single skin lean-to

Hello all,

I have a single skin brick lean-to that I'd like to convert into a useable room and then bring a door through into the main house. The lean-to isnt showing any signs of damp at the moment so do I need to get the walls tanked or would coats of bitumen paint do the trick? Also once the coating is on how do we go about insulating the wall before its plastered, if we batten it wouldnt we just be creating a weakness in the dampproofing?

Many thanks for any advice

S

Not sure about tanking. However:

As for plasterboard, depending on size of the room, you could create free-standing stud walls about 1" away from the existing wall which would prevent the problem of screwing into "tanked" walls and also any problems with the existing walls not being true anyway. It will also provide space for any wiring and sinking in any new electric sockets etc. Use 40mm centres with noggins as appropriate to provide additional rigidity. You could then use kingspan/cellotex between the battens.

Incorporate some airbricks into the existing brick skin to keep the 1" gap ventilated which means that tanking may not be required.

As for cutting a doorway into the main house, I believe that this may be subject to building control becoming involved as you are altering the structure of the house and they will require calculations for the size and style of lintel.

It's a starting point - now let's see what the pro's make of it