French Renovation

[AndrewCrown]

Rush... Lets see some Exterior photos... If you keep the location quiet, it shouldn't
jeopardize your negotiations...

Sorry..Rush....ZBC?

Edited by AndrewCrown on Wednesday 3rd February 18:16

[Rushjob]

AndrewCrown said:

Rush... Lets see some Exterior photos... If you keep the location quiet, it shouldn't
jeopardize your negotiations...

C'nest pas moi!! ZBC is the prospective buyer......

[zbc]

as requested. The small building at the back is also part of it. The main school room has the big windows and there's another building about the same size perpendicular to this but hidden behind it. Plan is to put bedrooms in the roof

Edited by zbc on Thursday 4th February 10:41

[Rushjob]

That looks interesting..... you've GOT to keep the rocking dog!!

[zbc]

I might need to find a new home for it but I'd love to keep it. There are quite a few other schooly features that come with it such as the bell, think small church bell rather than front door bell and there's lots of interesting things inside that I think the commune will take like desks and old maps but I might try to bargain to keep some of them

[AndrewCrown]

Merci Bien ZBC

Great to see...
what sort of condition is it in inside?

[zbc]

AndrewCrown said:

Merci Bien ZBC

Great to see...
what sort of condition is it in inside?

De rien AC

It was well maintained for a long time and was a school until 2007 but it hasn't had much care since then apart from the roof which they retiled as they knew it was a risk. Cellar is they dry though and there are no cracks. Beams are in a dreadful place for bedrooms in the roof though so I think that it will have to come off entirely and be redone but I think we can keep most of the ground floor arrangement

[zbc]

So we've started to get a few experts in for the main items and of course one of the biggest is the roof. We plan to put 4 bedrooms up here and there's plenty of room and headspace is good too despite the pitched roof but I'm wondering about insulation. As you can see from the picture it's just tiles at the moment. I had expected that we would have to remove the tiles, put on some sort of membrane and then replace the tiles which if course would have led to a lot of cost, not least for all the scaffolding but the roofer we spoke to said this isn't an issue and he can do it from the inside. Any thoughts?

[Fatt McMissile]

I can't speak for your region and others will know, but here in Brittany roofing felt is only used under the slates if the roof has a shallow pitch, and it's usual to insulate from the inside, even on new builds. There are hangers sold to hold the insulation.
A word of advice - have as deep a layer possible of insulation of the highest quality installed between the sloping ceiling sides and the roof, it's difficult to add more after the ceiling's in place.
The style of the A-frame would be unusual around here, it'll be a nice feature if it doesn't get in the way of your heads....

[zbc]

Fatt McMissile said:

I can't speak for your region and others will know, but here in Brittany roofing felt is only used under the slates if the roof has a shallow pitch, and it's usual to insulate from the inside, even on new builds. There are hangers sold to hold the insulation.
A word of advice - have as deep a layer possible of insulation of the highest quality installed between the sloping ceiling sides and the roof, it's difficult to add more after the ceiling's in place.
The style of the A-frame would be unusual around here, it'll be a nice feature if it doesn't get in the way of your heads....

Thanks Fatt, that's good to know and is very reassuring. I'm certainly up for as much insulation as we can and as I said in most places the height isn't an issue so I think we should be good. The A frame is quite unusual here as well and most of the discussion with the roofer was about ways that we can keep as much as possible exposed and integrated in walls as it is attractive and we don't want to hide the nature of the building. There are a couple of pillars to take out and then we should be clear for almost everything and there will be a couple of low points with the beams at about 1.8m in a couple of the bedrooms which isn't ideal but certainly livable. I'll try to get a proper set of pictures up soon and maybe time to start a proper thread.

[Magooagain]

You will need an air gap between tiles and insulation about 4 cm and a vapor barrier behind the plasterboard.

You don't have much depth after that for insulation so a metal rail suspended system could be used. This will give you enough depth then. Install the best insulation you can afford and make sure the insulation is across all the rafters(chevrons).
Insulation like kingspan would be decent say about 150 deep.

