Redbeard

If you quote the member's username @Brian Chequer, he'll get a notification of your post.

I'm guessing, but since one has earth wire on, I assume it's for an earth rod. @ProDave?

The vent you refer to must be in a room, as it is an internal chimney, so (a) it will be venting warm, possibly fairly moist air up into the flue - which can then condense higher up, and (b) it is only presumably venting one of the flues (there will be 2 at least, or even 3). Do you know if the ground floor flat has a vent? If none of those flues are used, and you could get agreement, filling the flues with a free-flowing insulant could be a plan...

From the link I posted above: 2 – Whole Dwelling Standard Assessment Procedure (SAP) A designer can exploit even more design flexibility by carrying out a SAP (version 10) energy rating calculation for the whole extended dwelling. Using this method a comparison is made with the expected carbon emissions and energy performance of a ‘notional’ dwelling with an equivalent (same size and shape) extension that complies with the fixed limits set out above. This method gives a designer the potential for ‘trade-off’ by improving the performance of the existing house. The upgrades must at least meet the standards in table 3 below. We ask that all SAP calculations are carried out by an accredited energy assessor. Table 3 – Minimum Standards for Upgrading Existing Thermal Elements U-Value (W/m² oK) Wall – cavity insulation 0.55 Wall – external or internal insulation 0.30 Floor 0.25 Flat or pitched roof – insulation at ceiling level 0.16

I cannot find it immediately in Part L but how about this which shows the method and refers specifically to Part L: https://www.hertfordshirebc.co.uk/guidance-note/designing-domestic-extensions-guide-to-compliance/ ?

I suggest you put your values into something like this https://www.calculator.net/right-triangle-calculator.html?av=&alphav=17&alphaunit=d&bv=3400&betav=&betaunit=d&cv=&hv=&areav=&perimeterv=&x=Calculate and ask how he gets something different. Or buy him one of these (I have no connection with this supplier) https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/286798055236?campid=5338947458&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&toolid=10050&customid=&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&loc_physical_ms=41684&loc_interest_ms=&campid=5338947458&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&toolid=10050&customid=519bad6e777c152ae5f5c591c56048c7&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&loc_physical_ms=41684&loc_interest_ms=&msclkid=519bad6e777c152ae5f5c591c56048c7 and then get him to tell you where the wall-plate has to go. It's worth noting that if your tiles are for min 17 deg pitch then a bit more gives you 'weasel room'.

And the gutters are on the end of the oversailing spars? A lot of stress on that joint, I'd guess. How many rafters? 1st thought was steel plates, but that's a lot of fabricating, particularly if you do them both sides.

My last IWI stint was just into the new 'regime'. I was client, PD and PC. It was well within my sphere of experience, but it has made me think re more 'complicated' jobs. Not so much will I need dwgs, but will I be able to 'prove' the 'skills and competencies' (or whatever the wording is) to the 'powers that be'. I have no doubt that I have them (all this is stuff I have done many times for myself and others), but will 'the system' be satisfied?

Only if you say it more than once.

It could work, but I have to say I have never heard of cheek ventilators. Might you perhaps be asking a lot of the air to follow a tortuous route? (I don't know the answer!). I do like the idea of a builder even thinking of venting the cheeks, though. I am not sure I have ever come across it before.

My contractor used mainly 40+mm limestone, with no fines. I don't think there were any stones under 30mm. but what you show looks fine, and fines-free. Really as long as it lacks fines which could emulate cement you are probably OK.

Yes. As the existing plaster will be an unknown quantity in a 1950's house (?breathable?) you may be best to hack that off and do a 12mm lime parge coat. Tooth it for about half its thickness and bed the boards in, then mechanically fix with plastic hammer fixings. Finish with a toothed coat of lime plaster, then mesh, then another coat, and just trowel up if you like a coarse finish, or use a fine lime finish if you like 'mirror-polished'. @Roger440 said "WUFI assesment is an awful lot of money to do just a wall or one room though." Yes, agreed, and practitioners sometimes hard to find, too, but not if the OP is maybe going to add IWI throughout the house, and also not if your WF merchant offers the service for free, as at least one does.

Absolutely fine to add insulation, but your initial post suggested that he saw the removal of the plaster as a 'trigger' point *requiring* you to comply with Part L (which in this case I am pretty sure it isn't, as the wall already complies). You could do just PIR, or you could consider an insulating plaster, or wood-fibre, or whatever you are comfortable with. I like wood fibre a lot. Whatever you decide to do it's worth getting a WUFI dynamic condensation risk assessment done.

I do not (and as I read it the Approved Document L does not) agree with your BCO. Page 26 of Approved Doc L has a table (4.3) showing a threshold U value (0.7) and an improved U value for filled cavity walls. I am pretty sure that UF foam (if still intact as you suggest) would give you 0.55W/m2K in a 65mm cavity, if rockwool is reckoned to do in a 50mm cavity. Anyway, as far as I am aware (although it is often misinterpreted) the 0.7 threshold means that if it is worse than 0.7 you have to achieve the target (of 0.55). I am even more sure it will have achieved 0.7. It sounds like your BCO is trying to make the 0.3 target for solid walls stick. I would write to them saying your wall already complies and that, accordingly, you will be taking no further action. Edit: Seen a lambda figure of 0.029W/mK for UF foam. At 65mm, with a base-case R value for the original unfilled wall of around 0.66m2K/W, that should give you a U value of around 0.35W/m2K, WAY better than table 4.3 requires a cavity wall to achieve.

I have used 21 Degrees (formerly Green Building Store). 21 Degrees seems to be a big network, so it's their Huddersfield office you are looking for - Chris Herring and Bill Butcher have been my contact-people.