Wall insulation in Lytchett Matravers

The borescope check comes first. A 12mm hole in a mortar joint, a camera on a stalk, and it settles how wide the cavity is, what is already in it, and whether the outer leaf is wet with penetrating damp. On the 1970s and early 1980s houses in Lytchett Matravers the cavity is often only 50mm, and half of that can be mortar droppings on the wall ties.

Cavity fill, where the wall earns it. A clear, dry Lytchett Matravers cavity takes bonded polystyrene bead or blown mineral wool, drilled on a set pattern and injected under control. Bead flows better into a narrow cavity and does not slump; mineral wool is more forgiving on an irregular brick and block wall. Eaves, the base of the wall and every reveal are closed off first. The fill itself is done by a separate cavity installer rather than by us, so ask them what paperwork you get.

Failed and slumped fill. Where a Lytchett Matravers wall was filled decades ago the camera often shows the top 300mm empty and a compacted mass lower down. That is a cold band across the top of every room, and it is where the condensation and the black mould turn up. The fix is extraction through the drilled holes, a clean out, then a refill in bead. Where the fill is wet, extraction is the whole job.

Solid walls, and why they cannot be filled. The older Lytchett Matravers cottages along the lanes are nine inch solid brick or rubble stone with no cavity at all. Internal wall insulation means insulated plasterboard bonded and fixed back, or a stud and batten frame with mineral wool or PIR board such as Celotex or Kingspan between it. It takes 60 to 100mm off the room, and where a narrow hall cannot spare that, an aerogel backed board gives a similar U value in a third of the thickness. Reveals returned, the floor junction carried down, joist ends thought about, and a vapour control layer taped so the dew point cannot sit in the build up as interstitial condensation. On old masonry we favour a breathable lining that dries inwards.

External wall insulation. Boards fixed outside, a render carrier and a thin coat finish. It keeps the room size, cures cold bridging and gives the biggest cut in heat loss, but it changes how the building looks, so it is a planning question before it is a thermal one.

Ventilation, because insulating a house makes it tighter. Every job includes a look at extract in the kitchen and bathroom and at trickle vents in the windows. Better airtightness without better ventilation turns a slightly cold house into a mouldy one, and Approved Document F sets what that ventilation has to do.

A price per square metre of wall would mislead you. The hours go into the edges. Cavity or solid. A seventies detached house with sound brickwork and an empty cavity is often a single day's fill from outside.

The older cottages have solid walls with nothing to fill, so they are lined inside with insulated plasterboard or clad outside, and that is a far larger job. A borescope through one small hole tells us which you have before anything is written down.

Driven rain. South west facing gables take the worst of the weather. Filling the cavity behind open joints or cracked render can let water bridge to the inside, so we check the pointing and render first and price any repairs on their own line.

Reveals and edges. Round window and door openings, at the floor, under the eaves and along a party wall, heat escapes and condensation forms if the detail is poor. It is fiddly, and it is where most of the labour sits.

The platform. A bungalow is filled from a tower. A tall gable needs scaffold, set by the work at height rules.

Ask any rival quote whether they drilled and looked with a borescope, what U-value their system reaches, and who replasters and redecorates after.

Thomas Hannen runs the business, and he does the borescope check and writes the price himself. We are eleven miles from Lytchett Matravers at our base in Boscombe, and we cover Lytchett Minster, Upton and the BH16 addresses around them, with Dorset Council for planning and building control.

Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, is the company you would contract with. There is a customer's verified 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written, itemised quote are free of charge. Before you book a visit in Lytchett Matravers, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Lytchett Matravers 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.