I notice you have a joint in the wall plate which is no problem but is there a joint also in the purling?
Stuff like that would need checking before adding weight to the roof structure.

Thoroughly check for wood worm etc particularly the tile battens.

[AndrewCrown]

ZBC

I’ll ask my guy...probably concurs with Magoo..

Here’s a project we’re working on in an outbuilding..



There was a membrane...then this layer...which may have been sound proofing...

Then this



Plasterboard is the screwed onto that steel railing...

[zbc]

Thanks Magoo and Andrew.

Yes there are some joints in the purlings. The roofer had a good luck and thinks they'll be fine. He has some plans for some other specific reinforcements so I'm hoping he has this covered. During the initial look he had a good look for woodworm and found some limited evidence but none of it recent as far as he could see.

Andrew is the plan to fill in the space behind the new wood also with insulation? I presume the second picture shows the roof "after". The wall is very similar to what we've done here in our current house. We didn't do a full renovation but as we've redone various rooms we've normally used the steel railing and insulation slabs to improve what wasn't there and it makes a huge difference.

[AndrewCrown]

Yes ZBC
The second photo is after..just a little more insulation to go in then the new wood will be covered in white bleached wood and the walls plasterboarded

What you can’t see is that on the other pitch we have solar Velux windows...well worth considering...no wiring...rain sensors and remote control opening/ blinds.

[zbc]

AndrewCrown said:

Yes ZBC

What you can’t see is that on the other pitch we have solar Velux windows...well worth considering...no wiring...rain sensors and remote control opening/ blinds.

We had much discussion of these during our meeting, both the roofer and the person who is helping at the moment are big fans. Any thought on minimising rain noise with Velux windows? We have them in our attic rooms at the moment, albeit 20 year old ones, and they are very noisy if it rains hard.

[AndrewCrown]

zbc said:

AndrewCrown said:

Yes ZBC

What you can’t see is that on the other pitch we have solar Velux windows...well worth considering...no wiring...rain sensors and remote control opening/ blinds.

We had much discussion of these during our meeting, both the roofer and the person who is helping at the moment are big fans. Any thought on minimising rain noise with Velux windows? We have them in our attic rooms at the moment, albeit 20 year old ones, and they are very noisy if it rains hard.

ZBC that’s a technical q for Velux ...(:
Rain happens...but it’s ok.. you certainly won’t hear it through the roof...
I neglected to mention the French are going crazy about insulation at the moment..I think there must be some kind of incentive, I’m sure Magoo will know...I’m a 180day man...not full time.

[Rushjob]

Yep, if you've been here more than a year and owned the house for more than two, and you're registered for tax, you can get quite a bit sorted for a symbolic €1. We're hopefully getting our roof done in a couple of months once we've replaced the battens which will take a week or two once I can find a window in my diary

[AndrewCrown]

ZBC
A little more progress on my barn... Just for inspiration.


And the depth of insulation

Edited by AndrewCrown on Saturday 13th March 20:57

[zbc]

I like the wood on the ceiling. Current house has wood everywhere, slight overload and reacting against it I was planning to cut back but with the white that looks really nice. I think our ceiling will look similar with partially exposed beams and as you say the rest hidden in the insulation so I might steal some of that - thanks. Meanwhile nothing moving here as the commune are still making up their mind and setting some ground rules for the sale.

[Mike-tf3n0]

Rushjob said:

Yep, if you've been here more than a year and owned the house for more than two, and you're registered for tax, you can get quite a bit sorted for a symbolic €1. We're hopefully getting our roof done in a couple of months once we've replaced the battens which will take a week or two once I can find a window in my diary

Oh Lord, don't mention the €1 insulation scheme, we have been getting anything up to eight calls a day from people trying to sell that scheme.

Now, what I'm waiting for is a similar scheme for photovoltaic 'leccy. Three of my neighbours have done their own system for an absolute fraction of the government schemes using top quality EU manufactured panels and parts but that way you cannot get the gridtie to sell your excess to EDF. I am sure eventually there will be something like the insulation scheme where you can pay just the cost price, or even less, and have the job done to include the gridtie and the excess buy back, then I'll jump on it!