Insulation in Hyde
Loft, solid wall and floor insulation around Hyde and SP6, specified for the building it is going into and quoted in writing.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
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Old buildings can be insulated, and there are a lot of old buildings at Hyde. What they cannot take is a modern build-up that seals a wall which has always worked by drying out. Get that right and the house is warmer. Get it wrong and you have bought yourself damp.
Insulation problems in Hyde tend to be one of three. A cottage with cold walls and black corners that appear every winter and get washed off every spring. A converted outbuilding or roof space with a sloping ceiling that never holds heat. Or a heating bill out of all proportion to the house, with nobody able to say where it is going.
We survey the whole envelope, loft, walls, floors and the way air moves through, not just the first thing you mention, and we say plainly where the money is best spent. You get photographs of what is really up there and behind it, and a written quote naming the material and the depth.
The work
We insulate to what the roof can honestly take
Low lofts over old ceilings. Where a roof is shallow, the ceiling below is often lath and plaster that will not take any weight at all. So crawl boards go in first, and the material is fed along the bays, never walked in.
The joists in an old Hyde roof are shallow and irregularly spaced, which means the between and over method matters: a thin layer between the joists and the real depth run across the top as a full width eco roll, because you will never get 270mm between timbers only a few inches deep. Where the roof is so low that full depth would close the eaves, vent trays hold the material clear and we insulate to what the roof can honestly take and never seal it up to reach a number.
Solid walls that need to keep drying. There is no cavity to fill in a brick or cob cottage. Internal wall insulation is the usual answer, and on this kind of fabric it has to be a breathable build-up: wood fibre board and a lime or mineral finish rather than a foil faced board sealed against the brick. A vapour tight layer on a wall carrying moisture moves the damp to the edge of the board, and you find it at skirting level a winter later. External wall insulation works technically and changes the outside of the building, which inside the Western Escarpment conservation area is a harder conversation than it is elsewhere.
Suspended timber ground floors with a draught coming up between the boards are common, and on a windy night that draught can be worth more than the walls. Where there is a crawl space we insulate between the joists from below and leave every airbrick clear, because the void has to stay dry. Surface water runs high on this ground and Huckles Brook is a little over half a kilometre away, so if a floor has taken water we want to see it before anything goes back down.
Converted outbuildings, annexes and dormers have no loft floor left to fill, so it becomes a warm roof: PIR board cut tight between the rafters, a continuous layer over them or a multi-layer quilt such as TLX where the depth is not there, a vapour control layer on the warm side and a clear air gap kept above. On a sloping ceiling with shallow rafters the gap is the thing people sacrifice to get more thickness in, and it is the thing that causes the condensation. On a post-war house the cavity may be empty or already part filled, and only a borescope tells you which. Then the practical end: an insulated hatch, fire rated covers over any downlighter, lagging on the cold water tank and the pipe runs left above the new layer, and a raised deck where boarding and storage go back.
How it runs
Walls, floors and roofs: planning an insulation job
Thomas comes out and looks at the whole house: the loft, the walls, the floor and any room that never warms up. In an older building he checks how it handles moisture before suggesting anything, because solid walls and old timber floors need to breathe. The quote is itemised: survey, clearing, material and depth, ventilation and disposal.
On the day the order is simple. Stored boxes are shifted and put back, boards come up and go down again, and the old material leaves in bags. The route from the front door up to the hatch is sheeted. Wet timber, a cracked ceiling or wiring that must not be buried under quilt is photographed and priced before we go on.
Loft insulation, cavity fill and internal wall lining all fall under permitted development, so you apply for nothing. Insulating the outside of the walls is different, because it alters how the house looks, and in the National Park that makes it a planning matter; the Planning Portal gives the general rules. The Western Escarpment conservation area is another thing to rule in or out for your house before an external system is chosen. Where a building is listed, consent reaches internal work as well, so the Park's heritage guidance and its property map are worth a look before any plans are made.
Cost
Old roofs, vaulted rooms and newer houses
Insulation is not priced per square metre; the area is the simple part. What kind of roof space. Crawling in over a lath and plaster ceiling, insulating a converted outbuilding with a vaulted ceiling and no loft at all, and topping up a newer house with a hatch and loft ladder are three very different jobs. The vaulted room needs insulation between and beneath the rafters and a new ceiling.
What the ceiling will take. Lath and plaster cannot carry weight, so crawl boards go down first and the quilt is pushed along the bays, which is slower.
Old material. Anything dirty or damp up there is bagged and carried out before the new goes in.
Walls and floors. A solid wall wants a lining that breathes, such as wood fibre, and never a vapour-tight board. A suspended timber floor can be insulated from underneath where there is a void, with its airbricks left clear.
The target. Approved Document L gives the U-value a renovated ceiling should reach. On an old roof we insulate to what it can take and keep it ventilated.
Ask other firms what finished depth they will lay, whether the eaves are left open, and how they will handle moisture in the walls.
