Wall insulation in Broadstone
The cavity in a late fifties or early sixties house is the awkward one, and only a borescope will tell you whether it can be filled.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Most of the housing here went up in the late fifties and early sixties, and the cavity of that period is the awkward one. Often narrow. Frequently carrying mortar on the ties. Whether it can be filled at all is a question a borescope answers, never a brochure.
What comes in: a bungalow with one cold flank, a house whose walls were filled decades ago where a bedroom corner has started going black, and somebody told their cavity is too narrow who wants to know whether that is actually true.
One small hole gets drilled in a mortar joint, a borescope goes through it, moisture readings come off the inside face and each elevation gets walked. All of that lands in a free written itemised quote, with the survey, the system, the junctions and the making good kept on separate lines.
The work
Early cavities, and telling a good one from a bad one
The question everything hangs on. Once render is on, a nine inch solid wall and an early brick and block cavity look identical from the road. Down the hole the scope shows the gap and its width, whether it is clean, whether it is dry, whether anything is in there already, and what the wall ties look like. Three answers follow from that, and only one of them is yes.
Yes: the cavity gets filled. Clear, dry, wide enough, ties sound. Material then goes in from outside on a pattern of drilled holes that are made good in matching mortar. On an elevation taking weather that means bonded polystyrene bead, which finds the corners and holds its shape; on a sheltered face blown mineral wool is the older material and does the job perfectly well. Most bungalows here run to a single day, all of it inside the reach of a tower.
No: leave the cavity alone. Fifty millimetres is common on a wall of this age, and a gap that narrow gives blown material almost nowhere to travel, which leaves voids you cannot see and a wall insulated in patches. Mortar droppings sitting on the ties are just as common and matter more, because a bridge of mortar carries water straight across to the inner leaf and filling around it makes that route permanent. Either one at any scale, and the honest answer is no.
Not yet: deal with the wall first. A slumped fill leaves a cold band at the head of the wall and a wet cavity brings penetrating damp through, black mould arriving behind it. Both read off the borescope. Extraction comes first, the outer leaf gets repointed or repaired where it is letting water in, and the wall is read again afterwards rather than assumed.
Where a no usually leads: lining from inside. Internal wall insulation covers what a cavity cannot help. Insulated plasterboard bonded on, or batten and stud packed out with mineral wool or PIR, then boarded and skimmed. Celotex and Kingspan buy more for the depth given up, and aerogel board is there for a room that has none to give. Reveals, threshold, floor junction and joist ends are wrapped as part of it, because heat in a lined room escapes at the edges rather than through the middle.
Where a no can also lead: the outer face. External wall insulation is board fixed to the outside with a render carrier and a thin coat finish over it, and on a bungalow it is unusually easy to reach. One pass lifts the thermal bridge off the corners and the eaves together. The shallow overhang typical of this stock has to be extended to suit, and every reveal, sill and rainwater pipe travels outwards with the wall face.
Whichever branch you end on: the air. Trickle vents in the frames, an extract fan that genuinely moves air, air bricks left clear. Insulation shifts the dew point and takes away what draughts were left doing the drying, so a taped vapour control layer and breathable materials hold interstitial condensation out of the fabric instead of letting it gather inside the build up.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team from first visit to last, one person to ring, and no sub-contracting your work out to somebody you have never met. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: the survey and any borescope check, the system and its thickness, making good around windows and doors, ventilation works, and disposal on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.
Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.
Lining the inside of a wall is not development and needs no application, which Planning Portal guidance on insulation confirms; the outside face is a bigger question and Planning Portal guidance on external walls sets out when permission is needed. There is no conservation area over the village and only a handful of listed entries, and BCP Council keeps the listed entries keeps those records. It is notifiable work either way: regulation 23 means a renovated thermal element has to reach the Part L standard in Approved Document L, and building control take the U value and the ventilation together.
Cost
What decides the price of a wall insulation job
No rate per square metre, because the wall area is the easy part; what happens at every window, door and floor junction is not.
Getting to it. A detached bungalow on a wide plot, a chalet with rooms in the roof and a 1960s house on a slope are three different jobs before a hole is drilled. Cavity fill is drilled from outside and a bungalow comes off a tower where a three storey gable wants a scaffold. Internal lining is worked room by room from inside, so it is your rooms rather than a platform that gets disrupted. The work at height rules still set the platform.
Which wall you actually have. A cavity that is clear and dry can be filled in a day. A solid wall cannot be filled at all, and has to be lined inside or insulated outside, which is a different job at a different price. A borescope through one drilled hole settles it, and no honest quote is written before that.
The junctions, not the field of the wall. Reveals at windows and doors, the floor junction, the eaves and any party wall are where heat escapes and where condensation shows up if the detailing is wrong. That work is slow, it is most of the labour, and it is the first thing a cheap quote leaves out.
Comparing quotes? Ask whether the wall has actually been checked with a borescope or just assumed, what system and what thickness is specified, how the reveals and floor junction are being detailed, whether ventilation is being addressed, and who makes good the plaster and decoration afterwards. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.
If damp has appeared
Damp or mould after a wall was insulated
Ring rather than use the form. Damp patches or black mould appearing on an outside wall after cavity fill or internal lining usually means water is tracking across the cavity, or warm air is reaching a cold surface at a junction. We look before we take anything out, because the fix depends on which of those it is. It is under six miles from us, so a BH18 address is normally looked at within a day or two. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
What a sixty year old cavity actually looks like inside
People picture a neat empty gap. What the camera usually finds on a wall of this age is fifty or sixty millimetres, wall ties every few courses, and lumps of mortar sitting on some of those ties where they dropped off the trowel while the wall was going up and nobody cleaned them off. Sometimes a snapped tie. Sometimes a rusted one. Sometimes a bird's nest at the head of the wall, or debris down at the bottom of it.
None of that is unusual and none of it is a disaster. It does change the advice. Blown material will not travel properly through a narrow, obstructed cavity, so what you end up with is voids you cannot see and a wall insulated in patches. Mortar on a tie is a route for water, and filling around it makes that route permanent.
So on the older half of this village a fair number of walls come back as a no, and the money goes instead into an internal lining on the coldest rooms. A smaller job done properly, rather than a bigger one done hopefully.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Broadstone, Dunyeats, the Higher Blandford Road side and the BH18 addresses around them, with Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council for planning and building control. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of 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.
Questions
Broadstone questions we get asked
Someone told me my cavity is too narrow to fill. Is that likely?
On a house of this age, quite possibly. Fifty millimetres is common, and it leaves blown material very little room to travel. The scope measures it instead of guessing from the brickwork.
What are mortar droppings and why do they matter?
Lumps of mortar left sitting on the wall ties while the wall was built. They bridge the gap and carry water to the inner leaf, and filling around them makes that permanent.
Can a narrow cavity be cleaned out instead?
Sometimes, over a limited stretch, but it is disruptive and it rarely stacks up against simply lining the coldest rooms from inside. We will tell you which we think applies.
Do bungalows need a scaffold for cavity work?
No. A tower reaches everything on a single storey house, which is why the access line on a bungalow quote is small next to the same line on a two storey one.
How long does an internal lining take in a bungalow bedroom?
A few days for the boarding and taping, then plastering and decorating after it. The room is out of use while that happens and the rest of the house is sheeted.
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Find out whether your cavity can take a fill
Thomas comes out, drills one hole, measures the gap and prices the honest answer in writing. The visit and the quote are free.