scottishjohn

you reasons on slate -- first one is you need 2 rowas at bottom to cover gaps in bottm row second is to slow up speed of water coming of roof what they did with my house is to use grp sheeting approx 12" wide under first row to make up the gaps --its less than 1mm thick ,so making slaters job much easier

looking closely at picture it wound appear the both gables are higher than the midlle measurement inside from ceiling joists or wall head to ridge in multiple places including both ends will show if it is indeed sagging if modern house not much chance of jacking it up on ceiling joists as they will be part of the truss and then adding more cross braces-you would need to bring up some serious timber to put across the wall head to jack against one truss at a time measurement first will tell you what you need to know - do you have any thoughts of making rooms up there ? you could jack up and then add sister strusses - not an easy job or add new ones of the attic type get the roof striaght and then cut out cross braceson old ones ones where needed and you have beginning of attic conversion ? maybe not enough head room though going by picture I am guessing the raters are not covered in OSB or sarking boards--just tar paper across the rafters my guess trusses were slightly under spec for weight and this is the result how old is house ?

yes my planning states that gates must be 6m back from road -to allow gettingo ut of car to open gates and not blocking road

to add my two pence worth my house has 6-700mm granite stone walls ,then 50mm air gap then 150mm t/f and insulation I can say now that mass matters to making a stable temp even now with still no bifolds fitted --but just blanked off with ill fitting osb -no heating as yet the temp inside is stable and in rooms that are finshed that get sun -and bear in mind these are not huge windows in old stone house the temp goes up noticably so much there have been days when joiners and plasters have complained of it being colder inside than out and upsatairs where it is all plasetered etc it is much warmer . but yes i agree with others that spending on insulation and stopping air leaks sghould be top priority on any house--

Iwould ring everbuild tech to see if it is happy going onto damp OSB

you can buy ready made grp flashings/ edging of all shapes to do what you are suggesting

there are plenty of adhesives that work on steel like sixaflex --that sticks your car windscreen in all you will need is an adhesion promoter primer I used to replace part body panels on cars with it - so idid not have to distrub the weldsand sealing of them the lotus alluminimum chassis are stuck together with it If you can,t find it ring your local windscreen company and ask them --maybe they will give you some ? or speak to SIKA tech dept --they will sort you out

yes side extension - no mention of how many floors etc -- just wanted 1m to boundary which if you think about it is sensible for repairs and alos inmtial building ,you need over 1m to get scaffolding in

not so sure my experience of concrete raft houses on old brickworks ,as we had alot of them in manchester ,was that the clay dried out under the slab over time ,contracted and then left voids , this is why on clay ground they want very deep foundations how deep are founds for house --have you dug down deep enough to find where they stop?

and did you have wall bracing system in place?

I know when I looked ta an extension to current house anything less than 1m was problem for planning

vented at fireplace and capped or open chimneys? if no vent in fireplace then your chimney will be another source of damp --rain going down them

what do you see from inside --a flat roof or can you see the shape -- is that wood work venting the space?

heating is a seperate problem and if rooms are large enough then easiest way is to build new studs walls inside outer walls with vpaour barrier and insulation in it can you afford to loose 140m- 150mm on inside of all outside walls , would still be very good if you only went for 100mminsulation ,then strapit to leave service void before plaster board ,that way there would be little or no penetrations in the vapour/air tightness barrier you then have same spec as a new build !! ,and somehting you can do in bits with not that much upheaval ,good time to rewire if its on the cards certainly iwould not otuch original plaster etc --just build inside them aslo the itme to retro fit UFH while skirting boards are off -ready for you ASHP at some point retro fit UFH can be done in under 50mm thickness just suggestions to bring your house into 21 century in a an easy doable way for the diy man while still living there again it is the only sensible way to insulate that sort of house ,

my thoughts are that adding mechanical ventilation is not really getting to the bottom of problem when house was built it must have had enough draft through the roof space or it would have rotted away 60 years ago a cols roof must have a good flow or air thorugh it and very well insulated from the living space with no leaks of hot humid air from that into the cold roof area It really is as simple as that you say walls are solid --no gaps ,so there must have been good ventilation from eves when it was built so simple answer maybe to fit a row of slate vetns close to bottom of roof and a higher row near top --unless you absolutl;y sure your ridges are also venting

got to be worth a shot --on energy savings grounds at least not as though you trying to lift roof up more than 150mm? at worst ,probaly less

is this a picture of your roof ? cos it looks like you got 2 seperate ones with a valley bewteen them and a dormer as well ? all these parts need good ventilation

