Ground Level: Cold Floor & External Walls

[JasL]

Hi

I know relatively little about all this stuff, but I'm trying to find out!!!

The house:
Located in Cambridge
Built in 2006, to 2005 regs. No air leakage tests.
3 story towm house.
Suspended bloack and beam
Dob & dab plasterboards /1 cm gap/ lightweight therma block / filled cavity / brick.
Building regs signed off by NHBC
NHBC : Insurance coverers stucture only now, as 3 years+ old.

The problem:
Does not retain heat very well. After the heating is turnned off, the heat disappears!!!
The external walls are cold to touch, particularly at ground level to about 2/3 ft.
The floor also feels very cold when walking around in bare feet - especially in the mornings.
I've recently taken the skirting board off in an area, and can fee cold air blowing in between the floor anf the plaster in the gap between them. I've also cut a hole in the plasterboard, and you can feel cold air. I belive there is air leakage into the gap behind the plaster board. No idea why the floor is also cold.

How to indentify the problem and Fix it:
This is where I'm stuck.....
I've tried to obtain the detailed construction plans, but Taylor Woodrow will not release them to me. Thx!!!!!
Suggestions on a way forward have been:
1. Employ a charted building survyor speialising in building defects to survey the house.
2. Employ a compnay that specilises in: Air leakage testing (+ /- / Smoke) and Thermal testing.
I'm sure a surveyor won't be cheap, and I know thermakl testing is quite expensive.

I've yet to decorate any of the ground floor, and I intend to chnage all of the existing wood laminate floors at some point. - so no worries there.

I've moved form a house built in 1996 (with non dob & dab) that was lovely and warm. This house feels soooooo col!!!!

Anybody got experience of this type of problem and any ideas what I can do???

HELP!!!!

Thx for looking.

Jason

 

[merlin50]

fit carpets and leave the heating on a bit longer

 

[JasL]

Thx a lot Merlin, but I actually want to deal with problem!!!!!

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Move house then, modern houses are cack and some are worse than others, I should know I live in one and I've produced many a drawing for developers and then see the reality on site! Seriously though your issues have come up several times on the Forum and people have pipe dreams about getting some kind of recompense from the developer or whoever signed off the building. They can spend allsorts on surveyors for this and experts in that and it never amounts to anything. You can find out what insulation etc you have by doing some exploitative digging about but it may be messy, this is how an 'expert' would have to approach it anyway. If you want to improve what's there and if you're serious about improving what's there then to enable us to help you need to provide a bit more info about the construction. Sorry.

 

[merlin50]

(The floor also feels very cold when walking around in bare feet - especially in the mornings.)
what else do you expect! put some slippers on

 

[TicklyT]

Merlin's point is you need to run the heating for long enough to heat the fabric of the building, not just the air contained in the rooms. Doing otherwise can lead to problems with condensation etc.

Insulation only works once the walls and floor slab etc. are up to temperature, then it stops the heat absorbed by the building fabric from leaking away.

Ventilation of the voids and cavities is necessary to keep the building healthy.

 

[merlin50]

now do you see i was being helpful

 

[JasL]

Hi

The builder will not supply the construction drawings so I have limited info. Says it is against their policy!!!

What do I know:
Floor: Suspended Block and Beam. Ventillated cavity below
Walls: Dob and Dab plaster, 1cm gap, light weight therma block, cavity (which is filled), then Brick outer.

I was hoping for advise on potential causes, and a potential approach to finding a solution.
E.g
Conduct Air leakage testing.
Do the results show signicantly worse results than a 'normal' house.
If so, try to find out where the air leakage is occuring.
More than likely to be "x" as the problem appears to be worse in the lower 2 ft of the walls, ie close to where the walls meet the floor.

From what I've read, I understand that there should not be very cold air blowing around in the small cavity between the dob & dab plasterboard and the therma bricks. Even if I were to seal EVERY single gap, the walls would still be cold. My insulation would then only be 1cm of plasterboard. My uneducated guess is that cold air is somehow getting in from the venitlated cavity below the floor - but I have no idea really, which is why I cam here. Am I in the wrong place to try to get advice?

I'm not looking to sue anybody, or find a utopian solution! I'm just trying to make the house more comfortable to live in, without spending a fortune. Advice like: Move, turn the heating on for longer (I cannot turn it on 24/7, just burning more money!), put slippers on (should I keep my coat on too) etc are not constructive. There is a real issue with my house that I just want to try to improve.

I really would appreciate any constructive advise

Thanks a lot.

Jason

 

[JasL]

Merlin

I did not understand you, when you said keep the heating on longer!!!
However, I did not make it clear, the heating can be on for hours (at high temps) , and the cold walls still don't warm up, neither does the floor.

I think this is because the cold air is constantly leaking in all over the place in the walls/floor.

I belive there is a real problem somewhere.

Jason

 

[merlin50]

the only way to solve the problem is to spend lots of money on proper advice then more vast amounts fixing it, or just buy the slippers

 

[foxhole]

New builds are built on shoe string budgets, first thing to check would be the roof insulation and even top it up regardless of whats there.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

New builds are built on shoe string budgets, first thing to check would be the roof insulation and even top it up regardless of whats there.

Well not really, with insulation you reach a point where adding any more is futile, probably about 400mm of rockwool though!

 

[brig001]

Hi Jason, a colleague had the same problem with dot and dab. He used decorators caulk, filler and expanding foam as appropriate to seal the edges of the plasterboard to the walls wherever he could get at them. He managed two sides of the house upstairs at the gable ends in the loft. He lifted a couple of floorboards upstairs along the outside walls and sealed up behind the skirting boards, down on the top edge of the downstairs plasterboards and sealed round the joist ends while he was there. He then sealed underneath all the downstairs skirting boards pushing the caulk under as far as he could to get a seal from the skirting board to the blockwork wall. None of this is really difficult depending on floor coverings etc., but altogether there is a LOT of work.

He joked at the time that it might have been easier to get the whole thing re-plastered.

If it was my house, I would remove sockets, light switches etc and seal the plasterboard to the wall there too, but I am a bit obsessive
HTH,
Brian.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

JasL, have you any idea what the house type was called?

 

[JasL]

Yes, I have. Will post it later when I get home from wk.

Thx