My house (early 1900's semi) has a bedroom in the loft. I've no idea when it was put there but by the look of the construction it was many moons ago. The walls are t&g with some sort of fibreboard fixed to the front and then woodchip. The ceiling is skimmed but I'm not sure what's underneath. I'm pretty certain there's little, if any, insulation between the celing and the roof tiles.
I'd like redo the walls and ceiling with plasterboard, inserting some appropriate insulation and generally bringing things up to a more modern standard.
Does anyone know how much I can change before I need to start implementing things like the door closers on other rooms and the other things that are required for new loft conversions? I'm going to call the local planning dept but just wondered what other people's experiences have been?
Don't get too hung up about the building regulations. With a few notable exceptions, they are usually very reasonable and may save your life. Personally, I'd try to bring up the current standards where possible.
Are there any areas where there is likely to be a problem?
Door closers can just be rising butt hinges. You don't need ugly door pushers.
I can absolutely see the point of smoke alarms and a suitable fire escape route and so on. The room will be used by my kids so I'm not going to cut those corners. What does concern me is that what might start out looking like a DIY job - bit of reboarding, some Celotex here and there, touch of plastering, will very quickly get out of control if I end up having to strengthen the floor and so on!
Just goes to show that I need to do my homework before reaching for the hammer.
The insulation is definitely important, and quite involved. You must design it properly or things can go wrong with condensation or fuel economy. Just bunging on Celotex without understanding about how the moisture in the vapour will behave is not the best technique.
You can get the roof much thinner with better u-Values if it is possible to redo the roof covering. If so, then you can use an unventilated system (saving 50mm), or even a warm roof system (this may be difficult on a semi or terrace unless doing all houses, as it may affect the roof line).
For a loft conversion, you are allowed to drop a bit on the roof u-Value.
To see the vast variety of different possible roof constructions see:
formatting link
you can't relay the tiles/slates, you'll be looking at the "Ventilated" versions, which require tile vents and 50mm gap behind the insulation (fig
2a/2b). If you have 75mm rafters, you'd need 25mm between rafters and 75mm underneath, although I'm not sure if this may result in condensation issues with the top layer being smaller than the underslung one. With 100mm joists it is a non-issue, as you'd be talking 50/50 split.
If you can re-lay, something like "Fully Filled Insulation Between Rafters" with or without sarking board and tile battens. Typically you will have 75mm rafters and 25mm board underneath, which should satisfy building control (fig 1a or 1c). If you have 100mm rafters, you can get 0.27 uValue and attach plasterboard direct to rafters. Although not good enough for new construction, most BCOs would accept this for loft conversion work, although having a thin layer of underslung insulation does prevent cold lines appearing on the rafter lines, which can attract mould.
If you have a detached house and can overcome planning restrictions then
50mm/50mm unventilated warm roof between and above rafters might be appropriate. This will give you full roof underneath with plasterboard attached directly to joists, but will raise the roof, literally!
Well, without sarking, you might get away with an unventilated between rafters only. The closed cell foam may even act as a form of sarking (but with big holes in!). I don't know what the BCO would say, though.
Quick calculation to metric:
152mm x 51mm joists at 355mm centres at a span of 3.96m.
According to Part A, your joists are good for 3.27m. To reach 3.96m, you need 195mm joists. However, it is likely that the limiting factor is floor bounce, not final structural strength. Certainly, your 6" joists are vastly better than what is normally found (i.e. 3" joists) which don't even make the tables. A 4" joist (i.e. 38x97) would only allow 1.83m span.
On Tue, 15 Jun 2004 13:11:15 GMT, a particular chimpanzee named "Mark Walters" randomly hit the keyboard and produced:
Basically, as long as the work at no stage adversely alters the structure or the means of escape in case of fire, then a Building Regulations application won't be needed.
However, when you come to sell the house you may well be asked by your buyer's solicitors for proof that a Building Regulations application was submitted for the original work. If the work was carried out after 1985 then you can apply for a Regularisation certificate. You haven't said if the floor is adequate (not just boards laid over the original 4" ceiling joists) or if there's a fixed stair leading to it from the first floor landing, and the stairs enclosed from first to ground floors. Self closers are the least of it.
Regularising a non compliant loft may involve a fair bit of work which you may not be prepared to do, and would probably be more expensive than starting from scratch. If you go with your proposed option you should perhaps consider whether it's worth spending that money lining and insulating that loft if it's all got to be ripped out before you can sell your house.
I think I would like to improve the current fire escape options by installing a road accessible velux or similar. There is already a side window but you need to get through a gate to get directly below it.
There is a fixed staircase leading up to the room and it was certainly made habitable before 1985.
The floor has proper fixed floorboards - the joists are 6"x2" - and appears to be very stable. There's no obvious bounce and the lath and plaster ceiling of the room below has only a few minor cracks which I take to mean that there's not been a lot of movement.
Yes. Given that you already have 6" joists, I'd be much more inclined to improve fire safety and insulation than joist thickness. The 6" joists are probably no worse than many Victorian properties would have had normally and people don't go round replacing those.
On Wed, 16 Jun 2004 10:17:31 GMT, a particular chimpanzee named "Mark Walters" randomly hit the keyboard and produced :
Apologies, I didn't read the entire thread before replying. It sounds like it was converted legally (or at least, as near as damnit to the requirements at the time), so you only need to concern yourself with upgrading the insulation. A building regulations application would be required for adding a Velux window, but only for the structural work in trimming the rafters, and to control the heat loss through the window.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.