Wall insulation in East Boldre, whatever the wall is

The survey. Reveal depth gives a first opinion, the borescope gives the fact. One hole in a mortar joint shows whether there is a cavity, how wide, whether it is clear or bridged with mortar, whether it is a wet cavity, and whether it was filled years ago and has slumped. Ten minutes, and it decides the whole quote.

Cavity fill. Bonded bead blown in with adhesive for a narrow, awkward or exposed cavity. Blown mineral wool where the gap is wide, clean and sheltered. Drilled on a grid from outside, filled, holes pointed to match. Of everything on this page it is the shortest payback and the biggest single cut in heat loss, and Part L sets what the finished wall should reach.

Cavities we will not fill. Under about 50mm, full of rubble, already wet, bridged by mortar, or with no cavity trays over the openings. On an exposed forest edge elevation we would rather leave a marginal cavity open than hand penetrating damp a route to the inner leaf.

Single skin walls and converted outbuildings. A stable, a cart shed or a workshop turned into living space usually has a half brick or block wall with no cavity and no damp course. That wall cannot be filled and should not be lined tight. It wants a stud or batten frame set clear of the masonry, mineral wool between, a vapour control layer taped, and the wall behind left able to dry.

Internal wall insulation on a solid wall. Insulated plasterboard, PIR such as Celotex or Kingspan where the wall is sound and modern, wood fibre and lime where it is old and must stay breathable. IWI is the cheaper and less disruptive of the two solid wall routes but it loses you 60 to 100mm a wall and leaves the joist ends cold unless they are detailed.

External wall insulation. EWI board fixed and bonded to the outside, mesh and basecoat, then a silicone topcoat or a render carrier and a finish to suit. It gives the best U value, keeps your room sizes and kills the thermal bridge at the eaves, but in the National Park the appearance is the first question, not the last.

Reveals, thresholds and junctions. A reveal too shallow for a normal board takes an aerogel laminate. The floor junction runs down behind the skirting, the threshold is detailed so the door still shuts, and the eaves are closed without blocking the ventilation path. Miss these and the condensation simply relocates to whatever you left cold.

Air and moisture. Better airtightness without ventilation is a swap, not a gain. Trickle vents, extract fans that work, air bricks left clear, to the rates in Approved Document F. Where a wall has already failed, with fill slumped or wet, we extract it, dry the wall and say honestly whether to start again.

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.

The New Forest National Park Authority is the planning authority here, not the district council, and East Boldre sits in the Forest South East conservation area, so anything that changes the outside face of a wall is an application. The Authority's interactive property map will tell you exactly what covers your address, and its heritage and conservation pages explain the rest. Internal insulation is not development, but regulation 23 still brings building control in once more than half a wall is renovated.

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. A photograph of the outside wall and one of the damp inside, taken on the same wet day, tells us more than any description over the phone. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.

Call now: 07435 839745

Planning here runs through the New Forest National Park Authority rather than the district, and the whole of this part of the village sits in a conservation area. For wall insulation that has one blunt consequence: external wall insulation changes the look, the depth of the reveals and the overhang at the eaves, so it is an application rather than a decision you make on your own. Check your own address on the Authority's property map before you plan anything.

It is not automatically refused. A rear elevation that nothing overlooks is a very different case from a frontage on the lane, and a finish that reads as render on a house that is already rendered gets a warmer reception than a modern panel look on a brick and timber cottage. What tends to fail is the detailing rather than the principle: windows sunk into deep clumsy reveals, an eaves overhang that no longer throws water clear, and a topcoat that shines.

Where the outside is out of reach, the work goes inside and breathability matters more. On the older cottages that means wood fibre and lime rather than a foil faced board, and it means spending the money on the two coldest rooms properly rather than on every room thinly.

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