loose fill roof insulation

[AJH]

Has anyone any suggestions for using a loose fill loft insulation for a single storey lean-to porch. The roof is concrete tilesd and I fitted fibre glass wool to one last week but it was quite difficult to spread even though I removed about 50 tiles to gain access. Problem was I broke quite a few tiles which were nailed to battens and then had to replace battens also.

So now I want to remove the minimum of tiles and no battens to place some loose fill insulation to cut the work, the area is only 8' by 4'.

[RJH]

Not the answer you're looking for, but I did my bay window roof from underneath - removed the lath/plaster and used Celotex, plasterboarded over.

The worst of it was the muck that came down with the ceiling.

[Tim Lamb]

In message , AJH writes

My dormers had a very narrow access from the loft. I adjusted the Rockwool blanket with a long reach litter picker:-)

>

[AJH]

I did exactly that using a litter picker but my chief concern is not having to remove that many tiles again.

[AJH]

Yes makes sense but much more work. Also the ceiling at that point is part of the kitchen and artexed.

AJH

[Tim Watts]

Same here.

But be sure to leave a ventilation path (50mm recommended) under the roof deck and there should be a way air can pass under the cold deck (vent into roof one side, soffit vents on the outside edge)

[Tricky Dicky]

Our bungalow had vermiculite insulation at one time. Most of it has been removed when it was upgraded to 280mm Rockwool but every time I do anything like changing a ceiling light I get a shower of the stuff falling down.

When I had to insulate a single storey kitchen that had a shallow pent style roof I used Rockwool which came wrapped in a silvery plastic foil this was quite easy to push into the shallow eaves a distance of 3m just using a floor brush.

Richard

[David]

Probably not what you want, but when we took off the roof to our lean-to (extending the rear) we found it had a load of loose fibre in it. As far as I can tell this probably came up the cavity when they did the cavity wall insulation but who knows, they may have blown some fibre in for insulation when they were doing the walls. For much the same reason you are talking about now.

Cheers

Dave R

[newshound]

Another good reason just to board it over with foam backed plasterboard and re-skim!

[AJH]

No it isn't, I paint with a very broad brush and plastering is something I wish to avoid. :-)

AJH

[AJH]

I see that there are firms that do this commercially but I don't want to go that route.

It's deciding what to use, at my last job I saved all the celotex off cuts and we bunged them through a wood chipper and the resulting "chips" were ideal, I wish I still had some.

AJH

[Brian Reay]

MicaFill?

My concern would be ensuring you've got ventilation under the tiles etc. You really shouldn't fill the cavity but leave a gap for air to circulate.

[Jim GM4DHJ ...]

In the 1980's I used to give gov grants for roof insulation and somebody complained one day saying they had filled his roof space had been filled between the joists with old newspapers...I had to inform him that the cellulose insulation that he had chosen was uncirculated news print treated with flame retardant etc......tee hee

[Jim GM4DHJ ...]

[tabbypurr]

cellulose is ideal for this, as long as there's no condensation in there. It can be blown in.

NT

[Andrew Gabriel]

Some years ago, someone at the other end of the road had loose fill polystyrene balls blown in walls or loft (not sure which). It was fine for first couple of months, but then there was a strong wind, and the other end of the road and all the gardens were covered in the stuff. It took a year or more before it eventually vanished.

My uncle also had this in the loft of his house. It didn't blow out of the house, but it did all blow around inside the loft. It was always covering the loft hatch whenever anyone wanted to go up there, resulting in something resuembling a waterfall pouring out on to the landing and down the stairs.

[tabbypurr]

Glue is usually applied to the balls as they're injected.

NT

[AJH]

I doubt there is much circulation as the sarking felt is not permeable, though it is just overlapped.

Anyway I'll just aim for a 20cms depth to drop the U value from the current 2.5 to around 0.3.

AJH

[AJH]

Yes this looks the sort of stuff, I wonder what its angle of repose will be. I'll look out for an electric leaf sucker/blower.

AJH

[Jim GM4DHJ ...]

no idea...ask captain sweat pants he knows everything...tee hee