Ground Floor Flat Insulation

[supersim65]

I'm the owner of a Victorian Ground Floor Flat with high ceilings. It's lovely.

Until it gets cold.

I have triple-skinned walls, so no cavity wall insulation and a suspended wood floor around 5 feet above the ground below.

I think I'm losing a lot of the heat my central heating pumps out through the ceiling into the first and second floor flats. So I'd like to insulate between the two.

Ideally, it would be best to pull up the boards on the floor above, and insulate between the joists, but it is a large space, and the upstairs flat is not mine, so it would mean considerable upheaval for my neighbour, not to mention the fact that my central heating wouldn't heat her flat anymore.

So I'm considering attaching batons to the joists across my current ceiling, creating a 'floating' plasterboard ceiling a few inches below it, and insulating between the existing ceiling and the floating ceiling.

The ceiling height is over 10 feet at the moment so that's not a problem, but I'm concerned about whether a floating ceiling like that would need ventilation, and whether the existing joists will be strained by the extra weight.

I can't find anyone who's done this before on the internet. Does anyone have any advice?

 

[HERTS P&D]

I know this post is from June, but you could fit a ceiling fan so that the hot air is pushed down again. The ceiling/light fans have a summer and winter setting.

What I done this year to my house was to remove all downstairs ceiling and insulate between the joints and re-board with 2 layers of plasterboard. I can't hear the kids upstairs and it's very warm now!

As to battening and insulating the ceiling, no ventilation is needed.

Andy

 

[RonnyRaygun]

Insulating between the ground floor joists will help too. Not as much as insulating the ceiling, but if you can prevent the cold air from below cooling your flat you will notice a considerable difference.

Might be difficult depending on current floor finishes though.