Icotherm conservatory roof replacement - Experiences?

TELLIT01

FreeBear said:

Chaoscontrol said: Why wouldn't you remove the doors then?

Once you remove the exterior grade doors between the main house and a conservatory, it becomes an "extension". As such, it will then need to comply with building regulations in terms of construction and minimum levels of insulation. Even with a lightweight insulated roof, you will not meet the minimum requirements. Extending the main central heating to add a radiator in the conservatory opens the same can of worms.

If/when you come to sell the property, if the door has been removed, there is a very good chance the surveyor would down value his/her valuation and solicitors could ask some rather awkward questions. In short, leave the door in place. Come the winter, it will reduce the amount of heat being sucked out of the house.

That's wrong FreeBear.  Ours now has full building regs compliance and we could remove the doors if we wanted to.  We won't, because there is still a larger heat variance in the conservatory than in the rest of the house.  The rest of the house is very well insulated.  When we use the conservatory, we have the doors folded back so it does just act as an extension.

Bendy_House

Chaoscontrol said:

The thing is that our conservatory already has central heating installed. And the sliding door in between doesn't look like external grade at all. Also the conservatory is also connected to a utility room too, and that does doesn't look external either, at all.

However, the conservatory door looks like external grade. 

So tbh, it looks like it was done already to be prepared for it. 

Our surveyor didn't highlight anything or downvalue. The valuation was exactly what we agreed to pay too. 

We are getting to the enquiries phase now, so I guess our solicitor will ask for certificates of the conservatory/extension.

I have taken a peek to the planning map of the council. It shows the conservatory application on 2003, but it calls it a conservatory, not an extension, but not sure if thats a wording thing. Because then the utility room (which is definitely an extension) doesn't appear at all, which is weird. 

I still want to remove the door. Unless it becomes super costly (which doesn't seem the case given the circumstances). 

Who knows what happened when it was built! It's certainly too late for Building Control to act retrospectively on it.

I would speculate that - since the Planning Portal does show an application for the connie in 2003, that it was built 'correctly' - ie in compliance - at that time. Ie, it was separated from the house by 'external' doors, and it did not have CH added to it. Quite possibly the doors at the time were the existing exit doors to the garden? Are there any drawings of the connie with that application? Does it show the doors?

And then at some point afterwards, the ext doors were replaced with int types, either for improved appearance, or as part of widening the through-way to the connie. Which would be a bigger issue - if it has been widened, has it been done properly with a larger lintel? Any mention of the doors in that application?

And then, possibly later still, they extended the house's CH system into it - again contravening Building Regs.

Again, no action can be taken retrospectively, so your choice is to either accept it or not. Or accept it and then change it!

What I think I can say with some certainty is that the connie will cost a lot more to heat compared to a proper house room. With energy costs going sky-high, you should consider this carefully, although we don't know how deep your pockets are. Your plans for the room will/should make a huge difference, but that still leaves the dwarf(?) walls and the floor which may, or may not be insulated. And are the windows installed well, with no draughts through or around them?

In practice, even without a source of heating, it should be a very useable room for much of the year, and that includes winter - provided the sun is shinning. I personally think you'd be nuts to then heat it using your CH at other times, but that's your call, and your pockets. However, if you remove these doors, then it's a fait-accompli - you will have to heat it like the rest of the house, 24/7.

There will even be times - when the sun is shinning - that the connie could provide heat to the adjoining room, so obviously you'd want the interconnecting doors open then.

Personally, unless the connie could be made as energy-insulated as the adjoining room, or very close to, I would keep some type of doors there, but perhaps choose some that will possibly add to the overall look, and don't have the usual drawbacks - eg sliding? Concertina'd folding? Opening out and flat against the side connie walls with parliament hinges?

DRP

Chaoscontrol said:

DRP said:

fyi we bought a house last year with a large glass roofed conservatory that was continuous with the house (no exterior grade doors, central heating & kitchen was located within the conservatory), and neither the surveyor , conveyancer nor mortgage company batted an eyelid. So there may not be any issues with buying it. I would 'price in' that you will need to get rid of it in the short to medium term though.

FYI we made the purchase fully aware that the conny would be comically difficult to heat in the summer and too hot/sunny in the summer - and it proved the case despite it being an expensive tinted dg roof! 

(we have just finished building an extension replacement on the same footprint!)

What forced you to get rid of it though? Is the council doing rounds and giving fines?

Forced? No i didn't say that.

It was replaced because the temperature wasn't (comfortably) habitable in either summer or winter. Fresh food rotted within days due to the heat, and condensation caused the interior upvc to go green every few months.

Chaoscontrol

Bendy_House said:

Who knows what happened when it was built! It's certainly too late for Building Control to act retrospectively on it.

I would speculate that - since the Planning Portal does show an application for the connie in 2003, that it was built 'correctly' - ie in compliance - at that time. Ie, it was separated from the house by 'external' doors, and it did not have CH added to it. Quite possibly the doors at the time were the existing exit doors to the garden? Are there any drawings of the connie with that application? Does it show the doors?

And then at some point afterwards, the ext doors were replaced with int types, either for improved appearance, or as part of widening the through-way to the connie. Which would be a bigger issue - if it has been widened, has it been done properly with a larger lintel? Any mention of the doors in that application?

And then, possibly later still, they extended the house's CH system into it - again contravening Building Regs.

Again, no action can be taken retrospectively, so your choice is to either accept it or not. Or accept it and then change it!

