Loft Lining

[TrailRat]

I live next to a busy main road and my loft is filled with a black soot like substance that I'm sure is from the car exhuasts so I would like to line my loft with something.

I have considered cheap tarpaulin but I would like to let my loft "breath" still and I think it would affect the way the insulation works too.

I have also thought about buying rolls of cheap polycotton which would keep the soot of my stuff and let my loft breath too.

Some might suggest just getting the loft boarded out on the roof rafters but this will prove expensive and I'm only a tenant in this property. My landlord wouldn't pay for it.

I was just lookingfor other possible cheap solutions that can stapled to the roof rafters. Cheap being the optimum word.

Many Thanks

[Andrew Gabriel]

It's almost certainly mostly historic. It came from smoke from fireplaces in the locality and drift from stubble burning, both of which have pretty much ceased.

There's loads in the loft of a 1900 house, but none has appeared on the stuff we put up there 20 years ago.

[TrailRat]

Ahhh no this isn't old soot, the house was built in the 30's (I think) and when I moved in I did at the expense of the landlord I laid insulation and floorboards. Before my stuff went up there it was hoovered out and cleaned up. But now my boxes of stuff is coated in this black soot! So in a massive sort out and clear up, lining the loft is one of the key jobs.