14. Big reductions in energy use after installing DIY External Insulation on house
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- Опубліковано 8 вер 2024
- This shows how much less heating I need now I’ve installed External Wall Insulation on my house.
Previous videos have followed my journey to learning how to instal this insulation. Ultimately I expect it to cost a little over £4,000.
Do let me know if any questions or comments.
All looking good. What is your heating and what are your plans for any changes. It will be interesting to hear your energy use in due course
Heating is gas although we used a lot less over winter after the insulation was in at the back as we mainly use the back of the house in winter. I don’t have plans to change although I’m sure a heat pump would be okay for this house now as we have the radiators on a very low setting if we ever have them on. Still, that would be a project for a few years’ time :)
It's nice to see your hard work paying off. How will you do the below dpc insulation? Do you have to leave a gap for the dpc or can you cover the dpc as it's polystyrene?
It seems that it’s quite easy. The plastic starter track is just above the damp course. So if I put adhesive a few cm lower than the top of the insulation below the damp course then it won’t breach the damp course. There’ll then be an air gap behind that bit of insulation. But as long as it’s snug with the bottom of the starter track that thin strip should also be insulated.
I’ll make a video as I do it :)
Do you know what R value you walls are now ??
Hi Paul,
Thanks for the question.
The specifications are:
70mm Kingspan k5 with U-value 0.3 onto a double brick wall with U-value 2, giving theoretical overall U-value 1 / (1/0.3 + 1/2) = 0.26.
R-value of this is 3.8333
I can see that this is theoretical though and I’ll typically get some reduction in this R-value through the gaps between boards. But I’ve been really careful to make sure the adhesive seals all the way around each board and also that the boards are fitting very snugly. And I think that, actually, a few little sealed air pockets between the boards and the wall could even give further insulation. So I hope to be pretty close to this theoretical value.
I’d be really interested in you thoughts on this.
@@aktsolar sounds about right. You are doing all the right things regarding minimising leakage in my opinion. I've just found out our local vets is built to the passivhaus standard, so I'm going to pay them a visit and see how they have achieved this. Keep up the great work. 👍
So will you be adding insulation below DPC level? How far down will you go?
Yes I will. I’m not sure how far down I’ll go though. I’ll start at the front where it’s about 35cm to the paving slabs and then probably do a similar distance at the back. And at the back, after I’ve put it in place I’ll backfill against it with pebbles (as it was originally)
Soon you won't have heating bills 😃
That’s the dream :) !!!