Big, cold, expensive house!

BUFF

EssexHebridean said:

I'd consider checking on those dehumidifiers costs if I were you - I have mine running on a tapo plug and that tells me that 7 hours running last night = 1.2kWh. If I were to have it running 24/7 it would be costing me in the region of £1.36 a day if I were n a single rate tariff. Now it might be that yours are very small indeed - but still, that cost per week seems optimistic for something that would actually be effective. 

I had similar thoughts when I read the post.
My 12l rated compressor dehumidifier (also measured by Tapo P110) is using ~1.15kWh for 10 hours overnight but by my reckoning that is 40p/night at EPG single rate (If I ran it 24/7 whilst it may increase I  don't think that it would increase pro rata as I think that the proportion of "off" cycle would increase). Even so that is ~£2.80 for one per week.
Possibly they are still on a cheap fix though?

Olly_J

I have a 1930's house also, and these are some of the things I found whilst improving the thermal profile

Check any chimney's aren't sucking up warm air from the room - Even behind unused gas fires - this was a major source of loss for me and should be tackled as a priority. If you can feel a stream of cold air coming down the stairs when central heating is on, this is likely a problem, just stick a hand through the bannister.

Check any pipes\cables that have been drilled through external walls have foam insulation in\around them

Check the bathroom extractor has backdraught valves, otherwise it acts as a path for cold air directly into the house, esp if you have the open chimney issue, as it forms a flow of cold air inbound, as warm air rises up the chimney, which causes a lower pressure inside the house than outside, pulling cold air in through it.

Also some bedrooms may have brick air vents, and this will be pulling air through them too.

Check the waste pipe for washing machine has a sealed adapter, rather than a pipe pushed inside another pipe letting cold air through - This can make the kitchen really cold.

Check your loft hatch has insulation on the back side - Just a bag filled with rock-wool and stapled to the back is effective

As mentioned above by theoretica, check silicon around window frames is in good order, get some draught excluder strip for your front door if it is a wooden original. Plus if you have suspended wooden floorboards, sealing around the skirting with silicon is effective if you have laminate flooring rather than carpet and underlay

Also do not let the temp of your house drop too low overnight, as this can cause condensation and is hard to recover from when temps are very low outside, a simple set back of a couple of degrees seems to work best for me.

FreeBear

Olly_J said: Check your loft hatch has insulation on the back side - Just a bag filled with rock-wool and stapled to the back is effective

If it is the original loft hatch, there could well be a nasty cold draugt coming in round the edges - My hatch is (was) built up from T&G planks. Had a bag of rockwool stapled on the top and also had brush strips added around the opening. Finally had enough and replaced it with a Manthorpe GL260 hatch. Had to get a little creative

Olly_J

FreeBear said:

If it is the original loft hatch, there could well be a nasty cold draugt coming in round the edges - My hatch is (was) built up from T&G planks. Had a bag of rockwool stapled on the top and also had brush strips added around the opening. Finally had enough and replaced it with a Manthorpe GL260 hatch. Had to get a little creative

Sounds very much like mine at the moment, as that is plank based, and I added double layers of draught strips around the edges, as it was a bit warped, plus the insulation bag..But I do plan on replacing it with a purpose made one, just not quite got that far yet!

Moneysavingdoc

Thanks again all. Will definitely plug the chimneys. Found a couple of draughts which have been filled. Chasing up the secondary glazing installers. Will change the thermostatic controls. Aiming to drape some curtain fabric over the downstairs bay plantation shutters.

Moneysavingdoc

Currently the house is zoned upstairs and downstairs with an on/off thermostat on each level. The Drayton controls only allow you to set timings for the heating being on or off. This means that if you want to allow a cooler temperature overnight you have to turn the thermostats down before bed and then turn them up again when you wake up (but then the house doesn't warm up before the kids have even left for school). Alternatively you can set the controls to have the heating off at night and come up before we get up (but then the temperature plunges to below 10c in the interim).
I need new controls that allow you to program different temperatures at different times. The vsmart looks good but doesn't allow 2 zones. Will that be a problem? Any other systems compatible with a valliant ecotec that people recommend? Thanks

EssexHebridean

I am reading this thread with interest, as someone who is viewing what looks like it could well be a  big, cold, expensive house tomorrow! 😆

Moneysavingdoc

EssexHebridean said:

I am reading this thread with interest, as someone who is viewing what looks like it could well be a  big, cold, expensive house tomorrow! 😆

If you don't mind the house tepid you might be able to only spend £20/day on gas!

RelievedSheff

Moneysavingdoc said:

EssexHebridean said:

I am reading this thread with interest, as someone who is viewing what looks like it could well be a  big, cold, expensive house tomorrow! 😆

If you don't mind the house tepid you might be able to only spend £20/day on gas!

That very much reminds me of a large old Victorian villa we used to rent. It was never warm in the winter.

The winter gas bill was around £150 per month back then and that would be some 16-17 years ago.

Dread to think what that house would cost to (try to) heat now.

jacko220

Cautiouslyoptimistic said:

We've got a 1960's reasonably sized 4 bed detached that isn't fantastically insulated with a 20-year-old Bosch 28 Cdi boiler that is a bit like Triggers Broom as it's been maintained/rebuilt several times by British Gas over its lifetime. 

Unfortunately, there's no pain free solution to heating a big, poorly insulated property in my experience.  This year we've changed our strategy to heating the living room only with a 5 kw log burner and wood plus smokeless coal, so we have a warm room in the house where we can all congregate and feel comfortable.

I have 4 small dehumidifiers going in the bedrooms 24/7 which cost about £1.30 each a week to run to try and counter moisture and reduce the likelihood for mould.  I also have a dozen disposable box dehumidifiers placed strategically in wardrobes and other spaces.

It's not the same as last year, we used over 20,000 kwh over 6 months heating the house through the colder months but I'm just not paying what it would cost to repeat that this year so the kids can jump in their beds with a thick duvet and get warm after a night sat in front of the log burner.   Working for us so far, although I must admit this cold snap is a real challenge.    

Unfortunately the problem is the ground floor and that it is detached and 1960's construction.

Your main heat loss is through the floor, when I started being an Architect/Building Scientist, you did not have to insulate the floor that was in 1970 it was not until 1992 that you where required to insulate the ground floor. The problem with 20 year old boilers is lack of efficiency, look at Seasonal Efficiency Database Boilers UK SEDBUK. 

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, I have lectured/practicized in this subject for over 50 years, I would be pleased to answer any questions that you have.