If it is urgent
Condensation, damp or a room that stays cold
A wet loft or a cold room is seldom an emergency, but condensation running off the timbers, or a room you cannot heat with winter coming, is worth a call. A call beats the form for this.
If a ground floor has taken in water, we would rather see it before anything is put back. Hold off adding more quilt to a damp loft for now. The first visit separates an insulation problem from a ventilation one, since insulating a space that cannot breathe makes it worse. We look at the eaves, the hatch, any bathroom fan and the floor void. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. Missed calls get a return call as soon as possible.
Worth knowing
Surface water, and what it does to a ground floor
Hyde is not in a river flood zone, but the surface water risk here is rated high, and Huckles Brook runs close by. Surface water flooding is the kind that arrives off saturated ground and running lanes during a downpour rather than a river coming up over days, so it turns up at a doorway or a low airbrick with almost no warning and it is gone again by the afternoon. That short event is enough to finish most insulation.
Mineral wool between floor joists holds water like a sponge and will not dry in place. An insulated plasterboard lining taken down to the floor wicks water up the wall and hides it. Before you specify a ground floor here, put your own address into the government flood service and see what it says.
What it changes is practical and cheap to build in. On a floor at any real risk, use a closed cell rigid board rather than mineral wool low down, because it does not hold water and can be dried and left. Keep the airbricks clear and as high as the wall allows, since the same vents that ventilate the void are what dries it afterwards.
Stop an insulated wall lining short of the floor on a replaceable plinth, so a wetting costs a skirting rather than an entire wall. And if water has already been in, do not insulate over what is there: wet material comes out and the structure dries first, however long that takes. Anybody willing to board straight over a floor that has been under water is selling you a problem for later.
Who you are dealing with
Insulation from a firm with its owner on the job
Our base is in Boscombe, 12.7 miles from Hyde. We insulate homes in the village, Frogham, Godshill, Fordingbridge and the SP6 villages, and further across the Forest to Burley and Ringwood. Planning is the New Forest National Park Authority and building control is New Forest District Council.
You would be dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719. It is run by its owner, Thomas Hannen, who looks at the loft and the walls and prices the job. On Checkatrade a verified customer rated the work 10 out of 10. The survey and the itemised written quote are free. Before you book a visit in Hyde, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Hyde?
Most repairs in Hyde need no application at all. What decides whether a change to the outside of your house does is who the council is, whether a conservation area or a listing applies, and whether the place sits in a protected landscape.
| Question | In Hyde |
|---|---|
| Who decides | New Forest National Park Authority is the planning authority for Hyde. New Forest National Park Authority's heritage pages set out what it controls. |
| Conservation area | Yes: Western Escarpment Conservation Area. Check whether your street is inside the boundary before changing anything visible. |
| Listed buildings | Yes, there are listed buildings in and around Hyde. If yours is one, work can need listed building consent. |
| Protected landscape | Inside the New Forest National Park, where design is looked at more closely and permitted development rights are narrower. |
Questions
Questions about insulation in Hyde
Who is the planning authority here, the district or the park?
The New Forest National Park Authority, not the district council. Hyde also sits inside the Western Escarpment conservation area, which controls how buildings look rather than what is inside them. Material over a ceiling is invisible and needs nothing from either body. Change the roof covering, add a rooflight or run vent tiles across a visible slope and you are into their territory, so that gets drawn up first.
We heat with oil out here. Does that change the priority?
It moves the roof to the front of the queue. Hyde is off the gas main, oil and electric heating are common, and oil is bought in advance and stored on site. What you burn is decided by the fabric, not by the boiler. I would sort the ceiling and the draughts first and look at the heating plant itself afterwards.
Surface water runs through here. Does that affect insulation?
It affects anything low down. Hyde carries a high surface water risk and Huckles Brook is only a few hundred metres off, so I will not put absorbent material at or below floor level where run off can reach it. Air bricks have to stay clear as well. Above the ceiling none of that applies, which is another reason the roof space is the sensible place to begin.
Can a listed cottage here be insulated at all?
Usually yes, but the route is different. There are 21 listed entries in Hyde and on those buildings the ceilings, plaster and joinery are part of what is protected, so consent comes before any work that disturbs them. Loose material laid over existing joists in an untouched roof space is the least invasive option and normally the one an officer will accept. Nothing gets screwed through old plaster.
You are a fair way out. Do you still come?
Hyde is 12.7 miles from our base in Boscombe, so the distance is not the issue. What I do ask is that we look at everything in one visit, because the ceiling, the floor void and the draught sealing are usually one job, not three. The visit and the written itemised quote are free, and Thomas Hannen does both himself.
Nearby, and next door
Insulation near Hyde
Nearby places we also cover for insulation, with straight-line distances from Hyde, and the other trades we offer in Hyde itself.
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Our other trades in Hyde
Insulation guides
Part L: do you have to insulate when you re-roof? Black mould on walls: what causes it and what stops it PIR board vs mineral wool: which insulation?Everything we do in Ringwood Insulation, all areas Every area we cover
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