Insulation in Sandleheath

Top-ups, done to the finished ceiling. A fifth of the village predates 1919 and most of the rest went up in the post-war decades and the eighties and nineties, insulated to whatever was normal at the time. Decades on it has settled, thinned at the perimeter and parted along the joists. We lay mineral wool between the joists and then an eco roll straight across the top of them at right angles, so no joist is left as a cold bridge. What is being aimed at is the ceiling and not the bag: a renovated thermal element is expected to reach a U-value of 0.16, which in ordinary quilt means closer to 270mm than the 250 most people have in mind.

The holes you cannot see. On a lot of these houses the draught is worth more than the last 50mm of depth. Air leaves through the loft hatch, round the pipes and cables where they pass through the ceiling, past an open chimney in a room nobody uses, and out of the gaps under a poorly fitted architrave. We seal the ceiling plane, fit a compression seal and insulation to the hatch and close the service penetrations. Then the air has to be put back on purpose: the eaves stay open with vent trays, extract fans get checked to see they discharge outside rather than into the roof space, and where a room has lost every route for air we say so before we make the house tighter.

Where a roof has been converted or a dormer added, the work is at rafter level and becomes board work rather than rolls: PIR rigid board such as Celotex cut between the rafters with a clear air gap above it, a foil faced board across the underside, or a multi-layer quilt like TLX where the headroom is tight. The knee wall voids behind the eaves cupboards are the bit that gets left out and the bit that keeps the room cold.

The later houses have a cavity and a borescope settles in minutes whether it is clear, already filled or slumped. The older brick and flint houses on the lane are solid walled with nothing to fill, so it is internal wall insulation on the coldest rooms in a breathable build-up. Solid ground floors are the one we usually talk people out of: taking up a concrete floor means moving out of the room, and on most houses the same money spent on the roof, the draughts and the ventilation does more good.

No rate per square metre. A 1990s detached with a fitted ladder and a boarded floor to clear, an older brick and flint cottage where the hatch is the size of a tea tray, and a converted roof where the insulation sits behind a plasterboard ceiling are three quite different amounts of work before any material is opened. Old material that has to be bagged and taken away is a cost before anything new goes down. Approved Document L sets what the finished work has to reach. Ask any quote what depth is going down and whether the old layer is being removed or just covered.

We cover Sandleheath, Fordingbridge, Rockbourne and Alderholt on SP6, out through Ringwood and down the Avon valley, and New Forest District Council is the planning and building control authority for this address. Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.