What I think I can say with some certainty is that the connie will cost a lot more to heat compared to a proper house room. With energy costs going sky-high, you should consider this carefully, although we don't know how deep your pockets are. Your plans for the room will/should make a huge difference, but that still leaves the dwarf(?) walls and the floor which may, or may not be insulated. And are the windows installed well, with no draughts through or around them?

In practice, even without a source of heating, it should be a very useable room for much of the year, and that includes winter - provided the sun is shinning. I personally think you'd be nuts to then heat it using your CH at other times, but that's your call, and your pockets. However, if you remove these doors, then it's a fait-accompli - you will have to heat it like the rest of the house, 24/7.

There will even be times - when the sun is shinning - that the connie could provide heat to the adjoining room, so obviously you'd want the interconnecting doors open then.

Personally, unless the connie could be made as energy-insulated as the adjoining room, or very close to, I would keep some type of doors there, but perhaps choose some that will possibly add to the overall look, and don't have the usual drawbacks - eg sliding? Concertina'd folding? Opening out and flat against the side connie walls with parliament hinges?

Thanks for the detailed reply. 

The application doesn't mention anything about doors, or map, or any detail really. My speculation is that all happened at the same time tbh. It would have been strange to build a utility room extension, put a external grade door. Then build a conservatory, still external grade door on both the utility-con and lounge-con. And then at some point to change both those doors for !!!!!! internal doors and make the con-garden an external one. Seems like too messy. Same with central heating. 

Our plans for the room is to be there 24/7. We will use it more than our living room, as we work from home and it will be our office. So we will definitely use CH in there. Just like we currently do in the house we are renting, with an extension. The temp varies but just on direct sunlight, but it's completely usable, with no separation door. 

The dwarf walls seem like external normal walls, so they should be insulated, and the floor has a large elevation as the house is slightly downhill. Doesn't seem to be a weird construction. 

My only worry here is that I will NEED to take out the sliding door to replace and unify the floors of lounge and conservatory. Since the height will change, the door won't fit afterwards. And since we don't want it we'll take it back. 

Then the roof will be replaced for the tiled one, and at that point we might consider (no-one has still confirmed if this is mandatory and why) applying for building regulations approval. Since we're doing it for the roof, we might as well do it for the door removal. After all, it will look like the conservatory will be suitable as a full extension at that point (roof, external grade doors, etc). Even if rejected, I think we would ignore and live without the doors ourselves. And MAYBE when selling at some point, if a problem was raised, we would fit a a cheap sliding door in there and get out. 

Chaoscontrol

TELLIT01 said:

FreeBear said:

Chaoscontrol said: Why wouldn't you remove the doors then?

Once you remove the exterior grade doors between the main house and a conservatory, it becomes an "extension". As such, it will then need to comply with building regulations in terms of construction and minimum levels of insulation. Even with a lightweight insulated roof, you will not meet the minimum requirements. Extending the main central heating to add a radiator in the conservatory opens the same can of worms.

If/when you come to sell the property, if the door has been removed, there is a very good chance the surveyor would down value his/her valuation and solicitors could ask some rather awkward questions. In short, leave the door in place. Come the winter, it will reduce the amount of heat being sucked out of the house.

That's wrong FreeBear.  Ours now has full building regs compliance and we could remove the doors if we wanted to.  We won't, because there is still a larger heat variance in the conservatory than in the rest of the house.  The rest of the house is very well insulated.  When we use the conservatory, we have the doors folded back so it does just act as an extension.

Thanks for this. When you say you have "full building regs", can you give me details about this? You mean you applied to classify it as an extension and they approved it? I would like to know more of the exact things you had to do. 

FreeBear

TELLIT01 said:

FreeBear said:

Chaoscontrol said: Why wouldn't you remove the doors then?

Once you remove the exterior grade doors between the main house and a conservatory, it becomes an "extension". As such, it will then need to comply with building regulations in terms of construction and minimum levels of insulation. Even with a lightweight insulated roof, you will not meet the minimum requirements. Extending the main central heating to add a radiator in the conservatory opens the same can of worms.

If/when you come to sell the property, if the door has been removed, there is a very good chance the surveyor would down value his/her valuation and solicitors could ask some rather awkward questions. In short, leave the door in place. Come the winter, it will reduce the amount of heat being sucked out of the house.

That's wrong FreeBear.  Ours now has full building regs compliance and we could remove the doors if we wanted to.  We won't, because there is still a larger heat variance in the conservatory than in the rest of the house.  The rest of the house is very well insulated.  When we use the conservatory, we have the doors folded back so it does just act as an extension.

I suspect it depends on exactly how much glass you have and what other measures you take to improve the thermal performance of the whole property.

Many conservatories are poorly built, and it would be a struggle to get them up to "spec" without spending a large sum of money.

TELLIT01

Our conservatory does have less glass than many.  There is only one wall with a dwarf wall with glazing above.  The others are (1) the full height brick wall to the main house (2) full height brick wall to the utility room (former coal store and shed) (3) to the neighbours property so brick wall to approx 5' with obscured glazing above that.  The glass wall, as mentioned previously, is a gable and faces south west.  All these elements do affect the thermal efficiency of the room.  Regarding building regs, I didn't have to do anything as the contractor handled all that side of things.  All I know is I got a certificate from the council confirming it complied with all building regs.

greenface2

never fitted a icotherm roof but fit guardian and equinox often . I suspect if they've passed the right tests then they should be suitable . get an experienced team to install . compare the thermal values between all also . 10k is about right for the guardian without much detail . our latest guardian was with tapco tiles . glass fillers both sides and 6 sided .5m x 5m in size . extra week onto a 3 or 4 day job