when doing the vallies I questioned my roofer why? he was cutting the lead into 1,5m lengths -- apart from being easier to do a good job the main reason was it allows for expansion in the summer ,just overlapeed by 150mm each section other thing i noticed was there was no double row at bottom at gutter,which you normally would have to do , they used a thin grp flat sheet which went up past first real over lap --very neat and makes a good edge at bottom

you do not state if walls are cavity type =2bricks with a gap bewtween presbt spec suggests at least 25mm -- some like 50 mm also the side with the non breathable plastic sheet --is that on top of OSB or sarking --or is it jusst a sheet and tile battons --as they used to use in english type houses? If you look at modern brickwork they now use vertical plastic vents in between the bricks every couple of metre or so right up the walls and top of walls have a fire stop --so air flow will in ina bottom vents and out at top that is to make a draft between the 2 brick walls and the top of the walls should not be covered,as that will stop airflow --eg your loft flooring going over the gap in the walls certainly a vented dry ridge system is good but still needs vents at eves to make an airflow out of the top,as warm air rises.or lots of slate vents on both sides of roof other wise the air will not move very quickly and maybe become stagnant a " cold roof" is meant to have an airflow to stop condensation and humidity building up all your insulation should be on outside of living area and well sealed as any leakageoof warm air will cost you in heating and make condensation worse there should have been a vapour barrier behind any plaster board that is ajoing any ouside walls or roof space. replacing your plaster section on one side with foam backed plasterboard after a vapour barrier should address all your problems without taking up too much space if there is no insulation behind the plaster board then heat will escape and possibly cause condensation on the vapour barrier at inside -so hence it should be vapour barrier ,insulation then plaster board --which is why i suggest using foam bacled plaster board to do both jobs are your tilles /slates fitted to counter battons or just one row of battons one row does not give an air gap between tiles and breathable membrane -- and dirt will gather up on cross battons and over time can cause problems,usally at 3 corners of roof will be first place to cause rot of trusses -double battons first row is vertical ,so no water or crap gathers on them scottish roofs due to extra wind up here use either osb sheeting or sarking boards then breathable membrane and slates are then nailed dicrtly to the boards ,over ime the sarking boards shrink as they dry out and you end up with little gaps whicgh allow some ventilation through the breathable membrane this is still a cold roof so needs ventilation at eves into roof space and out the top ideallyand totally sealed and insulated from living space have search for diagrams on cold roofs and warm roofs

Idid look at that but as we have 700mm original granite walls it was not possible webasically have a modern wood framed house inside granite walls so we went for concrete sub floor --100mm of pir and up the walls then ufh and going screed ontop of that

considering one for my rebuild any evperience of them and nay bad ones to avoid ?

something I have thought about for years why has no one -,to my knowledge made a heated bath to run off CH system It would heat the bathroom when not in use and keep the water warm for that long soak . and also be a towel warmer seems a simple job wrap a plastic bath in UFH piping and resin it in postion --job done If I were younger i would do it my self with a temp stat onso you can set to dired water temp Am i missing some major reason why not?

in answer to yuor question inthe title that will depend onthe roofs construction Iam guessing that there is no vapour barrier below the slates/tiles and it was constructed as a cold roof with lots of ventialtion it sounds lke you now have a ppart sealed roof with no ventilation would that be a good sumation of the situation ? sounds like you need slate vents or eve ventilation above any insulation you have to allow an air flow between your slates /tiles etc and your sealed off area below bottom line is old style cold roofs need to have a proper air flow at underside or you will get problems maybe a dry ridgge stsem will work as that will give you some air flow from eves outthrough the ridge ? your modern vaulted ceiling type roofs have osb cladding and house wrap under the sltes .tiles then pir packed tight up to thenm so there is no cold air in there so its either totally sealed oor cold roof qwith air flow -anything else will not work if the sealed sections with dormer have pir in but no gap above it with no venting from eves to ridge you will get stagnation and moisture . and no leakage of heat from ceilings below open areas so sum up you need airflow from eves to ridhe above any insulation you have is the house constructed with cavity walls ? if so there should be airflow up the gap from under floor or brick vetns just above DPC to loft/roof area which rthen goes out at eves re reading your first post you are saying even downstairs is higher humdiity thaan you would like ,so maybe its a combination of ventilation problems of whole structure If you feel I,m talking nonsense feel free to ignore , lack of heating or ventilation are the usual causes of your problems

there was nothing anywhere when we bought it --but a year on we suddenly had a bees nest --not a problem local bee keeper came and got the queen and the swarm I mean where do you stop if your house is in the country? ,badger sets --fox dens toad and newt migation tracks across to a water source you may have on the site worlds gone mad next thign is you cannot dig a hole in the ground because of worms robins always follow my digger around

strabgly enough there was no rquirement for a radon barrier under my new floor --suprising as its built on solid granite and obsidion so just shows they never get it right