Fire wall

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can anyone advise me?

I’m renovating a Victorian mid terrace house. Including building up the left hand side wall in the loft void. The house next door is a recently renovated council house. It has what appears to be insulation hung off brackets and no wall. Please see photo

Is this some sort of fire proofing? Are the council obliged to build a brick or block wall here? And if they don’t will it affect my ability to mortgage my property?
 

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That is totally unacceptable with regard to fire resistance; whoever undertook Building Control on that conversion needs striking off - it's a clear fire hazard.
The dividing wall in the roof space should be at least 100mm brick or block, and well-sealed up to the underside of the roof finish. Any surveyor will flag that up.
 
Tony, whilst I don't like them, I have installed fire curtains in roof spaces of commercial premises (specifically restaurants) which are quite similar to the OP's situation and where a 60 minute between the kitchen and restaurant areas was specified. They were inspected and did get passed (this is a standard construction technique for one pub/restaurant chain I've worked for in the past who are in the habit of adding a new dining room/kitchen block onto an existing building). Was this wrong? Or is it permissable because the building is owned and maintained by a single entity?
 
@ JobAndKnock - I think the issue is that the wall is regarded as a compartment wall and should be fire resistant to 60 minutes from both sides. It may be fire-resistant from the adjoining property (assuming there might be Fireline on studwork) but not fire resistant from the OPs side to the neighbour's side.
Presumably in a kitchen/restaurant situation the fire risk is only one way? Just surmising? Must confess have had no experience with fire curtains.
There's also the question of sound-insulation.
 
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Thank you. Yes indeed, the fire risk in the instance I mentioned is predominantly from the kitchen (for obvious reasons, if you've ever seen a commercial kitchen in operation).

OP - Sorry I hijacked your thread :whistle:
 
Thanks for both your input. I was surprised to see it as I’m Installing blockwork on my side. I have a concern about it’s safety. Should I raise it with building control to confirm?
 
See a fair few properties when installing alarms with the lofts open like this ....a burglar’s paradise....
 
thanks all. im doing my reno by the book, but there seem to be bunch of these quick fixes on the council house side. sigh.
 
As JobandKnock posted, it looks very similar (if not the actual product) to the Rockwool fire barrier product. We've been involved on commercial projects where this type of system is installed with fire resistance of up to 120 minutes - providing it's installed correctly!
 
Sorry to [again] Hijack the post but?

This to me looks and smells like a cheap fix, just had a look at the "sales pitch" on the Rockwool web site, not impressed at all, at all.

What concerns me is the blow out, meaning if there is some sort of sudden increase in the fires ability to get more [say] oxygen, a window on the floor below failing, a stored camping gas cylinder, a bottle of White Spirit, Two bottles of whisky / Vodka / Rum something. anything at all that could occasion a sudden violent rise in the combustion volume then this type of "screen" will be simply overwhelmed?? or severely compromised

This "quick CHEAP fix" appears to me to have all the hallmarks of Grenfell, where the fire resistance of the windows was in effect "Downgraded" to a flammable plastic, the external insulation was flammable [still is in many , many situations] the cladding over the flammable insulation if sprayed with water exacerbated the fire.

What I believe is that we have here yet another area where commercial interests [with money and commercial interests] have bulldozed there way past recognised fire safety protocols by using carefully engineered "SAFETY TESTS" to "apparently" meet the desired criteria to call themselves and their products a "Fire Barrier"

OK Just my rant for tonight BUT???

Ken
 
Trust me, when this stuff is correctly fitted it's a lot more substantial that it looks. I've also seen the aftermath of a fire (in commercial premises) and this type of product was still in place and had performed well in a very significant fire. I have to say that the picture in the OP's post doesn't look like the sort of installation I'm used to - not to mention there appear to be open sections near the eaves.
 
thanks for your answers. Ive used blocks to build the wall up on my side and sealed any cracks i can find on the council side.

Not sure i want to put the young family next door through the pain of taking the council to task about this. but it doesnt look great
 

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