back.

muskoka

Also, if your planning to change the external appearance of your house, you have to get planning permission these days...i.e. if currently dashed & you change it to render.....you gotta get planning..........

Hayesmyth

You may like to consider lining the inside of the coldest walls with a product manufactured by a German wallpaper company called ERFURT. It is called Wallrock Thermal Liner.

It claims to reduce room warm up time by 65%, with an energy saving of 36%.

It covers cracked plaster, textured coatings, allows walls to breath and resists mould and damp formation. It even claims to reduce noise pollution.

It comes in 10 metre lengths: (0.75m wide) and will cover 7.5 sq m.

It can then be covered by decorative wallpaper or painted.

The downside is price: £51 per roll and you must use their pre-mixed adhesive: £28 which is sufficient for 2 rolls. The upside is you paste the walls not the paper.

B&Q sell it.

chaz_bird

Re the wall insulation on a roll, no need to renew light switches and plugs, just buy longer screws. I have fitted this for clients and they seem very pleased with it. After hanging I crossed lined with a thick lining paper and painted. Good luck.

harryhound

muskoka wrote: »

Also, if your planning to change the external appearance of your house, you have to get planning permission these days...i.e. if currently dashed & you change it to render.....you gotta get planning..........

Even if you replace like with like for more than 25% of the envelope element: eg re-render a wall or re-tile a roof

You should get building regs. It gives them an opportunity to insist that you bring the insulation up to modern standards.

harryhound

I've done the fitted cupboards and drawer backs with Kingspan (Screwfix) / Celotex (Tool Station). It is thick foil covered PUR/PIR (poly urethane) type foam easily cut with a bread knife. It is twice as effective as the same thickness of glass fibre.

It has not had any effect on me but there could perhaps be an issue with the gas given off by freshly made sheets?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R-value_%28insulation%29.

ormus

27col wrote: »

If you insulate the outside it changes the appearance. If you insulate the inside it makes the rooms smaller. You pay your money and take your choice. They insulated some large concrete blocks of flats near us recently and the result looks great. I shudder to think how much it all cost.

very true.
a council estate near me has just had all the houses done this way.
they were the old concrete panel houses.
100mm kingspan type insulation on the outside and then colored render.
they look ok, but i hate to think of the costs.

ps
the houses were completely refurbished, (new roofs, electrics, kitchen, windows, bathroom etc) and i know the costs for each house was 42k!