NON cavity wall insulation, methods?

[aaron]

Happy new year everyone!

Having recently bought a house which is 1930's built, it is noticeably colder than our previous one. It has 9" solid brick walls and a tendency to grow mildew spots in corners of rooms!

Can anyone recommend a tried and tested method of internally insulating rooms with outside walls........... Please.

I have heard about fixing battens down the walls then plaster boarding over them, leaving an air gap behind or cavity behind. Sounds like a good idea but will the damp not still grow in the cavity on the inside of the external wall?

Any ideas welcome!

[Llanigraham]

Aaron,
we live an even older house so have had similar problems.
Last year we insulated the longest wall in our bedroom by battening with 2" vertical timbers and cross pieces, infilled with 2" thick wool insulating "bats", then covered with silver backed plaster board. This has made a huge difference to the temperature of the room. The wool is unaffected by any damp, but we are told that because the inner face of the wa;ll is now covered it won't get damp anyway.
This year we have just done the same on 2 walls in the kitchen and are noticing the difference already.

[Mutz]

Kingspan thermal boards.

You can buy plaster board with insulation already fixed to back. neither of which are cheap, but its the correct way of doing it.

Aaron, your problems are probably caused by the heat you are producing hitting the cold walls and causing condensation/mould, if these are insulated it should stop the mildew; but you would be better having airflow behind the panels.

Are you still in Norwich?

[T30CDB]

Your mildew spots are caused by the lack of fresh air ventilation. ncover any air bricks in the wall. If there are none put some in high up in each room. The insulated plaster board is the best method by far but not cheap !

[aaron]

Hi guys thanks for your comments.

Llanigraham : this sounds like the way forward!

T30CDB : we have vent bricks, in each room upstairs and venting the floor boards downstairs. Our windows are all on vent too, so we should have plenty of fresh air !

Mutz :Hi how are you? Long time no see! We are still living in Norwich just moved over to Thorpe St Andrew. How is the 90 coming on?

[Mutz]

Not far from me then, Hmm 90 is in the rolling chassis stage.

Long way to go but funds are low at the moment; so it will just have to wait a bit longer.

Sold my Blue Paj, and just using the wifes Black Paj when i want to go laning.

[Range Rover Blues]

I heard of an old house in Gainsborough that the new occupants decided to redecorate only to find several inches of newspaper under the wallpaper.

[wheels244]

Have a look at this - it should help.

http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=1921

I'm just about to embark on doing some of our house - early 1700's with 18in stone walls - apparentley solid walls will lose heat over twice as fast as a cavity wall  :(

[carbore]

Some good advice here and that forum link is also interesting.

We opted for foam/foil backed platerboard at about 30cm called xtratherm. Oyr walls are 2ft thick stone, no cavity. Having moved in over Christmas I can say the house is now amazing at statying warm. We really went to town on inulation as it has the fastest payback rate over say solar heatign/ground source etc.

If you batton it off the walls or "dot and dab"  (Balically glue it) then you shoudl have no more damp form condensation. Beware though that its quite thick so think about how that affects any electrical sockets or switches on the wall and how you will finish the reveals/sills  around the windows.

And buy for a builders merchant after phoning around for a lot of quotes, ask for best prices and dont pay the first thing your quoted. We started on 5% disocunt and ended up on about 20% for our materials (mind you we spent a blinking fortune)

[jay2578]

battening the walls then plasterboarding is probably the cheapest option, but make sure you use vapour barrier, which is bought on a roll(looks a bit like sandwich bag material) which is a lot cheaper than the vapour barrier plasterboard . staple this over the battens before fixing the plasterboard. using kingspan etc. is also a good idea, but you will still need an air gap of at least 20mm otherwise the kingspan acts as a moisture bridge and the damp and mould will return.
 to use kingspan to its full potential you would need at least 3" x 2" timbers fixed edge on, 40mm kingspan sandwiched in between, vapour barrier over that, then plasterboard. overall you`d lose about 3and a half inches of floorspace per wall

[Lucy1978]

there is a prduct that  can be sprayed on teh outside of the walls as insulation, it's then rendered over.  I can't remember the name of it though.

[wheels244]

Update:

I've just done one of my daughters bedroom.
The room for some reason was always 3 degrees C cooler than the rest of the house.
I've put insulating plaster board with 2" foam backing on the inside of the 2 external walls - the results are nothing short of spectacular !
It's turned a cold room typically 17 degrees C in cold weather even with the heating going full blast, to a warm room typically 21 degrees C for the same conditions.
I couldn't be happier and will be doing other rooms as I decorate or upgrade the rooms.