Have you put your heating on yet?
Discussion
gotoPzero said:
One of my things to do when I get chance is to fill the void under our kitchen cabinets with insulation.
Anyone else done this?
We had the base boards off to clean them at the end of summer and there was quite a draft coming from under there.
I did this a few years back as a temporary measure with a few bits of loft insulation and it made a difference - I've since insulated under the floor with 75mm Kingspan PIR and I've removed the loft insulation as it's no longer needed and insulating properly under the floor has made a much bigger differenceAnyone else done this?
We had the base boards off to clean them at the end of summer and there was quite a draft coming from under there.
I don't have the fancy controls and outside temperature throttling of my boiler that some on here have, but I have been running a sort of 'set back' routine this winter. My programmable thermostat has a frost setting, which I increased to 18 deg C and I can turn the boiler timing at the boiler end so that overnight the boiler is off and comes on to the frost setting before we get up. From 5pm until 11pm the thermostat timer comes on, set to 20 deg C, since I usually go to bed after midnight and it stays warm enough until then.
We've found this year that the house doesn't get to that stage when it feels cold, yet our gas use doesn't seem any worse than the same months last year. It's not quite 'low and slow' since our combi boiler isn't a condensing one, but the general principle of a background heat to stop it getting too cold seems to have worked well. Tried it out mostly based on what I'd read on this thread.
I did put extra loft insulation in last autumn, so we're up to 400mm at least and in some sections over 500mm (just to use up the material). I also put a letter catching box to stop a draught from our through the wall, non standard size letter box. That's helped too judging by the lack of draughts in the hall now.
We've found this year that the house doesn't get to that stage when it feels cold, yet our gas use doesn't seem any worse than the same months last year. It's not quite 'low and slow' since our combi boiler isn't a condensing one, but the general principle of a background heat to stop it getting too cold seems to have worked well. Tried it out mostly based on what I'd read on this thread.
I did put extra loft insulation in last autumn, so we're up to 400mm at least and in some sections over 500mm (just to use up the material). I also put a letter catching box to stop a draught from our through the wall, non standard size letter box. That's helped too judging by the lack of draughts in the hall now.
Edited by OldSkoolRS on Thursday 11th January 09:17
UTH said:
I chucked a load of rock wool in my loft last year - not a very professional job, but there's certainly a lot up there.
Floors - I WISH I'd insulated under the bedroom floorboards when we had the carpets up for renovation in 2020, such a mistake. As for insulating the walls, I'm not really sure how that's done, I think I need a pro to come and assess my house really.
Depends on the wall construction. If you have a cavity then as long as your house isn't exposed to wind driven rain and your cavity and brick ties are clear then that's a fairly cheap and easy fill. Still needs a pro as the drill lots of holes and use a machine to blow the fill in.Floors - I WISH I'd insulated under the bedroom floorboards when we had the carpets up for renovation in 2020, such a mistake. As for insulating the walls, I'm not really sure how that's done, I think I need a pro to come and assess my house really.
If you have solid walls then it's usually a pro job. Either external insulation and render, or a internal refurbishment with insulated plasterboard. Both expensive and messy.
B'stard Child said:
gotoPzero said:
One of my things to do when I get chance is to fill the void under our kitchen cabinets with insulation.
Anyone else done this?
We had the base boards off to clean them at the end of summer and there was quite a draft coming from under there.
I did this a few years back as a temporary measure with a few bits of loft insulation and it made a difference - I've since insulated under the floor with 75mm Kingspan PIR and I've removed the loft insulation as it's no longer needed and insulating properly under the floor has made a much bigger differenceAnyone else done this?
We had the base boards off to clean them at the end of summer and there was quite a draft coming from under there.
Scabutz said:
UTH said:
I chucked a load of rock wool in my loft last year - not a very professional job, but there's certainly a lot up there.
