Vaillant ashp (my battle with).

[Big Jimbo]

@-rick- so is the heat going through the ceiling, through the floor, and rising through the upper floor between the outside wall, and the PIR in the wood frame ? Then rising through into the roof space, and being blown out through the tiles / eaves vents ?

[-rick-]

Just now, Big Jimbo said:

@-rick- so is the heat going through the ceiling, through the floor, and rising through the upper floor between the outside wall, and the PIR in the wood frame ? Then rising through into the roof space, and being blown out through the tiles / eaves vents ?

 

Honestly not sure. @zoothorn has attempted to seal off the outside so we should be talking just internal air bypassing the insulation and touching the cold wall but I struggle to see why the space just isn't taking heat if it's well sealed.

 

One of the reasons I think these two upper rooms should be approached first is that any hidden issues behind these walls (and maybe at the floor/wall junction) can be addressed.

[Big Jimbo]

@-rick- if the framed filled with Pir is not tight to the wall, and stands off the wall at the top and bottom, chances are you have the tent effect, just like badly done dot and dab ?

[-rick-]

Yes. Sorry if it wasn't clear, I agree with the plasterboard tent description. Just wanted to claify the build up.

[Big Jimbo]

So the thick brick block, or stone wall is in effect doing nothing. The heat in the air gap is not being obtained by the wall. Its being washed away by that space being open to free air.

[Big Jimbo]

So, as i said, Holes around the top and bottom, through the plasterboard, and the 25mm PIR behind it, into the air gap top and bottom, and seal the bloody things up. That way, you have a dead air space, and a chance for that air to retain heat.

[Big Jimbo]

Might cause dead rot, dry rot, cold rot, snot rot, or whatever bloody else. Zoot the hoot (no offense fella) will be dead by then from the fecking cold. Just because you have some shite old stone crumbly walls or whatever, does not stop you heating a house up. The bloody heat escaping is what stops the bloody walls eventually heating up.

If you build 4 outside walls 1m thick, and light a bloody great fire in the middle of the room. You might still not get the walls to heat up if you forgot to put a bloody roof on.

Zoots house is freezing cold, because no matter how much heat he pumps in, The place leaks like a sieve. Block up a load of those escape routes, and retain the heat within the building. The heat never reaches the stone cold walls, because it's all gone before it gets there.

 

[Big Jimbo]

Zoot has got some mass, and that should store some heat, and block some heat loss. althought might have a shite U value it would still do the above. It ain't because the heat is gone before it gets there.

[zoothorn]

2 hours ago, -rick- said:

 

I'm sorry I missed that. In which case changes needed.

 

 

Do you notice much difference in comfort with the new setup?

 

 

I think if I was in your position I'd want to attack this before attacking the floor. It's much less work and you've said you don't use the rooms much so tearing into them should be less disruptive than the floor. It should be cheaper too and you might be able to use the opportunity to stuff insulation under the floor of the bedrooms. Result might be that those two rooms become much easier to heat. You could move your living room area up there and be warm while then considering what to do downstairs and stopping the cold from coming down the walls will likely help downstairs also.

 

Edit to add, I think I saw you said you think the void behind the plasterboard/PIR is 4". If so, filling that with mineral wool (replacing the PIR) brings you up to pretty modern insulation standards. It's also something you can do one or two sheets of plasterboard at a time limiting mess and that feeling of risk in tearing the place up to make a change.

Do I notice any difference in comfort (with the replacement Monobloc, for the old Split system). Hard to say. Apologies you are dealing with rather a simpleton here Rick.
 

I can obviously notice the rads can get warmer. But now, I only have them on for 2x AM & PM blocks of 2 hours. Wheras before, the rads came on/ off basically during the day.

 

So to answer your Q: erm, I think I'd have to say kinda even stevens.

 

Tbh I find all heating system infuriatingly complicated, that I can't understand why the rad is sometimes on, then a bit later it's off. You mentioned before, about TRV's, as if you expected them to be on my rads. But I don't have any on my rads. When I had them on a property before, I found them infuriatingly impossible to understand. One minute the rad is on flatout, & I was too hot, then half an hour later the rad wasn't seemingly on (but it was within the block time the heaters were meant to be on) & the room was pretty cold again.

 

My parents place, is THE most unfathomably infuriatingly impossible to understand heating situation. I stay few days, & so they put the storage heater on for me. Medium settings on both dials, nothing daft. At 3am O wake in a sweat, the room gallopingly hot.. & the damn thing's almost flat out hot. At 3am. At the very time you DON'T want a radiator on. Then at 9pm, it's barely warm at all. Just when you DO want the radiator on. 
 

The installer mentioned something about setback time. And my head explodes. Setback time, TRV's, I mean jesusH. I just want to be able to put a rad on from 6-8pm, medium hot. Any rad. Any system. But I'm just not allowed to. It's fkn nuts. And so at my folk's house, 1st thing I do, in midwinter as I get there.. is go upstairs & switch the storage heater off. So I can sleep without being woken up in a sauna at 4:23am.

 

Sorry I digress yet again. TRV's & thermostats separate from them.. & my head explodes. I just can't deal with these stupid UK heating systems. So tbh I'm best off with a hottie & a leccyB under my butt seeing my breath at home here!!

 

Thanks, Zoot

[zoothorn]

41 minutes ago, -rick- said:

Yes. Sorry if it wasn't clear, I agree with the plasterboard tent description. Just wanted to claify the build up.

Me back on track..

 

Yes now I understand the analogy of the tent. I think. Do I? No hang on.. I don't think I do.

 

Tent. Right so I put up a tent. It has 4 sides, and is cold in the middle. But the middle has to warmer than the outside. Fk. Panic.
 

Are the 4 thin tent walls (sat upon the ground in a perimeter rectangle) the point here.. or the area within the tent-?
 

Nope. I don't understand the tent analogy. I can't cope with these boxes of text. I need people doing jazz hands or something that I can see like a 4 year old!!

Zoot

 

[-rick-]

7 minutes ago, zoothorn said:

I can obviously notice the rads can get warmer. But now, I only have them on for 2x AM & PM blocks of 2 hours. Wheras before, the rads came on/ off basically during the day.

 

If before the system was supposed to be on all the time and was set to 17C and yet the rads were turning on/off while you could see your own breath then the system wasn't doing what it should. The rads should have been warm continuously.

 

When I was skimming history I saw some talk about the thermometer but not the full context. Where was this located on the old system? On the new? (Thermometer if not separate is likely the controller with the LCD screen for the system). To work properly in your property it really needs to be located in the coldest room.

 

7 minutes ago, zoothorn said:

My parents place, is THE most unfathomably infuriatingly impossible to understand heating situation. I stay few days, & so they put the storage heater on for me. Medium settings on both dials, nothing daft. At 3am O wake in a sweat, the room gallopingly hot.. & the damn thing's almost flat out hot. At 3am. At the very time you DON'T want a radiator on. Then at 9pm, it's barely warm at all. Just when you DO want the radiator on. 

 

My previous flat had storage heaters, they drove me insane and why I desperately searched for a flat with gas/central heating when I bought this place (unusual in modern flats). People on here claim modern ones work much better so long as you know how to set them up but I suspect most people don't and so suffer the behaviour you describe.

 

[-rick-]

3 minutes ago, zoothorn said:

Yes now I understand the analogy of the tent. I think. Do I? No hang on.. I don't think I do.

 

Most commonly used to describe new-builds where they have lots of insulation but also lots of airgaps that effectively outside air bypasses the insulation and sits behind the plasterboard of the room. (Plasterboard sealing off much of the airflow into the room so you don't necessarily feel the drafts but you do feel the cold). So the plasterboard acts as well as a tent does. All the insulation and brick is effectively bypassed and useless from a heating point of view.

 

In your case, used to describe what seems likely that outside air is getting directly behind the plasterboard/PIR upstairs effectively preventing any heat build up in the stone walls.

 

Thick stone walls would normally build heat given enough time - 2ft solid walls if heated right should be a more comfortable/stable environment than victorian brick solid walls. I've lived in a number of houses with brick solid walls and they are cold when the heating is off but warm up fairly easily when the heating is on.

[Big Jimbo]

Zoot. I am very jealous of your cabin overlooking the water. If i ever become homeless, i am going to squat in there.

Live in the cabin. Go for a walk for your mental health, every day, and collect wood. Keep your little wood burner ticking over 24 hours a day, and when you are too warm, (even in the winter) open the window. Sit in your armchair, and write a great book. (We all have One good book in us). When you are too hot, it will make you sleepy. Just let yourself drift off, regardless of time of day. Sounds way more fun than living in your house fella.

[zoothorn]

1 minute ago, -rick- said:

 

If before the system was supposed to be on all the time and was set to 17C and yet the rads were turning on/off while you could see your own breath then the system wasn't doing what it should. The rads should have been warm continuously.

 

When I was skimming history I saw some talk about the thermometer but not the full context. Where was this located on the old system? On the new? (Thermometer if not separate is likely the controller with the LCD screen for the system). To work properly in your property it really needs to be located in the coldest room.

 

 

My previous flat had storage heaters, they drove me insane and why I desperately searched for a flat with gas/central heating when I bought this place (unusual in modern flats). People on here claim modern ones work much better so long as you know how to set them up but I suspect most people don't and so suffer the behaviour you describe.

 

Ahhh... relief. I'm not the only one!! You're the only one on here. I've mentioned this on BuildHub before, my folk's place example etc. And the only replies were kinda a collective "yes storage heaters are meant to do that (IE belt out heat) at 3:38 am".

 

Prior to this explanation though, as I had no other notion other than with my folk's rads doing this insanity at 3:55, it seemed completely logical to me, that their old brown/ beige storage heaters, were long gone/ knackered/ & acting up by kicking off at 3am (further evidence I was further convinced, of their being barely warm at 9pm too).

 

So then, at the advice on here, & because I was concerned my  84/88 yr old folks needed to update their rads to be wrm at 9pm.. I persuaded them to spend £3k on two new ones. 
 

Once up & running, I noticed the new ones were belting hot at 4:11 am.. & barely warm at 9pm. I asked WTF on here etc.. & got the "yes they're meant to do that- they're working correctly" reply I mentioned earlier in this post. So, the old rads weren't knackered at all. The new ones perform exactly the same. My old folks scrimp & save for every £1 eating macaroni cheese 3x a week in their tiny house.. & I felt absolutely terrible. A huge lesson learnt that was. 
 

--

 

Honestly such a relief to read your post here, as you sound as if you understand what I describe. Furthermore found the same inherrant insanity with them, as I did/ still do.

 

Thanks Zoot

[zoothorn]

11 minutes ago, Big Jimbo said:

Zoot. I am very jealous of your cabin overlooking the water. If i ever become homeless, i am going to squat in there.

Live in the cabin. Go for a walk for your mental health, every day, and collect wood. Keep your little wood burner ticking over 24 hours a day, and when you are too warm, (even in the winter) open the window. Sit in your armchair, and write a great book. (We all have One good book in us). When you are too hot, it will make you sleepy. Just let yourself drift off, regardless of time of day. Sounds way more fun than living in your house fella.

Ahh thanks BigJ.

 

It's THE most wonderful little space, the ammount of times Ive snoozed off almost as soon as I put a C4 ipad download doco on, with the stream noise outside.
 

It's just running the gauntlet wrapped up for that 1st 1/2 hour freezing until it's just cosy enough.. that's the caveat. Older you get, the bigger a bugbear that is to face. But it takes just 40mins to get from 0 to 19*C. And your mood increaces in harmony, as you recall with your tent as a kid, the campfire etc. It really does have that diddy thrill factor of 'camping out' at the end of the garden. Even as a 55 yr old baldy barst, with terrible breath, athletes foot, bad back, appaling footrot, overpowering BO, piles, squiffy eyes, what else can I throw in the pot.. my limp, frightful flatulence, & my terrible drooling habit. You see I can do all that.. in my fkn cabin. Still wanna come stay?

 

Zoot