North West EnerPhit Retrofit

[TimL]

Hello all,

 

I'm a chemical engineer working in the sustainable energy industry (who right now wishes he was a structural/civil engineer) and I'm just over one year into an EnerPHit retrofit of a three bed end terrace. I'm passionate about sustainable housing and sustainable urban design.

Currently in the middle of levelling a concrete ground floor and working out how to reinforce a timber first floor of a house that has been stripped virtually back to brick.

This is my first time joining a forum of any kind and I look forward to hearing advice from the community! 😃

[SteamyTea]

Welcome

 

It is about time we had a useful chemist on here again.

My knowledge is very limited in the black art and usually involves a bucket and stick.

[Adrian Walker]

Tim

 

This podcast from Ben Adam-Smith is worth a listen.

 

Tim Nicholson, Joanne Bowlt and their two boys live in a 1960s end of terrace house in Oxford. Recently they started work on upgrading the property but why did they choose to retrofit? 

 

https://www.houseplanninghelp.com/why-retrofit-a-house-for-energy-efficiency/

 

 

 

[Alan Ambrose]

@TimL I would be very interested to hear your insulation plans. I'm struggling with the idea that a lot of retrofits need to use external wall insulation and in a lot of cases in towns (e.g. brick Victorian terraces) the planners almost certainly won't allow individual houses to use EWI and, say, render. So, I can't square that circle atm.

[ToughButterCup]

10 hours ago, TimL said:

.....

This is my first time joining a forum of any kind and I look forward to hearing advice from the community! 😃

 

Welcome!

The trick in Structural Engineering is knowing the chemistry of the materials being used ..... 

A colleague of ours did an Enerphit (re)build in Lancaster  his screen-name is (was) he doesn't post any more .... @VIPMan

 

Click on his screen-name and you'll be taken to his content. Excellent build, lovely bloke.

Ian

[SteamyTea]

59 minutes ago, ToughButterCup said:

The trick in Structural Engineering is knowing the chemistry of the materials being used

Which is based on Physics.

 

[TimL]

12 hours ago, Adrian Walker said:

Tim

 

This podcast from Ben Adam-Smith is worth a listen.

 

Tim Nicholson, Joanne Bowlt and their two boys live in a 1960s end of terrace house in Oxford. Recently they started work on upgrading the property but why did they choose to retrofit? 

 

https://www.houseplanninghelp.com/why-retrofit-a-house-for-energy-efficiency/

 

 

 

I've come across House Planning Help somewhere before and I think I subscribed to their mailing list. Though those emails got buried amongst a mountain of other stuff so I had forgotten about it. Thanks for the suggestion, I'll check it out.

[TimL]

10 hours ago, Alan Ambrose said:

@TimL I would be very interested to hear your insulation plans. I'm struggling with the idea that a lot of retrofits need to use external wall insulation and in a lot of cases in towns (e.g. brick Victorian terraces) the planners almost certainly won't allow individual houses to use EWI and, say, render. So, I can't square that circle atm.

For the first stage we're putting in 30mm Kingspan TF70 under our floors and struggling to find someone who will do specifically party wall insulation (as opposed to cavity wall insulation which we already have). Later on when we've saved enough to afford it, we plan on putting in EWI, installing Passivhaus windows and doors and insulating the rafters to expand the thermal envelope to include the loft space. We're not sure how our local planning inspectors might feel about brick slip render on EWI since we're nowhere near that stage yet - our Passivhaus architect seemed to think this would do. I wouldn't fancy losing so much internal floor space to internal wall insulation, which I imagine is the only other way you can reach EnerPHit levels.

Didn't realise what journey it would be preparing the floor for insulation. Chiselled up about 45mm of screed by hand (so the new floor level wouldn't be so high we couldn't open the doors), filled a gas pipe channel under that screed with concrete (after disconnecting the gas) and we're currently pouring a few hundred kilos of self levelling compound to try and achieve the 5mm over 3m levelness specified by Kingspan.