Floors - I WISH I'd insulated under the bedroom floorboards when we had the carpets up for renovation in 2020, such a mistake. As for insulating the walls, I'm not really sure how that's done, I think I need a pro to come and assess my house really.
Depends on the wall construction. If you have a cavity then as long as your house isn't exposed to wind driven rain and your cavity and brick ties are clear then that's a fairly cheap and easy fill. Still needs a pro as the drill lots of holes and use a machine to blow the fill in.Floors - I WISH I'd insulated under the bedroom floorboards when we had the carpets up for renovation in 2020, such a mistake. As for insulating the walls, I'm not really sure how that's done, I think I need a pro to come and assess my house really.
If you have solid walls then it's usually a pro job. Either external insulation and render, or a internal refurbishment with insulated plasterboard. Both expensive and messy.
UTH said:
Ok, makes sense then, I'll have to investigate what my wall construction is. Probably a dumb question, but what's the best way to find out? From the outside it looks like the whole house is 'normal' brick construction.....
Couple of ways. Check the EPC if you have one. The assessor would have looked at the wall construction.Otherwise look at the brick pattern. If its a regular pattern with each brick lengthways it's probably a cavity. Uneven with bricks laid sides ways, probably solid brick.
Also look at the window recess. If the distance from inner wall to outside is bigger than 260mm its a cavity.
soupdragon1 said:
Anecdotal story. We built our house just 9 years ago and didn't take the option of UFH, choosing rads instead. That was based of my sister's experience, where she had to get a duel fuel stove in her kitchen/diner/lounge living space. She said it just never felt warm enough in winter. Hers was a new build too, a couple of years earlier.
I don't know much about UFH to be honest, but it was enough to put me off and go with rads.
UFH is nice because it holds onto the heat far longer than rads when you switch the heating off. The only trouble with it...it needs hours and hours to heat up in the first place though. I only said to my missus last night that I'd like rads in the kitchen/middle hall as well as UFH in an ideal world. We only have UFH in those 2 rooms currently. I don't know much about UFH to be honest, but it was enough to put me off and go with rads.
Sometimes you just want to stick the heating on for an hour or 2 to take the edge off, but if you did that the Kitchen/hall would still be freezing in our house though, because the UFH needs at least 6 hours to start coming through with our set up.
Trustmeimadoctor said:
Ufh is better than rads you just need to understand how it works don't expect rapid temp changes ic your using if in a big slab!
I think the previous owner of our house just kept the UFH ticking over, and he kept the thermostat at 18 degrees. Whereas I tend to heat it right up to above that and then turn the thermostat right down so it goes off. But I don't honestly know which is the best way of doing it really. 
cerb4.5lee said:
Trustmeimadoctor said:
Ufh is better than rads you just need to understand how it works don't expect rapid temp changes ic your using if in a big slab!
I think the previous owner of our house just kept the UFH ticking over, and he kept the thermostat at 18 degrees. Whereas I tend to heat it right up to above that and then turn the thermostat right down so it goes off. But I don't honestly know which is the best way of doing it really. As mentioned my house is poorly insulated, and some have said maybe the system wasn't actually specced correctly (although I do struggle to believe that given how many systems they install). I do maintain that there's only so warm an UFH system can get a room when it's fighting against poor insulation etc.
Eg put underfloor heating in your garden shed and it's never going to be warm in there!
UTH said:
cerb4.5lee said:
Trustmeimadoctor said:
Ufh is better than rads you just need to understand how it works don't expect rapid temp changes ic your using if in a big slab!
I think the previous owner of our house just kept the UFH ticking over, and he kept the thermostat at 18 degrees. Whereas I tend to heat it right up to above that and then turn the thermostat right down so it goes off. But I don't honestly know which is the best way of doing it really. As mentioned my house is poorly insulated, and some have said maybe the system wasn't actually specced correctly (although I do struggle to believe that given how many systems they install). I do maintain that there's only so warm an UFH system can get a room when it's fighting against poor insulation etc.
