Advice on renovating old house

50HX

Starting at the old home house

Walls are 15 inches thick....Old stone house

Thinking of wrapping the house in external insulation

Am I correct in thinking the house has to be near or completely air tight for an air to water system to work properly?

At a loss as to what heat system to put in....currently rads with 2 rooms upstairs

Any advice greatly appreciated

Anyone done something similar?

Silver Breeze

We did something similar on a 1950 house, one of 18 identical square bungalows in a cul de sac.

Vendor in 2014 was a charming man who had been born in the house but was two or three sandwiches short of a picnic. House and grounds were a wreck.

The house was built using large concrete blocks manufactured locally, bigger blocks than you can get now. No insulation, two and a half bedrooms, tiny kitchen, tiny bathroom, three fireplaces, living room, dining room. Very large rere garden.

Our builder was very good, employing excellent sub contactors to:

External insulation wrapping a 24.9 sq meter kitchen / living room extension, with internal insulation in three sides of the original house.

Completely rewire electricity, panel, new smart meter.

Strip roof tiles, replace rotten felt, reset tiles. Install evacuated glycol tubes on south side of roof to provide free hot water to 300 litre hot tank.

300 mm insulation in attic.

Original floor was floating but serious woodworm. Cheaper to install radon barrier, add several inches of 804 hard core, 200 mm insulation panels, layer of 2 inch steel reinforced concrete then self levelling screed then engineered floorboards throughout.

All windows and doors triple glazed.

SEAI grant extended to PV Cells in 2019, put up 14 panels and battery, very pleased. Thus we abandoned air to water heat pump idea because in winter mains gas powered condenser boiler heats hose on winter five months, turned off in summer (no need for heat in super insulated house, tubes heat hot water for shower and cooking.


SEAI is your friend, seek grants for insulating the house, windows, evacuated tubes for hot water, PV for electricity, insulate the attic.

Do lots of research. Have fun, we did.

50HX

Thanks for such a detailed reply

What are pv panels running?

Alf Veedersane

I'd be having someone have a look at the walls before going ahead with EWI. Breathability may be an issue that dictates your options.

50HX

There is a slight mould issue in the house but that appears to be more to do with no ventilation anywhere,

Started ripping a few places this morning and walls appear dry with no visible signs of damp

coffeyt

Really recommend getting a qualified person to look at it first.
My parents house is old with stone walls nearly 2 feet thick and I got SEAI engineer out to look at insulation options.

He advised that they no longer recommend EWI for old stone houses as they are finding it is causing mould issues down the line due to the walls being unable to breath.

I have read recently about another type of breathable EWI but unsure as to the cost and I was unable to find any reviews on it.

50HX

Good to know coffeyou, thanks

What did your parents go with regards insulating

coffeyt

Hi the engineer was only out a few months ago so waiting on work to proceed.
The rear of house is an extension done in 80s so they are going to pump the cavity there and obviously upgrade the attic insulation but he was adamant that the older walls be left as is.

Having said that the only rooms really affected are the sitting room and front hall/stairs as the upper level was redone in the 80s also.

A few years back they internally dry lined the hall but if I remember correctly the builder put some sort of batton system on first with air vents all along skirting board to allow the old wall to breathe (he was also adamant that sealing the old walls was a bad idea). The hall and stairway is much warmer since and my parents are planning to do the same in the sitting room once all other work is completed, it will obviously mean losing some space in that room but it is large enough.

50HX

Yeah that makes sense, I not a fan of sealing old stone walls completely as they need to breathe,

Your builder was correct to baton the wall first before insulated slabs,

There is a plastic out now you can put on with rubber studs on it keep it out from the wall,

There is also wall injecting or the electro coil to draw water away

So many options and few different builders telling me different things to do

coffeyt

Tbh I was hoping to get the EWI and heat pump in their house as per your plan as well but the SEAI engineer was fairly straight up and said look its just not an option as we would never get the house insulated enough for a heat pump to be economical.

He believed that old stone houses that have had EWI done previously are only starting to see problems now and that until a better option came along we were better off to do what could be done (attic and pumping the cavity where we could) and leave the old walls alone.

It's hard to know what's best as I'd had a private insulation company out a couple months earlier who were happy to price up for pumping the cavity and doing EWI and never mentioned any problems 're stone walls and EWI.

As much as I'd have liked to get it done for them I reckon the SEAI engineer had nothing to gain whereas the private company did so going with his advise for the time being.

BryanF

Not sure where to start.

There is no such thing as an SEAI engineer
Breathable wall construction: battening and insulated drylining and then venting the cavity defeats the purpose of the insulation.

coffeyt

BryanF wrote: »

Not sure where to start.

There is no such thing as an SEAI engineer
Breathable wall construction: battening and insulated drylining and then venting the cavity defeats the purpose of the insulation.

Well according to the report I was given that is what it said he was and there is a massive difference in the heat in that area since that work I spoke about was completed but as I advised at the start I was simply giving the op my experience of it, I did specially advise to speak to a specialist.

Can't understand why people are so critical of posters simply giving their personal experience, foolish me believed that is what happens on a forum.
I'll bow out now to the more educated on the matter.

I'm sure you'll be happy now to give him all the correct info now that ive been put in my place.

50HX

Had a good look at this over the w/end with different tradesmen

Thinking of insulating the floors+ attic, insulated plasterboard on inside...have the room to do this
Zoned stove to provide heat to rads with oil as back up

Can't see air to water working with out making the house close to air tight which means ewi and inside insulation plus mhrv plus the cost of this even with grant and I have to do new septic tank

Have access to all the timber I want going forward

What would ye think??

Alf Veedersane

50HX wrote: »

Had a good look at this over the w/end with different tradesmen

Thinking of insulating the floors+ attic, insulated plasterboard on inside...have the room to do this
Zoned stove to provide heat to rads with oil as back up

Can't see air to water working with out making the house close to air tight which means ewi and inside insulation plus mhrv plus the cost of this even with grant and I have to do new septic tank

Have access to all the timber I want going forward

What would ye think??

I'm not sure about the logic that you'd need to get very airtight to go with A2W but you'd fire ahead with MVHR.

50HX

Alf Veedersane wrote: »

I'm not sure about the logic that you'd need to get very airtight to go with A2W but you'd fire ahead with MVHR.

If the house not air tight would A2w struggle to reach a decent temp plus it's constantly drawing electricity

Or am I viewing this all wrong

listermint

50HX wrote: »

If the house not air tight would A2w struggle to reach a decent temp plus it's constantly drawing electricity

Or am I viewing this all wrong

You need airtightness for both these systems.

And yes you are correct it would struggle and actually be crap because it wouldnt work at all well in colder conditions should the extremes arise.

MicktheMan

50HX wrote: »

Can't see air to water working with out making the house close to air tight which means ewi and inside insulation

Fyi, neither EWI or IWI address air tightness.

Calibos

coffeyt wrote: »

Well according to the report I was given that is what it said he was and there is a massive difference in the heat in that area since that work I spoke about was completed but as I advised at the start I was simply giving the op my experience of it, I did specially advise to speak to a specialist.

Can't understand why people are so critical of posters simply giving their personal experience, foolish me believed that is what happens on a forum.
I'll bow out now to the more educated on the matter.

I'm sure you'll be happy now to give him all the correct info now that ive been put in my place.

This forum is dying a death due to the years long perpetual condescending attitude coming from certain quarters. Its driving away those looking for answers and others that might have the answers because both groups are sick of snarky interactions and disagreements with certain people on here. If people are sick of dealing with uninformed or incorrect posters here and can't help but lose patience with them and be snarky and condescending, then perhaps they should move on themselves for the sake of their sanity. I've probably signed my 'death warrant' on this forum.

booooonzo

Calibos wrote: »

This forum is dying a death due to the years long perpetual condescending attitude coming from certain quarters. Its driving away those looking for answers and others that might have the answers because both groups are sick of snarky interactions and disagreements with certain people on here. If people are sick of dealing with uninformed or incorrect posters here and can't help but lose patience with them and be snarky and condescending, then perhaps they should move on themselves for the sake of their sanity. I've probably signed my 'death warrant' on this forum.

Not here long but use a lot of various forums and I must say this is one of the worst for what you have outlined.

certain quarters seem very quick to give one liners on why something is wrong but rarely to offer positive constructive advice.

Voodoomelon

3 story stone Georgian home here, walls vary from 18-22 inches thick of stone rubble, did 4 limecrete slabs on the ground floor with underfloor heating, rads on upper floors. 5 zone Honeywell system.

Lime render on outside and lime plaster on the inside. I didn't insulate the walls as I didn't see the cost/benefit to warrant it considering the size of the windows, original and single glazed.

In your case if not protected and getting new windows, breathable board like Calsitherm can be stuck to the inside of exterior walls and skimmed with lime to maintain breathability on the ground floor where its important. It's also important on upper floors but less issues with moisture in the walls higher up. Is the house of special significance or just happens to be a basic stone construction?

50HX

It's just basic old stone walls

Would you consider your house warming or warmer than it was iykwim

Voodoomelon

I essentially have the underfloor running non stop October-April and its very nice, just very expensive. The rads upstairs hold a lot of heat so stay warm for about 2 hours after turning off but the rooms can cool down quite quickly afterwards. They tick on 5pm-11pm and for an hour in the morning.

Bottom line is when the heating is on and a few hours afterwards, the house is lovely. On very cold days it can feel a bit chilly so can light the stoves outside the heating schedule. The oil is costing me about €9 a day, which seems mental, but the house also heats up a lot from May to September and the heating is virtually never on then. Stoves can provide hot water.

I was quoted about €13,000 to insulate all the external walls on the inside and skimmed with lime, I said i'd rather spend it on the heating and that's the way I went.