Cavity wall advice please help

[JP_]

Some builders will blatantly lie to your face to try to get away with shoddy work.
My loft conversion builder told me that BC like builders to leave gaps in the insulation to aid air flow and stop damp problems.
Another builder told me the condensation problems in the loft above extension was because of too much insulation (the kitchen extractor fan was leaking air into the loft, and no vents had been put in the loft).

 

[frutbunn]

Slightly off topic but cavity wall related. I once went out to inspect DPC levels on a single storey extension, it was nearly up to wallplate and being built by two old dry stone wallers who'd constructed it with a cavity and had even dressed the stone to maintain a cavity but then completely filled the cavity with loose rubble as you do with dry stone walls. This was in a upper dales area and they tried to convince me that every building in the next dale (different authority) was built like that!
Needless to say they had all the blockwork to take down.

 

[dontbelieveawordofit]

Slightly off topic but cavity wall related. I once went out to inspect DPC levels on a single storey extension, it was nearly up to wallplate and being built by two old dry stone wallers who'd constructed it with a cavity and had even dressed the stone to maintain a cavity but then completely filled the cavity with loose rubble as you do with dry stone walls. This was in a upper dales area and they tried to convince me that every building in the next dale (different authority) was built like that!
Needless to say they had all the blockwork to take down.

in fairness every property in the next dale probably was built like that ........ a hundred years ago

 

[JP_]

in fairness every property in the next dale probably was built like that ........ a hundred years ago

and those 2 old school builders probably built them

 

[frutbunn]

in fairness every property in the next dale probably was built like that ........ a hundred years ago

He was referring to new work and quoting the building inspector, who I just so happened to know as he lived in the same dale I worked and used to work at the same authority. I used to do quite a lot of private work in that dale in any case.

 

[dontbelieveawordofit]

He was referring to new work and quoting the building inspector, who I just so happened to know as he lived in the same dale I worked and used to work at the same authority. I used to do quite a lot of private work in that dale in any case.

we used to live in a stone house built around the 1890s those were rubble filled walls. very little damp but draughty as hell. got to take your hat off to past methods and how they got around things given the materials available.

 

[frutbunn]

we used to live in a stone house built around the 1890s those were rubble filled walls. very little damp but draughty as hell. got to take your hat off to past methods and how they got around things given the materials available.

Lived in one, my parents still do, it was the traditional method of construction, you can get an approximation when somewhere was built based on the thickness of the wall, older walls being thicker, or at least where I worked.

 

[dontbelieveawordofit]

Lived in one, my parents still do, it was the traditional method of construction, you can get an approximation when somewhere was built based on the thickness of the wall, older walls being thicker, or at least where I worked.

24” downstairs iirc. ceiling joists sat on a wallplate internally ,then walls narrowing to 18” upstairs all tapering inward slightly yet plumb inside. genius.

 

[frutbunn]

24” downstairs iirc. ceiling joists sat on a wallplate internally ,then walls narrowing to 18” upstairs all tapering inward slightly yet plumb inside. genius.

24" would be about 150 to 250 year old but never seen it tapering down.

 

[dontbelieveawordofit]

24" would be about 150 to 250 year old but never seen it tapering down.

unless it was my dodgy eye.