marshian

Having insulated the suspended ground floor with PIR from the crawl space below I really don't want to have to deal with PIR again Cutting it down so it fits thro the loft hatch fills me with dread........... I considered removing some roof tiles and battens so I could post it thro in full sheet size to avoid cutting it and then making good but removed it from my thought process........ I do like the walk way idea for access but I need a storage area even if it's capacity is limited

Was an option - last year when I was thinking about it - got as far as costing it out and got to £500 without any insulation cost - it's good but it's expensive and I'm not sure it's going to be any lighter

Considered it but felt it was probably not the best place to put any load

Oh and a picture might help - this one side of the loft from when I was moving the Cold water tank to a location that wasn’t overhanging the loft hatch It’s the same length behind me and there are two legs of the roof going out left and right House is a T shape so a lot of the roof structure is bloody hard to negotiate

Bit of background - 33 years ago we bought the current house - it was built in 1982 and insulated to 1980 stds - Loft had 25mm of blown fibreglass loft insulation in the 75mm truss depth When I looked up in the loft it was clear that it was getting blown around - so some of it I replaced with roll style loft insulation in 75 mm and other areas I boarded out to stop the existing insulation moving around. I had an abundant supply of free euro pallet sized 22mm chipboard so it was easy to do piecemeal and they went up thro the loft hatch easily. I got power sockets and lighting up there as well as a decent loft ladder because I've moved the cold water store and CH header tank to make better use of the space (Well and to stop my back hitting the framework every damn time I went into the loft because it overhung the loft hatch) That's how it stayed for many years - a few areas of the loft got extra insulation laid across the roof trusses another 100mm so at best in some areas I have 175mm in other areas it's just 75mm - so pretty poor by modern stds I considered getting rid of the boarding but having the central area boarded out gives me good access to most of the loft without sicking my feet where they shouldn't and whilst it's only really got a few empty suitcases, Xmas decorations and a few sailing bits finding homes for them out of the loft would be difficult. I'd really like to increase the depth of insulation in the boarded out area and replace the loft hatch with a modern one with better seals and now the weather is starting to turn this is my opportunity to plan and execute I want to re-use the existing boarding where I can because it's already up there I had considered 8 x 2 Joists but they works out at 9 kgs per metre and that sort of weight plus the boards already used is going to build up quite fast - then there is the cost of wood these days........ I looked at loft legs but meh......... sorry they just look flimsy and well I'm not convinced. I'm not a lard arse but I wouldn't trust them Then I saw another thread on here where I-Joists were being used on a build - a couple of quick searches and it seems 220mm I-Joists are 3kg per metre They'd be a heck of a lot easier to man handle up thro the house and the loft hatch and it would get me much closer to the 300mm insulation depth I'd like to get to. All the internal walls of the house are thermalite blockwork and ground floor is replicated on the first floor so the roof trusses are very well supported but I don't want to put too much additional weight up there. If I-Joists are prohibitive cost wise I could probably cut sheet OSB down and tile batten and my my own Daft Idea or does it have some merit?

It's actually quite a long border Suffolk literally surrounds my town and the next town from me Norfolk almost surrounds it - it's like no-one wanted either which is probably true!!!

@Alan Ambrose I was hoping it would

Amen to that - general knowledge base is poor and the general view is the UK doesn't need or want the benefits of DHWP / X plan - it's S or Y plan and that's your choice........... I my case I specified DHWP and "X plan" and I got a weather compensated S plan because the Gas engineer didn't know what X plan was - I should have got him to fit the boiler and commision it and done all the rest myself!!!

Really nice work and great joinery too. Well done I'd be bloody happy with that for £4K I think we spent 4K last time we refurbed our bathroom 7 years ago but it was all off the shelf stuff

I had my 100W (Heat only) fitted by a Viessmann trained Gas Engineer at the end of July I was really specific about what I wanted and how I wanted it set up (not specific enough in hindsight) Hopefully the HW demand box, the Wifi Module and the NO CH zone valve (to replace the NC zone valve that was fitted) will all get fitted very soon then I can turn on the weather compensation and the CH can do it's CH thing based on a the WC curve and the HW I can set up to do it's thing at an elevated flow temp in a reasonable time frame. Once it's all sorted I might do a little thread on it. It does amaze me how low the Viessman can go in terms of flow temp and output.

