Upside Down Living Heating Options

[daveincornwall]

Hi, 

 

Thanks for reading and any help would be greatly appreciated. 

 

We are just about to start a project to add a second storey to a 1970's bungalow. We will need to entirely remove the roof, all ceilings and are going from a hip roof to gable end. 

 

We are going to go upside down living and starting to look at heating options. At the moment the EPC is an F, the new build is to current regs so upstairs will be well insulated, we are also going to add a layer of plasterboard insulation to the entire inside downstairs, and looking to add a heat loss fan at the top of the stairs to try and keep heat in. We are going to have a fire upstairs too. 

 

Currently we are on bottled gas, which definitely isn't going to be what we have afterwards. We don't really have an option for oil or ground source. 

 

So we are exploring options around: 

PV's

Air source 

Electric rads (of various types) 

Wind generation (it's pretty windy!) 

Underfloor heating

 

But would love some advice as to what people think may be the most effective and efficient going forwards. Don't mind a bigger outlay now if it's going to help in the long run and definitely want the house to be warm as we have two under threes at the moment. 

 

Any help would really be greatly appreciated. Thanks. 

 

Added pics of the plans for info. 2259_11 Proposed Plans (1).pdf2259_11 Proposed Plans (1).pdf

Edited October 13 by daveincornwall
Add plans

[Conor]

Do you have cost estimates for this work and have you compared these to a new build? What stage are you at?

[Benpointer]

If it were me taking the roof off a bungalow, I'd use it as an opportunity to raise the ground floor enough to put in a decent amount of floor insulation + UFH and replace the bottled gas by ASHP.  

 

UFH upstairs too and an 'upside down' house works in your favour where you normally want the living areas a bit warmer than the bedrooms.

[daveincornwall]

29 minutes ago, Conor said:

Do you have cost estimates for this work and have you compared these to a new build? What stage are you at?

Yeah we had cost estimates for both and whole new build was going to be approx 30 percent extra. Which we just can't afford sadly. 

 

We're starting the roof take off next month. 

[daveincornwall]

18 minutes ago, Benpointer said:

If it were me taking the roof off a bungalow, I'd use it as an opportunity to raise the ground floor enough to put in a decent amount of floor insulation + UFH and replace the bottled gas by ASHP.  

 

UFH upstairs too and an 'upside down' house works in your favour where you normally want the living areas a bit warmer than the bedrooms.

This is something we are considering, we just need to insulate super well to get the most out of the ASHP and for it to not cost a fortune. Think this would work out more cost effective than electric rads over time? 

[Benpointer]

1 minute ago, daveincornwall said:

This is something we are considering, we just need to insulate super well to get the most out of the ASHP and for it to not cost a fortune. Think this would work out more cost effective than electric rads over time? 

It should work out 3-4 time more cost effective to run than electric rads because of the COP efficiency.  BUT...  as others will point out, ASHP and UFH really needs a well insulated airtight house, then you can ditch the idea of heating on/off times and keep the house at a constant comfortable temperature all the time.

 

Other things to consider: air-tightness, MVHR, and triple-glazed windows without trickle vents.