Eg put underfloor heating in your garden shed and it's never going to be warm in there!
cerb4.5lee said:
UTH said:
cerb4.5lee said:
Trustmeimadoctor said:
Ufh is better than rads you just need to understand how it works don't expect rapid temp changes ic your using if in a big slab!
I think the previous owner of our house just kept the UFH ticking over, and he kept the thermostat at 18 degrees. Whereas I tend to heat it right up to above that and then turn the thermostat right down so it goes off. But I don't honestly know which is the best way of doing it really. As mentioned my house is poorly insulated, and some have said maybe the system wasn't actually specced correctly (although I do struggle to believe that given how many systems they install). I do maintain that there's only so warm an UFH system can get a room when it's fighting against poor insulation etc.
Eg put underfloor heating in your garden shed and it's never going to be warm in there!
UTH said:
cerb4.5lee said:
Trustmeimadoctor said:
Ufh is better than rads you just need to understand how it works don't expect rapid temp changes ic your using if in a big slab!
I think the previous owner of our house just kept the UFH ticking over, and he kept the thermostat at 18 degrees. Whereas I tend to heat it right up to above that and then turn the thermostat right down so it goes off. But I don't honestly know which is the best way of doing it really. As mentioned my house is poorly insulated, and some have said maybe the system wasn't actually specced correctly (although I do struggle to believe that given how many systems they install). I do maintain that there's only so warm an UFH system can get a room when it's fighting against poor insulation etc.
Eg put underfloor heating in your garden shed and it's never going to be warm in there!
Put more length of pipe in the floor
Run the water hotter through the ufh
Or insulate!
if you have heatloss of 3kWh @ -3 then the system needs to be able to emit at least that to maintain the temp
If the system was only designed to emit 2kWh then the room will NEVER get to temp when it gets to that temp outside
Trustmeimadoctor said:
As you say it's poorly insulated there are a few ways to fix it
Put more length of pipe in the floor
Run the water hotter through the ufh
Or insulate!
if you have heatloss of 3kWh @ -3 then the system needs to be able to emit at least that to maintain the temp
If the system was only designed to emit 2kWh then the room will NEVER get to temp when it gets to that temp outside
Yep, sounds about right from what I experience here. I think you've advised me previously - I would be interested to know if they did factor in things like this when speccing the system and did put more pipe in the kitchen.....I know there is a laminated SOMEWHERE in this house that has that info on it, maybe I'll hunt for it. Put more length of pipe in the floor
Run the water hotter through the ufh
Or insulate!
if you have heatloss of 3kWh @ -3 then the system needs to be able to emit at least that to maintain the temp
If the system was only designed to emit 2kWh then the room will NEVER get to temp when it gets to that temp outside
Cotty said:
I think you win the thread.However, your place isn't as cold as someone I knew from Sunderland. His kitchen was so cold that the dishwater in the sink froze so he couldn't access a teaspoon to stir his tea.
Sheepshanks said:
Our house seemed to take a lot of warming up this morning vs other mornings - even after the heating being on for 90 mins it was still only 16C in our bedroom and I really feel the cold. No idea why it was so bad, every way I could check the outside temp shows it showed +1C, although it was quite frosty this morning.
Have to be up earlyish tomorrow and I'm thinking of just leaving the heating on.
I left the heating on last night - backed the temps (on Tado's) down to 18C overnight. Normally 21C. Was perfectly comfortable getting up this morning. Have to be up earlyish tomorrow and I'm thinking of just leaving the heating on.
Used quite a lot of gas though - 112kW, normally on a coldish day we'd be 70ish. Did reheat the hot water after granddaughter's bath last night too, which wouldn't normally do in the evening.
Annoyingly the rad in our bedroom in the NE corner of the house cycled a lot and it's the one rad that's noisy with expansion and contraction.
Be interesting to see what today's use is without the boiler having to run at for a few hours at a high output to warm the place up.
Gassing Station | Homes, Gardens and DIY | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff