free loft insulation - poor fitting service?

griffen76

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Hi, we've had the loft insulation done recently for free. Was told over the phone it should take apx 1.5-2.0 hrs to install. On the day the fitters arrived they said they'll be 20 mins! Any way true to their word 20 mins and they were gone so apx 15mins was for the fitting, 5 mind setting up. After inspection they haven't put it in-between the joists, they've slapped it the other way going over the joists.I've had to pull a lot of it up as my loose boards have been left down by the eaves, can't see what I'm treading on to retrieve them. All in all I feel this is a !!!! poor job, as I'm not a paying Customer standards don't matter.Also Big gap near loft hatch,no insulation on loft hatch. And a complete role unused left up there lying on the fitted stuff,I guess this is for me to finished the rest off myself . To be honest I would of preferred them to just deliver the insulation and i'd of fitted it to a far better standard myself. Any help or advice on what I should do now as I don't think I want the same fitters back.

zeupater

Hi

Did you already have insulation between the rafters ? ... if so it's normal to top-up by running the new rolls across them ...

When I did ours I ensured that the rolls were well fitted with the edges butted-up against the next roll with completely no gaps in order to reduce the chance of condensation .... if it's a complete mess I'd either get them back to sort it or relay the rolls myself ...

HTH
Z

griffen76

We had some old insulation in the loft-not much, a bit here and a bit there, no Bounce to it at all plus it was ripped and tatty so as I had some nice shiney new stuff on its way I decided to take up what was there,so there was no insulation fitted prior to the new install.

Hobbo2006

We had ours done in March by Insta Group through my provider Southern Electric. The insulation we had previously was very thin maybe only 20mm. Insta Group laid one layer of insulation between the rafters and then a second layer perpendicular to the first layer. Building it up to around 30cm of insulation. It didn't take them long but I did find that I needed to top up several areas including the space under the cold water tank.

Sounds like you got a shoddy team of installers. I'd go back through the utility provider, if that's where you got the contact from. Definitely complain. If the worst comes to the worst then relay what you have and then get someone else in to top up the insulation to 30cm.

Cardew

Hobbo2006 wrote: »

I did find that I needed to top up several areas including the space under the cold water tank.

It has always been my understanding that you do not insulate under the cold water tank.

All cold storage tanks in the loft, including central heating expansion tanks, and all water pipes, including overflows, must be insulated. Do not insulate the floor of the loft under the tanks, heat coming up from the area below should help prevent the tanks freezing.

The_Green_Hornet

Hobbo2006 wrote: »

. It didn't take them long but I did find that I needed to top up several areas including the space under the cold water tank.

You should not insulate the area directly underneath the cold water storage tank, and central heating header tank (if you have one), as you need to allow some heat from the house to travel through the loft floor to help prevent freezing.

Kernel_Sanders

How about if you instead completely clad the tank in 100mm insulation (making sure the lid vent isn't obstructed)? What temperatures would this be effective for (assuming pipework is in foam tubing)?

zeupater

Kernel_Sanders wrote: »

How about if you instead completely clad the tank in 100mm insulation (making sure the lid vent isn't obstructed)? What temperatures would this be effective for (assuming pipework is in foam tubing)?

Hi

Our header tanks sit in the 'V' between the 'W' purlins and have insulation jackets but I still packed the gap between the tanks and the purlins with standard 200mm loft insulation .... it stayed below -15C for a couple of days the winter before last and averaged below zeroC for more than 2 weeks. In all this time we had no ice in the tanks .... Below the tanks we left the original (minimum 4") insulation but added 400mm (crosslayed x2) over the remainder of the loft area ...

HTH
Z

Hobbo2006

Cardew wrote: »

It has always been my understanding that you do not insulate under the cold water tank.

Ah so there was some reasoning for this....

The tank is already well insulated though as it was asbestos they insisted that the tank be wrapped in plastic (as well as the polystyrene boards already there) to prevent the workers rubbing up against the tank and loosening particules which they could breathe.

EricMears

Hobbo2006 wrote: »

as it was asbestos they insisted that the tank be wrapped in plastic (as well as the polystyrene boards already there) to prevent the workers rubbing up against the tank and loosening particules which they could breathe.

Were they not wearing face masks (to prevent them inhaling particles of fibreglass, rockwool or whatever) ?

And of course a so-called 'asbestos' tank would actually be constructed from an asbestos/cement composite where any asbestos fibres are locked in by cement and wouldn't be released into atmosphere by 'rubbing' - it would take vigorous drilling or sawingto do that.

griffen76

I spoke to company and there going to send a different fitting team to have a look, they said it should of taken between 45 mins - 1 HR. Also only 1 layer of apx 170-200 mm definitely not the required 270 mm. I did wonder what that loud "yeeeee haaa" noise was when they left.