Quick and dirty attic bedroom insulation!

[johnpound]

Hi all
As the title suggests I am wondering how to semi insulate an attic room that has zero insulation so that I can take the edge off the cold. I don;t sleep in there bu have my office in there and it is very cold even with the rad on full. I have little money and do not want to pull off the plasterboard. What I can do is access the vertical eaves plasterboards from inside the eaves so I wondered about using cheap polystyrene panels and hot gluing them onto the walls so that at least the sides have some insulation. I thought about injecting polystyrene balls into the ceiling voids but am concerned about condensation long terms.

Any ideas?

 

[Doggit]

Sorry John, but there are no quick and dirty solutions to this one. You'd be better of ripping the plasterboard off, putting up some insulation, and then not plastering till you've got more funds. If you put expanded polystyrene in behind the dwarf walls, it won't achieve anything, and the polystyrene balls would stop an airflow up an over the roof, and cause other issues.

 

[catlad]

You could buy insulated plasterboard and just screw it over the existing plaster board and re-skim.

 

[Doggit]

Except he's going for the cheap and dirty option (no offense meant John) so as per our other thread conversation, it would be cheaper to fit the insulation board, and then use adhesive foam to fix the plasterboard.

John, can you post some pictures of the room please.

 

[johnpound]

Hi Doggit and Catlad
Yes, sticking insulated board over the top is a good idea, thanks. But it is a bit procey and I do have access to quite a lot of a friends excess kingspan insulation that his builders used. One slight issue is that the room height is only just over 6 foot (i've put 2 m on my sketch as an estimate). so bringing the whole room inwards may not be ideal. Attached (hopefully) is a sketch showing my plan to put insulation where I can easily reach in, ie on the vertical eaves walls, and a little on the sloping eaves, but the upper eaves I can't reach so I wondered if pouring in poly balls would be an idea?

 

[oldbutnotdead]

Putting insulation up the dwarf walls will help a bit but not a lot. Stuffing the ceiling void with poly balls will deprive the roof timbers of ventilation and cause expensive problems down the line. Bite the bullet- clear the room, drop the plasterboard and insulate it properly. Not a big room so won't cost a fortune especially if you have access to free/cheap insulation, if cash is tight you can do it in stages (insulate and seal 1st month, plasterboard 2nd month, woodwork 3rd month). You can even save on plastering costs by using tapered edge plasterboard.

 

[RayCaister]

 

[Doggit]

I really can't add much more to Olds comments, except to say that you can do it on the cheap and slow, but you can't do it wrong. You must do the job properly, even if it takes time. You need to post a photo of the space behind the dwarf walls, and tell us if you have felt under the tiles. If you do, this needs a 2" air gap up and over the room, or as Old says, you'll get issues later that require the roof to be strippe and replaced - and you don't want that whatsoever. Once we know what's behind the plasterboard, or behind the dwarf wall, we can guide you, but if you're going to carry on with your ideas, then it can only turn out for the worst.