Reminds me of my neighbour - He had a Viessman 100W Heat only boiler fitted - with weather compensation but not DHWP - consequently his flow temp is fixed for CH at 68 deg (Because any lower than that and his HW is not heated in a reasonable time) totally negates the point of weather compensation because the boiler isn't actually using it despite there being an outside temp sensor on the north facing wall. At the end of the day he's got a nice boiler but he's not taking any advantage of what it can do when the temperatures aren't -2

I'm bang on the Norfolk/Suffolk Border but I'm Suffolk born

This was my solution We never had a problem with pigeons on the close I’ve lived for 33 years till recently….. 3 years back English Heritage repointed up a local church ruins - all the nooks and crannies were filled up and all the ledges covered in spikes - so the population of pigeons and doves decamped 50 yards to the nearest houses Each house got 4 to 5 new roof top occupants The first year they decimated all the fruit trees and so we pruned them back the second year they destroyed every single young plant in the veg patch the other half does every year The other half tried feeding them to save her veg patch this year - they pulled the young plants up and left them The territorial males constantly fight for the right to f (party) - they s (defacate) over everything - windows cars patio decking it’s everywhere and I have one modern car with water based paint and the laquer coat is utterly ruined in places The doves I leave alone - the feral pigeons unfortunately I don’t - there is a “bird table” in the garden now that has a substantial back stop (6 inches thick) They soon get used to feeding from there They get a weeks worth of free food then they get despatched Downside is that as they seem rather territorial more move in But numbers are going down…… about 4 a fortnight

I think that tells you all you need to know - they are working to a one size fits all script and complies with the BUS grant criteria I’d find someone who actually will design a system that meets your criteria which I don’t think is impossible at all No local “heat geek” trained installer???

That is the value for the wall but for the section below it looks like averages the wall Window and Door area by the U value for each by area then divides it by the total area

I honestly think you need to find another supplier - if they aren't listening you are almost certainly going to get what you don't want I am assuming here that you are going for the BUS grant?

330 m3 is a big house - are you really going to replace all that air in the house every hour? Seems a bit high? 21 Deg for all rooms also seems a bit high - if the house is relatively well designed and sealed then a target temp of 19 is fine for me

3.1 Oversize factor (from the Heat Emitor Guide) They are trying to improve the Heat pump efficiency by ensuring the operational flow temp is 45 deg is my guess so 3.1 x oversize for the room heat loss https://zlcenergy.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/MIS-3005-Supplementary-Information-2-Heat-Emitter-Guide-v2.0.pdf

That expansion pipe is full of water until it rises above the level of the cold store (Funny story I know this becuase I wasn't thinking straight one day and cut into it to change it's route without drain down - luckily I had a bucket nearby and some self amalgamating tape to temporarily cover my error) Anyway heat rises and it will be a source of losses (I am very tempted to fit a london loop in mine to see if it makes any difference)

I think of it like that too - Loft temp in the spring/summer/autumn in daylight hours can regularly be above 30 Deg C for most of the day and has occasionally hit low 40's I have a data logger recording temp and humidity up there because I was concerned about pipes freezing in the winter after I moved the cold water tank to a better location and increased the length of all the pipework by 3m This winter (when temps are cooler) the plan is to increase the level of insulation up there which will lower the cold temps further

We have a 114 Litre tank (Ish) we heat water once a day between 7am and 8am to around 50 deg (this fluctuates a bit because the water heating is timed rather than to a set temp point) This gives us enough water for 2 showers AM and 2 showers PM - I have data logging temp sensor at top of tank and another at the bottom However this means our graphical representation looks a little weird but fundamentally once the morning showers are done the water at the bottom of the tank is replaced with water from the cold store in the loft above Our energy usage in summer for water heating is much lower than the winter where the cold store tank (cold loft) is at a much lower temp

Assuming S or Y Plan - How close is that rad to the HW tank return to the boiler pipework? (is it just pipework stealing heat by convection?)

Old topic but I got our water bill today and we used 97 Litres per person per day (70,500 litres per year) Previous years have been consistently around the 110 Litres per person per day The one outlier was 2021 when I'm pretty sure a leaking cistern (that I hadn't noticed) drove up the usage to 160 Litres per person per day

A - Restrict the feed with an isolation valve? B - Add a small length of capped pipe vertically before the cistern connection - creates a pressure absorber with no mechanical parts to worry about Upstairs in my house the toilets are all gravity feed so no issues with shut offs causing pipe work noises - downstairs I have one on mains pressure I tried A but it was still filling very quickly and causing pipework noise so I did B and that made the pipework silent

Stick your postcode in here https://www.degreedays.net/?gad_source=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIsoL13PmohAMVG7CDBx27swedEAAYASAAEgJ_bPD_BwE Will find the nearest weather station to you and if you want you can download the temps by hour for up to 36 months or HDD data as a value by day Excellent data resource for me as I have 3 weather stations within 10 miles of me The HDD data I find really useful to compare if improvements (Boiler/insulation etc) are working or not - my base line target is 3.7 kWh per HDD - if I use more than then I've left a door open or I've got my boiler set up wrong!!!